Re: [asa] historical versus experimental sciences

Cameron,

Evolutionary biology is essential for many aspects of modern biology: for example developmental biology / medical research on model organisms. The reason that model organisms (such as fruit flies and nematodes, and even bacteria) are useful for medical biology is because they use many of the same proteins inherited through common descent for the same tasks. For example, insulin signaling in fruit flies is very similar to the same process in humans. Using sequence data from flies (and closer relatives such as mice) allows one to predict structural properties of the various proteins and test those hypotheses on the model organism in question. Evolutionary biology is essential for this type of work. Please stop misrepresenting modern biology - it is clear that you do not understand what you are criticizing. That's not intended to be harsh, just forthright.

Best,

Dennis

On 29/07/09 11:56 AM, "Cameron Wybrow" <wybrowc@sympatico.ca> wrote:

David, I have strong reasons for sympathizing with out-of-work academics.
But I did not realize there were any on the Darwinian side. I thought they
were all on the ID side. :-)

I continue to maintain that if it could suddenly be proved that there were
no such things as atoms -- not just that we cannot fully comprehend the
nature of the atom, or that atoms have some as yet unaccounted-for property,
but that there are literally no such entities as atoms (composed of protons,
neutrons, electrons, having mass, etc.) -- almost all theoretical work in
modern science would be brought to a standstill. Industrial machines could
still
be operated by routine and habit, and would still keep generating
electricity and widgets and peanut butter if fed the same mathematical
formulas, but no new science (as opposed to mere technique) would be
possible until some conception were found that could fill the place of
"atoms" in physics, chemistry, biology, etc. It would be as if someone were
to appear in the 13th century and prove to physicians that there was no such
thing as the four humours. All the medical books would have to be thrown
out, and the physicians would not know where to begin to look for a
replacement for their foundational doctrine. They might still be able to
carry on with bleeding and purging their patients, and hacking off
gangrenous limbs, as usual; but medical schools would have to cancel all
theory courses and offer only practicums.

On the other hand, if the Darwinian mechanism were entirely falsified, most
of embryology, genetics, etc. would remain intact, not just in practice but
even in theory. We don't have to know where chimp DNA came from in order to
understand how it codes for proteins. We don't have to know whether or not
ontology recapitulates phylogeny to investigate the detailed stages of the
embryological process in a chicken, its biochemical triggers, etc. We don't
have to be able to reconstruct the ecology of the Precambrian oceans in
order to generate elaborate mathematical models of the food chains affecting
the Atlantic cod fishery.

I am not saying that Darwinian theory should cease to be studied merely
because it is (mostly) useless. I think it is good for scientists to study
nature purely for the love of knowledge. It does me no good to know that
the elements on earth were formed in the hearts of extinct stars, but I find
it fascinating and worth knowing nonetheless. But it is important for
everyone to know that, despite the bluster of Darwinists, Darwinian theory
is not the backbone of biology *in the same sense* that atomic theory is the
backbone of much of modern science. Darwinian theory, rather, is the main
interpretive gloss put on the results of the various indepdendent
subsciences of modern biology. Most of those subsciences (paleontology and
evolutionary biology obviously being the two main exceptions) could live
without it.

This is especially true in an age where biology is increasingly becoming
interpreted in terms of biochemistry. Biochemistry is an intrinsically
a-historical science. It deals with eternal geometrical and physical truths
about the structure and function of molecules, not with historical
reconstructions. There is of course nothing wrong with scientists trying to
make historical reconstructions, but there is no reason whatever why some
scientists should be able to impose their historical reconstructions upon
others, who do not need them to do their work.

Cameron.

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Campbell" <pleuronaia@gmail.com>
To: "asa" <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, July 28, 2009 6:10 PM
Subject: Re: [asa] historical versus experimental sciences

> Regarding the general acceptance of historical science, YEC and ID
> advocates are generally quite ready to accept historical science
> assertions from YEC or ID sources, respectively; the problem is more
> one of not applying the same standards for accepting historical
> science that doesn't match up with what they want to hear. ID has not
> produced any 500 page books detailing exactly when and how God has
> intervened in the course of evolution, but that does not invalidate ID
> in my opinion.
>
>> The point is that in science what is "boss" is not the historical
>> reconstruction but the empirical data, and that all historical
>> reconstructions must fall in line with the (verified) empirical data.
>> "Cooking" the data, or even just ignoring it, to sustain a favoured
>> historical reconstruction, is out of line. This applies equally to
>> sacrosanct theories like the Big Bang -- which at one time was sneered at
>> by the majority of advanced theoretical physicists -- and
>> macroevolutionary theory. <
>
> Very true. However, there's a huge loophole in that we must decide
> the difference between data and noise. One odd result is not enough
> reason to reject a generally very well-supported model, though it may
> be worth checking out the odd result to see what's up. For example,
> there were the reports of seasonal variation in radiometric decay
> getting a bit of publicity within the past year or so (I think Science
> News had it.) Given how much work has been done on nuclear decay, and
> the number of ways in which seasonal changes in weather and in human
> behavior might subtly affect the sensors (cf. high water use at class
> change affecting some lab equipment in the same building), not to
> mention the failure to report the obvious control experiment of
> simultaneously monitoring apparent background radioactivity with no
> sample, I'm not going to take the claims too seriously.
> Unfortunately, there's a lot of cooking or ignoring data in YEC and ID
> arguments about the past, and a lot of work cleaning that up is needed
> on the part of serious ID advocates.
>
>> The point Dr. Skell -- one of America's elite scientists -- is making, is
>> not that Darwinian theorizing cannot serve as an overarching theory, or
>> even
>> that Darwinian theory is false. Rather, it is that Darwinian theorizing
>> has
>> been of little practical use in the major biological breakthroughs, that
>> it
>> is largely an 'after the fact' gloss on empirical discoveries.
>
> Rather, it provides a framework for making sense of the empirical
> discoveries. Evolutionary models help us know where to look for
> something and how to understand it, but they generally give more than
> one possibility for a specific situation.
>
>> This is very odd for a scientific theory. In atomic theory, nuclear
>> theory,
>> electromagnetic theory, wave theory, etc. the theoretical perspective has
>> generated massive amounts of new data, countless confirmed or at least
>> viable explanations for what actually happens in nature, countless
>> technological applications, etc.
>
> Check on the volume of data generated by evolutionary studies. It's
> not small. Evolution provides a viable explanation for what actually
> happens in nature. Historically, the applications tended to be more
> agricultural than technological, but the advent of biotech has changed
> that.
>
>> The task of sequencing the vast majority of genomes still lies before us,
>> and can be
>> accomplished by well-trained technicians who believe the earth was
>> created in six days.
>
> But they won't be able to make sense of the data, nor will they be
> able to predict which genomes will be most informative, without
> evolutionary considerations. (E.g., we need better sampling of
> invertebrate genomes, especially lophotrochozoans, to understand
> animals generally, not to mention the usefulness of this for my work
> on mollusks.)
>
>> The mysteries of embryology will continue to be probed via microscopes,
>> inter-uterine cameras, biochemistry, etc., and will continue to be
>> uncovered, no matter what the fate of Darwin's theory.<
>
> Again, evolution lets us make sense of the patterns observed in
> embryology.
>
>> If Darwinism were to fall, only Coyne and Dawkins and Orr and Eugenie
>> Scott and their ilk -- the small number of biologists and anthropologists
>> whose scientific activity depends entirely on the truth of Darwinian
>> theory -- would be out of work. <
>
> This would be true of any theory. In reality even those folks when
> they're doing science are trying to generate data on empirical
> reality, which would be relevant even if some significant modification
> of current evolutionary models seemed necessary.
>
>> The same could *not* be said of atomic theory, electromagnetic theory,
>> the theory of stresses in materials, aerodynamic theory, etc. A
>> refutation of any of these would bring vast areas of physics, chemistry
>> and engineering to a complete standstill.<
>
> No. Whether for evolution or any of these, a new model would have to
> explain the successes as well as the failures of the previous model.
> If a major flaw were found in aerodynamic theory, airplanes would not
> immediately fall out of the sky. The existing work would be gone
> through to integrate it with the new results.
>
>> Biology is unique among the natural sciences in that the theory it
>> claims as its most vital and overarching conception is virtually
>> irrelevant for further advances in most branches of the science.<
>
> Biology and geology have a much larger component of empirical data
> generation relative to physics or chemistry-not that all four do not
> have a lot of both empirical data and theoretical modeling, but that
> the relative proportions differ. Anyone dealing primarily with
> empirical work is not going to be as directly affected by changes in
> the overall theory.
>
> Just as electroweak theory is probably not what I need in trying to
> build a simple circuit, you don't need evolution to answer "how does
> the human body work", which probably constitutes the majority of
> biological investigation. However, you do need evolution to address
> "why does it work this way and not that way?" or "why is it similar to
> other organisms to varying degrees?" or "where did this function come
> from and what might be unexpected side effects from messing with it?"
>
> (NB-Given that a) my research interest is pretty much in the field of
> evolution and b) jobs and funding for basic research in the field are
> scarce, I am somewhat disgruntled with regard to this topic.)
>
>
> --
> Dr. David Campbell
> 425 Scientific Collections
> University of Alabama
> "I think of my happy condition, surrounded by acres of clams"
>
>
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Received on Wed Jul 29 15:13:36 2009