Reflectorites
On Sun, 18 Jun 2000 12:22:22 EDT, Huxter4441@aol.com wrote:
>BV>Denton, Nelson and Wells are scientists...
[...]
HX>I'd say Bert needs to drop her hero-worship for a bit.
>
>Wells has a total of THREE publications in which actual original research is
>presented related to biology.
>
>3 publications may a scientist make... in the creationist community, anyway.
>I had 3 publications as a 3rd year grad student.
This may be Huxter's private definition of a "scientist" (i.e. 1. more than 3
publications; 2. more publications than Huxter as a grad student) but it is
not the public, dictionary definition of scientist:
------------------------------------------------------------
http://m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=scientist
Main Entry: scientist
Pronunciation: 'sI-&n-tist
Function: noun
Etymology: Latin scientia
Date: 1834
1 : a person learned in science and especially natural science :
a scientific investigator
------------------------------------------------------------
Just counting the number of publications that scientists make says nothing
about the *value* of those publications. In fact there have been scandals
where professors have inflated the number of their publications by
appending their name to their grad. students' papers.
I would have thought anyone these days who attained at least basic science
qualification (e.g. BSc or equivalent from an accredited university) would
be entitled to be regarded as a scientist.
How many papers they had published is arbitrary and might be relevant for
determining how *active* they are as a scientist, but they would have had
to be scientists in the first place for even one paper to be published.
Wells has, I understand, a Ph.D in Developmental Biology from Berkeley
University.
BTW, the ARN website mentions a paper that Wells recently had published
on the Peppered Moth in The Scientist:
------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.arn.org/wells/jwhome.htm
[...]
Second Thoughts about Peppered Moths File Date: 11.08.99. Published in
The Scientist, May 1999 [The Scientist - Second Thoughts about Peppered
Moths May. 24, 1999 - http://www.the-scientist.com/yr1999/may/opin_990524.html]
Every student of biological evolution learns about peppered moths. This
species has become the classical story of evolution by natural selection.
The same careful scientific approach which established the classical story
in the first place, however, has now revealed major flaws in it. It is time to
take another look.
[...]
------------------------------------------------------------
I would be interested in details of what papers Huxter has published,
and in what field.
HX>Nelson is definitely not a scientist. He has done no original scientific
>research at all.
>
>From the ARN site:
>Paul A. Nelson received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago Department
>of Philosophy.
>He has no scientific publications.
Huxter leaves out what else the ARN site says about Paul Nelson:
------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.arn.org/nelson/pnhome.htm
[...]
Paul A. Nelson received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago
Department of Philosophy. His thesis critiques aspects of
macroevolutionary theory in light of recent developments in
embryology and developmental biology. Entitled On Common Descent,
it will be published in the University of Chicago Department of
Ecology and Evolution's "Evolutionary Monographs" series (and the
first in this prestigious series to critique neo-Darwinism). He
is currently collaborating with Stephen Meyer and William Dembski
on a book formulating a scientific theory of biological design. He
has written several articles on the philosophical aspects of
evolutionary biology including one recently published in Biology
and Philosophy. He edits the journal Origins & Design
[...]
------------------------------------------------------------
Since Nelson is "a person learned in science and especially natural science"
he would qualify as a "scientist" by the above dictionary definition.
He would certainly know more about science in general, and evolution in
particular, than most of those that Huxter would call scientists. In fact he
would probably know a lot more about evolutionary biology than Huxter
himself!
HX>Please do not drag down the profession by calling op-ed writers and
>propagandists 'scientists'....
See above on Wells' and Nelson's qualifications. It would be interesting to
compare Huxter's.
In any event, I would have thought that what would "drag down the
profession" of science in the eyes of the general public is the sort of
prejudice that Huxter and his ilk regularly display!
In the end a scientist is not so much about what qualifications they have, or
how many papers they have published, but their *attitude*:
"Popper's logic implies that a theory's scientific status depends less upon its
subject matter than upon the attitude of its adherents towards criticism. A
physicist or a biologist may be dogmatic or evasive, and therefore
unscientific in method, while a historian or literary critic may state the
implications of a thesis so plainly that refuting examples are invited.
Scientific methodology exists wherever theories are subjected to rigorous
empirical testing, and it is absent wherever the practice is to protect a
theory rather than to test it." (Johnson P.E., "Darwin on Trial", 1993, p.150)
Many scientists defending evolution these days resemble *priests* in their
attitude, seeing their role as defending the `sacred deposit', from the
challenges of `unbelievers', by attempting to discredit those `unbelievers' so
the `faithful' don't have to be troubled listening to what they say.
On Sun, 25 Jun 2000 10:28:02 EDT, Huxter4441@aol.com wrote:
Re: The Wedge of Truth : Splitting the Foundations of Naturalism
AR><************** Some of the men associated with Dr. Johnson are world class
>>scientists. He has not only learned from them but has read voluminously
>>himself from the evolutionary material. What CC is really saying is that he
>>does not like what Dr. Johnson has learned, and disagrees with his
>>conclusions. In CC's mind this then makes Dr. Johnson (take your pick or
>>choose all...) stupid, ignorant, deceitful, deceived.
HX>Of course, Johnson is not a 'Dr.' , either.....
Huxter again needs to check his facts. The Berkely University faculty page
for Johnson below lists him as having a "J.D., University of Chicago" The
Webster's online dictionary defines "JD" "juris doctor, doctor of
jurisprudence, doctor of law; [New Latin jurum doctor] doctor of laws ..."
(http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=JD):
========================================================================
http://www.law.berkeley.edu/faculty/profiles/pej
Phillip E. Johnson
Jefferson E. Peyser Professor of Law
Office: 434 North
Tel: 510-642-5370
Fax: 510-643-2673
Secretary: Florence McKnight
E-mail: johnsonp@law.berkeley.edu
After law school, Professor Johnson clerked for Chief Justice Roger
Traynor of the California Supreme Court and Chief Justice Earl Warren of
the U.S. Supreme Court. He joined the Boalt faculty in 1967.
Professor Johnson has served as deputy district attorney while on leave
from his teaching duties and has held visiting professorships at Emory
University and at University College, London.
He is the author of two books on evolution and naturalistic philosophy for
the general reader: Darwin on Trial (2nd ed., Intervarsity Press, 1993) and
Reason in the Balance (Intervarsity Press, 1995). He frequently lectures
and writes on subjects relating to science, philosophy and religion.
Education:
A.B., Harvard University
J.D., University of Chicago
========================================================================
Steve
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"Darwinian evolution, by natural selection, predicts that organisms are as
they are because all their genes have been and are being subjected to
selection, those that reduce the organism's success being eliminated, and
those that enhance it being favoured. This is a scientific theory, for these
predictions can be tested. 'Non-Darwinian' or random evolution predicts
that some features of organisms are non-adaptive, having neutral or slightly
negative survival value, and that the genes controlling such features are
fluctuating randomly in the population, or have been fixed because at some
time in the past the population went through a bottleneck, when it was
greatly reduced. When these two theories are combined, as a general
explanation of evolutionary change, that general theory is no longer
testable. Take natural selection: no matter how many cases fail to yield to a
natural selection analysis, the theory is not threatened, for it can always be
said that these failures of selection theory are explained by genetic drift.
And no matter how many supposed examples of genetic drift are shown to
be due, after all, to natural selection, the neutral theory is not threatened,
for it never pretended to explain all evolution." (Patterson C., "Evolution",
British Museum (Natural History): London, 1978, p.70)
Stephen E. Jones | sejones@iinet.net.au | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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