Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

Thursdayites

Share
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Flipboard
Print
Email

An article over at classical conversations takes on the establishment’s insistence that common descent is as well-evidenced as has been suggested.

She notes that there are several issues with the reasoning from common descent, because the present gaps in knowledge could be as easily (or more easily) satisfied with separate creation as common descent. The only reason for choosing evolution as being what fills the gaps, the author argues, is the modern preference for mechanistic systems. Preferences, as the author points out, are not evidence, and the modern preference is no more weighty than a passing fad. Quoting Chesterton, the author points out,

My attitude toward progress has passed from antagonism to boredom. I have long ceased to argue with people who prefer Thursday to Wednesday because it is Thursday.

The point being that if one is to insist that one’s view is correct and another’s view is incorrect, one should base it on actual evidence, and not the current fads of explanation. Read the article here.

Comments
Johnnyb I like this part of the article:
Kepler is an excellent example of this. Although the 'scientific establishment' of Kepler’s time was firmly convinced that the orbits of the planets were circular (because of the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle), Kepler himself did not accept that scientists should have to do mathematical gymnastics to 'reconcile the phenomena:’ to come up with complex explanations (what is referred to as 'saving' the appearances). In other words, the phenomena simply did not match the theoretical hypothesis. From an ancient Greek view, that did not pose a problem because the phenomena, that is the 'stuff' in the material world, was considered an imperfect reflection of transcendent ideas. So, the Greeks simply did not expect the material world to be perfectly orderly. They accepted 'fuzzy' answers (See Nancy Pearcey and Charles B. Thaxton, The Soul of Science: Christian Faith and Natural Philosophy, Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1994,, 27-28). This perspective also became the prevailing 'box’ out of which the Church was evaluating the phenomena. Notice how remarkably similar this is to current science’s acceptance of the 'fuzzy' answer that macroevolutionary theory must be true even though there are grave flaws in the empirical evidence. Kepler, a devout Christian, did not accept the ‘prevailing wisdom.’ He was convinced that an orderly God would not create 'fuzzy' phenomena and that there should be no need to 'save' the appearances. He spent years painstakingly analyzing the mathematical data. The end result was the discovery of elliptical, rather than circular, orbits. The face of astronomy changed forever. And furthermore, Kepler’s hypothesis not only ‘worked’ but it was ‘true:’ it correlated with an objective, physical reality.
Johannes Kepler also stated this:
"The chief aim of all investigations of the external world should be to discover the rational order and harmony which has been imposed on it by God and which He revealed to us in the language of mathematics." - Johannes Kepler "Geometry is unique and eternal, a reflection from the mind of God. That mankind shares in it is because man is an image of God." - Johannes Kepler
To which it should also be carefully noted that Darwinian evolution has no rigid mathematical foundation to which we can appeal, as all the other 'primary sciences' have:
Accounting for Variations - Dr. David Berlinski: - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW2GkDkimkE Darwin and the Mathematicians - David Berlinski “The formation within geological time of a human body by the laws of physics (or any other laws of similar nature), starting from a random distribution of elementary particles and the field, is as unlikely as the separation by chance of the atmosphere into its components.” Kurt Gödel, was a preeminent mathematician who is considered one of the greatest to have ever lived. Of Note: Godel was a Theist! http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/11/darwin_and_the_mathematicians.html Majestic Ascent: Berlinski on Darwin on Trial - David Berlinski - November 2011 Excerpt: The publication in 1983 of Motoo Kimura's The Neutral Theory of Molecular Evolution consolidated ideas that Kimura had introduced in the late 1960s. On the molecular level, evolution is entirely stochastic, and if it proceeds at all, it proceeds by drift along a leaves-and-current model. Kimura's theories left the emergence of complex biological structures an enigma, but they played an important role in the local economy of belief. They allowed biologists to affirm that they welcomed responsible criticism. "A critique of neo-Darwinism," the Dutch biologist Gert Korthof boasted, "can be incorporated into neo-Darwinism if there is evidence and a good theory, which contributes to the progress of science." By this standard, if the Archangel Gabriel were to accept personal responsibility for the Cambrian explosion, his views would be widely described as neo-Darwinian. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/11/berlinski_on_darwin_on_trial053171.html Oxford University Admits Darwinism's Shaky Math Foundation - May 2011 Excerpt: However, mathematical population geneticists mainly deny that natural selection leads to optimization of any useful kind. This fifty-year old schism is intellectually damaging in itself, and has prevented improvements in our concept of what fitness is. - On a 2011 Job Description for a Mathematician, at Oxford, to 'fix' the persistent mathematical problems with neo-Darwinism within two years. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/05/oxford_university_admits_darwi046351.html "No human investigation can be called true science without passing through mathematical tests." Leonardo Da Vinci
It is also extremely interesting to note, the principle of Genetic Entropy, which stands in direct opposition to the primary claims of neo-Darwinian evolution, lends itself quite well to mathematical analysis by computer simulation, whereas neo-Darwinism does not:
Genetic Entropy - Dr. John Sanford - Evolution vs. Reality - video (Notes in description) http://vimeo.com/35088933 Using Computer Simulation to Understand Mutation Accumulation Dynamics and Genetic Load: Excerpt: We apply a biologically realistic forward-time population genetics program to study human mutation accumulation under a wide-range of circumstances.,, Our numerical simulations consistently show that deleterious mutations accumulate linearly across a large portion of the relevant parameter space. http://bioinformatics.cau.edu.cn/lecture/chinaproof.pdf MENDEL’S ACCOUNTANT: J. SANFORD†, J. BAUMGARDNER‡, W. BREWER§, P. GIBSON¶, AND W. REMINE http://mendelsaccount.sourceforge.net Refutation of Evolutionary Algorithms https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1h33EC4yg29Ve59XYJN_nJoipZLKIgupT6lBtsaVQsUs
bornagain77
February 18, 2012
February
02
Feb
18
18
2012
03:39 AM
3
03
39
AM
PDT

Leave a Reply