Science and Language (The limitations of science)

by dhw, Monday, March 05, 2012, 20:08 (4644 days ago)

An interesting piece in the latest "Workshop" issued by the Society for Interdisciplinary Studies summarizes various articles from New Scientist about evolution. Apart from new ideas about rapid adaptation, which David has also drawn our attention to, I was particularly struck by certain phrases in the final section, and although we've often discussed the abuse of language before, it's a subject worth returning to:-"Some researchers think that certain kinds of biological progress are necessitated by physical law. [...] Wherever gradients of energy occur, as with the heat of the Sun to Earth, order appears spontaneously from chaos. Convergent evolution, where very different species living in similar environments independently evolve similar adaptations, also indicates that certain paths of evolution are inevitable, just as catastrophes can be seen, not to divert evolution's direction, but merely delay it. There is no need for any purposeful force, such as intelligent design, behind a progressing evolution; it is simply a natural product of physical laws which mathematicians term self-organising chaos."-The assumptions embedded in these words leave me gasping. You will note how the cautious approach ... "certain kinds of progress...certain paths of evolution" ... turns into "progressing evolution" as a whole being a natural product of physical laws. If various species adapt to unplanned environmental changes, wherein lies the inevitability of progress? Adaptation entails staying basically the same, not "progressing". For progress, new organs and new species, you need innovation. Not to mention the fact that for both adaptation and innovation (even if they turn out to be connected) you need mechanisms so complex that we still don't understand them. And why talk of evolution's "direction" if there is no purposeful force? If catastrophes merely delay the direction, the implication if anything would be that it's already programmed to go that way regardless of environmental change. One up for ID, which is perhaps the reason for the final disclaimer. But can anyone tell me what "physical laws" prescribe the emergence of life and the mechanisms that enable it to evolve progressively? And what physical laws determine that life will survive all catastrophes? Finally, "self-organising chaos" is yet another of those phrases that are meant to cloak our total ignorance by sounding scientific. What does that last sentence mean? We don't need a designer because chaos organizes itself so that evolution will progress? It's a great way to win your argument: just state what you believe as if it's a fact, and don't bother about evidence. Isn't that what atheists usually accuse theists of doing?