The Sunset of Darwinism

tfp ^ | 06.04.08 | Julio Loredo

[Coleus]

Praised until recently as dogma, Darwin’s theory of evolution is now fading away, discredited by the same science that bore its poisoned fruit. Instead, the Christian vision of a supernatural design is being increasingly affirmed. “Evolution is now a datum proven beyond any reasonable doubt and no longer a theory, it’s not even worth taking the trouble to discuss it.” This is what a spokesman proclaimed at the Festival of Science held in Genoa in November 2005, thereby neglecting a very important aspect of modern science—the need to be open to new perspectives. Instead, the truth is quite the opposite. Paradoxically, evolutionists are taking an ever greater distance from empirical science and are wrapping themselves up in a dogmatism that borders on ideological fanaticism.

Unprovable Hypothesis
“What is left, then, in evolutionism, that is valid according to the scientific method? Nothing, actually nothing!” This is the conclusion of journalist Marco Respinti in his recent book Processo a Darwin (Darwin on Trial, Piemme, 2007). He continues: "Not one of his postulates can be verified or certified based on the method proper to the physical sciences. His whole claim escapes verification. Based on what, therefore, other than on strong prejudices of an ideological nature, can anyone affirm or continue to affirm that the evolutionist hypothesis is true?"  Indeed, the consistency of a scientific theory is founded on its capacity to be verified empirically, be it through observation of the phenomenon in nature or by reproducing it in the laboratory. The evolutionist hypothesis fails on both counts. “Thus,” Respinti shows, “Darwinism remains simply an hypothesis devoid of empirical or demonstrable foundation, besides being unproven. . . . The evolutionist hypothesis is completely unfounded for it does not master the very domain in which it launches its challenge.”

Respinti reaches this “verdict” after a rigorous “trial of Darwin” in which he analyzes the main arguments that debunk the notorious theory, ranging from nonexistent fossil records to the conflict of Darwinism with genetic science and the flimsiness of the “synthetic theory” of neo-Darwinism, without forgetting the countless frauds that have stained notable evolutionists in their insane quest to fabricate the “proofs” that science tenaciously denied them.  Respinti concludes by denouncing the ideological drift of the evolutionist school: “To categorically affirm the absolute validity of the theories of Darwinian and neo-Darwinian evolution based on the claim that discussing them would be unscientific by definition, is the worst proof that human reason can give of itself.”

A Long Sunset
The sunset of the Darwinist hypothesis has picked up speed over the last two decades. For example, consider the work carried out by the Osaka Group for the Study of Dynamic Structures, founded in 1987, in the wake of an international interdisciplinary meeting convened “to present and discuss some opinions opposed to the dominant neo-Darwinist paradigm.” Scientists from all over the world participated, including the outstanding geneticist Giuseppe Sermonti, then a professor at the University of Perugia, Italy. In 1980, together with Roberto Fondi, now a professor at the University of Siena, Sermonti wrote Dopo Darwin—Critica all’evoluzionismo (After Darwin—A Critique of Evolutionism, Rusconi, 1980). “Biology,” Sermonti explains, “has no proof at all of the spontaneous origin of life, or rather biology has proved its impossibility. There is no such thing as a gradation of life from elementary to complex. From a bacterium to a butterfly to man the biochemical complexity is substantially the same.”   For his part, Fondi shows that from the first appearance of fossils to this day, the variety and riches of living beings have not increased. New groups have replaced older ones, but the intermediate forms that the evolutionists have so frantically searched for do not exist. “The theory of evolution,” Sermonti and Fondi conclude, “has been contradicted as have few other scientific theories in the past.”

In Le forme della vita (The Forms of Life, Armando, 1981), Sermonti unveils other obstacles to Darwinism. According to the renowned geneticist, the “random” origin of life and the gradual transformation of the species through “selective change” are no longer sustainable because the most elementary life is incredibly complex and because it is now proven that replacement of living groups takes place “by leaps” rather than “by degrees.”  Putting together forty years of experience, in 1999 he wrote Dimenticare Darwin—Ombre sull’evoluzione (Forgetting Darwin—Shadows on Evolution, Rusconi, 1999). With rigorous argumentation, the author demolishes the three pillars of Darwinism: natural selection, sexual mixing and genetic “change.” According to him, history will remember the theory of evolution as the “Big Joke.”

Not Just Creationists
Sermonti has been often accused of being a “creationist” or a “religious fundamentalist” even though he has always said he does not fit his scientific vision into a Christian perspective, and this yet one more aspect to note in the polemic against Darwinism, which many people other than Christians also contest it.  In this sense, it is interesting to note the recent editorial in Il Cerchio, “Seppellire Darwin? Dalla critica del darwinismo agli albori d’una scienza nuova,” ("Bury Darwin? From a Critique of Darwinism to the Dawn of a New Science") containing essays by seven specialists including Sermonti, Fondi and Giovanni Monastra, director of Italy’s National Institute for Food and Nutrition Research. The title refers to the famous phrase by Chandra Wickramasinghe, a professor of applied mathematics of the University College of Cardiff, “The probability that life was formed from inanimate matter is equal to 1 followed by 40,000 zeros . . . . It is large enough to bury Darwin and the whole theory of evolution.”

From Dimenticare Darwin—Ombre sull’evoluzione’s introduction: For the first time in Italy, a critique of Darwinism is presented in all its complexity thanks to the interdisciplinary contribution of scholars of several orientations—[b]eyond the polemic between neo-Darwinian fundamentalists and religious integralists, the essay demonstrates how the critique of the now old neo-Darwinist paradigm opens the doors to a new science.

A Crisis of the Positivist Paradigm
Francis Crick, who together with Watson discovered the structure of DNA, openly declared, “An honest man, armed only with the knowledge available to us, could affirm only that, in a certain sense, the origin of life at the moment appears to be rather a miracle,” In the same wavelength, Harold Hurey, a disciple of Stanley Miller who made history with his failed attempt to recreate life in the laboratory from a so-called primordial broth, said, “All of us who studied the origins of life uphold that the more we get into it, the more we feel it is too complex to have evolved in any way.” Indeed, a lot of faith is required to believe in evolutionism, and it is precisely that faith, of a clearly positivist^[1] mold, that is now beginning to weaken.

In Darwinismo: le ragioni di una crisi (Darwinism: The Reasons of a Crisis), Gianluca Marletta sticks his finger in the wound by observing that “The crisis of Darwinism is above all a crisis of the philosophical paradigms that allowed its success.”  “One cannot understand the origin of this doctrine,” Marletta explains, “without going back to the cultural climate of ‘triumphant positivism’ straddling the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” According to Marletta, Darwinism constituted a wonderful occasion to strengthen the positivistic view of the world being affirmed at that time. Darwinism represented the perfect tool to transplant, into the biological field, the mechanic and materialist paradigms already imposed on the social sciences. This is the true motive of this theory’s success. A motive that now begins to subside with the crisis of the positivist paradigm. This explains the almost fanatical tenacity with which evolutionists are defending their convictions. “Many fear,” concludes Marletta, “that the fall of Darwinism can bring down with it the whole positivist vision of the world.”

God’s Comeback
The crumbling of positivism is bringing back to the limelight issues that a certain conventional wisdom thought to have definitively eliminated. Shaken from the sudden crumbling of old certainties, worried about the chaos that increasingly marks this postmodern age, many people are once again asking the fundamental questions: Does my life have a transcendental meaning? Is there an intelligent project in nature? In short, does God exist?   Sociologist Rosa Alberoni wrote about this in her book, Il Dio di Michelangelo e la barba di Darwin (The God of Michelangelo and Darwin’s Beard), published last November by Rizzoli with a preface by Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Pontifical Council Justice and Peace. The onslaught of “Darwin’s worshippers,” Alberoni explains, is carried out by the “usual destructive atheists obsessed with the goal of stamping out Christ and destroying the Judeo-Christian civilization after having sucked its blood and essence.” This sullen assault, however, in the deeply changed ambience of post-modernity, risks being counterproductive: The monkey myth is what really shook ordinary people. Like soldiers woken up by an alarm in the middle of the night, Christian believers and [O]rthodox Jews prepared for the defense. Or rather for the war, because that is what it has become . . . [o]n the symbolic level, the bone of contention is the ancestor of man: God or a monkey? Should one believe in God or in Darwin? This is the substantial nature of the ongoing clash in our civilization.

In other words, a real war of religion looms in the dawn of the Third Millennium. Precisely that which secularists have tried to avoid at all cost.

Footnote:

1. Positivism is the philosophical system created by August Comte (1798–1857), which only accepts the truths that we can reach by direct observation or by experimentation. Thus it denies classical philosophy, theology and all supernatural religion.

[LeGrande]

Well then, let's take the simplest solution. Merely observe how the Sun moves against the stars and that's the end of it.

What does that tell you?

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

I am pretty sure that I used the term aberration of light not stellar aberration. I might have used the term in replying to you and Ethan because both of you started using the term.

Where was I using this term?

[LeGrande]

A single academically challenged slug has more intelligence than the sum of the intelligence of the entire congress.

To compare the two is really an insult to the slug.

We are in agreement once again : ) And yet somehow those congress critters are smart enough to keep taking our money and getting re-elected.

[LeGrande]

Where was I using this term? Just MrJesse then, I am too bored to go back and look it up.

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

LOL The 2.1 degrees is is exactly related to the light-time correction and the distance of the earth from the the sun. If the Sun was closer the angle would be smaller, and if the sun was further away the angle would be larger.

And if the Sun was 10 light-years away?

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

You have given some fine lectures on "falsifiability", like this one in post 342:

You are simply ignorant about the scientific method. Simply provide a falsifiable hypothesis to test. In other words show how Creationism can be falsified and then it will count as a credible theory, for which evidence can be shown for and against. A theory that can't be falsified, like string theory, is worthless, at best a pleasant diversion.

But as we shall see, your notion of falsification is a special one: it only applies to the other guy you may be talking to.

The Sun is only 2.1 degrees behind strictly in relationship to an observer on the earth, in a two body model.

How would you falsify this hypothesis?

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

[Fichori to LeGrande] You’ve been trying to tell us about how the apparent position of the sun is not its actual position. If you could give us a link to some peer-reviewed scientific journal that is available online that describes this phenomenon there is a chance that we would understand it better.

If it were true that the actual position of the moon is 2.1 degrees away from the apparent position of the Sun during a solar eclipse, you would think that someone would have mentioned it somewhere.

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

Is it possible for a stars actual position to be 180 degrees from its apparent position?

In the LeGrandeic System of Astrophysics, it is indeed possible, and no black holes are necessary. post 498:

[mrjesse] If the earth were turning at the rate of 180 degrees per 8.5 minutes, how far lagged would the sun's optical image be from its real position?

[LeGrande] 180 degrees off.

[Fichori]

From the article titled "Lead-Lag Frequency Response"
(Mentioned in 577 in response to 574)

In view of this, we expect that a two-body system such as the Sun and the Earth, which produces almost no gravitational radiation (according to general relativity) should have numerator dynamic effects in the gravitational field that give nearly perfect phase-lag cancellation, and therefore the Earth's gravitational acceleration should always point directly toward the Sun's position at the present instant, rather than (say) the Sun's position eight minutes ago. Of course, if something outside this two-body system (such as a passing star) were to upset the Sun's pattern of motion, the effect of such a disturbance would propagate at the speed of light. The important point to realize is that the fact that the Earth's gravitational acceleration always points directly at the Sun's present position does not imply that the "force of gravity" is transmitted instantaneously. It merely implies that there are velocity and acceleration terms in the transfer function (i.e., numerator dynamics) that effectively cancel out the phase lag in a simple periodic pattern of motion.[excerpt]

How this relates to the addlepated observer hypothesis, I haven't a clue.

[mrjesse]

I am pretty sure that I used the term aberration of light not stellar aberration. I might have used the term in replying to you and Ethan because both of you started using the term.

You were the first to use "Aberration" in this thread, in 506, and it is true that you didn't specify what type of aberration and since it seemed that Stellar Aberration was the most common meaning of "aberration", so I assumed you meant Stellar Aberration.

Then in 508 you gave the snow example.

Then, in 509 I replied "There are several types of aberration of light - but I'm assuming you're talking about stellar aberration of light since you did not mention - let me know if you were talking about another and we'll address that one."

Then again in 528 you gave the "Falling snow" example - which is unquestionably an illustration for Stellar Aberration and only Stellar Aberration!

So there's no way out - you had Stellar Aberration in mind. You used the word Aberration (which is different then "light time correction") and you gave two examples of stellar aberration (i.e. snow or rain falling). Now you may change your mind - but the fact that you gave the falling snow experiment (Twice!) is evidence that you had indeed in your mind Stellar Aberration - which is unrelated to distance to the sun and nowhere near 2.1 degrees.

The other thing is that stellar aberration illustrates that the apparent position is not identical to the actual position and I have been trying to use every example I can think of. Trying to get this very simple concept (apparent vs actual position ) across is like pulling teeth.

Stellar Aberration only accounts for about 20 arc seconds of apparent angular displacement. I have no doubt whatsoever that the sun is apparently 20 arcseconds displaced due to the transverse velocity (sideways) of the earth as it orbits the sun. But 20 arcseconds is 0.000277777 degrees. You're talking about 2.1 degrees, which is seven thousand five hundred times bigger! Don't forget that you're the one who's arguing that the sun's apparent position is lagged by 8.2 minutes and 2.1 degrees behind its actual position!

So which phenomenon is it that you are claiming causes 2.1 degrees and 8.2 minutes lag in the optically measured angle of the sun as compared to its actual position? Stellar Aberration? Light-time correction? Please choose one (or another if that's what you're claiming.) So far you're being very vague and not committing to either/anything, and then switching to whichever one you like when one gets debunked as the cause. I appreciate that you're in sort of a bind here, but it would help if you figured out what it is you're trying to say and say it!



Thanks,

-Jesse

[mrjesse]

You have given some fine lectures on "falsifiability", like this one in post 342:

You are simply ignorant about the scientific method. Simply provide a falsifiable hypothesis to test. In other words show how Creationism can be falsified and then it will count as a credible theory, for which evidence can be shown for and against. A theory that can't be falsified, like string theory, is worthless, at best a pleasant diversion.

But as we shall see, your notion of falsification is a special one: it only applies to the other guy you may be talking to.

The Sun is only 2.1 degrees behind strictly in relationship to an observer on the earth, in a two body model.

How would you falsify this hypothesis?

Great point! I wanna know that too!

Thanks,

-Jesse

[mrjesse]

Ahh but the earth is spinning and the spin changes the angle of the apparent position.

I'm not seeing the scientific reason that it should change by the 2.1 degrees you're taking about. 20 arcseconds to be sure, due to Stellar Aberration, but not 2.1 degrees for any reason whatsoever. By the way, regarding Stellar Aberration, the speed through space at which the earth moves as it orbits the sun is about 60 times greater then the surface speed of the earth due to its rotation.

Primarily the time light correction and spin. The Stellar Aberration only plays a small part at these distances and has factored out the earths spin.

See this note here on WP for a clue:

^ Annual aberration is the ratio of Earth's orbital velocity (around 30 km/s) to the speed of light (about 300,000 km/s), which shifts the Sun's apparent position relative to the celestial sphere toward the west by about 1/10,000 radian. Light-time correction for the Moon is the distance it moves during the time it takes its light to reach Earth divided by the Earth-Moon distance, yielding an angle in radians by which its apparent position lags behind its computed geometric position. Light-time correction for the Sun is negligible because it is almost motionless during 8.3 minutes relative to the barycenter (center-of-mass) of the solar system.

Notice that the moon does have light-time correction and apparent angular displacement -- because it does orbit the earth. The sun, on the other hand, does not orbit the earth, and as a matter of fact doesn't move all that much in 8.3 minutes, (no where near 2.1 degrees!)

I'm telling you, it does make a difference whether the earth is rotating at 1 turn per 24 hours or the sun orbiting the earth at 24 hours per orbit.

The light in the Ring Laser Gyro knows whether the earth is spinning and the light coming from the sun knows whether the sun is orbiting!

Thanks,

-Jesse

[LeGrande]

I'm telling you, it does make a difference whether the earth is rotating at 1 turn per 24 hours or the sun orbiting the earth at 24 hours per orbit.

Ok lets go back to our transit at dawn experiment. Only this time the earth is fixed and the sun is orbiting the earth. Now as the first light of the sun is seen at the horizon, point the transit at it. Then 8.3 minutes later measure the difference between the apparent edged of the sun and the horizon. You will see a difference of apx 2.1 degrees on the transit. I am assuming that with the sun orbiting the earth you will agree that its apparent position differs from its actual position by 2.1 degrees, right?

Now lets repeat the experiment with the Suns position fixed and the Earth spinning in place. Now as the first light of the sun is seen at the horizon, point the transit at it. Then 8.3 minutes later measure the difference between the apparent edged of the sun and the horizon. You will see a difference of apx 2.1 degrees on the transit. This is the identical experiment and the identical result except that instead of the sun orbiting the earth the earth is spinning. As far as our observations go the results are identical.

There is no difference between the Earth spinning in place or the sun orbiting the earth, the suns apparent position vs actual position is the same.

[LeGrande]

The Sun is only 2.1 degrees behind strictly in relationship to an observer on the earth, in a two body model.

How would you falsify this hypothesis?

It is easy, show how the earth is not one AU away from the sun or that the earths rotational speed is different. Or demonstrate that the speed of light is instantaneous or simply a different speed, etc. etc. In short, measure it : )

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

It is easy, show... that the earths rotational speed is different.

By using a Foucault pendulum or ring laser gyroscope?

[LeGrande]

Let me give you a little tutorial in observation and stellar aberration.

The first thing that is factored out in making observations is the rotation of the earth. Observatories are specially built so that their rotation cancels out the earths rotation. You can even buy relatively cheap automated telescopes that do the same thing. The fact that the earth is spinning is of no interest to anyone, it is a bother. It is important to understand the concept but we have bigger fish to fry : )

Now there is another problem, the astronomers would like to know the distance to the objects that they are observing. You measure distance by the difference in the angle that each eye sees an object. If you only had one eye, your depth perception would be terrible.

Astronomers start with two problems, one they typically only have one eye (telescope) and the light from these distant objects is parallel. So even if they had two telescopes it would make no difference. Even if they make an observation in June and another in December the light rays are still parallel and they can’t triangulate the position. They even have this problem observing items in our solar system. Put two observers a thousand miles apart and have them observe the sun at the same instant, their lines to the sun will be parallel.

So now we come to stellar aberration we know that the earth is traveling through space (our solar system is traveling through space) the fact that our solar system is traveling through space distorts the apparent position of the stars in much the same way that that our angular velocity does, except to a much lessor degree. And they would like to eliminate the stellar aberration too. So, some observatory’s automatically compensate for it too.

Essentially the two concepts boil down to the difference between angular velocity and straight velocity, but the effects are identical. That is why I am more than willing to switch back and forth.

[LeGrande]

By using a Foucault pendulum or ring laser gyroscope?

Yes they can show that the earth is spinning. But if the earth is fixed and the sun is orbiting the earth in our thought experiment, how are they applicable?

The point I am trying to make is that the suns apparent position differs from its actual position whether the sun is rotating around the earth or the earth is spinning.

I am beginning to understand the gulf between creationists and scientists. I would never have guessed that such a simple concept would be so hard to explain.

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

Yes they can show that the earth is spinning.

Ah, good, Foucault pendulums and ring laser gyroscopes are allowed. Therefore, your next assertion in post 533 is dead and buried:

In the two body model there is essentially no difference between two stationary objects with one of the them spinning or having one of them orbit the other object.

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

But if the earth is fixed and the sun is orbiting the earth

Fixed by what? I thought you said there were no third bodies. And what is it that propels the Sun around the Earth in a circular orbit at 11,000 km/s? There must be some kind of supposition behind that. Is it magic?

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

Now lets repeat the experiment with the Suns position fixed and the Earth spinning in place. Now as the first light of the sun is seen at the horizon, point the transit at it. Then 8.3 minutes later measure the difference between the apparent edged of the sun and the horizon. You will see a difference of apx 2.1 degrees on the transit.

Do the same thing with Saturn and wait 83 minutes. Or with Sirius and wait 8.6 years.