ScienceWhopper:Natural History According to Jeffrey Holland

[_jon]

Just study erosion enough and you will find that our dating methods are completely wrong.

Frank, please can you provide the material that has led you to this conclusion?

Thanks

Bump for Frank

[Guest]

Franktalk,

Four questions:

1. Do you believe, if confronted with the subject article in public today, that Jeffrey Holland would defend his statement that the continents of the Eastern and Western Hemispheres were rent apart at God's command a few thousand years ago as the waters of a mythical global flood receded?

1 a, b. Do you believe that Mitt Romney would defend this statement of Jeffrey Holland in public? Would you?

2. Do you realize that the Journal of Scientific Exploration is a self-identified fringe science journal, which is a place where authors are invited to publish in the pseudo-science fields of "ufology", cryptozoology, astrology, paranormal phenomena and pre-Columbian Trans-oceanic contact? Is this really your "scientific reference"?

3. Do you know that the (largely religionist) appeal to Kuhnian paradigm shifts as a means of, or justication for, science denial has been criticized by Kuhn himself?

In an essay written after the publication of SSR, Kuhn re-emphasizes the following criteria, as published in SSR, for the selection of a best hypothesis or theory:
1.- Accurate - empirically adequate with experimentation and observation
2.- Consistent - internally consistent, but also externally consistent with other theories
3.- Broad Scope - a theory's consequences should extend beyond that which it was initially designed to explain
4.- Simple - the simplest explanation, principally similar to Occam's razor
5.- Fruitful - a theory should disclose new phenomena or new relationships among phenomena

4. Do you understand that your "erosion theory" meets none of these criteria as well as does conventional geologic stratigraphy theory and plate tectonics, both of which absolutely preclude the formation of the Atlantic basin in a "rent event" some four thousand years ago as described by Holland?

Franktalk, you seem like a sincere individual. You have clearly been reading materials carefully selected to support your pre-conceived and unfounded religious beliefs.

It also sounds to me as if you might be a younger individual who may still have some opportunity for formal higher education. I would urge you to take any opportunity you have read and study more about the science you seem to distain (at least when it conflicts with your faith) and then determine for yourself which paradigm (science or religionist pseudo-science) best describes the reality you observe every day.

[_Chap]

So let us start on the right foot in our discussions. Science provides no truth. Facts are few and raw data from direct observation is king. Theories although pleasant to the ear and eye are not fact. I will walk all over them with no respect at all.

As Franktalk is no doubt aware, there is an academic discipline called philosophy of science that deals with questions such as these. "Truth", "facts" and "theory" are big words, and we could argue for weeks on a board like this without coming to a common view of how we are to use them. But since this is a conversation and not a graduate seminar, let's try to keep the discussion down-to-earth.

If I want to know what someone's real position on a question is (as opposed to hearing all the possible quibbles they can advance), I like to ask them to think of an important practical decision that relates to the issue under discussion.

How about this one: your child proposes to make an airplane journey that will involve a landing at a busy airport at night, when there will be low cloud and the pilot will therefore have to rely largely on radar. Do you let them go or not? If the answer is 'yes', that means you have trusted your child's life to the scientific theories that tell us that the blips on radar screens do (if the system is functioning correctly) correspond reliably to the positions and velocities of real objects in space. Somehow I doubt that you have a problem with that.

So, do you have "no respect at all" for the scientific theory on which you are willing to let your child's life ride? If you still want to say that, go ahead, but a lot of people will be a bit puzzled. And of course similar examples could be multiplied.

Chap,

Nice strawman. I have already said that science is divided. If you try to use this type of argument it will just waste time. Of course it may serve the purpose it was intended.

But you said:

So let us start on the right foot in our discussions. Science provides no truth. Facts are few and raw data from direct observation is king. Theories although pleasant to the ear and eye are not fact. I will walk all over them with no respect at all.

Was I not starting off on the right foot by taking you literally? That seems quite a good way of conducting a dialogue on terms of mutual respect, does it not? And you said science provides NO truth - where you just exaggerating there, or did you mean it?

So perhaps you respect some scientific theories, but not others. How about a little list of (say) six scientific theories you respect, and six that you don't? (Let's carry on with this rather vague 'theory' concept for a while longer).

[_DarkHelmet]

The church should build a Museum of Natural History based solely on scripture and latter day revelation. Can you imagine what that museum would look like? LOL

[_bcspace]

Genesis 10:25 tells shortly after the flood the earth was divided:

Quote:
25 And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg; for in his days was the earth divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan.

Yes, but the word rendered as "earth" (erets) can mean country, district, land, piece of ground, as well as the whole earth.

The church should build a Museum of Natural History based solely on scripture and latter day revelation. Can you imagine what that museum would look like? LOL

It could be funny as I remember going to a Natural History museum recently in Las Vegas with my mom, who is a Fielding-McConkite, and she chortled and chuckled the whole time.

However, since the LDS Church is open to all science and truth, I don't see it holding to the traditional view in lieu of specific revelation on the subject as a problem. I don't see anyone getting ex'd or censured for expressing a disbelief in a geologically recent global flood or accepting evolution. I've personally expressed such over the pulpit and nothing untoward happened except I didn't get released from my calling.

[_Tarski]

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/thomas-kuhn/

Here is a link which looks at the work of Thomas Kuhn. He took a critical view of current science and so do I.

Look everybody. Here is a real life instance of the "Kuhn therefore Nephi" maneuver.





O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

Jah-oh-eh, Enish-go-on-dosh, Flo-ees- Flos-is-is

[_Chap]

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/thomas-kuhn/

Here is a link which looks at the work of Thomas Kuhn. He took a critical view of current science and so do I.

Look everybody. Here is a real life instance of the "Kuhn therefore Nephi" maneuver.

I wanted to link to your rather good thread when I read the 'Kuhn ... took a critical view of current science" stuff , but was interrupted before I could find it. Please could you remind us?

[_Blixa]

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/thomas-kuhn/

Here is a link which looks at the work of Thomas Kuhn. He took a critical view of current science and so do I.

Look everybody. Here is a real life instance of the "Kuhn therefore Nephi" maneuver.





O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

Jah-oh-eh, Enish-go-on-dosh, Flo-ees- Flos-is-is

It's become quite the go-to "gotcha" argument, hasn't it? Poor Kuhn, his corpse must be sore from so much spinning.

But wait! Kuhn proposed a theory of the production of science! And theories are made to be disrespectfully walked over! Get yer boots on, Franktalk! Start stomping!

[_Phillip]

2. Do you realize that the Journal of Scientific Exploration is a self-identified fringe science journal, which is a place where authors are invited to publish in the pseudo-science fields of "ufology", cryptozoology, astrology, paranormal phenomena and pre-Columbian Trans-oceanic contact? Is this really your "scientific reference"?

Not the best journal to include in your tenure file. Doesn't quite have the cachet of Nature or Econometrica.

[_DrW]

However, since the LDS Church is open to all science and truth, I don't see it holding to the traditional view in lieu of specific revelation on the subject as a problem. I don't see anyone getting ex'd or censured for expressing a disbelief in a geologically recent global flood or accepting evolution. I've personally expressed such over the pulpit and nothing untoward happened except I didn't get released from my calling.

Doctrine, bcspace, doctrine.

We need a call as to whether or not this post-deluge Earth-renting business can be considered doctrine as suggested by Truth Dancer above.

What say you?

Why or why not?

Thanks.