Date: Fri, 6 Sep 2002 15:53:11 -0700 (PDT) From: "Neal E. Westfall" <nwestfal@directvinternet.com> To: Joshua Lee <yid@softhome.net> Cc: tlambert2@mindspring.com, <dave@jetcafe.org>, <chat@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Why did evolution fail? Message-ID: <20020906153844.K44494-100000@Tolstoy.home.lan> In-Reply-To: <20020906183427.5aa10ec8.yid@softhome.net>
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On Fri, 6 Sep 2002, Joshua Lee wrote: > Lamarkianism, which is really not all that different than evolution > other than it's mechanism not being the same. One would have to go back > to before the Rennaisance, during periods where practically no > scientific activity was being pursued in Northern Europe, to get to the > point where you want to take science. Let science progress according to > it's own process, a process that Behe respects, rather than trying to > hurry it along with doctrines that cannot be used scientifically. Actually I'm not trying to hurry anything along. What I object to is the dogmatism of evolutionism. (By the way, the -ism on the end there is a dead giveaway) You assume too much. > Biology is a young science. Often when I read Maimonidies and how he > reacted to the Aristotelian physics of his day (an intellegent > comprimise rather than disagreeing with it's premises altogeather) I am Sometimes disagreeing with the premises is necessary. Read Thomas Kuhn's "Structure of Scientific Revolutions". > astounded by how odd scientists of that early period in physics's > history seemed in their theories. Physics eventually straightened itself > out. (The eternity of matter, the last piece of Aristotle to be > rejected, was an accepted theory a couple of decades into the 20th > century!) Let biology straighten itself out too - using the scientific > method. Second-guessing the scientific method is a recipie for > scientific disaster, even in the hands of the best theologians. Who is second-guessing the scientific method? I happen to think it works quite well, when allowed to truly work. Problem with evolution is that, almost 150 years later, it is no more closer to being empirically verified than it was in 1859. So lets drop it and get on with something else already. > (If you > really have objections to how it's being teached in public schools send > your children to private ones - that's what we do, we don't expect > Judaism to be taught in public schools - stop insisting your religious > minority, and it is a minority, be given a place of privledge in the > marketplace of ideas; against the constitution that made your brand of > protestantism possible.) Actually you have that exactly backwards. It is my brand of protestantism that made the constitution possible. 8-) And you are making assumptions again. I do not expect Christianity to be taught in public schools. I just don't want evolution dogmatically taught as "the truth" when there are other explanations that better account for the data. Is that too much to ask for? Neal To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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