Readers will remember Suzan Mazur, author of Altenberg 16 and The Origin of Life Circus.
Her latest is The Paradigm Shifters: Overthrowing “the Hegemony of the Culture of Darwin”:
Major scientists from a dozen countries present evidence that a paradigm shift is underway or has already taken place, replacing neo-Darwinism (the standard model of evolution based on natural selection following the accumulation of random genetic mutations) with a vastly richer evolutionary synthesis than previously thought possible.
The subtitle is owed to the late Carl Woese. See Carl Woese, discoverer of a whole domain of life, regretted not overthrowing Darwin regretted not overthrowing Darwin
When you see who is listed on the cover, you will definitely want this book.
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Science, like living things, changes over time. Who’da thunk it? The “paradigm” is still not shifting towards Christian or any other kind of creationism, though.
Science is a living thing. Like the Bible is a living book.
“Evolution is true!” Um, no.
“Jesus is True!” Amen brothers & sisters:)
That’s exactly what this argument is about, for many.
I don’t know anything about this book, but I’ll take a stab at what the new non-Darwinian paradigm is going to be:
First, since design can no longer be denied, even by the so-called scientific community (a shiftless claque of jobbers and mouchers if there ever was one), and since an intelligent designer can, under no circumstances, ever be admitted (because that would be a violation of the Prime Directive, of course), the new thesis necessarily follows in which the nature of matter itself must be found to be intrinsically capable of directing itself toward functional ends. I know that thesis sounds even dumber than Darwinism, and, in fact, it is. But the important thing is that it’s new (sort of). And if it’s new, that means it hasn’t been refuted a half million times and disproven six ways to Sunday yet — which is more than can be said about Darwinism.
“That’s exactly what this argument is about, for many.”
Not really, DS. It’s just me calling BS on Seversky. Unless you are also part of the “Evolution is True” gang – then I call BS on you too:)
Seversky, contrary to what you desperately want to believe, Theism, and Christianity in particular, are both doing quite well in regards to modern science.
First off, Christianity gave birth to modern science.
Secondly, since it is impossible to ‘do science’ without Theistic presuppositions,,
Secondly, since it is impossible to ‘do science’ without Theistic presuppositions, Darwinism, since it has no real time empirical evidence nor even a rigid mathematical basis to establish itself as a proper science, Darwinism only gained pseudo-legitimacy in science by invoking sophomoric Theological argumentation against the reigning paradigm of creation.
To this day Darwinism, since it has no real time empirical evidence nor even a rigid mathematical basis to establish itself as a proper science, is reliant on sophomoric Theological argumentation in order to make itself seem like a legitamate science, instead of the pseudo-science that it really is:
Moreover to repeat, contrary to what you desperately want to believe Seversky, Theism, and Christianity in particular, are both doing quite well in regards to modern science.
As you can see when we remove the artificial imposition of the materialistic philosophy (methodological naturalism), from the scientific method, and look carefully at the predictions of both the materialistic philosophy and the Theistic philosophy, side by side, we find the scientific method is very good at pointing us in the direction of Theism as the true explanation. – In fact it is even very good at pointing us to Christianity:
Verse and Music:
daveS:
Especially for the Darwinists among us. It’s become an obsession. It’s never about the science with those guys. It’s always about how much they hate Christianity.
Yes I think a paradigm shift is coming but not happened yet. A shift to be a shift must of happened.
The point is accurate that old yime evolution is under attack as few ideas in science ever are. this because evolution was never based on biological scientific evidence but cousins in other subjects. so it was desired, believed in with these cousins, but fails as people get smarter in the small circles that really apply thier minds to these things.
Its yEC that has been the army, iD the officers and any others other groups troops.
bornagain77 @ 7
No, Christianity did not “give birth” to modern science. The Chinese, Indians, Egyptians and Greeks all did what was, for their day, good science. You could say that Europe took it in and fostered it until it was strong enough to stand on its own but it certainly didn’t give birth to it.
On the contrary, it’s practically a requirement to set aside theistic presuppositions if you’re going to do good science. Do you think we would have an understanding of – treatments for – epilepsy if we had just sat back, said they were obviously cases of demonic possession and called in an exorcist? Would we have had treatments for diabetes and all manner of other ailments if we had just meekly accepted it was all God’s will?
Darwin constructed a well-ordered theory and painstakingly gathered evidence to support it. By any reasonable measure he was the archetypal scientist. The references to God and religion in his text were there in anticipation of the arguments and criticism that would come from the faithful. His theory no more depended on religious beliefs than did James Clerk Maxwell’s equations depend on his religious beliefs.
As for that tired C&P about “naturalism/materialism”, I might as well return the favor:
Both contenders for the crown in cosmology – Big Bang and Steady State – were naturalistic/materialistic (nat/mat) theories
The current age of the universe is estimated to be around 13.82 bn years, somewhat older than the 6000 years predicted by one theistic faith.
Theism covers a number of faiths. Not all of them hold that God is sustaining the entire universe from second-to-second.
Non-locality in quantum mechanics (a nat/mat theory) does not necessarily imply that the universe is dependent on something outside itself for continued existence.
Consciousness is not observed to exist apart from a physical substrate. A living brain exhibits consciousness, a dead brain does not. The signs of consciousness that were once exhibited by a dead brain have so far proven to be unrecoverable in all cases.
The “observer effect” in quantum physics is produced by measuring instruments as much as by any human observer. It doesn’t support the claim that consciousness is what holds reality together.
Both Newtonian mechanics and relativity are nat/mat theories.
None of the theistic faiths that I’m aware of make specific predictions about the rate at which time passes.
Psalm 90:4 – “For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.” refers to God’s perception of time.
2 Timothy 1:9 – “Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began,” concerns salvation.
Neither make any prediction concerning the speed of light.
Observations and calculations have shown that, if certain fundamental physical (nat/mat) constants varied from their observed values by even a small amount, the universe in which we live could not exist. The vast majority of this universe is unremittingly hostile to organic life such as ourselves. It is a huge leap of faith from those observations to the conclusion that this entire universe was created just for us.
Nat/mat estimates concerning the prevalence of life in the universe vary considerably. Our planet could certainly be unique, not just “extremely unique” (is that like being ‘a bit pregnant’) in the sense that there is no other exactly like it that we know of. On the other hand, astronomers are finding plentiful evidence of planets around nearby stars so it’s certainly possible that there are other planets similar to Earth which bear life. Any theistic prediction that the Earth is unique as a home for life is in serious danger of being proved wrong.
Nat/mat observations find evidence of life stretching far into deep time, tailing off billions of years ago and completely at odds with a special creation event 6000 years back.
The simplest life found on earth so far is not necessarily the earliest life ever to appear on Earth. Its relative complexity does not contradict the hypothesis that much simpler forms existed earlier or support a claim that they were created by a god.
The nat/mat theory of evolution predicted that the “unfolding” of life would proceed in small, incremental steps but allowed that the rate at which it could happen could vary considerably. The 20-25 mn year Cambrian Explosion was a period when it happened a
lot more rapidly but there is evidence of life preceding it. It was not the original creation event described in Genesis.
Nat/mat theory holds that fossilization is a very rare event but even so there many transitional fossils have already been found. Theism makes no predictions about the frequency of fossils, transitional or otherwise, in the geological record.
It is estimated that new species are being discovered by science at the rate of 15000 – 20000 per year. The rate of speciation can vary hugely, new species of large animals taking hundreds of thousands of years to appear while new bacteria or viruses can emerge in just a few years. One study cataloged some 1400 human pathogens of which 87 were characterized as “novel”. If evolution occurs, there is no reason to think it has stopped now.
Nothing in that research contradicts Darwin’s original claim that it was a question of degree not of kind.
Nat/mat still predicts that much of our DNA is ‘junk’. The ENCODE researchers were heavily criticized for overstating their case. Thesim said nothing at all about the existence of DNA, let alone how much of it night be ‘junk’
Nat/mat theory always held that more mutations were detrimental than beneficial if for no other reason than that there are many more ways for something to go wrong than to go right. With the advent of neutral theory, the majority of mutations are held to be neutral or nearly so, a much smaller number are detrimental and a much smaller number still are positively beneficial, all of that being dependent on circumstances.
As noted before, theism made no predictions concerning the existence of DNA, let alone the relative frequencies of neutral, detrimental or beneficial mutations.
Nat/mat argues that morality is subjective. Theistic faiths simply argue that the morality dispensed by their chosen deity overrides all others. That doesn’t make it objective. The claim that morality is somehow embedded in our genes or in the fabric of the universe is nonsense.
As noted above, quantum theory is a nat/mat theory. It just deals with nat/mat reality on the very smallest scales. It lends no support to the concept of a transcendent soul which at best is poorly-defined and at worst is incoherent.
Seversky, do ‘you’, if there were even a ‘you’ in atheism instead of a brain merely having a neuronal illusion of ‘you’, ever think about this stuff before ‘you’ spout your insane gibberish?
Seversky claims:
Yet, contrary to the lies Seversky desperately wants to believe in, modern science has everything to do with the rise of Christianity.
Seversky then falsely claims:
Although I think that some atheists on the internet definitely need an exorcist, no Christian I know of cites ‘demon possession’ as a cause when someone they know personally gets sick. In fact prayer and medicine go hand in hand for all Christians that I know personally.
In fact, meta-studies on the efficacy of prayer have shown that those who pray, and who are prayed for, have a notable benefit when they undergo medical treatment in a hospital or from Doctors.
Moreover, contrary to what you want to believe Seversky, medical miracles really do happen and have been documented:
In fact, just considering the pronounced benefits to one’s own personal health, every atheist in the world should immediately renounce their atheism and become a Christian:
Moreover, most major breakthrough advances in medicine have been fostered by men of, you guessed it, the Christian and/or Theistic persuasion
Moreover, setting aside the Theistic presuppositions of the ‘laws of logic, the uniformity of nature, the ability for the mind to understand the world, and moral absolutes’, that you insist is ‘practically a requirement’ of science, leads to the epistemological failure of science.
It simply is impossible to practice science without logic, mind, morality, and the uniformity of nature. In fact, denying any of those taken for granted attributes, as atheists are prone to do whenever they feel like their personal belief in atheism is threatened, as mentioned previously, leads directly to the epistemological failure of science.
Seversky then states:
Comparing Darwin to Maxwell is a sad, ludicrous, joke. Even though Maxwell’s equations have now been superseded by quantum electrodynamics in terms of accuracy, we can go test Maxwell’s equations for the classical theory of electromagnetic fields to show that they are true. There is nothing even remotely close to that in Darwin’s theory. Even Charles Darwin himself admitted as much:
*More specifically, they should become Mormons.
As to the failed fundamental predictions of Naturalism/Materialism, here is a short defense of all 16 points from Seversky’s extremely weak counter claims
http://www.uncommondescent.com.....ent-564709