berger@aecom.UUCP (Mitchell Berger) (06/04/85)
I thought I'd get you to read this article this way. The
truth is, you're never going to find any. Creationism is a
religious belief, not a scientific one. It does not oblige
itself to be provable. Evolution does lay claims to being a
science. It must stand up to proof. What does evolution gain
from this obligation? Universality. If evolution is ever
conclusively proven (It's inconclusiveness will be discussed
later.) - every sane human would be forced to agree with it.
The question is, can it ever be conclusively proven?
(Aside from the "G-d is just kidding claim".) Probably not. Not
unless we develop time machines. A scientific theory must stand
up to experimentation and observation, something the past can't
do. We may be able to say that evolution is a good model for
making predictions about what geologists will find, which is not
really the same thing. I guess you can say that the whole matter
isn't really under the realm of science. You can duplicate
evolution, and still not prove that it is what really what had
happened. The past is dead. The scientific method can't prove
if evolution _did_ happen, only that it _could_. There is a
difference between a theory for predicting geological finds, and
a law of nature.
You're probably asking me what _is_ the difference. That
goes back to the "G-d's just kidding" idea. Notice that this
claim can be made only about evolution, of all of the presently
debated theories out. (Of course it is also the only theory that
requires such a response.) You don't here anyone saying that the
world is really deterministic, G-d is just making it look like
it's probabilistic. Such a claim, although indisputable, would
require daily miracles. Of course, the net result is, you've
just said that item "x" isn't a law of nature, just that every
time the law is used, G-d over-rides it. Same thing. This
equivalence doesn't hold true for evolution. Try it mentally.
It only requires G-d over-riding the rules of nature once, when
He created them. Because evolution doesn't claim to be a law of
nature, but an event. So I ask again, why is it called "science"?
The question is, why _would_ G-d want to fool us? I don't
know, ask him. But I have a couple of guesses. Maybe He
realized that if we all had indesputable evedence that He
existed, there would be no challenge (or value) to being good
little girls and boys. Or, maybe, that the laws of nature can't
work unless they are applied retroactively. It is also possable
that as He was creating time, the aging of things aren't at the
same rate they are now. That for six days, c was greater than it
is now; not only causing star-light to reach us, but also
decreasing the half-life of carbon. Why would it? I don't
really know, I never really thought about it. It's just a
thought.
Thanks for hanging in for 52 lines. I'm soon leaving the net.
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Micha Berger
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Micha Berger
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