Re: THE OTHER SIDE OF THE BOY SCOUT STORY


Roger Pearse wrote:
On Jul 4, Chimp wrote:

I know Roger....
(snip rest of troll)

I'll take my lap of victory now...

You'll do a lap of victory will you? Well, have a
read of this first. To quote your assertion to Emma:

"But I think that science has a narrower meaning in
our world, and the key to it is reproduceability (sp.?)
-- things that can be investigated by the sciences
can be stuck in a test-tube and will always turn blue
when heated (etc)."

I replied: "You can't stick stars in test tubes. That
does not make stellar astrophysics unscientific."

You said: "But it does, in just that respect and to
that extent. To precisely that extent one is really
doing scholarship, not science. But this is not
something that I need to argue. Ask the professionals
at any university in the world. "

When I tried again to correct you, using the example
of astronomy, you simply sneered "You don't know
much about astronomy then. "

When I tell you that reproduceability is not essential
to science you just sneered "As if you know.
Unfortunately, little troll, it is."

And to all my careful explanation you just respnd
"I have snipped repeated assertions of the same
kind, often rather laughable ones".

Well Roger, I've just done a quick bit of Googling
(you did say I should consult university professionals).

First, let's take Michael Covington, Associate Director,
Artificial Intelligence Center, The University of Georgia
http://www.ai.uga.edu/mc/ He's also a Christian, so
you can't just sneer at him the way you do to atheists.
He is also a computer expert and has knowledge
about astronomy, having written books on both. See
http://www.covingtoninnovations.com/astromenu.html

He says "What is the "scientific method"?
(see http://www.covingtoninnovations.com/tough/tough3.html

"There is no single, fixed "scientific method" for
distilling raw data into Truth. Instead, at the cutting
edge of research, dealing with unfamiliar phenomena,
scientists often disagree as to what methods are valid.

"Most scientific investigation involves controlled experiments,
where you compare one thing to another (e.g., to find out
whether a chemical causes cancer). In astronomy and geology,
controlled experiments generally aren't possible; you have to
rely on observations instead, [. . .]"

Which completely disagrees with you.

Or, we can take James Schombert, an astronomer
at the University of Oregon http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/

He says "Astronomy differs from other sciences
in that an astronomer can not change the parameters
of an experiment, i.e. only passive observations
are allowed"
http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/ast121/lectures/lec01.html

Then there is http://www.candleinthedark.com/validity.html
"There are many parts of science that cannot easily
be forced into the mold of "hypothesis-experiment-
conclusion." Astronomy is not an experimental science,
and Paleontologists don't perform Paleontology experiments. "

By the way, there is _loads_ more of this available
from a simple Google search, but best of all I think is
David Snoke of the University of Pittsburgh.
http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~snoke/

Snoke is also a Christian, indeed a preacher,
and a scientist. And he's written a whole book
about this. See
http://www.arn.org/arnproducts/books/b072sk.htm

And to quote from this book:

"1.7 Myths about the Scientific Method"
"Many people learn a very trivial version of the
scientific method. Often, people say something
is scientific or unscientific based on naive ideas
of how scientists work. The following are common
"myths" about the scientific method.

"1. Reproducibility. Some people have argued that
science deals only with things which are reproducible,
that is, things which the scientist can cause to happen
over and over. This is not true; if it were, astronomy
and archaeology would not be sciences! Science
often deals with events which can not be reproduced."
www.cityreformed.org/snoke/hsbook/selection2.pdf

So, Roger, that is a fellow Christian (a preacher!),
and a scientist, telling you that your view of science
is "naive", "trivial" and a "myth". Err, isn't that
exactly what I was saying?

Now, why don't you crawl away in embarassment
and stick to things you know about such as
Eusebius and Origen? You really _do_not_ know
about science. The view you have expounded
is wrong, naive, simplistic, uninformed and
very easily refuted.

It isn't just me who is saying that but your fellow
Christians such as David Snoke, a professional
condensed-matter physicist at the University of
Pittsburg who has a couple of thousand citations
to his name on the Science Citation Index (err,
much like me). [Remind me how many you have,
was it, err, "none"?]

Of course feel free to snip all this and sneer as
you crawl. Enjoy your victory lap. The crowd
will be laughing at you!

Chimp

.

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