N.Wells
Posts: 1836
Joined: Oct. 2005
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From Gary at http://ncse.com/blog......._thread
| Quote | Ann, if I were you then I would be more fear what your minion army of science defenders are doing to the reputation of the NCSE, and US public school system (that already looks bad enough to other countries like Norway and Japan).
US science teachers are now so stuck in the middle of religious politics it might be best to just thank all who managed to find a way to avoid turning students totally against science, by acting on bad information they got from the top, which was so bad it no kidding took PBS Dinosaur Train to get the US on the same page in what a "hypothesis" is (An idea you can test, period.) By the time the top science departments got done with "hypothesis" it became an expensive media event run by science journals that requires a research lab to perform otherwise it's not a hypothesis and all involved must be disgraced for punishment.
The requirements for something to be called a "theory" ended up going into controversial philosophy that in the end could be used to stop any theory at all anyway, by leaving the final say to critics who as expected never accept any "falsification" ever offered. The premise of a proposed theory that boils down to only requiring putting the phrase "intelligent cause" into a more proper scientific context became academically impossible even though it actually is just a Planet Source Code simple thing, which I ended up having to put together and get online before science became even more dysfunctional. For someone like Edvard it's a scientific way to end the accepted ignoring of their area of science by the US public schools, and be less bothered by the "controversy" their work gets them stuck in the middle of anyhow because of it pertaining to how intelligence works.
The definition for a "theory" must be kept Dinosaur Train simple too, regardless of that immediately allowing "Theory of Intelligent Design" to become a legitimate scientific challenge. In all cases whether a theory is useful or not (to explain how something works) is another matter that does not change whether it can be called a theory or not. A theory that makes no sense is simply a useless theory. Where some find it useful then it is a useful theory. The logic is all very simple and straightforward. Where there are more than one theory claiming to explain the exact same thing then the one that must prevail is the one that best explains how something works by providing a model to experiment with described in its text, and these days can be included as computer software. And since Darwinian theory is not for explaining how "intelligent cause" works there is no scientific conflict at all with ID theory.
After the useless academic red-tape is gone both science and science teaching will be much more productive. No longer need to respect the advice from big-brother science agencies, academies and other entities that cannot even figure out whether a clearly labeled "theory" is a "theory" or not. I would be very inspired by seeing US science teachers eliminate what is now enabling the defamatory bullies that are in this forum too. |
This is a towering pile of steaming crap, and I’m going to respond to it here rather than at the NCSE blog because the blog requested a nice discussion of how science teachers have influenced people, whereupon Gary pissed all over it by launching into a long whine about being ignored and bullied.
It is lunacy from beginning to end. The writing is incompetent: “I would be more fear...”; “it no kidding took..”; “it became an expensive media event run by science journals that requires a research lab to perform ....”, “by providing a model to experiment with described in its text, and these days can be included as computer software”; "their area"; “their work gets them stuck in the middle of anyhow because of it pertaining to how intelligence works.”
The assertions are insane. “Science defenders” are not harming the reputation of the NCSE and US public schools. The process of science is to propose and test hypotheses, but hypotheses can be proposed that cannot yet be tested. (That would not be an immediately useful hypothesis, but non-testability does not keep it from being an hypothesis. However, non-testability does preclude an idea from being a theory, which is one of several reasons that Gary’s ideas do not rise to the level of a theory.) Research labs are not necessary for testing ALL hypotheses. No one has to be “disgraced for punishment.” The requirements for something to be called a theory are that the idea must explain available evidence in its domain, it must be coherent and internally consistent, it must be potentially falsifiable, it must have passed a few tests, and it has to have reached a certain level of acceptance. None of this is controversial philosophy, and the fact that Gary’s miserable dreck cannot rise to this level does not negate the requirements.
Gary’s description of “The premise of a proposed theory that boils down to only requiring putting the phrase "intelligent cause" into a more proper scientific context”is nonsensical, as “intelligent cause” isn’t operationally defined and is meaningless in the context of the rest of his word salad. “Just a Planet Source Code simple thing” is gibberish. Science is not dysfunctional.
The statement that “it's a scientific way to end the accepted ignoring of their area of science” is hogwash. The K-12 curriculum is crowded. Educators have to decide which basics need to be covered in which grades, so not all areas of science can be covered.
| Quote | | The definition for a "theory" must be kept Dinosaur Train simple too, regardless of that immediately allowing "Theory of Intelligent Design" to become a legitimate scientific challenge. |
It already is simple, and it doesn’t let Gary’s ideas in, because they are not legitimate science.
| Quote | | A theory that makes no sense is simply a useless theory. |
Hey, Gary said something true. It’s too bad that it's his rubbish that makes no sense.
| Quote | | Where there [is] more than one theory claiming to explain the exact same thing then the one that must prevail is the one that best explains how something works by providing a model to experiment with described in its text, and these days can be included as computer software. |
“Models to experiment with” are not required, although they can be offered and they may take the form of computer software. However, software models have many weakness, such as producing artefacts from their programming and not satisfactorily matching reality, so they require extensive ground-truthing. Gary does none of that. Also, his not-a-theory literally doesn't explain anything.
| Quote | | And since Darwinian theory is not for explaining how "intelligent cause" works there is no scientific conflict at all with ID theory. |
And I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn that you might like to purchase.
| Quote | | No longer need to respect the advice from big-brother science agencies, academies and other entities that cannot even figure out whether a clearly labeled "theory" is a "theory" or not. |
They are very good at figuring out what counts as a theory, and Gary’s rubbish fails on all fronts. Gary's labelling something as a theory does not make it one, no matter how clear the labelling.
| Quote | | I would be very inspired by seeing US science teachers eliminate what is now enabling the defamatory bullies that are in this forum too. |
The truth is not defamatory, and Gary being inspired is clearly not a promising indicator of scientific progress.
However, Gary does touch on a very serious point: conservatives in the US are increasingly determined to have their own reality and to deny anything they don’t like. This in turn leads to delegitimizing and defunding the experts whose evaluations they don’t like. Back in the 1990's, Newt Gingrich didn’t like what the Office of Technology Assessment and the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations were telling him, so he scrapped them. Republicans haven’t liked conclusions arrived at by the House Budget Office, so they have been attacking it and trying to defund it. Scientists who accept human influence on global climate change and the theory of evolution are clearly also potential or actual targets, and given that many people in the general populace are mistrustful of science, we might be closer than we think to America turning its back on science, in the manner of the Islamic world closing off debate, inquiry, and independent thinking at the end of its “Golden Age”. This would be a tragedy for all concerned. (See http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publica....science for detailed discussion of the end of the Islamic Golden Age.) However, this problem is not remedied by being nice to Gary or pretending that his pile of crap is worthwhile science. This is not the fault of mean scientists trying to keep poor little Gary off their lawn, but Gary’s fault for not understanding what science is and how to do it. Science has a great track record that establishes how science should be done, and the fact that Gary is completely clueless about this is not science’s fault.
(My wordiness is clearly all Stevestory's fault for encouraging me.... :) )
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