Astronomy is observational, physics is experimental and so it was more
Galileo than anyone else. I have published papers on the Big Bang but I
must say I do not know how all came into being. I am more at easy with
experimental science rather than forensic science. Delbruck and
Schrodinger paved the way for the double helix, which is fundamental to
making biology more like physics. Moorad
-----Original Message-----
From: george murphy <gmurphy@raex.com>
To: Moorad Alexanian <alexanian@uncwil.edu>
Cc: Jonathan Clarke <jdac@alphalink.com.au>; asa@calvin.edu <asa@calvin.edu>
Date: Thursday, April 05, 2001 11:02 AM
Subject: Re: preposterous
>Moorad Alexanian wrote:
>
>> I have always said that physics is the prototype of science and I do not
>> know of any reasonable argument against that. The proof of that is the
>> historical order in which the different sciences achieved maturity.
Imagine
>> biology, historical biology, etc. without the experimental scientific
method
>> developed by the likes of Kepler, Newton, Galileo, etc. By knowing what
>> science is, then we are in a position to know what it is not. For
instance,
>> it is self-evident to me that the fundamental question of origins is not
a
>> scientific question, the answer lies outside of science. It is foolish to
>> attempt to find a theory for it. I never said that other sciences
cannot
>> teach physicists something new. But it is true that the people who did
big
>> things in biology were physicists, viz., Schrodinger, Delbruck, etc.
>
> 1) Your historical argument is problematic. It is really
astronomy
>which came first as a science
>able to give any really precise predictions. That gave a great deal of
stimulus
>to physics, which has now of course pretty much subsumed astronomy. But
without
>Copernicus & Kepler, Newton would have had a lot tougher time of it.
> 2) What is "the fundamental question of origins"? If it's really
>fundamental - i.e., Why is there something rather than nothing? - then it's
>indeed beyond science. But is the origin of a star or of planetary systems
>outside astrophysics? Doesn't standard big bang theory do a pretty good
job of
>explaining the origin of light nuclei? Darwin & Wallace's theory may not
be
>able to explain the origin of species with the kind of precision that we
have in
>predicting ~25% He-4 but that doesn't mean that it says nothing at all.
> 3) You've been pretty selective in listing "the people who did big
>things in biology", leaving out a few minor players like Mendel, Darwin,
>Wallace, Morgan, &c. Of course if "did big things" means "bringing the
insides
>of physics to biology" then your statement is tautologous.
>
>Shalom,
>
>George
>
>George L. Murphy
>http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
>"The Science-Theology Interface"
>
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