Apologists and Thomas Kuhn: A Love Story

[_Cicero]

As the B.H. Roberts Chair of Mopologetic Studies, I feel that I need to point out that, within this sub-field of Mopologetics--i.e., Rhetorical (Ab)Uses of the Work of Thomas Kuhn in the Realm of Mopologetics--the following should always be required reading:

http://mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/vie ... f=1&t=8289

As I said, I haven't been paying much attention to apologetics for the last 8 years, but I see that they really haven't changed their tactics much. It still all boils down to bloviate, obfuscate, insult and excoriate, rinse and repeat . . .

I was at BYU in the late 90s during the heyday of FARMS. BYU had just taken them over, which seemed very much like an official endorsement of their tactics. DCP had tons of fanboys on campus (I can't recall any fangirls). Bateman was hiding Rodin's "The Kiss" in the basement rather than expose such shockingly pornographic art to the horrified citizens of Utah County. Ah, the good ol' days . . . the times are a'changin . . .

[_MrStakhanovite]

lol

This is not what my philosophy teacher taught as a legitimate reading of Nietzsche. A "humanist?" Nietzsche called himself and those who followed his ideas "immoralists," and "humanists" in the contemporary sense would have been seen by him as servile weaklings besotted of slave morality just as Christians were. Nietzsche is, in actuality, the unambiguous fountainhead and nucleus of much of the evil that has dogged the modern world since the end of the 19th century, and an archetypical example of what I would term the "virus" of German idealistic philosophy generally (and continental philosophy even more broadly speaking).

everytime I go back to that thread I get a treat.

[_Blixa]

lol

This is not what my philosophy teacher taught as a legitimate reading of Nietzsche. A "humanist?" Nietzsche called himself and those who followed his ideas "immoralists," and "humanists" in the contemporary sense would have been seen by him as servile weaklings besotted of slave morality just as Christians were. Nietzsche is, in actuality, the unambiguous fountainhead and nucleus of much of the evil that has dogged the modern world since the end of the 19th century, and an archetypical example of what I would term the "virus" of German idealistic philosophy generally (and continental philosophy even more broadly speaking).

everytime I go back to that thread I get a treat.

"This isn't what my teacher said." Seriously? Maybe a very weak undergrad might lead with that in a dorm room discussion.

An unambiguous fountainhead? An unambiguous nucleus? An unambiguous fountainhead AND nucleus? An abused language cries out in pain.

And finally, the bacillic metaphor. So close the way the ideas and philosophy of another people were once called germs and viruses, eh? He's Godwined himself pretty bluntly here.

[_DrW]

When cold fusion was announced to the world did scientist around the world walk around giving each other high fives or did each one become a doubting Thomas.

Not sure why you are asking this question, but as one who remembers very well the Cold Fusion debacle, I will tell you that I was aware of no "high fives" in the scientific community (outside of Utah, that is).

However, there were most certainly a lot of "WTFs". Cold fusion is a not too distant relative of perpetual motion. The purveyors of cold fusion were not nearly skeptical enough of their own results in the lab. When one doesn't have a mechanism and can't get an energy balance (without hand waving and magic) and when one can't reproduce their basic experiments, they should keep their mouths shut until they do and can.

I was working at a DOE National Lab at the time and we were quite taken aback that any Federal Government agency would actually put money (some considered it "our money" because it came out of our budgets) into this idea based on the experimental evidence that had been published.

Of course, if one comes from a culture where belief in magic is pretty much a requirement, then all bets as to rational decision making are off. And, of course, politics (cough Jake Garn) were certainly involved.

Sorry Utahans, but in retrospect, I fear that the pervasive "I BELIEVE" ethos in that State had a lot to do with the "coming forth" of Cold Fusion.

On the other hand, the larger scientific community at that time had just finished dealing with Russian "polywater" and, as I recall, a few other fantastical claims based on poorly controlled experiments, and was in a pretty skeptical mood in general.

[_DrW]

Most of the arguments that scientist have with creationist are valid. If a person believes in God in faith yet attempts to declare that faith by proof then they don't understand the separation of faith and evidence. There is no trail of evidence that leads to God. In my mind everything leads to the conclusion that there is a God. Yet no one part or parts of the universe can put together a natural chain of observable things which lead to proof of God Now many suppose that when God can not be found by proof that in itself is somehow proof that He does not exist. Yet in the same breath they declare an undying love for dark matter.

Franktalk,

We have been over the Dark Matter issue before. Several folks on this board, including me, have explained to you that there is plenty of physical evidence for Dark Matter. It's gravitational influence on visible matter can be detected and quantitatively measured.

We know a lot about Dark Matter, including where it is located (concentrated) in our neighborhood of the galaxy. We can measure the effects of Dark Matter gravitational field within the Milky Way Galaxy and outside it as well (e.g. by gravitational lensing, x-ray gas temperatures, and motions of affected visible matter including entire galaxies) just as we can measure the effects of magnetic field.

Or do you not believe in magnetic fields because you can't see them?

[_Cicero]

And finally, the bacillic metaphor. So close the way the ideas and philosophy of another people were once called germs and viruses, eh? He's Godwined himself pretty bluntly here.

Droopy was banned (again) for his postings on the thread. I'll say this for the guy, it takes something to get repeatedly banned by MD&D for being too right-wing. Talent is not the right word, but I'm stumped. Suggestions?

[_Franktalk]

Franktalk,

We have been over the Dark Matter issue before. Several folks on this board, including me, have explained to you that there is plenty of physical evidence for Dark Matter. It's gravitational influence on visible matter can be detected and quantitatively measured.

We know a lot about Dark Matter, including where it is located (concentrated) in our neighborhood of the galaxy. We can measure the effects of Dark Matter gravitational field within the Milky Way Galaxy and outside it as well (e.g. by gravitational lensing, x-ray gas temperatures, and motions of affected visible matter including entire galaxies) just as we can measure the effects of magnetic field.

Or do you not believe in magnetic fields because you can't see them?

We do have a difference of opinion on these matters.



Here we have plasma. You know charged particles.



Here are cosmic filaments. I say they come from charges. You say they come from dark matter. When you have a bucket of dark matter to show me I may change my mind.

Of course you may not see how similar they are to each other.

Frank

[_Bob Loblaw]

I wrote a post about this some time ago, and I like to link it when Kuhn crops up. I've dubbed the strategy "The Kuhnian Shift" and examined Kevin Christensen's use of Kuhn for his own apologetic purposes. Kevin does a lukewarm response on Runtu's blog, which you can get at on the second page of the thread.

The Kuhnian Shift.

I loved Tarski's summation of it, "Kuhn, therefore Nephi."

Their abuse of Kuhn and postmodernism in general is embarrassing.

[_DrW]

Franktalk,

We have been over the Dark Matter issue before. Several folks on this board, including me, have explained to you that there is plenty of physical evidence for Dark Matter. It's gravitational influence on visible matter can be detected and quantitatively measured.

We know a lot about Dark Matter, including where it is located (concentrated) in our neighborhood of the galaxy. We can measure the effects of Dark Matter gravitational field within the Milky Way Galaxy and outside it as well (e.g. by gravitational lensing, x-ray gas temperatures, and motions of affected visible matter including entire galaxies) just as we can measure the effects of magnetic field.

Or do you not believe in magnetic fields because you can't see them?

We do have a difference of opinion on these matters.



Here we have plasma. You know charged particles.



Here are cosmic filaments. I say they come from charges. You say they come from dark matter. When you have a bucket of dark matter to show me I may change my mind.

Of course you may not see how similar they are to each other.

Frank

Frank,

I hate to be the one to point this out to you. But if one could see dark matter from its emission of visible light (or from emissions anywhere in the electromagnetic spectrum) then it wouldn't really be dark matter, would it?
__________

by the way, the light in both of your images is emitted from plasmas. While there may well be magnetic fields (even intense magnetic fields) associated with these plasmas, the photons that created the images themselves are not magnetic fields and the images you have shown give one little information as to what the associated magnetic fields might look like.

Bottom line: these images do not demonstrate that one can see magnetic fields. While I will agree that it is possible to show the distribution or motion of charged particles (or even ferromagnetic particles) in a magnetic field, what one is observing in such cases is particles responding to the field, not the field itself. You do understand this, don't you?

In much the same way, we can see visible matter responding to dark matter. This has been explained to you several times. Do you understand this yet?

[_Franktalk]

Frank,

I hate to be the one to point this out to you. But if one could see dark matter from its emission of visible light (or from emissions anywhere in the electromagnetic spectrum) then it wouldn't really be dark matter, would it?
__________

by the way, the light in both of your images is emitted from plasmas. While there may well be magnetic fields (even intense magnetic fields) associated with these plasmas, the photons that created the images themselves are not magnetic fields and the images you have shown give one little information as to what the associated magnetic fields might look like.

Bottom line: these images do not demonstrate that one can see magnetic fields. While I will agree that it is possible to show the distribution or motion of charged particles (or even ferromagnetic particles) in a magnetic field, what one is observing in such cases is particles responding to the field, not the field itself. You do understand this, don't you?

In much the same way, we can see visible matter responding to dark matter. This has been explained to you several times. Do you understand this yet?

You mean light is light. Thank you for pointing that out, I would never have guessed. Your position on orthodox science is well established. You have drank the koolaid and found it agreeable. That is fine. What I can't stand is your attitude that the current theories will never fall or be changed because they represent facts. You fail to even acknowledge the fact that science drifts and goes through major changes all of the time. Open up your mind DrW to other possibilities. Don't you find it hard to walk about with your feet stuck in concrete?

And I will point out that there are some scientists who happen to agree with me on a plasma universe. So I am not alone in my thinking. So why do you think others disagree with you as well? Could it be that we are talking about unsettled science?