Question on scientific method, evolution, creationism. *Scientists answer only please*?

Question

Sometimes science is straightforward - you can just measure data to support your case eg toss a coin and count it and you can show head/tails is roughly 50/50.

Sometimes it is about having a theory that explains the data and slowly building on this case so that the scientific community accepts it as the most likely explanation. If your case it strong enough it almost becomes accepted as 'fact'.

An example is evolution - the fossil record, mutations in genes and observation of microbial evolution all support it as the most likely explanation.

However Creationists would say that God fits the same purpose, a single unifying theory that explains all the observations.

Philosophically how can you differentiate between these two?

Answer 1

There is a huge, *glaring* difference between the two:

"God" is not a unifying "theory", because invoking God (or "the Designer") does not actually *explain* anything.

An *explanation* is a description of something complex in terms of something simpler. Simply saying "God did it" does precisely the opposite. It describes complex things in terms of something *infinitely* more complex. Faced with questions about the origins of some phenomenon X, it replaces X with something that has no origin, and then claims to have provided an answer. In fact, it raises *additional* questions because by invoking an "intelligence" you add to the questions of origins the questions of mechanism (HOW did God do it?), and of *motive* (*WHY* did God do it?) Answers like "God works in mysterious ways", or "God did so for His own greater glory" are equally NON-answers. We're far worse off than where we started.

The insistence by scientists that a scientific "theory" be testable, (falsifiable) is rooted in this issue of what constitutes a good explanation. If a "theory" explains *everything*, then it explains nothing. If the theory is so vague that it is claimed to explain all possible outcomes, then it gives us no way to verify its truth other than blind faith. It leaves us worse off ... far more mystified ... than when we started.

-------------- {end of my answer} -------------------

To respond to a couple of other answers.

When someone says that evolution is also a "belief system" ... I actually have no objections as long as you include ALL OF SCIENCE, rather than just try to single out evolution. Science is the "belief system" that has one core belief: the value of the scientific method. Evolution springs from the scientific method just as surely as the plate tectonics theory of geology, or acretion disk theory of star formation, or the atomic theory of matter, or the theory of relativity, or quantum theory, or the big bang theory, or the germ theory of disease, or the heliocentric theory of the solar system. Attempts to try to carve out evolution while leaving science intact have all been disastrous.

With respect to whether ID should be examined in schools ... I think the answer is yes, at the *university graduate school* level, but rarely in an undergrad Biology level, and certainly NOT in high schools or elementary school. ID poses some very good questions of evolution. Questions about the origins of complexity, order, intelligence, and the like. But a series of questions is not an explanation ... and therefore is not a theory. And these questions, while good to ask ... actually DO have answers already ... in fields such as complexity theory, emergence, chaos theory, information theory, systems theory, chaotics, and even advanced molecular biology, genetics, and thermodynamics ... all topics that few high schoolers ... in fact few high school *teachers* ... have a solid foundation in, much less a 6th-grade teacher and her class. The way to build a new theory and gain support for it among scientists is to *do science*. Finding yourself unable to convince the PhD community, and therefore taking your case to 10th-graders or 6th-graders is NOT doing science ... it is the cynical attempt to throw questions at children that they're not prepared to examine, in the hopes that they leave thinking that evolution is confusing ... or at best controversial or in doubt among scientists ... which it most certainly is NOT. Teaching with the aim of *confusion* is despicable.

Answer 2

Science must find a way to incorporate all the available data, not adding or removing things to make a theory work. Scientific theories are really disposable constructs. Impermanent and changeable when contradicted by new data. The theory of gravity is a good example. It's just a theory, but the apple still falls down, and not up, every time.

Creationists work from a belief, not a theory. Belief does not reacquire data, and it can't change. They will find ways to ignore inconvenient data when it can't be incorporated, by discrediting it usually.

But ALL the evidence must fit. Not just evidence from rock strata or DNA. It's entirety must hold up to scrutiny. Astronomy, chemistry, sub atomic physics, geology, biology. For a creationist to be right, most of our knowledge about these, and other areas of science have to be wrong.

Answer 3

Good question.

The thing is, God is the simple answer and I think that his definitions are changing quite dramatically in the face of new evidence. Evolution is being fine-tuned but Christianity is contradicting itself and jumping all over the place.

For example, not so long ago, Gallileo was imprisoned by the church for suggesting that the earth rotates the sun. Do Christians still believe this? If the Bible is the word of God, how can they change their mind? Or has God spoken to us since then and told us something new?

Its very easy to make up a being that knows everything and explains all, but Christianity, and most religions, fall down at the first hurdles of logic. That is why now it is all abuot 'faith'. That means I'm not interested in what is logical, and the facts, I'll believe somethiung irrational and justify it with faith.

Answer 4

What does the Theory of Evolution state, basically? Evolution involves change in species over time. I know you may think that many believers think evolution is how an organism came to be but that is not the case. What do the Laws of Thermodynamics address? Thermodynamics address heat, which cannot be created nor destroyed theory, conversion of heat, energy sources. What is entropy? Entropy is the order to disorder theory in a closed system. What is carbon dating, and what is it used for? Carbon dating is detecting how old an object is by using radioactive ions. I have taken plenty of science courses to understand science and how it works and can I just say that science can only prove things bound by this Earth, by the natural laws. It cannot prove anything that goes outside the definition of science itself.

Answer 5

10 pts to secretsauce

A big difference is that science is always willing to investigate. If the evidence shows that the earth is not the center of the universe, the geocentric model is thrown out, and data is used to create a new model. Only if the data continues to support, is the model upheld.

the ID crowd simply relies on denial. quick example: A fair question to ask would be why would a designer reboot? if the design is perfect, what need for the permian extinction? The ID crowd often simply denies the facts (they say that the earth isnt even that old)

good luck to you!

Answer 6

Your basic idea that evolution and creation are similar is flawed. They most certainly are NOT. Creation is not a theory. Evolution is. Therefore NOT comparable. Therefore no differentiation. You are back to comparing science to religion. A comparison most of us don't make. A comparison religious people should not make, but continue to do so.

Nothing explains all observations. Most certainly not one that is nonfactual and based on belief.

I note that none of these people answering your question state they are scientists. You really cant expect a question you post in Answers to the answered by a specific group.

Answer 7

A Creationist can never be convinced that their theory is wrong by logic. The statement, "God did it" explains all and forever.

A scientist will throw out a theory (such as evolution, or that the sun is the center of the universe) if new evidence comes to light that indicates it is not a sufficient explanation.

Hope this helps.
Catherine

Answer 8

most creationists deny the facts. the most common misconception about evolution by creationists is that we evolved from monkeys. this is not true Darwin's theories state that apes and humans share a common ancestor. As a religious man and an evolutionist i believe god created the universe with the knowledge of how it would develop. when you get to the core of such things however you really have to base it off of personal belief. Just don't tell my colleagues.

Answer 9

I teach middle school science and occasionally someone will say,"Well my (dad, mom, chaplin, whatever) says that God created everything and that's that!" My general response is that God represents a finality in questions and answers. To resort to this line of reasoning is no reasoning because answers based on religion do not require and many cases frown on scientific answers. If you want to ask scientific questions, then you have to exempt God from the baseline question. Now, with that being said, I am not an atheist. I do believe in the existence of God and believe that God had an integral role in the creation of the universe. I believe that God willed creation to be so and the universe in response to God's will came into being following all the rules that it does.

Answer 10

The major issue, at least in recent media (and posts here) is about the teaching of Intelligent Design (which may, or may not be Creationism with another name) in Science Classes.

Most Scientists would not have a problem with teaching ID in social studies, or philosophy, or religious classes, or similar.
The major problem comes with the assertion that ID is a *scientific hypothesis* as it currently stands.

An important aspect of "science" is *falsifiability*, which is to say that your hypothesis has to be able to be disproven by experiment. Without this quality, you can never determine whether your idea is correct, because you will never be able to design an experiment that says "If ID is false, then situation X could/must occur. Can we find any examples of situation X?"
Experiments of this sort are the ones that actually lend strength to an hypothesis.

Certainly - ID is an *idea* that explains much of what science observes - but it in itself is *not* science. And that's the problem.


That said - *parts* of the arguments that ID proponents use (whether Young Earth Creationists, or simply anti-evolutionists) *are* valid science. And these things *can* be taught in science classes as possible weaknesses of the Theory of Evolution. For example, the (currently) poor evidence for "macroevolution" (which has possibly been observed, but only infrequently) as opposed to "microevolution" (such as antibiotic resistance in bacteria).
After all - even from the point of view of pro-evolution science - if future scientists are not educated about the weaknesses of current theory, they will never be able to refine or redifine the paradigms themselves.
_______________________________________________

To respond to Jim - Yes, I am a Scientist.

And to agree with others' posts - I'd give 10pts to Secretsauce for the best answer.
And I agree with him that it is not feasible to properly teach science's answers to many of ID's objections. However - as ID va evolutions is obviously an issue, it might be important to let people know that there *are* answers, it is just that they involve what you might call "deep science", and to attempt to simplify some of them for a "non-scientific" audience.
Not an easy task, however :-(