Re: [asa] historical versus experimental sciences

Sure, there's a difference between research that aims at testing & possibly
broadening the range of a theory and research that is directed toward
applications. I thought the question though was not about that distinction
about about one between "historical" & "expoerimental" science.

I appreciate your 1st sentence in which you grant that evolutionary theory
is correct. This is the first time I recall you making a clear statement to
that effect.

Shalom
George
http://home.roadrunner.com/~scitheologyglm

----- Original Message -----
From: "Alexanian, Moorad" <alexanian@uncw.edu>
To: "George Murphy" <GMURPHY10@neo.rr.com>; "Dennis Venema"
<Dennis.Venema@twu.ca>; "Cameron Wybrow" <wybrowc@sympatico.ca>; "asa"
<asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 10:19 PM
Subject: RE: [asa] historical versus experimental sciences

> George,
>
> I grant you that evolutionary theory has been proven correct. Then, why do
> any further experiments? You know that in physics we do experiments to
> falsify theory and thus advance knowledge. Is that what we are doing with
> the fruit flies? Is that the intent of such experiments? People interested
> in applications in medicine and so on make sense of the data by the
> usefulness of the data for medical purposes. Their interest is not in
> using their results to fit it into the general scheme of a theory. For
> instance, there are those doing research in quantum optics to investigate
> fundamental questions in quantum mechanics and others that direct their
> research for practical applications. This is common in science.
>
> Moorad
> ________________________________________
> From: George Murphy [GMURPHY10@neo.rr.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 7:40 PM
> To: Alexanian, Moorad; Dennis Venema; Cameron Wybrow; asa
> Subject: Re: [asa] historical versus experimental sciences
>
> Without the "historical science" the fact that different organisms "use
> many
> of the same proteins ... for the same tasks" would be just a brute fact
> with
> no underlying rationale & therefore would provide a questionable basis for
> the type of research Dennis describes. It's the fact that those proteins
> are "inherited through common descent" that allows scientists to make
> sense
> of the data.
>
> Moorad, your pattern here has been to take a brief shot like the one below
> &
> then not respond when someone points out its weakness. It would be more
> helpful if you'd engage in a real discussion of your sharp "experimental"
> vs. "historical" science distinction. Of course doing that would open the
> possibility that you might eventually see that your position isn't really
> defensible.
>
> Shalom
> George
> http://home.roadrunner.com/~scitheologyglm
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Alexanian, Moorad" <alexanian@uncw.edu>
> To: "Dennis Venema" <Dennis.Venema@twu.ca>; "Cameron Wybrow"
> <wybrowc@sympatico.ca>; "asa" <asa@calvin.edu>
> Sent: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 3:39 PM
> Subject: RE: [asa] historical versus experimental sciences
>
>
>> Isn’t this work on fruit flies actually experimental rather than”
>> historical”?
>> Moorad
>> ________________________________
>> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On Behalf
>> Of
>> Dennis Venema [Dennis.Venema@twu.ca]
>> Sent: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 3:15 PM
>> To: Cameron Wybrow; asa
>> Subject: 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<UrlBlockedError.aspx>> 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<UrlBlockedError.aspx>>
>> To: "asa" <asa@calvin.edu<UrlBlockedError.aspx>>
>> 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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>>>
>>
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Received on Wed Jul 29 22:39:15 2009