Global Warming and Zohnerism: An Inconvenient Truth
Who says the global warming eco-nazis are stupid? Weren't they the first to warn us of the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide?
Public Education + Hollywood celebrities + a little bit of knowledge.... be afraid. Be very, very afraid!
Lest you think I am leveling charges of eco-hysteria haphazardly, let me refer you to the 1997 Washington Post article in which James K. Glassman coined the term "zohnerism" (i.e. the use of a true fact to lead a scientifically and mathematically ignorant public to a false conclusion). Below are the concluding paragraphs of Glassman's Dihydrogen Monoxide: Unrecognized Killer: (emphasis mine)
Environmental hysterics -- Vice President Al Gore springs to mind -- and ideologues in such fields as race, women's issues and economics are adept at using Zohnerisms, with help from the media, to advance their agendas. A few examples:
The breast-implant mania. Dow Corning was driven into bankruptcy through lawsuits over its silicone implants -- even though science doesn't support claims that they're dangerous. Marcia Angell, executive editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, cites the problem jurors "have in thinking in terms of probabilities, or in acknowledging the possibility of coincidence."
Research, she says, has consistently failed to find a link between silicone and disease. Yes, women who have implants get sick, but, in a typical study, "the implant group was no more likely to develop connective tissue disease than the group without implants."
White flight. In the headline above an article Sunday about population growth in rural areas, the New York Times claimed, "Hint of Racial Undercurrents Is Behind Broad Exodus of Whites." Steven A. Holmes, the reporter, wrote that studies by demographer William Frey "show that of the 40 fastest-growing rural counties, virtually all are at least 70 percent white."
Shocking? Well, according to the Bureau of the Census, 83 percent of the U.S. population is white.
Finding Zohnerisms in the press, Congressional Record and speeches of administration officials makes a great parlor game. One place to start is the collected speeches of EPA chief Carol Browner, who has used Zohnerisms masterfully to promote expensive, disruptive new standards for particulate matter and global warming -- despite evidence from scientists that is, at best, inconclusive.
That's a shame. In a land where technical ignorance reigns and susceptibility to Zohnerisms is high, it's the duty of politicians, journalists and scientists to present facts responsibly and in context.
After all, think what would happen if the EPA really did ban dihydrogen monoxide.
You've got to love the quote by the Journal of Medicine's Marcia Angell. Basically, 21st century jurors (judges, politicians, journalists also) are no smarter than the men who sat behind the bar at the Salem witch trials. So, who is your Cotton Mather?
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Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/02 @ 01:46 PM — (Reply)
Comment by Cate— 2007/09/02 @ 02:13 PM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/02 @ 02:46 PM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/02 @ 02:47 PM — (Reply)
Comment by Ernie Els— 2007/09/02 @ 03:15 PM — (Reply)
source: the Politically incorrect guide to science
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2007/09/04 @ 09:33 PM — (Reply)
Because when I want to know what to think about chemistry, biology, medicine or other sciences, I -always- consult my nearest conservative columnist!!
I'm just waiting to for the "Politically Incorrect Guide to Math," where we can find out how the Liberal bias has forced us to accept clearly false (and more importantly, inconvenient) "facts". Like, a real Conservative will know that:
- Pi is really just 3. Not that 3.1415926... mumbo-jumbo. That's not even a number! You can write it down, so it's not real! 3 is a much simpler number to understand.
- Trigonometric "proofs" are just leftist indoctrination to the myth of scientific rigidity. A Conservative knows that the real proof is in the Bible.
- Spheres aren't actually round, like those liberals would have you believe.
- 0.999999... = 1 is impossible, despite what those Big-Government mathematicians would have you think
- a^n + b^n = c^n does have integer solutions for all n greater than 2, but the liberal media is just too lazy to go and find them.
- Calculus wasn't invented by either Newton or Leibnitz! It wasn't actually discovered until 1983, when Ronald Reagan was stacking his Jelly Bellies during a long Cabinet meeting, and came up with the notion of integration.
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/06 @ 02:32 AM — (Reply)
From the Washington Post article you cited:
Got that? "At best, inconclusive." At best...
To which, I'll just provide a link to the wikipedia article on "Scientific opinion on global warming" for full quotes and subsequent references for citations. Summation:
Gosh... that doesn't quite seem to jibe with the "at best, inconclusive" quote.
Zohnerisms are clearly not just the purview of the Left, your Rush Limbaugh-appelation of "eco-nazis" not withstanding. The Rightist, Bible-thumping money-grubbers are just as culpable of ignoring basic facts whenever it gets in the way of their doctrines, their chance to make money, or their need to avenge the failures of their daddy.
The over-simplification of nearly every debate down to a "Does So!/Does Not!" kind of argument leads to just this sort of idiocy. And yes, tied to that is the alarmist idiots unwilling or unable to find out information for themselves, to question what they've been told, but who prefer to sign whatever petition is placed in front of them, or pass on whatever political columnist's opinions they find most amenable to their own. Never stopping to come up with their own thoughts, their own analysis, their own opinions.
Global warming? Definitely a trend. Entirely caused by human interference? Almost sure not- natural factors still outweigh most human effects. Influenced by human interference? Strongly suggestive that this is so.
Can we predict what effects this will have in 100 years, 50 years, 20 years?? Heck- your local weatherman can't even tell you if it's going to rain tomorrow with 100% accuracy. Does that mean that meteorology is an empty science, and we ought to stop funding the NOAA? Hmm... maybe I shouldn't ask a conservative that. They'd probably prefer to watch the skies and pray for some indication of where the hurricane might go.
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/06 @ 03:36 AM — (Reply)
Have you read the book Harry?
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2007/09/09 @ 08:57 AM — (Reply)
Most Americans don't believe evolution to be true (source Carl Sagan) despite the fact that it's the only theory that's been taught in public schools and any objections or alternatives (creationism or not) are met with hostility
The very fact that any objections are not taught and any student that raises questions is shouted down would it seem any wonder that most people do not accept it?
The issue then becomes one of indoctrination vice education and smacks of zohnerism.
The rise of modern science would have been impossible without Christian presuppositions that the universe is rational because it was created by a rational God. Christians have nothing to gain from returning to a pre-scientific superstition, but Christianity has rightly critiqued instances where science has acted more like a religion.
If one wishes to place theif faith in science it's perfectly fine with me.
Pi is really just 3. Not that 3.1415926... mumbo-jumbo. That's not even a number! You can write it down, so it's not real! 3 is a much simpler number to understand.
- Trigonometric "proofs" are just leftist indoctrination to the myth of scientific rigidity. A Conservative knows that the real proof is in the Bible.
- Spheres aren't actually round, like those liberals would have you believe.
- 0.999999... = 1 is impossible, despite what those Big-Government mathematicians would have you think
- a^n + b^n = c^n does have integer solutions for all n greater than 2, but the liberal media is just too lazy to go and find them.
- Calculus wasn't invented by either Newton or Leibnitz! It wasn't actually discovered until 1983, when Ronald Reagan was stacking his Jelly Bellies during a long Cabinet meeting, and came up with the notion of integration
this is all a straw man as these issues are not in debate
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2007/09/09 @ 09:43 AM — (Reply)
I have read the book, Elmer, and I saved you the majority of my scorn, because I fault the author for sham methodology and flawed presentation.
Intelligent debate about "truth" and "science" are worthy of having. Even discussion about the indoctrination methodology of K-12 education is worthy having. But the "Politically Incorrect Guide" is nothing more than a shill for anyone looking to vindicate their otherwise irrational worldview, rather than investigate and uncover the unvarnished facts.
The harsher fact is that many folks are nearly incapable of viewing data with anything approaching an unbiased view. And perhaps I'm among that crowd... it'd be self-righteous to assert that mine is an unbiased viewpoint.
I'm curious how you can cite Sagan as a source, when he's been dead for several years. But regardless of that- most Americans couldn't explain Relativity, or perform the most basic linear algebra computations. Most Americans don't recognize the basic notion that Science is, by definition, always correcting itself, and that the process is never a smooth, consistent pattern. Personal egos are vested in explanations, and established notions are only supplanted or amended after meeting resistance from other "experts."
The modern scientific method arose from the Mu'tazili Islamic philosophy of reason and logic. Islamic scientists, al-Haytham above all, relied on patterns of observation, experimentation and interpretation into theory as opposed to the more typical pattern of interpreting what was observed in terms of pre-existing (and generally presumed to be superior) abstract theory. Note that this second pattern is more common in history, and is what restricted development of science in China and Europe until the Crusaders came into contact with the Islamic world.
Even the notion that the universe itself is rational, comes from ancient Greece (notably Plato and Aristotle) long before any "rational God" concept as you assert.
You know your history. You know that Christianity took western Europe from the Roman civilization to the depths of the Dark Ages. Christianity, like Islam and Judaism, sees a time-directional universe, one that may be predictable in many methods, but "rationality" is hardly parallel to the faith that also sees possession, witchcraft and miracles.
The effect that Christianity had to the scientific method was two-fold. The Crusaders brought back texts from the Islamic world, introducing concepts foreign to thinkers more accustomed to interpretting the world in terms of what the Bible (and therefore the TRUTH) and Aristotle told them. The Condemnation of 1277 then essentially pulled the rug of Aristotlean Authority out from the "learned community," forcing them to cease relying on a priori theory, since (Creationists not withstanding) not everything is explained in the Bible.
This is not to refute your belief and trust in Christianity, EB. Science and any of the "Peoples of the Book" need not be in opposition, for literacy and comprehension, prerequisites for science, is inherent in all three faiths. But dogmatism in Judaism, Christianity and Islam can just as easily abuse or inhibit science. We've seen it, historically, in the decline of the Islamic Golden Age, as religious adamantism killed off the birthplace of science.
A good teacher of science will encourage healthy scientific analysis, discussion and debate. Creationism vs. evolution is not such a debate, any more than flat earth vs. spherical is. And with the PIG to Science book, there are issues worth discussing in his chapters... but instead of inciting discussion, the author evidences minor (and often conflicting or erroneous) points and wrongly concludes that debate isn't worth having.
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/09 @ 02:36 PM — (Reply)
Christians underestimate the power of their position by not following the timeline all the way back. If God walked with Adam, they certainly weren't discussing superbowl scores. Has it ever occurred to anyone that mankind, through their own ill advised choices and wicked idolatry lost more information about the universe than we can even possibly conceive of now?
This would mean that scientific discoveries and intellectual rennaisance were part of the plan rather than contrary to it and that attempts to keep men ignorant and submissive through a suppression of his free will was a work adverse to God's design. Men were no more designed to be ignorant than they were to be heady and highminded drunkards intoxicated in the power of their own capacity for inspiration and scientific discovery.
This would mean that paganism, for example, was a perversion of Christianity instead of the contrary being true (in spite of what Dan Brown suggested). And it would mean, Michael, that humanism is man's rediscovery of what God already knew and taught our fathers - that each spirit quickened in his mother's womb has a moral compass which he can choose to heed or disregard.
You blame Christianity for the dark ages - I blame the abandonment of Christianity by power hungry authoritarians. You extoll the virtues of ancient civilizations and I remind you that they, even in their apostate condition, retained a better memory of Adamic teachings than Western Europeans laboring under the yoke of wicked men.
To take Christianity back only 2000 years would be to see the world hopelessly out of context.
Comment by Cate— 2007/09/09 @ 04:03 PM — (Reply)
With all due respect to you and your faith, but what can you possibly mean by "the gospel of a Messiah ... was preached 'from the beginning'"?
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/26 @ 12:29 PM — (Reply)
Many modern cultures embrace a messianic tradition and many ancient ones as well.
Ex: Saoshyant, Maitreya, Kalki, Mahdi, Mithra, etc...
Some may find it ironic that so much of the world has at one time or another embraced messianism. Some use this idea to undermine the credibility of individual belief systems. Instead, I find the prevalence of the idea in all of its various incarnations indicative rather than merely interesting.
Comment by Cate— 2007/09/26 @ 01:59 PM — (Reply)
Myself, I wouldn't use this point to undermine any particular belief structure. I do believe there is a deeper wisdom, an essential reality, that we are able to only glimpse a facet of at any given moment.
But that might be my humanistic relativism coming into play.
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/27 @ 05:23 AM — (Reply)
Oddly enough, even though 82% of US climate scientists refused to support the global warming theory then, liberal activists were already claiming a scientific consensus for Anthropogenic global warming. (It's hard to understand how 18 percent credence in any global warming translates into "consensus" support for human-caused global warming.)
The campaign to convince the public (and their elected representatives) that the "science is settled" began in 1988 or 1989, shortly after the left lost the Cold War. So possibly the new leftist issue became global warming (see Kyoto Protocol and emissions trading schemes).
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2007/09/09 @ 10:04 AM — (Reply)
It certainly does take an open mind to embrace such logic ;-)
Comment by Cate— 2007/09/09 @ 02:55 PM — (Reply)
Are you mocking the notion that our race is capable of affecting global consequences? Does a species only a million years from the trees might be able to affect changes on a global scale seem like an absurd idea to you? Perhaps you don't believe in toxic waste was behind Love Canal, that acid rain has anything to do with deforestation, that mercury levels are in anyway affecting our fisheries, or that nuclear fallout has anything to do with the situation near Chernobyl. If that's the case, then it'd be silly to think that something as innocuous as 25 billion tons of CO2 might affect our climate.
Or perhaps instead, you're making light of the notion that we've descended from the trees? Naturally the cattle-breeding, SUV-driving proves that we were divinely formed in God's image- is that what you mean? I suddenly have an image of God as a Texan... which would explain why He and George W. have such a close working relationship.
Allow me this simple point, Cate.
In 1783, after 5000+ years of efforts, humans "flew" for the first time.
It took 120 years from that point, for humans to fly in a craft that was heavier than air.
It took less that 60 years from then, for humans to breach outer space, and just 8 years later, we had put a human on the moon.
For 5000 years, nothing.
For 120 years, just balloons.
In less than a century, we reach a location that for most of our existence was simply unattainable.
Unless you're going to assert that the whole space project was a fake hoax (yes, I'm looking at you AZA), you have to acknowledge that as a species, we certainly can affect change quickly. Not bad for some curious monkeys.
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/26 @ 12:56 PM — (Reply)
I was making light of the fact that the far left embraces both the extreme of man's nothingness and the extreme of his godlike prowess at producing universe altering catastrophe.
Ex: The folks picketing slaughterhouses because we have no right to breed and kill our fellow animals (no human superiority) are marching right alongside the folks who think that my Denali is singlehandedly melting the polar ice caps.
Yawn.
I'm simply saying that there is a baffling dichotomy that many social leftists embrace. Personally, I believe in man's natural superiority. And in spite of your using science as the measuring stick, let's remember that even when science was in its infancy, rhetoric, art and morality were fundamental parts of humanity. I'm still waiting for the chimps in Africa (basking in that glorious energy source, the sun) to come down from the trees and pen Hammurabi's code.
Comment by Cate— 2007/09/26 @ 01:24 PM — (Reply)
The saying goes that if you give a million monkeys a million typewriters, eventually one will type out Hamlet. The Internet has proved them wrong. A billion monkeys typing out around the world have failed to produce anything yet so fundamental as Hammurabi's code.
You're asking too much from the chimps. ;)
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/27 @ 05:32 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/27 @ 05:32 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Ernie Els— 2007/09/09 @ 03:28 PM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/09 @ 04:48 PM — (Reply)
Comment by Ernie Els— 2007/09/09 @ 05:17 PM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/09 @ 06:43 PM — (Reply)
Comment by Barry G.— 2007/09/09 @ 07:03 PM — (Reply)
Does that make me at least an honest liberal?
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/26 @ 07:49 AM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/26 @ 08:41 AM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/09 @ 08:08 PM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/09 @ 08:11 PM — (Reply)
Comment by Cate— 2007/09/23 @ 04:33 AM — (Reply)
The public deserves to know how he was converted from an apparent believer in a coming ice age who had no worries about greenhouse gas emissions to a global warming fear monger.
Why is everyone such a moron when it comes to science??? The answer is blatantly obvious to anyone who spends a little moment reviewing planetary science from 1970 to present. The answer is: VENUS.
Planetary science is still an incredibly immature field, but back in 1971, we barely had a notion of what the Venutian atmosphere was. Thanks to a couple of satellites we smashed into the surface, we knew the ground was hot while the clouds were cool. We knew that carbon dioxide was a principle constituent, and we knew of the greenhouse effect, but the mechanism for the runaway behavior found on Venus hadn't really been developed- largely because the data we needed hadn't been accumulated until the Pioneer missions, missions that investigated Venus in 1978- 7 years before this "conversion."
A scientist who clung to an outdated model, when a better, more substantiated one was developed, is one who should be questioned. Calling out this guy for accepting actual evidence and superior models is beyond ridiculous. It demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of the scientific method, as well as an intentional ignorance of history.
May as well take quotes about computers from the 70's, and ask how so-called "experts" at the time could have let their politics affect their opinions.
Bad example, and really not worthy of you.
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/26 @ 07:44 AM — (Reply)
This is precisely the reason why people like me object to the codification of a body of facts as "science" rather than the teaching of a practical, albeit limited, methodology of discovery.
You want to lambast me for suggesting someone be held to account for fear mongering 30 years ago when the science wasn't available then to counter his presumptions. Tell me, Michale, what will we learn scientifically in the next 30 years to prove the human impact on global warming was negligible?
Scientists (and the politicians who use them) want us to respect their predictions as if they were oracles in Delphi but hindsight proves the folly of such a course.
Comment by Cate— 2007/09/26 @ 02:07 PM — (Reply)
I agree that science is best when taught as a tool for investigation, but as a practical measure, some assumptions have to made at elementary levels of education, simply in order to develop a foundation. We learn in elementary education that the Declaration of Independence was signed on the 4th of July. That's not the full story, of course, but it suffices until we're old enough to go back and learn that the complete story is much more complex. Just so, in elementary education, we learn that gravity keeps us from floating away. It isn't until later, in high school and college, that we learn the full story... what was commonly thought before Newton, how he came about to his investigations, even deriving out the equation F=mmG/d^2 for one's self.
And even THAT'S not the full story, as we go on to learn in college. We get around to General relativity, and partial differential equations, space-time curvature... and we learn that even THAT'S not the full story... indeed, we don't have the full story yet. The model is incomplete, satisfying on many levels, but still not yet a unified model.
It's the methodology that's learned- to question what is given to us as fact, and to take quantifiable steps to ask those questions.
The Earth is round. Is that "truth"? No. It is a model, based on evidence, refined through Occam's razor. If you want a model where the Earth is flat and a square (to go with the Biblical "four corners" line), you're free to have that as a personal truth, but in practical terms, the formulas you need to force the universe to fit into that model are ridiculously complex.
Perhaps in 30 years, someone will uncover an underlying solution that actually makes the Flat Earth model a more elegant solution than our archaic Round Earth model. I won't rule out the possibility. I consider it unlikely, but strange things happen all the time in science.
Until then, though, I don't have any major problems with all the globes sold to students, spreading the "THEORY" of a Round Earth, as if it were some "fact"; and not presenting on an equal footing, the Flat Earthist ideas as somehow 'scientific.'
Comment by Michael— 2007/09/27 @ 06:02 AM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/09/26 @ 08:37 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Cate— 2007/10/09 @ 10:49 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Cate— 2007/10/15 @ 07:54 AM — (Reply)
Comment by aza spade— 2007/10/15 @ 08:09 AM — (Reply)
Love the blog Sweetie.
And I was even enjoying most of the tongue-in-cheek comments...
Ah well, suffice to say I love the blog.
XOXO
Anne
Comment by Anna~Anna— 2008/04/18 @ 02:57 AM — (Reply)
Comment by riffran— 2008/04/18 @ 03:49 AM — (Reply)
The passage saying the earth is round is Isaiah 40:22:
He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in.
The four corners bit you're referring to Michael is in Revelation...
After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth, so that no wind would blow on the earth or on the sea or on any tree.
One should use the correct hermeneutics when interpreting this text. Revelation often uses symbols and metaphors...the four corners are in most commentaries refer to east, west, north and south.
and besides this scripture hasn't been used to justify the earth being flat.
no one in the right theological mind ever thought the Bible said that the earth was flat. The flat earth bit that medieval scientists and theologians was concocted in the 19th century by Wathington Irving's fictional account of Christopher Columbus and by the likes of Draper and White.
It's an ad hominem accusation and term of derision against someone who casts doubt on a particular scientific theory.
"The almost universal supposition that educated people believed the earth to be flat puzzled me and struck me as dissonant when I was in elementary school, but I assumed that teachers knew best and shelved my doubts. By the time my children were in elementary schoo, they were learning the same mistake, and by that time I knew it was a falsehood. Most of the undergraduates I have taught at the University of California have received the same misinformation - from schoolbooks, storybooks, cinema, and television. The Flat Earth Error is firmly fixed in our minds."
Jeffrey Burton Russell, Inventing the Flat Earth; Westport CT: Praeger, 1991 xiii. Emeritus professor of history at University of California
In the first fifteen centuries of the Christian era only five writers seem to have denied the globe, and few others were ambiguous and uninterested in the question. But nearly unanimous scholarly opinion pronounced the earth spherical, and by the fifteenth century all doubt had disappeared. There was no 'Great Interruption' in this era. (from the same book)
even C.S. Lewis an expert in Renaissance literature wrote that "physically considered, the earth is a globe; all the authors of the high Middle Ages are agreed on this...The implications of a spherical earth were fully grasped.
None of the great eighteenth-century anticlerical rationalists (Condillac, Condorcet, Diderot, Gibbon, Hume or our own Benjamin Franklin) accused the scholatics of believing in the flat earth.
The earliest promoter of the myth was Washington Irving who wrote the fictitious History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus by fantasizing a confrontation at the university in Salamanca in 1491. The true flat earthers were nineteenth century Americans. John William Draper who wrote History of the Conflict between Religion and Science published in 1874 and Dickson White's tract The Warfare of Science. Draper used his thesis to illustrate that the Catholic Church was antagonistic to learning.
Draper's book became very popular and it fixed in the educated the mindset that science stood for freedom and progress against the superstition and repression of 'religion'. His viewpoint became conventional wisdom.
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2008/04/18 @ 09:42 AM — (Reply)
Comment by jim— 2008/04/18 @ 06:19 PM — (Reply)
Thanks for the historical overview, one that I actually was familiar with. I did not cite the example intended an ad hominem attack, for despite the parenthetic comment about Biblical line, I did not mean to imply that flat earthers and creationists (or ID'ers if you prefer) are equivalent.
Instead, I intended to cite the distinction between "truth," which I view as a philosophical question, versus "science," which I view as one of several varying (and sometimes competing) efforts at explaining the world about us.
Contrary to many realists in the scientific camp, I do not hold that round world vs. flat earth, is a question of which is the real truth. You may replace that model with geocentric vs. heliocentric models of the solar system, or atomism vs. infinite divisibility. It is not the role of science, in my opinion, to assert what the TRUTH of the question may be, but rather what model is the easiest to use.
Science is a model, one that by its very nature is constantly evolving and changing. Observing that a scientist has changed their opinion over time (as Cate did) is something that should be praised, not ridiculed (again, as Cate did), because intransigence in science voids its very purpose.
The truth may well be that the Earth sits on the back of a giant turtle, which in turn rests on the back of a smaller turtle, which ... and turtles all the way down. But that model proves to be exceedingly challenging to work with if you want to launch a communications satellite into orbit. The truth may be that on the seventh day, God took a day off, but that model does make analysis of differentiation amongst taxa a moot point.
In short, I agreed with Cate that the elevation of science to omniscience is misplaced and misguided. Science is incomplete, and the one thing all the greatest scientists had in common is that they were wrong, at least in some aspect. It's the worst kind of science (if it can even be called science) that admits no error. But that makes a great religion.
Besides... the only absolute and universal truth lies in mathematics, though this is small solace, for as Einstein said: "As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."
Comment by Michael— 2008/04/21 @ 07:36 AM — (Reply)
Ridiculing scientists for changing their minds (as I did) is not ludicrous when their faulty models are used for government policy and taught as fact to our children.
An example - very recently there was an article about scientists being "shocked" by the discovery that the earliest link on their evolutionary chain was much more complex than previously thought. If this scientific model was presented as a theory - a fluid, as yet unverified, estimation - why would scientists be SHOCKED to discover their guess was off? They had already accepted as fact information that was false, thus they were surpised.
When science is presented as a method rather than a group of facts, which it rarely is, you and I will have much less to disagree upon. Although, we'll still be dealing with the persistent Al Gores who demand we jump through hoops for whatever di-hyd-mon-ox theory gets the most scare points.
Democrats are using global warming in the same way they used social security. "Vote for us or your future is in jeopardy!!!" Ironically, some evidence predicts a coming ice age rather than global warming, but hey, the public is already snookered and politicians are already making the most of it, wouldn't want to look at data that refutes the cause. So long as the eco-nazis out shout everyone esle and the politicians validate their causes, we'll watch our tax dollars go toward reducing SUV and cow emissions, won't we?
We could go a lot cleaner if the "greenies" weren't wetting themselves over the prospect of nuclear power... another battle lost because of Americans' inability to understand probabilities.
Comment by Cate— 2008/04/21 @ 11:03 AM — (Reply)
Scientists are frequently "shocked" by their discoveries- that itself vindicates the scientific method, for while there are always underlying assumptions, the methodology properly applied seeks to minimize, if not completely remove, a priori bias. Who has ever read about relativity or quantum physics for the first time without being shocked or surprised?
Incomplete models are only faulty to the extent that it represents the best understanding of science at that time and place. That doesn't mean that they should be refuted out of hand simply because they may, at some future point, be refuted or amended. But I do agree that they have to be accepted provisionally and with a healthy dose of skepticism, and ought to be included as just one element of political policy, balanced against economic and social impacts as well.
We agree about nuclear power. Disposal of nuclear waste has been, and will continue to be, a concern that should not be overlooked lightly.
As for the inability of Americans to understand probability... Could Las Vegas or the lottery exist otherwise? The problem runs deeper than just bad math, though, I fear.
Comment by Michael— 2008/04/22 @ 07:35 AM — (Reply)
Neither should they form the underpinnings of policy or a substantial part of the miseducation of our children.
Comment by Cate— 2008/04/22 @ 08:54 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2008/04/21 @ 09:26 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Michael— 2008/04/21 @ 10:27 AM — (Reply)
an ancient or old earth creationist was the predominant theory among creationists prior to the 20th century and should not be confused with theistic evolution
I'm still learning but I think it's possible that God could have created in fiats with an indeterminable amount of time between 'days'
Most of my objection to evolution like you is not based on whether it can be believed as truth
Most of my objection lies in the fact that any objection is not allowed and in my mind then makes it a 'religion'
(btw I would not support 'creation scienc'/intelligent design be taught in public schools but
one of the few places I know of where both evolution and ID/creationism is being taught with objections to both is in Christian colleges
Today, just because both Old Earth and Young Earth Creationists believe in special creationism, it should not be assumed that they are really allies. In fact, Old Earth Creationists can be highly critical of Young Earth Creationists, especially when it comes to their impact on science education in the United States through their efforts to suppress the teaching of evolution in schools.
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2008/04/21 @ 11:05 AM — (Reply)
I think those who believe God created the earth and humanity in 168 hours are reading the Bible way too literally. I think each "day" represents a creative period and they may not have even been equal in time (as we reckon it) and I think that science (once we have the correct model) will support this.
Dinesh D'Souza has a column relevant to this discussion that you might find interesting.
Comment by Cate— 2008/04/21 @ 03:56 PM — (Reply)
But these are essentially tautologies, well worth debating or discussing in philosophy courses. But they are largely outside the scope of scientific inquiry, since by their nature they not falsifiable.
ID'ers strut proudly when they can stump a scientist on something that hasn't been understood yet. Whoopie-ding! That merely proves that what they spew ISN'T science. Abiogenesis, intelligence, quantum gravity, aging, cancer, the unidirectional nature of time, the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, homochirality, language, baryon assymetry, Feynmanium, superconductivity. All acknowledged points that science has made, at best, limited progress in.
Heck, scientists haven't figured out fully how water works its hydrogen bonding! The most common chemical substance to be working with, and there's still much left to learn.
Comment by Michael— 2008/04/22 @ 08:28 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2008/04/22 @ 08:57 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Michael— 2008/04/22 @ 09:22 AM — (Reply)
Comment by Elmers Brother— 2008/04/22 @ 02:09 PM — (Reply)