6 ms·
A meaningless platitude.
by saturn 15y ago
A meaningless platitude.
- yters 15y agoNo, it's good science. If a theory is supported by both a piece of evidence and its contrary, and it can predict one thing and its contrary, then the theory doesn't explain anything, nor is it falsifiable. Geez, I wish they'd teach kids science in schools today.
- thyrsus 15y agoGood science accepts all non-fraudulent evidence. In the case of evolution, we're dealing with large, highly variable populations. Thus, no individual observation will falsify the theory. Evolution is almost tautological in predicting that traits which increase the likelihood of reproduction in a population will become more common in that population. To falsify evolution, you would have to observe a population in which traits that increased the likelihood of reproduction became less common. There is an important subtlety with social groups: a trait that decreases the likelihood of an individual's reproduction may increase the likelihood of the group's reproduction. For instance, worker ants have near zero probability of reproducing, yet they highly increase the likelihood of the group's (colony's) reproduction.
- EGreg 15y agoI think saying "evolution theory" is very vague. There is the theory of common descent. That is what is being supported here: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/ http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/ But claiming that mutation and natural selection alone explains ALL speciation and ALL behavior that we observe today is just a simplistic position, almost an article of faith. How do you know there is no other factor involved? How do you know no other process WAS involved in the past? We don't. So far as I know, we have never observed macro evolution taking place in recorded history (although I would be happy to be shown wrong on this point), so what actually causes speciation is just speculation at this point. Common descent is one thing. "Evolution" is a loaded term. What does it mean? It's a bit like the people who claim that the Bing Bang Theory describes an explosion in the first seconds of the universe. Actually, the BBT just extrapolates backwards from what we observe today -- which is that the visible universe is expanding, and there is microwave radiation at its edges. How do we know there wasn't some other process earlier in the real universe, which would make our extrapolation completely erroneous? How do we know that the universe isn't infinite beyond our visible universe? Every year objects disappear further beyond the light horizon, due to the expansion of space. Who knows hoc much lies beyond that? And yet people talk about "the universe had a beginning" ... how do they KNOW? Okay I just wanted to throw a crazy idea at the end: Maybe our universe is like a reverse black hole, with a singularity at the edges instead of its interior. Meaning that just as gravity increases as you approach the singularity in a black hole, so the universe expands faster the bigger a "sphere" you take in it.
- tel 15y agoNo on many counts. Evolution theory is an umbrella term for a number of predictions including common descent, mutation, natural selection which is sufficient in theory and observation to create genetic and then physical changes in a population. We have observed macro evolution countless times in bacteria and viruses. It's not even difficult. I'm not sure why you'd call Evolution a loaded term in a scientific domain. It's clearly loaded in politics these days, but it's a very clear and celebrated theory with sharp and validated predictions in scientific domains. You're somewhat right in the statement that BBT extrapolates from data observable today, but due to the nature of the universe, data observable today provides evidence that is not fully localized in time. We believe that the universe is infinite beyond our light cone because if we make the minimal possible assumptions on the net geometry of the universe you end up with three choices, each having to do with the sum of the angles in a very large triangle. We measured this triangle (see WMAP) and found the angles to be very nearly 180 degrees corresponding to a flat, infinite universe. So long as we have no compelling reason to invent more exotic geometry (which if GR holds would require some rather incredible momentum-energy that we haven't observed --- all possible, but very, very exotic) then this is a safe prediction. BBT theory doesn't even describe an explosion anywhere. There wasn't something to explode in to. It instead suggests that the invariant metric has been expanding throughout the lifetime of the universe making things grow further and further apart. It's unclear that there wasn't more exotic behavior in there again, but without evidence of it, the best prediction is the simplest prediction. I could go further into how we KNOW things and why that's not really a great way to think about it, but this is already grown long. But if you want your crazy idea to be meaningful at all, please specify it formally enough so that it predicts something about the shape or behavior of the universe different from current theories and then see if that prediction holds. Without at least claiming a prediction, it's difficult to even begin to understand what a crazy idea might mean.
- EGreg 15y ago1) re evolution: when I say it's a "loaded" term, it's because it is sometimes by people who seem to make the additional assumption that mutation and natural selection are sufficient to produce the results we see today. I think that assumption is unfounded and seems to be more like a wish to keep things simple. I don't for example see how gay people could be genetically predisposed to be gay, since they would have a reproductive fitness level far lower than others. But that's not even the biggest thing. Little mechanisms which could hardly make a difference in survival one way or the other are doing an amazing job. Maybe it's sexual selection. But where is the evidence that all that we see around us was produced with simple mutation and natural selection? Regarding bacteria and viruses: that's micro-evolution, isn't it? Why is it macroevolution? 2) Regarding the BBT: so why do people think there was a "big bang" and talk about the "first few seconds of the universe" if the universe is probably infinite, and it is only the visible universe that we see expanding? 3) I don't know, I'm not a physicist... seemed like an intriguing way to think about the expansion though
- yters 15y agoEver heard the reproduction rates across the western world are dropping off the charts? Oh, did I just falsify evolution?
- Natsu 15y agoActually, it's a perfectly reasonable statement. That which truly proves anything would be able to prove a statement and its own converse, creating a contradiction. Evolution, of course, is true, but that doesn't mean that everyone who tries to claim that X is an effect of evolution is correct. There are other causes for things, after all and people are right to be wary of easy explanations trotted out without any discussion of the basis for them.