OK, I told you people that I would try to keep up with this thing...
And, I intend to keep that promise.
I don't know if anyone has noticed, but I haven't made many comments about the whole Goth scene in a long while. That is mostly because it began to bore me so badly that I thought I might go blind, which I did the other day*... Anyway, I figure, the whole scene is just a big re-run of stasis and imminent demise ( Read more... )
I don't know if anyone has noticed, but I haven't made many comments about the whole Goth scene in a long while. That is mostly because it began to bore me so badly that I thought I might go blind, which I did the other day*... Anyway, I figure, the whole scene is just a big re-run of stasis and imminent demise ( Read more... )
Disproving an existing theory is only half of what is required for a paradigm shift. One also needs to advance a new theory that explains the observed evidence at least as well as the old theory. Absent such a new theory, the old theory stands, as still useful.
In fact, the Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection explains the phenomena of biology so well that it is exceedingly unlikely that we will disprove it, unless something very strange is true (**). There is, after all, an immense body of evidence, of many types, supporting that theory.
What is more likely is that we will learn something little-suspected about the laws governing evolutionary systems, such as metacoding in DNA controlling directions of evolution, intelligent systems emerging from patterns of genetics, or even something like morphic resonance being real. Perhaps species within a genus frequently interbreed on a geological timescale, or bacterial lateral transmission of genetic infortmation crucially changes the rules. Perhaps many species are sapient, but our system of searching for sapients is overly restrictive.
I can speculate -- but I don't know. That's the mystery and wonder and beauty of real science -- the patterns existing in Nature are always more fascinating that one can imagine ahead of time.
In real science, not ID nonsense.
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(*) And an inept one at that. At most, ID arguments prove that some aspects of existing evolutionary theories have gaps in their explanations. But then, we already knew that: if there were no gaps in the existing theories, there would be no more basic research to undertake!
(**) As in Terry Pratchet's Strata, in which one civilization produces planets, complete with sapients, ecosystems and phony geological records, much to the later confusion of those planets' inhabitants.
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In the last few years I have had plenty of opportunity to read quite a bit on the subject.
Those are some fucked-up people.
In the more recent past though, I have been taking a class in logic, and I have discovered that I have a terrific knack for Logic and rational thought. Including some rather interesting logic / rational abilities that have surprised the heck out of me and some of the class (not to mention my teacher). I have the second highest grade in the class due to his more harsh grading of my work than the others (he keeps telling me that I tend to be too lazy in my work and that I need to exercise a lot more precision in many of my assertions).
Anyway, the work in logic has allowed me to put specific names to the delusions or irrational beliefs and contrivances devised by the ID folks:
Ad Hoc fallacies, Confabulation, Confirmation Bias, Argument to Ignorance (The most favorite of the God people's delusions: Wow! I have no idea what that is! SO it must be god that is doing it), Shoehorning, and what is actually behind it all: Collective delusion/hallucination...
BTW, check out The Skeptic's Dictionary.
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