Discussions in the comment sections of many posts on this site chaotically tend toward the strange attractor of one generally off-topic issue: Why does Creation/Evolution seem correct to you? It is usually a discussion between Creationists who believe that the scientific conclusions are based on faith, and Naturalists who believe that the Scientific Method is best tool ever invented to extract sense from chaos.
In the beginning, Natural Philosophers (now called Scientists) in the West all believed in the Bible. Bishop Ussher gave the final word on the age of the universe according to the Bible in the early 1600’s, and the Church had all the answers. But then the idea emerged that one can actually test Aristotelian conclusions (purely rational and based on “what everybody knows”) with observations. Copernicus demonstrated with careful observation and applied math around 1600 that only the moon itself orbited the Earth, and all the other planets circled the Sun. The church accepted this, as a philosophical observation, irrelevant to the place of Man in the Universe. Then Galileo made a gadfly of himself by publishing popular books mocking the Pope for publicly continuing in the preaching of Geocentrism when it was clear, with the aid of a telescope, that not only did the planets orbit the sun, but that some of those planets had moons of their own. Many moons, placed where Man couldn’t even see them without modern technology.
Well, it just snowballed from there. Newton, a devout Christian, developed math in the late 17th century that accurately modeled the behavior of pretty much everything that man could observe at the time (the Laws of Motion). And those models showed how things naturally happen, without need for divine intervention. 
Then in the mid-19th century, J.C. Maxwell developed similar rules to explain electromagnetism (light, electricity, radio, etc). Discovery after discovery kept challenging the universally held beliefs in many areas. Gravity wasn’t related to nor caused by sin. Demons didn’t cause disease. The basic elements weren’t Earth, Air, Fire and Water. Air was a complex substance, but caloric and phlogiston weren’t. The planet and the universe steadily got wider and older and more complex as more and more evidence collected by true believers forced them to acknowledge that nature is as it is, and not how interpretations of the ancient texts described it.
By the 1700’s, many Christians were becoming Deists; they believed in an omnipotent Creator, but not in the meddling and insecure deity portrayed by most western religions. God as a watchmaker, who wound up the universe, and then sat back to watch it play out.
By the start of the 20th Century, there was a problem. The Universe (what we now call our galaxy) was only measured to be 100,000 light years across, yet every measure of geology pointed to many millions –hundreds of millions by some measures– of years of history on the Earth. How could the Earth be orders of magnitude older than the universe? Then came General Relativity, quasars, and the red shift. Suddenly the universe exploded out to billions of years across/old. And then quantum and then nuclear theory led to unstable isotopes being used as accurate clocks. The planet rose to billions of years old, too. When we brought samples back from the moon, they indicated the same age as Earthly rocks. Conflict resolved.
But there is still a small group of people who hold tight to the 17th century interpretation of a literal Genesis story. This movement emerged in the United States after the Scopes Trial in the 1920’s, depending on the idea that a Young Earth precludes the principle that species could have evolved; there wasn’t enough time. Odd schools of thought therefore emerge (Flood Geology, Intellignet Design, etc), that try to sound scientific, yet not actually using that methodology developed centuries ago.
We see comments saying that “old Earth” evidence is only found because the discoverers believe in it. They didn’t always. Most of the earlier and still useful evidence of the age of the Earth was found by those who didn’t initially believe in their own results. And when they did, they had to fight ridicule before the disbelieving community. It is the method that prevailed, not the authority of the discoverer. Nor are convincing arguments much good against the method. Scientists are often wrong. Very often. The scientific method records these wrong results so that they can be checked. And they are. And eventually and asymptotically, the correct ideas are refined and prevail.
Unfortunately, the public only sees the tip of the science iceberg. There are big, splashy announcements of bold ideas. Like Cold Fusion. That was a case when would-be discoverers did an end run around the method and announced to the public before their results could be independently checked. A quiet retraction was printed when the dozens of labs that should have been contacted first, demonstrated universally that the first announcement was based on a procedural error. But research continues. That they didn’t demonstrate something new does not imply that there is nothing new to be discovered.
I blame the media. Remember Halley’s comet? The previous time around, it was a gaudy show. In the 1980’s most astronomers said that it might be visible. The media covered it as the show of the century, assuming that it would be the same show. Technically, it was the same show. But this time we only had partially obstructed nosebleed seats, rather than right on the gridiron. Actual scientists knew this, but their story wasn’t newsworthy. When it turned out to be exactly what the scientists said, the public blamed the scientists for misleading them.
Science is portrayed to the public as a mixture of magic and authority. It is neither. It is a process whereby thousands of brilliant and highly trained competitors are all trying to prove each other wrong, or to come up with a new twist. After a generation or two of consistently and universally failing to prove that something is wrong, then it becomes provisionally accepted: A “theory”. Then it continues to be tested. Nothing is accepted on authority. Rarely is something revolutionary accepted within a decade of its announcement.
Einstein wasn’t correct about relativity because he was Einstein. He was correct because many experiments and observations failed to prove him wrong, and that his ideas led to other subsequently proven ideas. The same went for Newton, Maxwell, Bohr, Feynman, Hawking, and so on. Up-and-comers are always re-testing the earlier theories using newer methods. Under the sedate public image, real science is contentious and messy.
Finally, science is all about “how”. Religion or faith may cover “why”, for those who need it. The problem comes when unqualified observers (who sometimes have credentials to state otherwise) with a philosophical axe to grind revisit long-discredited arguments and claim them as new discoveries. They dun researchers for refusing to look at their “new evidence”, but neglect to review the existing literature, or to run the standard tests themselves. They just make claims that sound reasonable. Anyone who knows the history of 20th century discovery knows that common sense reasonableness does not match reality beyond the everyday scale of experience. And modern instruments measure far beyond that realm.
To (finally) sum this up. The question comes down to: Do you believe in the Scientific Method and its results, or in the principle that unless it agrees with a particular minority interpretation of The Bible, it is wrong?
Karl seems to willfully ignore all the links we provide. Uniformitarianism is about process, not state. Asteroid collisions, gamma bursts, vulcanism, oceanic sulfur bursts, ice ages, and other already-known catastrophic events are part of uniformitarian theory. How big does a catastrophic event have to be for you to claim that we are ignoring it?
Human written history is a fraction of known modern human time on this Earth. Cities existed long before writing was invented. Why is something written more to be believed than something measured? Measures like magnetic field precession, alpha track accumulation, air composition ratios in ice, and so on are continuous records that far predate written history. If something had changed in the laws of physics, violating uniformitarianism, then it would have left marks. Much like how the uniformly changing seasons leave annual marks in trees, sediments, and glaciers. So we can look at these records to see when a summer was missing, or an ice age occurred, or any other non-uniformity.
As for "all the facts". I'm sure that Grumpy meant it in the scientific sense of "every observation and test made so far" rather than in the absolutist faith-based sense of "everything that can be known".
Again, we trust scientific conclusions because they can be proven false, yet never have. Every conclusion by science is considered tentative, with an unspoken, "unless something new turns up". It is only in the media that science is presented as authority.
Trained observers are only a certain percentage sure that the sun will rise tomorrow. But will gladly put money on the odds. Like James Randi. If anyone on the planet had the power of miracles, then Randi would pay up.
Dan stated
Karl: I disagree with "Science has no basis of determining the value of anything."
This is where I would disgree over what you define as "a value." Numerical value is just one such type of value that is based upon other such ideas as beauty, artistry, personal experience, or any other philosophical perspecteive such as economics or utilitarian beleifs. One must choose either consciously or subconsciously what "value" or values you are going to associate with some human experience or sentiment or the numbers have very little connection with reality.
Some people choose willingly what they "value." Others subconsciously believe something that they try to say is objective reality but is really far from that. Human's are not capable of total objectivity, or is present company to be excluded?
Anything that you can debate endlessly means objectivity has not been achieved. A judge can claim to make a decesion in a case but that decesion is normally based upon tje judge's predisposition and how the interpretation of the presumed objective facts have been presented and considered.
Trying to decide a matter of science by a majority of consensus leaves the true facts ignoring the minority report.
Karl: Attacking Uniformitarian principles would seem to run counter to Occam's Razor. I realize that Occam's Razor doesn't actually prove Uniformitarian principles, but (to me), it suggests to me that I should put the burden of persuasion on those who insist that the laws of physics or geology etc are sometimes suspended willy nilly.
I'm curious: Other than in areas where your religious beliefs are concerned, do you think that the laws of nature are not uniformly applied throughout the universe?
Science is not based on consensus. Consensus results from every competing skeptic individually checking the evidence, and then coming to the same conclusion in spite of preconceptions.
It is important to the process that there be skeptics. Every once in a while, one of them produces an improvement to existing theory, and incrementally changing it. But each generation produces smaller changes to any given theory; philosophically asymptotic.
"Value", as Karl points out, is as slippery a term as Truth, Theory, or Fact. These words mean different things to different disciplines. In science (the paradigm whose definitions I unconsciously assume) "Value" means measurement. But what is the human value of 65 miles per hour or 10 rads per second? It depends on the context and the observer. Either can be deadly. Either can mean prosperity. Either can inspire admiration or dread.
In economics or social utility, the value of things can be measured statistically. In philosophy, value is a personal decision. F'rinstance, what is the value of gold? Some people believe that it has some inherent economic or spiritual value. Anthropologists know that gold is just a metal; one that only gained a popular luster when populations became dense enough to support a non-productive ruling class that would exchange things to possess it. But because this event was prehistoric, most people think that this yellow, heavy metal has some value beyond the economic maxim that the value of a thing is precisely what that thing will bring in exchange.
Science is all about the measurements.
Erich asked:
I’m curious: Other than in areas where your religious beliefs are concerned, do you think that the laws of nature are not uniformly applied throughout the universe?
I believe the basic laws and patterns of the physical world in the environment of the earth are actually very consistent, are invariant and are not ever suspended willy nilly. I believe that there are manifestations of these laws to such degrees in nature that are not seen in operation except on rare occasions. These conditions and observations only come into focus when the small typical cyclical variations in physical forces, energy or beliefs that currrently exist are supassed by what is commonly called the supernatural or the supranatural.
The limits of our understandable world can be exceeded by either the supernatural or the supranatural. For the lack of a better term these are grossly unexpected and unheard of observations that would be called by science, unscientific or even miraculous. While flat out unusual and not at all very common, these are not beyond the control of the designer of the universe.
As long as the physical world exists, I do not think the laws of nature will ever be null and void, but I do not believe that any of us has ever witnessed the conditions where the laws of nature were ever put to the test as they were in the time of the world wide flood.
Those who doubt the power of belief systems in shaping man's interactions with the world as well as with other people are oblivious to well documented atrocities caused by people who thought their beliefs needed to eliminate the competetion no matter what that might mean. Darfur comes to mind at the moment. If any of you think George Bush is an ignoramous, go meet a Muslim terrorist who would kill entire provinces to enforce what they saw as a superior belief system.
As for other parts of the universe, it has already been demonstrated in the pioneer anomoly that outside of our solar system either the speed of light is changing, the shape of space is not as we think, or our perceptions of how these are related is not clear.
I do not dislike science, I teach the structure and function of matter, energy, and the physical laws governing their interactions. I do not teach that the observations and applications of these commonly seen laws have never been superceeded by the supernatural or the supra-natural conditions where these laws were pushed beyond everyday common experience.
Anyone who claims that there was never a universal world wide flood, or that there has been steady gradual slow changes to our earth's surface over billions of years does so willingly from a vested interest. The flood is historical in man's recorded history. Those who scoff at a world wide flood choose to do so and can not be convinced by any evidence otherwise.
Dan writes:
Science is all about the measurements.
Karl responds: This is absolutey correct. There would be no need to consider odds and probabilities if this were the case. The problems of interpretation arise over possible "what if" scenarios that extrapolate through attempted calculations into the distant past or future.
Dan recently just wrote: Science is all about the odds.
There a potential new jeopardy category "odds and measurements."
Sorry I couldn't resist.
When extrapolations are taken into places were they lack certitude science does become a matter of odds which are often confused with measurements. Calculations are not measurements. These calculations stem from models that have presuppositions which resist being falsified.
Many errors have been discovered in radiometric dating but the errors are rejected as problems in the samples not with the methodology. Many adjustments are made to the methodology to circumvent the need to reconsider the presumtions upon which the model is based. This is why the technician is never encouraged to run a double blind test without a hint as to where the sample came from and what the potential expectations concerning the findings might be.
Anyone's odds will say if they play the lottery long enough they will win. Unfortunately, most people will need to play from the grave to win.
Karl: Thank you for answering my question about Occam's Razor.
I'm interested in knowing more about your world view, and I don't want to be presumptuous. I'm assuming that you believe that on those rare moments when the laws of nature are suspended, that this is not a moment of randomness. Rather, it is a moment when a sentient God has chosen to intervene directly and specifically. In short, I'm assuming that it is your belief that there is a sentient and purposeful God who suspended the ordinary laws of nature during the flood in order to carry out his holy mission. Do I understand your viewpoint correctly?
Erich,
I thought I made myself clear, but I'll try to state it again.
I do not believe that the laws of nature were suspended. The extreme events that occurred took the existing world and nearly destroyed it used the same laws basic laws that currently exist.
The miracle was that the world was taken to the very brink of total annihilation but was kept from total destruction. Land animals and man only survived because of the sentient caring warning that God gave to Noah. The events were drastic physical changes based upon existing laws in nature.
The miracle was that the ark was preserved throught the violent changes to the earth's upper mantle, crust and topography.
I do not call the destruction the act of a caring God. I call that the decision of just God with no other recourse. I call the preservation of both man and animals a miracle. If the ark had not been built, and kept from the violence on the earth's surface, no land animals would have survived.
Karl wrote, "What a prideful assumption to make, as if science will never discover anything knew, or ever be shown to have some of its presumed facts to be in error…."
Nowhere did I say or suggest the things you are reading into my comment.
Karl continues, "Please get off your high horse and bring the discussion back to an awareness of the falibility of either system based upon the truth of the basic premises."
Again, nowhere did I say or suggest the things you are reading into my comment.
And still Karl continues, "Naturalists don’t do their science in a vacuum which can presume infallibility. That’s an unwillingness to admit possible bias."
And, again, nowhere did I say or suggest the things you are reading into my comment. Karl, please stop making so many strawman arguments to try to avoid addressing my actual points. Nowhere have I suggested that science is infallible; I merely said it is better than any other method yet found (including the dogmatic method that you use).
Edgar observes, "There is a bit of circular logic in this statement, specifically the assertion that, “I trust the scientific method because it gives the correct answers, and I get the correct answers because I use the scientific method.” How do you verify your definition of “correct”?"
I disagree that it is circular logic, mainly because I don't think your paraphrase correctly captures what I said. I asserted that the scientific method "is the only methodology that has been demonstrated to consistently give correct answers to questions about our natural world." Plainly, we can verify many, many correct answers without using the scientific method to do so. For example, we don't need the scientific method to confirm that men landed on the moon and returned safely to earth, or that a bridge we have built has not fallen down, or that the new batteries we put into our flashlight really do make it work. Yes, we do have to use some minimal level of inquiry to confirm such things — and yes, we might call such inquiries a form of the scientific method, but I would not put it the way that you have; viz., "I get the correct answers because I use the scientific method." We get correct answers because we can readily see that they are correct. The correctness is self-evident and undeniable.
Dan wrote, "Nowhere in Creationism do they say, “Never mind what the Bible says, look at the evidence”."
Dan's observation nicely illustrates another point I want to add to this discussion. I've been talking about the difference between the scientific method (which looks for a theory that fits the facts) and the theological method (which looks for facts that fit a particular religious doctrine). In science, new facts often yield new insights about old theories or, sometimes, even entirely new theories. When this happens, it is a *surprise* to those who have made the discovery. By contrast, when the inquiry begins with the outcome (i.e., a religious doctrine derived from some holy book), there is no possibility for surprise to occur: inquiry consists merely of looking for evidence that supports the (mandated) outcome and suppressing all contrary evidence.
Of course, there are many other defects in the theological method, including: (i) determining whose holy book to use as the source of All True Knowledge and (ii) determining whose interpretation of that holy book to use as the source of All True Knowledge. For example, consider the following. One person reads the Bible and declares that the earth is 6,000 years old. A second person reads the Bible and declares that the earth is 10,000 years old. A third person reads the Bible and declares that it says nothing definite about the age of the earth. A fourth person reads the Bible and declares that it is a sin to discuss the age of the earth. A fifth person reads the Bible and declares that the Bible has only one true interpretation. Do you see the problem here? Wars have been fought over theological disputes even less important than these.
grumpy wrote: "…finding proof that there is a god, finding proof that the god-of-the-Bible exists, and finding proof that the Bible accurately describes the nature of our universe, are three completely different things. From your queries, it is unclear to me which of these issues you are concerned about."
I don't care. Pick whichever one you want.
Grumpypilgrim wrote: "we don’t need the scientific method to confirm that men landed on the moon and returned safely to earth, or that a bridge we have built has not fallen down, or that the new batteries we put into our flashlight really do make it work."
Grumpy, you and I generally agree on things, and I, in fact, agree with the substance of your assertion, but not your defense. The (admittedly simplistic) examples that you offered are so terribly subject to misinterpretation as to render them useless. For example, few have directly observed the moon landings, and given our proven ability to "fake" dinosaurs walking on Earth (Jurassic Park), how can we possibly accept moon landings as fact? Certainly one can deduce, through logic, that the animation technology to fake that did not exist in 1969, but that same kind of logic was used in the past to deduce that people were possessed by demons. How can we know for sure?
Grumpypilgrim: "We get correct answers because we can readily see that they are correct. The correctness is self-evident and undeniable."
This time let us turn to your argument about batteries and flashlights: What is to say that the act of replacing the batteries did not jar loose a stuck switch? In this case you hypothesized beforehand that the cause of the malfunction was dead batteries, function returned after you replaced the batteries, so you have concluded from the self-evident and undeniable results that your hypothesis was correct even though it was not.
This is the basis for all superstition.
Again, I do not disagree with your point of view; I disagree with your arguments for it. If I can think of any better arguments, I will post them.
Grumpypilgrim says:
I merely said it is better than any other method yet found (including the dogmatic method that you use).
Karl says: I'm sorry to have to get you to tell me I'm wrong about my assessments because I can't get a discussion otherwise.
I understand that you prefer the methodology you use. I'm just trying to eliminate all other avenues for why you prefer it since you won't answer the question without appealing to the supposed authority of the methodology. The same type of claim to authority you claim holy writ makes. Any appeal to authority be it holy writ or a methodology are both value ladden constructs in the human mind. Claim all you want that one is more "objective" than the other but they both conatin a degree or measure of subjectivity as well.
I believe the methodology works well in many many cases, but not in as many cases and the extent to which it is attempted to be applied. The methodology can be shown to have flaws and even though the methodolgy doesn't like dents in its armor, they are still there.
Dan asked: How big does a catastrophic event have to be for you to claim that we are ignoring it?
Well lets start with the major one that raises the hair on the back of the neck of most university geologists – the world wide flood recorded not in just the Bible, but which is apart of the historical accounts of a large number of cultures. This flood more than likely included nearly all of the catastrophies you mention separately, and then some more as well. The miracle wasn't that the water appeared from nowhere. The miracle was that we are still here to discuss what really may have happened.
There is no physical evidence of a world wide flood. There are scattered flood stories from many cultures world-wide, but they all are placed at different times and with different stories about who, why, and how many times. Try this set, or this group. Also, there are cultures that have no such story. Did they forget about it, yet still remember earlier events as more important?
There is much physical evidence for the series of ice ages. There is much physical evidence for the dinosaur killer. There is some physical evidence for the moon-maker incident. We have discovered Thera, a possible candidate for the Sodom and Gomorrah incident. But no geological record indicating a world wide deluge. None.
If you have access to such evidence, please inform us, and the geological community. As I have said many times to Karl, "Your Nobel Prize is waiting".
Karl doesn't seem to know what statistics are used for. They are a measurement tool. It is a mathematical system that can accurately determine the likely result from a known set of parameters based on a diverse set of precise measurements of an imprecise phenomenon.
The odds of winning the lottery yield a negative average increase of value to all players. This is a simple and easily proven statistic.
The odds of a particular nucleus decaying in a particular interval is not a useful number, however well it can be calculated. However, the odds of a certain time elapsing before a certain percentage of nuclei decay is a useful number. And completely accurate.
Although one can easily lie with statistics to the innumerate public, it is harder to fool those who know what this measuring tool is good for and how to wield it.
I have said before the evidence is assumed to not be there because the time frames of preference have ruled it out. The enormity of the event has been spread out over millenia by those who believe they can extrapolate to time frames that never existed, and in so doing they supply the supposed statistcs and probabilities a crude launching point to provide the possibility for nearly anything to have happened, except for one huge inter-related event that would leave the facts greatly changed.
If you keep the events isolated they will never be considered as even being capable of being connected.
There is evidence on both sides of the issue. If you refuse to acknowledge that their could very well be evidence for a global flood that could smack you in the face and because you choose to interpret the actual physical records by your preferred methodology with it preferred premises you will not give even an a casual consideration of the idea.
I'll offer many evidences if you will read them. Here is the first one.
Reason 1. The trilobite eye may seem to be an odd place to begin, but its very place and existence in the fossil record challenges the conventional “Geologic Time Scale.” Viewed as among the earliest forms of life, the trilobite has eyes that are super-super-super complex. Riccardo Levi-Setti was professor of physics and director of the Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago. He was also a research associate at the Field Museum of Natural History. His beautiful book, Trilobites, published by The University of Chicago Press, contains these words: “Among the remains of early life on earth, the fossil record we find buried in ancient sedimentary rocks bears evidence of an extraordinary group of marine creature, the trilobites. The position of these invertebrates in the evolution of the animal kingdom is extraordinary because of their early ascent to a high level of functional complexity, described in fascinating detail by their persistent and ubiquitous fossil remains. Trilobites could see their immediate environment with amazingly sophisticated optical devices in the form of large composite eyes, the first use of optics coupled with sensory perception in nature. As a unique feat in the history of life, their eye lenses were shaped to correct for optical aberrations, with design identical to that proposed (quite independently of any knowledge of trilobites) by Descartes and Huygens. … When we humans construct optical elements, we sometimes cement together two lenses that have different refractive indices, as a means of correcting particular lens defects. In fact, this optical doublet is a device so typically associated with human invention that its discovery in trilobites comes as something of a shock. The realization that trilobites developed and used such devices half a billion years ago makes the shock even greater. And a final discovery–that the refracting interface between the two lens elements in a trilobite's eye was designed in accordance with optical constructions worked out by Descartes and Huygens in the mid-seventeenth century–borders on sheer science fiction.”
Continuing, “By comparing the shape of the aspheric lens exit surfaces constructed by Huygens and Descartes with the two lens structures identified by Clarkson … little doubt remains that trilobites utilized the properties of Cartesian Ovals more than 400 million years before the seventeenth-century masters discovered the principle. … The design of the trilobite's eye lens could well qualify for a patent disclosure.”
Some evolutionists probably would say, “That’s okay; trilobites evolved eyes from eyeless trilobites,” but this does not seem to take into account the following. In his book, Bringing Fossils to Life: An Introduction to Paleobiology (McGraw-Hill), Donald R. Prothero wrote: "Trilobites as a whole remained constructed on the same archetypal plan defined in the earliest Cambrian, and, especially after the Early Ordovician, changes of real significance remained surprising low." He also wrote, "Another common trend is the reduction and loss of eyes, which happened independently in several clades." Loss of eyes does not account for how the eyes got there to begin with.
In summary, super-complex trilobite eyes existed at the beginning of the so-called evolutionary process. There was “surprisingly low” change (Prothero), and what existed “borders on sheer science fiction” (Levi-Setti).
This is one of many such evidences that I'm sure means very little to you, but which enables me to say I'm do not ignore data. I look into it. I am familiar with both sides of the issue as I'm sure you are somewhat as well. I do not ignore your links. I just don't believe the scientific evidence is overwhelming on the side of the athiestic naturalists.
Karl, I'm confused. Exactly of what are you saying that the trilobite eye is evidence? Sure, the eye evolved many times, independently. Compare the physiological and genetic structures of the eyes of arachnids, cephalopods, fish, and insects, for example. Trilobites are another separate example. The several million year period known as the Cambrian Explosion produced many genera to fill empty ecological niches. But few that have modern descendants. As you trace the descent of various classes of animals, you see most features change in some way. Including eyes. Meanwhile, the extinction event that did in the trilobites left no trilobite descendants. btw: Fish (our currently presumed ancestors) didn't yet exist in the Cambrian era.
So why is this particular evolution of an eye somehow evidence of anything we've been talking about?
Karl writes, "I understand that you prefer the methodology you use. I’m just trying to eliminate all other avenues for why you prefer it since you won’t answer the question without appealing to the supposed authority of the methodology. The same type of claim to authority you claim holy writ makes. Any appeal to authority be it holy writ or a methodology are both value ladden constructs in the human mind. Claim all you want that one is more “objective” than the other but they both conatin a degree or measure of subjectivity as well."
Karl, none of your observations alters the truth of what I stated: the scientific method is demonstrably the best (most valid, most accurate…choose your own metric) method we have yet found to answer questions about our world.
Karl continues, "I believe the methodology works well in many many cases, but not in as many cases and the extent to which it is attempted to be applied. The methodology can be shown to have flaws and even though the methodolgy doesn’t like dents in its armor, they are still there."
Again, as I have already stated, no one is claiming the scientific method is flawless or infallible. It is simply better than any other method yet discovered. In particular, it is better than any method yet found in any religion on our planet.
I find it interesting that in the entire 2,000 year history of Christianity, there has yet to be *any* valid study demonstrating that prayer works, that faith healing occurs, that the earth is 6,000 or 10,000 years old…,or, indeed, that *any* of the extraordinary claims that the Bible makes about events in this world are valid. One would think that if Christian doctrine were actually true or that if the Bible really were an infallible source of knowledge, someone would have proven it by now. But the fact is that no one has. Indeed, if we hold all other factors equal, people who call themselves "Christians" don't live longer than non-Christians, they don't recover from disease faster or at a higher rate, they don't get better grades, they don't have fewer divorces…,in sum, there appears to be virtually no statistical difference between Christians and non-Christians when it comes to anything we can measure.
Responding to Edgar's comment, it seems to me that we have a choice: we can speculate forever about whether or not we can ever believe anything — was the moon landing faked, did our flashlight have a flakey switch, were invisible dwarves holding up the bridge — or we can take at least some things at face value: people did land on the moon and return to earth because the scientific method (e.g., Newton's laws) worked; the flashlight batteries really were bad because we used the scientific method to verify they were bad (e.g., we tested them in many other devices until we could find no other reason for the flashlight to not work); the bridge stayed up not because of invisible helpers but because the scientific method worked (e.g., stress analysis gave us the equations). Could all of what we experience be an illusion, or the result of some ongoing continuous miracle by an invisible divine deity, or the consequence of our being trapped in The Matrix? Sure, but we have no *evidence* of this, and we *do* have evidence that the scientific method gives us answers to questions that we have been unable to answer by any other means. Accordingly, until someone demonstrates that our existence is something other than what it appears to be — the natural result of millions of years of undirected evolution — I'll continue to put my bet with the scientific method, notwithstanding the fact that people such as Karl continue to prefer ancient myth and superstition.
By the way, speaking of ancient myth and superstition, here are some questions for Karl: you say you put all of your faith in the book of Genesis, but can you prove who physically wrote the book of Genesis and prove by what method(s) he, she or they acquired the stories it contains? Can you prove that the book of Genesis is not merely the codification of ancient pagan superstitions, conveniently pre-packaged and attributed to Moses merely to give them the air of authenticity?
Here are a few more little thoughts for the day. In the U.S.A., east of the Mississippi River, lies a range of mountains called the Appalachians. In the U.S.A., west of the Mississippi River, lies a range of mountains called the Rockies. Morphologically, the Appalachians are relatively low and rounded, while the Rockies are relatively high and jagged. Based on this morphological difference, we infer that the Appalachians have had more time to erode than have the Rockies; i.e., the Appalachians are older than the Rockies. And, when rocks from both mountain ranges are tested to see how old they are, tests indicate that the Appalachians are, indeed, older than the Rockies. However, Young Earth Creationists declare that all mountain ranges on our planet are the same age. If so, then why do the Appalachians and Rockies look so different from each other, and why do tests of the rocks confirm that the mountains which look older are older?
Here's another question. The Hawaiian islands form a line. At one end of the line is an island with active volcanoes. The other islands have no active volcanoes and, like the mountain ranges mentioned above, contain morphological evidence that they are older than the island that has active volcanoes. Curiously, tests of the rocks on the islands indicate that the islands do not have random ages nor do they have the same age as each other. Rather, as you go from one island to the next along the archipelago, the rocks get older and older as you go farther and farther from the island that has active volcanoes, suggesting that the islands were not all formed at the same time but, instead, were formed sequentially over a very long span of time. Using the Young Earth Creationism notion of how our planet was created, explain these findings.
Grumpy: The answer to your first and second hypotheticals is the same: The Mountain Fairy made it that way and you are not to question the wisdom of The Mountain Fairy.