From Philip Cunningham: Darwin’s theory vs. falsification

_{Denyse O'Leary

April 23, 2018

Darwinism, Philosophy, Science}

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Paper. “Popper, in approx 1978 for the most part, took his criticisms of Darwinism back. But when John Horgan interviewed Popper in 1992, Horgan noted that Popper “blurted out that he still found Darwin’s theory dissatisfying. “One ought to look for alternatives!” Popper exclaimed, banging his kitchen table.” ”

See also: Laszlo Bencze on the current campaign against Karl Popper’s falsification criterion for science. “I assume that these critics have only read other people’s writings about Popper and not Popper himself.”

and

Question for multiverse theorists: To what can science appeal, if not evidence?

Comments

as to:
"Adding auxiliary theories to adjust the existing theory is a perfectly valid approach in science"
Not according to Imre Lakatos and Thomas Kuhn. According to them it is a sure sign we are dealing with a pseudoscience. as to:
"I don’t know where you get your understanding of evolution but if you think Darwin’s original theory has been “cast under the bus” you should look at some different sources. Natural selection is still a part of evolutionary theory, even if it is no longer thought to be the only, nor even the primary, process involved."
I get my information from empirical evidence and population genetics (not from Darwinian "just so stories").
Sociobiology: The Art of Story Telling – Stephen Jay Gould – 1978 – New Scientist Excerpt: Rudyard Kipling asked how the leopard got its spots, the rhino its wrinkled skin. He called his answers “Just So stories”. When evolutionists study individual adaptations, when they try to explain form and behaviour by reconstructing history and assessing current utility, they also tell just so stories – and the agent is natural selection. Virtuosity in invention replaces testability as the criterion for acceptance. https://books.google.com/books?id=tRj7EyRFVqYC&pg=PA530
Natural Selection is now shown to be grossly inadequate as the supposed 'designer substitute'.
Genome-wide analysis of a long-term evolution experiment with Drosophila – 2010 Excerpt of concluding paragraph: “Despite decades of sustained selection in relatively small, sexually reproducing laboratory populations, selection did not lead to the fixation of newly arising unconditionally advantageous alleles. This is notable because in wild populations we expect the strength of natural selection to be less intense and the environment unlikely to remain constant for ~600 generations. Consequently, the probability of fixation in wild populations should be even lower than its likelihood in these experiments.” http://www.homepages.ed.ac.uk/aspiliop//2010_2011/Burke%20et%20al%202010.pdf “The Third Way” – James Shapiro, Denis Noble, and etc.. etc..,,, excerpt: “some Neo-Darwinists have elevated Natural Selection into a unique creative force that solves all the difficult evolutionary problems without a real empirical basis.” http://www.thethirdwayofevolution.com/ “the uncritical acceptance of natural selection as an explanatory force for all aspects of biodiversity (without any direct evidence) is not much different than invoking an intelligent designer” Michael Lynch - The Origins of Genome Architecture, p 368 The waiting time problem in a model hominin population – 2015 Sep 17 John Sanford, Wesley Brewer, Franzine Smith, and John Baumgardner Excerpt: The program Mendel’s Accountant realistically simulates the mutation/selection process,,, Given optimal settings, what is the longest nucleotide string that can arise within a reasonable waiting time within a hominin population of 10,000? Arguably, the waiting time for the fixation of a “string-of-one” is by itself problematic (Table 2). Waiting a minimum of 1.5 million years (realistically, much longer), for a single point mutation is not timely adaptation in the face of any type of pressing evolutionary challenge. This is especially problematic when we consider that it is estimated that it only took six million years for the chimp and human genomes to diverge by over 5 % [1]. This represents at least 75 million nucleotide changes in the human lineage, many of which must encode new information. While fixing one point mutation is problematic, our simulations show that the fixation of two co-dependent mutations is extremely problematic – requiring at least 84 million years (Table 2). This is ten-fold longer than the estimated time required for ape-to-man evolution. In this light, we suggest that a string of two specific mutations is a reasonable upper limit, in terms of the longest string length that is likely to evolve within a hominin population (at least in a way that is either timely or meaningful). Certainly the creation and fixation of a string of three (requiring at least 380 million years) would be extremely untimely (and trivial in effect), in terms of the evolution of modern man. It is widely thought that a larger population size can eliminate the waiting time problem. If that were true, then the waiting time problem would only be meaningful within small populations. While our simulations show that larger populations do help reduce waiting time, we see that the benefit of larger population size produces rapidly diminishing returns (Table 4 and Fig. 4). When we increase the hominin population from 10,000 to 1 million (our current upper limit for these types of experiments), the waiting time for creating a string of five is only reduced from two billion to 482 million years. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4573302/ More from Ann Gauger on why humans didn’t happen the way Darwin said - July 2012 Excerpt: Each of these new features probably required multiple mutations. Getting a feature that requires six neutral mutations is the limit of what bacteria can produce. For primates (e.g., monkeys, apes and humans) the limit is much more severe. Because of much smaller effective population sizes (an estimated ten thousand for humans instead of a billion for bacteria) and longer generation times (fifteen to twenty years per generation for humans vs. a thousand generations per year for bacteria), it would take a very long time for even a single beneficial mutation to appear and become fixed in a human population. You don’t have to take my word for it. In 2007, Durrett and Schmidt estimated in the journal Genetics that for a single mutation to occur in a nucleotide-binding site and be fixed in a primate lineage would require a waiting time of six million years. The same authors later estimated it would take 216 million years for the binding site to acquire two mutations, if the first mutation was neutral in its effect. Facing Facts But six million years is the entire time allotted for the transition from our last common ancestor with chimps to us according to the standard evolutionary timescale. Two hundred and sixteen million years takes us back to the Triassic, when the very first mammals appeared. One or two mutations simply aren’t sufficient to produce the necessary changes,, in the time available. At most, a new binding site might affect the regulation of one or two genes. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/more-from-ann-gauger-on-why-humans-didnt-happen-the-way-darwin-said/ “many genomic features could not have emerged without a near-complete disengagement of the power of natural selection” Michael Lynch - The Origins of Genome Architecture, intro “a relative lack of natural selection may be the prerequisite for major evolutionary advance” Mae Wan Ho - Beyond neo-Darwinism – Evolution by Absence of Selection
As Dr. Richard Sternberg states in the following video, “Darwinism provided an explanation for the appearance of design, and argued that there is no Designer — or, if you will, the designer is natural selection. If that’s out of the way — if that (natural selection) just does not explain the evidence — then the flip side of that is, well, things appear designed because they are designed.”
“Darwinism provided an explanation for the appearance of design, and argued that there is no Designer — or, if you will, the designer is natural selection. If that’s out of the way — if that (natural selection) just does not explain the evidence — then the flip side of that is, well, things appear designed because they are designed.” Richard Sternberg – Living Waters documentary Whale Evolution vs. Population Genetics – Richard Sternberg and Paul Nelson – (excerpt from Living Waters video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0csd3M4bc0Q
And when looking at Natural Selection from the physical perspective of what is actually going on, as this following video does, (princess and the pea paradox & quarter power scaling) that is to say when looking at Natural Selection with empirical evidence, then it is very easy to see exactly why Natural Selection is grossly inadequate as the supposed 'Designer substitute' that Darwinists have falsely imagined it to be.
The abject failure of Natural Selection on two levels of physical reality – video (2016) (princess and the pea paradox & quarter power scaling) https://youtu.be/ISu-09yq2Gc
Even many leading Darwinists, such as Larry Moran, readily acknowledge that Natural Selection is now falsified by population genetics as the supposed 'Designer substitute'. Without Natural Selection, Darwinists are, basically, now reduced to arguing, with their appeal to Neutral Theory, that pure chance, all by it's lonesome, produced all the elegant Design we see around us in life. In the following article Larry Moran quotes Austin Hughes who states, 'Darwinism asserts that natural selection is the driving force of evolutionary change. It is the claim of the neutral theory, on the other hand, that the majority of evolutionary change is due to chance.'
Austin Hughes and Neutral Theory - Laurence A. Moran - June 19, 2017 Excerpt: Originally proposed by Motoo Kimura, Jack King, and Thomas Jukes, the neutral theory of molecular evolution is inherently non-Darwinian. Darwinism asserts that natural selection is the driving force of evolutionary change. It is the claim of the neutral theory, on the other hand, that the majority of evolutionary change is due to chance. http://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2017/06/austin-hughes-and-neutral-theory.html
Thus, with Natural selection being tossed by the wayside by the mathematics of population genetics, (and by empirical evidence), as the supposed "Designer substitute" for the 'appearance of design' that we see in life, Darwinists did not accept such a devastating finding from population genetics as an outright falsification for their theory, as they should have done, but are instead now reduced to arguing that the 'appearance of design' that we see in pervasively throughout life is, basically, the result of pure chance with natural selection now playing a very negligible role if any role at all. To call such a move on the part of Darwinists disingenuous would be an understatement.bornagain77_{April 25, 2018
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Seversky:
Natural selection is still a part of evolutionary theory, even if it is no longer thought to be the only, nor even the primary, process involved.
According to Futuyma's university textbook "Evolution" natural selection is still the only posited mechanism capable of producing adaptations. It is still the only mechanism tat is seen as being able to produce design without a designer. Other mechanisms cause mere change in allele frequency. There still isn't a scientific theory of evolution. There still isn't any evidence that natural selection is a designer mimic. And there still isn't any evidence that blind and mindless processes can do anything more than cause genetic diseases and deformities.ET_{April 25, 2018
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bornagain77 @ 2
Seversky, what you call ‘improving’ Darwinian theory is actually “adding ad hoc theories” and is actually another sure sign that we are dealing with a pseudoscience instead of a real science.
Not so. Adding auxiliary theories to adjust the existing theory is a perfectly valid approach in science If that doesn't work then something new may be required. It's called adjusting theory to fit data, I need hardly point out how critical you Hunter and WJM would be if science refused to accommodate a theory to new data.
As to ‘moving way beyond Darwin’ by 1992, if you mean that natural selection itself was being cast under the bus by then, you are right. But that is hardly ‘improving Darwin’s theory’. That is ripping the heart out of Darwin’s theory and trying to prop up its stinking corpse with nothing but blind faith in atheistic materialism.
I don't know where you get your understanding of evolution but if you think Darwin's original theory has been "cast under the bus" you should look at some different sources. Natural selection is still a part of evolutionary theory, even if it is no longer thought to be the only, nor even the primary, process involved.Seversky_{April 24, 2018
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Darwin's Theory is the alternative. We still can't show that imperfect fidelity in a self-replicating system will yield a more sophisticated system, or even a good reason to believe it. Engineering, a set of fields that are even more useful than evolutionary hypotheses have been useless, contradicts it in both theory and practice. I mean, genetic algorithms were inspired by such; but what is a genetic algorithm, if not a poor man's configuration search heuristic? The pseudorandomness does alleviate the need for properly structuring and storing memory of past attempts, but you're going to repeat yourself A LOT for being lazy/indulging your slot machine addiction.LocalMinimum_{April 24, 2018
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Seversky:
Of course one ought to look for alternatives.
Alternatives to what, exactly? Accidents happened are here we are can be dismissed without effort.
One should also look for ways to improve on the existing theory.
What existing theory? Accidents happened and here we are don't count as a theory
Does Horgan indicate if Popper was aware that by 1992, the theory of evolution had moved some way beyond Darwin’s original thesis?
There still isn't a scientific theory of evolution and natural selection is still the only posited mechanism capable of producing the appearance of design- but it has failed to pan out in that regard.ET_{April 24, 2018
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Off topic: Dr. Paul Giem is up to chapter 11 of his review of John Sanford's new book "Contested Bones":
Review of "Contested Bones" (Part 11 - Chapter 11 "Coexistence: Australopith and Man") 4-21-2018 - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXBqS_LGP-E&list=PLHDSWJBW3DNU_twNBjopIqyFOwo_bTkXm&index=11 Contested Bones (by Christopher Rupe and John Sanford) is the result of four years of intense research into the primary scientific literature concerning those bones that are thought to represent transitional forms between ape and man. This book's title reflects the surprising reality that all the famous "hominin" bones continue to be fiercely contested today - even within the field of paleoanthropology.
bornagain77_{April 23, 2018
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Seversky, what you call 'improving' Darwinian theory is actually "adding ad hoc theories" and is actually another sure sign that we are dealing with a pseudoscience instead of a real science. Thomas Kuhn, of paradigm shift fame, stated, "when faced with an anomaly, a theory's defenders "will devise numerous articulations and ad hoc modifications of their theory in order to eliminate any apparent conflict."
Inquiry-Based Science Education -- on Everything but Evolution - Sarah Chaffee - January 22, 2016 Excerpt: As Thomas Kuhn wrote in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, when faced with an anomaly, a theory's defenders "will devise numerous articulations and ad hoc modifications of their theory in order to eliminate any apparent conflict." http://www.evolutionnews.org/2016/01/inquiry-based_s102534.html
And Darwinists are the reigning kings of making up "ad hoc modifications of their theory in order to eliminate any apparent conflict." As Dr. Hunter noted: “With each new absurdity another new complicated just-so story is woven into evolutionary theory."
Here’s That Algae Study That Decouples Phylogeny and Competition – June 17, 2014 Excerpt: “With each new absurdity another new complicated just-so story is woven into evolutionary theory. As Lakatos explained, some theories simply are not falsifiable. But as a result they sacrifice realism and parsimony.” – Cornelius Hunter http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2014/06/heres-that-algae-study-that-decouples.html
Darwinists simply refuse to let any countervailing evidence falsify their religion:
“Being an evolutionist means there is no bad news. If new species appear abruptly in the fossil record, that just means evolution operates in spurts. If species then persist for eons with little modification, that just means evolution takes long breaks. If clever mechanisms are discovered in biology, that just means evolution is smarter than we imagined. If strikingly similar designs are found in distant species, that just means evolution repeats itself. If significant differences are found in allied species, that just means evolution sometimes introduces new designs rapidly. If no likely mechanism can be found for the large-scale change evolution requires, that just means evolution is mysterious. If adaptation responds to environmental signals, that just means evolution has more foresight than was thought. If major predictions of evolution are found to be false, that just means evolution is more complex than we thought.” ~ Cornelius Hunter - Arsenic-Based Biochemistry: Turning Poison Into Wine - December 2, 2010 http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2010/12/arsenic-based-biochemistry-turning.html
And as William James Murray quipped,,,
“Who would have thought that it would be biologists that came up with the first Theory of Everything? Biological divergence? Evolution. Biological convergence? Evolution. Gradual variation? Evolution. Sudden variation? Evolution. Stasis? Evolution. Junk DNA? Evolution. No Junk DNA? Evolution. Tree of life? Evolution. No tree of life? Evolution. Common genes? Evolution. ORFan genes? Evolution. Cell with little more than a jelly-like protoplasm? Evolution. Cell filled with countless, highly-specified nano-machines directed by a software code? Evolution. More hardy, more procreative organisms? Evolution. Less hardy, less procreative organisms? Evolution.” – Evolution explains everything. – William J Murray
As to 'moving way beyond Darwin' by 1992, if you mean that natural selection itself was being cast under the bus by then, you are right. But that is hardly 'improving Darwin's theory'. That is ripping the heart out of Darwin's theory and trying to prop up its stinking corpse with nothing but blind faith in atheistic materialism. Moreover, all the proposed materialistic alternatives to Darwin's theory that try to 'fill the gap', as it were, left by the gross inadequacies found in Darwin's theory, and as Stephen Meyer has pointed out in his book "Darwin's Doubt", all fail on some level or other. Some replacement theories fail more so than others. But they all fail. The primary failure of each is, of course, trying to account for the origination of information.
Darwin's Doubt (Part 9) by Paul Giem - video - The Post Darwinian World and Self Organization Chapter 15 and 16 of Darwin's Doubt in which 6 alternative models to neo-Darwinism, that have been proposed by evolutionists (such as those of the Altenberg 16) to 'make up' for the inadequacy in neo-Darwinism, are discussed and the failings of each model is exposed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iREO1h4h-GU&index=10&list=PLHDSWJBW3DNUaMy2xdaup5ROw3u0_mK8t Scientists stunned by the public’s doubt of Darwin - April 22, 2014 Excerpt: (Stephen) Meyer said that view under-represents the real facts being discovered in evolutionary biology. “Very few leading evolutionary biologists today think that natural selection and random mutation are sufficient to produce the new forms of life we see arising in the history of life,” Meyer said. “And then when the public is catching wind of the scientific doubts of Darwinian evolution and expresses them in a poll like this, these self-appointed spokesmen for science say that the public is ignorant. But actually, the public is more in line with what’s going on in science than these spokesmen for science.” https://world.wng.org/2014/04/scientists_stunned_by_the_publics_doubt_of_darwin
bornagain77_{April 23, 2018
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Of course one ought to look for alternatives. One should also look for ways to improve on the existing theory. Does Horgan imply that Popper thought that none of this had been happening? If he did then that would suggest he was out of touch with the field he was criticizing Does Horgan indicate if Popper was aware that by 1992, the theory of evolution had moved some way beyond Darwin's original thesis?Seversky_{April 23, 2018
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