Re: Evolution is alive and well
George Murphy (gmurphy@raex.com)
Tue, 20 Oct 1998 07:11:15 -0400
Tim Ikeda wrote:
>
> I wrote:
> >> Essentially, I don't feel the case has yet been made by Moorad that
> >> "evolution is unfalsifiable." That was the original claim that
> >> triggered many of these posts. .....................................
>
> George writes:
> > Whatever one may say about the falsifiability of evolutionary theory,
> > "special creation" seems to me _less_ falsifiable from a scientific
> standpoint.
> [...]
>
> Yeah, that's pretty much a given. What I do not accept is a claim that
> evolution and special creation are equivalent from the standpoint of
> explanation and potential verification.
>
> This is not to say that _some_ versions of creationism are not subject
> to falsification; the YEC position about the age of the earth being one
> example.
But again, whether or not young earth views have been falsified depends in part
on what you consider plausible. One can always appeal to "apparent age, aka
Russell's paradox. Bertrand Russell, certainly no friend of creationism, argued that
there's no way you could prove scientifically or logical that the earth didn't come into
being 15 minutes ago with all evidence, memories &c consistent with that. I think that
there's a fundamental _theological_ problem with the apparent age notion, but it can't
be refuted by strictly scientific arguments. (Of course most scientists who don't care
about theology would just roll their eyes and ignore the suggestion.)
George L. Murphy
gmurphy@raex.com
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/