Trusting the experts

[twrobson]

I am assuming that the majority of viewers and participants of this forum are not scientists, have little or no formal training in the relevant fields, and therefore cannot speak with authority regarding the scientific evidence for or against evolution. The purpose of this post is to explain why we nonscientists nevertheless ought to accept evolution.

First point: Evolution is so well established by science that it is not an open question.

Evolution is no doubt a controversial issue. This is made clear by the fact that so many people argue about it. But it is not an open question. An open question is an issue about which there is official disagreement or doubt among the proper authorities. Ask the proper authorities, namely scientists, what caused the extinction of the mammoths. You'll get a range of answers (disease, overhunting by humans, climate change, a combination of any or all of these, etc.). The cause of the mammoths' demise is thus an open question. Ask scientists whether there is intelligent life elsewhere in the galaxy. You'll get a variety of answers (yes, no, maybe so, I don't know, probably so, probably not, etc.). The existence of extraterrestrial intelligence is thus also an open question. Ask the proper authorities, in this case historians, who it was that assassinated Abraham Lincoln. You will get one unequivocal answer - John Wilkes Booth. The identity of Lincoln's assassin is thus not an open question. If you reject the findings of the proper authorities on a matter that is not an open question, you've either got a lot to learn or a lot of explaining to do.

Now there is no official disagreement or doubt among the proper authorities, namely scientists, that evolution is true - that all species are related and that life has been evolving on planet Earth for roughly four billion years. There are of course many professional scientists who disagree, but that still does not make evolution an open question. Why not? Because their dissent is without sufficient merit to render it official. And how can we know that? Because their dissenting views do not appear in mainstream scientific journals. Of course it is easy to find scientific cases against evolution in libraries, bookstores, particularly christian bookstores, on the internet, and even on TV and radio. The problem, though, is that any crackpot can present any quack theory through any of these media. But since the science journals are peer-reviewed, it is difficult to publish one's work in them unless it is of high quality and great merit. This is where the "big boys", the top scientists working on the frontier, publish their work and their findings. Their articles are primarily written by scientists, for scientists, although anyone who is interested can read them. This does not mean that everything in the journals is gospel truth. Writers may deal with open questions, and much research will inevitably become outdated. But everything in the journals, at the time it is published, at least has enough merit to be worthy of consideration. (Once in a great while, a journal may feature a work of poor quality, but this is due to human error and is very rare.) Thus junk science has no place in the science journals, and that includes creationism and intelligent design.

Of course, creationists publish in their own journals, but this only indicates that their work is unworthy of consideration by the professional scientific community. Creationists may even sometimes publish other sorts of work in science journals (work not pertaining to evolution). But I contend that in no reputable journal do there appear any explicitly creationist articles. If I'm wrong, show me. Show me any mainstream science journal (such as Science or Nature) in which there appears an article (the more recent, the better) which clearly argues or implies that evolution never happened. Better yet, show me several such articles. You won't find any. For that matter, show me an article in such a journal arguing that evolution DID happen. You won't find that either. Why? Because evolution is common knowledge among scientists, so there is no need to argue in its favor. You'll find many articles regarding evolution, but they address the details of the process - not whether or not it happened. There is therefore no official doubt in the scientific community that evolution is true, and so it is not an open question.

Second point: It is irrational to reject anything that is established by proper authorities.

This is not an invitation to brainwashing, nor is it an elicit appeal to authority. It is only common sense (for those of us who are not experts) to accept what the proper authorities have concluded. I believe, and am quite justified in believing, that the earth orbits the sun and not vice versa, not because I can see it or because I have made observations and performed calculations to reach that conclusion, but because this is what scientists know from the work of people who have. I know that the speed of light is roughly 186,000 miles/sec, not because I personally have measured it, but because I have learned it from reliable authorities, who ultimately learned it from people who have measured it. And I am quite rational, indeed obliged, to accept evolution, not because I have studied the evidence, but primarily because I know that evolution is what is accepted by the experts, who have studied the evidence.

From these two points, it follows that any rational thinking, educated adult, living in this day and age, believes evolution.

Now for those creationists who would argue that the Bible is a more reliable authority than science, I ask: If it were shown that somewhere in the Bible, there was a passage that clearly and unequivocally taught that the earth is flat, would you believe it and deny all scientific evidence to the contrary? If there were a passage that clearly and unequivocally taught that the moon was made of green cheese, would you believe it and deny all scientific evidence to the contrary? Would it not be far more sensible in these cases to admit that the Bible is in error? It makes no sense at all to use the Bible, or any book for that matter, as a standard to judge the evidence. We should use the evidence to judge the Bible. And the evidence shows us that evolution occurred. The only rational thing to conclude is that the creation account in Genesis is either in error or is not intended as literal history.

As for the arguments of creationists and intelligent design theorists, though they may sound impressive to the scientifically untrained, if the scientific community ain't buyin' it, I ain't buyin' it. And I'll renounce evolution in a heartbeat - when the proper authorities do so first.

[YEC]

But it does pretty clearly say that the earth is immovable and that the sun moves.

ref please

[micatala]

YEC Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2005 9:47 pm Post subject:

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But it does pretty clearly say that the earth is immovable and that the sun moves.

ref please

You've never heard this argument before? You don't recall Galileo's condemnation based on the contention that the Copernican system was unscriptural?

At any rate, here is a sampling.

Joshua 10:12 and 13 "On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord int the presence of Israel: O sun, stand still over Gibeon, O moon,over the4 Valley of Aijalon. So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies."

Psalm 19:4-6 "In the heavens he has pitched a tent for the sun, which is like a bridgroom coming forth from his pavilion, like a champion rejoing to run his course. It rises at one end of the heavens and makes its circuit to the other; "

Psalm 104:5 "He set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved."

Job 38:4-6 "Where were you wehn I laid the earth's foundations . . . Who marked off its dimensions? . . On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone."

Obviously, we have reinterpreted these (and other verses) to reconcile them with what we have learned from science. However, in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, people who read the Bible and made what they felt was the most straightforward interpretation felt the Bible clearly stated that the earth does not move and the sun does.

As a reference for quotes on the views of churchmen on Copernicus, see Thomas Kuhn's "The Copernican Revolution," or Santillana's "The Crime of Galileo."

and so I ask again,

If so many learned men of the church could be wrong about what the Bible said about the solar system, how can you be so sure that your particulary interpretation of how scripture applies to the development of life is not wrong? On the basis of this history, why would we trust the Bible more than science with regards to a scientific matter?

[wgreen]

Dear micatala,

It is possible that the imagery of the sun moving is metaphorical, though it need not be. From the perspective of a human on earth, the sun does move and the earth is immovable. The sun does move with respect to me, and the earth does not. It is a matter of perspective.

Even today on earth we talk about the sun "rising," though we clearly do not mean that it is moving around the earth.

This sort of language is either from our perspective or it is metaphorical. In the case of the bridegroom passage, the writer is clearly using simile, why not metaphor also?

Earlier readers of the bible (like Galileo's inquisitors) misinterpreted the language of the Bible.

Sincerely,

Bill Green

[stevencarrwork]

This sort of language is either from our perspective or it is metaphorical. In the case of the bridegroom passage, the writer is clearly using simile, why not metaphor also?

Earlier readers of the bible (like Galileo's inquisitors) misinterpreted the language of the Bible.

Joshua 10:12 and 13 "On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord int the presence of Israel: O sun, stand still over Gibeon, O moon,over the4 Valley of Aijalon. So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies."

And what is that a metaphor for?

What happened which made the writer think, a good way to describe that in a metaphor would be to say that the sun stood still?

[micatala]

wgreen Posted: Sat Mar 19, 2005 4:32 pm Post subject: earth and sun

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Dear micatala,

It is possible that the imagery of the sun moving is metaphorical, though it need not be. From the perspective of a human on earth, the sun does move and the earth is immovable. The sun does move with respect to me, and the earth does not. It is a matter of perspective.

Even today on earth we talk about the sun "rising," though we clearly do not mean that it is moving around the earth.

This sort of language is either from our perspective or it is metaphorical. In the case of the bridegroom passage, the writer is clearly using simile, why not metaphor also?

Earlier readers of the bible (like Galileo's inquisitors) misinterpreted the language of the Bible.

Yes, I absolutely agree, the readers at the time of Galileo and previously at the time of Copernicus misinterpreted the text. I also agree it is reasonable to take the text, especially the text in Psalms, metaphorically. However, those at the time did not make this interpretation. They didn't see any reason to do so.

The point I was making is that if reasonable literal interpretations have been wrong in the past, why is it not possible that those who subscribe to a literal or even semi-literal (eg. 'day-age') interpretation of Genesis are wrong? Young-earth creationism would not exist without this interpretation. Probably a lot of anti-evolutionism, even when not based on YEC would not exist either.

I'm not criticizing Martin Luther or others who were skeptical or even dismissive of Copernicus for holding that view. It would have been astounding if they had thought otherwise, especially in Luther's case as there was essentially no observational evidence at his time to suggest Copernicus was right and Ptolemy wrong. The Catholic heirarchy is a little harder to forgive, because Galileo had produced ample evidence that at least suggested Copernicus theory had a reasonable possibility of being correct.

Our YEC has been claiming that the bible is 'scientifically accurate.' It seems to me this is an irrelevant claim, and difficult if not impossible to support. It would certainly require, as has been done with respect to Copernicus, constant reinterpretation to reconcile the biblical understanding with known scientific facts and theories, as scientific knowledge expands. Given this, why we would attach scientific validity to ANY passage of scripture. Scientific validity is not the point of scripture, IMHO.

If we are talking about whether to believe the experts, then we should weigh competing experts by their track record. The scientific experts have, in general, an extremely good, though admittedly not perfect record. The 'biblical experts' have a much poorer record with respect to scientific matters, and arguably even with respect to religious and spiritual matters. I don't say this to denigrate religious experts. It seems to me an inevitable consequence of the nature of religious truth, and of the sacred writings we commonly use. Science has the advantage of concerning itself with phenomona that we can observe. Religion and theology is concerned to a large degree with what we cannot directly observe, namely God. It is also concerned with the spiritual and moral nature of humans, who are arguably the most complex entities in the universe, even in a physical sense, never mind our more ambiguous spiritual and moral dimensions.

[juliod]

And what is that a metaphor for?

Good point, and one that apologists often fail to appreciate. Metaphors are used in written works to convey some point, or to express something in a certain way. These passages are not in any way metaphorical, and could not have been viewed as metaphorical until the heliocentric view of the solar system was established.

DanZ

[Jose]

These passages are not in any way metaphorical, and could not have been viewed as metaphorical until the heliocentric view of the solar system was established.

The sun does move with respect to me, and the earth does not. It is a matter of perspective.

Both quite true. Certainly, if I were writing a Book of Lore from the viewoint of 2000 years ago, I would use my reference point as the Center. It would be immovable. Only centuries later did we come up with the idea of relative motion, in which the direction and speed depend upon one's reference point. Only with this concept and telescopic observations (and a lot of thinking) was anyone prepared to develop the idea of a heliocentric solar system. In writing my book, I wouldn't have known these things that would be learned later, so I would think I was writing the literal truth.

What do future generations do, once the truth is known? Do they abandon my book, or do they accept the fact that I was writing from the only viewpoint that was logically possible at that time? Do they interpret my writing as metaphorical, or as my attempt to explain what I see? I would hope that they would recognize the limits of my scientific knowledge, and re-interpret what I had written--so that the bits about how the gods set things up are metaphorical, and the bits about what I saw and believed are re-considered as not infallible truth, but nonetheless an accurate guide to historical understanding of the worldview in which I lived. I would hope that they would take this part of my writing as a story, but still recognize the deeper truths (if I had any), such as how to minimize strife among people, and how to maximize civil and moral behavior.

So I imagine the writers of the bible to be--recording their truths in the form of stories that fit their level of scientific knowledge. As scientific knowledge increases, we must (as we have with geocentrism) accept some parts of the text to be stories, but we should still retain the deeper truths. A mere scientific finding may eliminate our "belief" in a particular thing, but should not eliminate our understanding of the deep truths that have confronted humanity for eons.

[QED]

So I imagine the writers of the bible to be--recording their truths in the form of stories that fit their level of scientific knowledge. As scientific knowledge increases, we must (as we have with geocentrism) accept some parts of the text to be stories, but we should still retain the deeper truths. A mere scientific finding may eliminate our "belief" in a particular thing, but should not eliminate our understanding of the deep truths that have confronted humanity for eons.

But if some of the content is rendered invalid due to the limited knowledge of the day then what confidence can we have in "the bits we have to take peoples word for". We are supposed to believe that the writings are divinely inspired, yet the divine being obviously hasn't got any way of ensuring that the content is factually correct.

I've made this point before to suggest that the bible is entirely man-made, without any input whatsoever from god. The ever growing gap in the level of scientific knowledge held by iron-age man gives an ever- growing hint as to the true provenance of the supposedly factual content.

I've already mentioned the unforseen problems of having god create man in his own likeness. What about, as another example, the rainbow. This was supposed to have been placed in the sky by god to mark the covenant that he made with us to visit no more mass-extinctions upon us after the flood. The Franciscan monk Roger Bacon is credited with being the first to explain what rainbows actually are around 1000 years later. Today we can safely say that rainbows must have existed throughout all of time as the phenomena is explained through Quantum Electro Dynamics and is thus intimately linked to every other aspect of physics/chemistry/biology. In the past however it may well have been seen as an isolated phenomenon that god might have chosen to "switch on".

All this makes me think that appeals to the "essence of the story" being correct are only acceptable in the context of dropping the alleged direct involvement with god and accepting that it is no more than a human intuition that such a being exists, and that this speculative god has been made to seem real so it can be woven into stories for the benefit of those unable to appreciate some of the more subtle issues of a particular form of philosophy.

[micatala]

Jose wrote:

So I imagine the writers of the bible to be--recording their truths in the form of stories that fit their level of scientific knowledge. As scientific knowledge increases, we must (as we have with geocentrism) accept some parts of the text to be stories, but we should still retain the deeper truths. A mere scientific finding may eliminate our "belief" in a particular thing, but should not eliminate our understanding of the deep truths that have confronted humanity for eons.

QED wrote:
But if some of the content is rendered invalid due to the limited knowledge of the day then what confidence can we have in "the bits we have to take peoples word for". We are supposed to believe that the writings are divinely inspired, yet the divine being obviously hasn't got any way of ensuring that the content is factually correct.

This is a good question. On the other hand, this objection can be made of most any body of knowledge. Let's take all the evolutioary tracts ever written (or some subset which we want to define as 'evolutionarily canonical). Surely, we will find some parts that are just flat out wrong, and others where the evidence is doubtful, the whole spectrum from downright false to (nearly) undoubtably true. Obviously, the parts written many years ago are likely to be less reliable than the more recent bits. Should we throw out the whole thing because of the false parts?

We should do with the Bible just as we do with any other information. Use our reason and judgment in evaluating what is worthwhile and what is not.

Of course, this does not address your second point as to whether the Bible is the product of man alone, or whether it is divinely inspired. Either way, it does come to us through the hands of men, and so will inevitably be imperfect as a result. This does not necessarily mean it is not divinely inspired, or that the imperfections are 'God's fault.'

Obviously this comparison is not perfect, as the Bible is not a scientific text and so its purpose, value, and nature are different then an 'encyclopedia of evolution.' I don't think we should expect the level of factuality to be the same, or worry that it is not.

[QED]

Let's take all the evolutioary tracts ever written (or some subset which we want to define as 'evolutionarily canonical). Surely, we will find some parts that are just flat out wrong, and others where the evidence is doubtful, the whole spectrum from downright false to (nearly) undoubtably true. Obviously, the parts written many years ago are likely to be less reliable than the more recent bits. Should we throw out the whole thing because of the false parts?

We should do with the Bible just as we do with any other information. Use our reason and judgment in evaluating what is worthwhile and what is not.

In science, things can only ever be "wrong", or "probably right". The only theories that are accepted as reasonable are those that are amenable to testing in various ways. Once a theory fails a test it is held to be wrong, if it survives repeated tests then it may be held to be probably right.

The parts of the bible that are a problem are those that are not amenable to testing. These parts frequently correspond with the more extraordinary claims - and we are asked to take them on faith. This makes your plea for me to accept the bits that I judge to be reasonable impossible to accept. If I am told that the bible is accurate and inerrant, and it proves otherwise it fails to gain my confidence in every respect.

Of course, this does not address your second point as to whether the Bible is the product of man alone, or whether it is divinely inspired. Either way, it does come to us through the hands of men, and so will inevitably be imperfect as a result. This does not necessarily mean it is not divinely inspired, or that the imperfections are 'God's fault.'

Obviously this comparison is not perfect, as the Bible is not a scientific text and so its purpose, value, and nature are different then an 'encyclopedia of evolution.' I don't think we should expect the level of factuality to be the same, or worry that it is not.

Shouldn't we worry though if people use the word of the bible to justify actions in the larger world? Without certainty of its provenance it cannot safely be held as an authority for any action with serious consequences and is potentialy dangerous as a result.