Current science; fraudulent thinking (Introduction)
by David Turell 
, Monday, May 11, 2015, 23:37 (3274 days ago)
This series of essays expresses my frustration with the reports I find to show here and why I make fun of a portion of them:-http://p2c.com/students/blogs/kirk-durston/2015/02/should-we-have-faith-science-part-i-"As a scientist, I am increasingly appalled and even, just this past week, shocked at what is passing as 21st century science. It has become a mix of good science, bad science, creative story-telling, science fiction, scientism (atheism dressed up as science), citation-bias, huge media announcements followed by quiet retractions, massaging the data, exaggeration for funding purposes, and outright fraud all rolled up into what I refer to as 21st century science. In some disciplines, the problem has become so rampant that the ‘good science' part is drowning in a mess of everything else."-http://p2c.com/students/blogs/kirk-durston/2015/02/should-we-have-faith-science-part-ii-peer-reviewed-science-papers-"The journal Nature, in a paper calling for increased standards in pre-clinical research, revealed that out of 53 papers presenting ‘landmark' published findings in the field of haematology and oncology, only 6 could be confirmed by subsequent laboratory teams. ....Worse still, some of the papers that could not be experimentally reproduced, launched ‘an entire field, with hundreds of secondary publications that expanded on elements of the original observation, but did not actually seek to confirm or falsify its fundamental basis'. Hundreds of other peer-reviewed, published science papers based on faulty initial papers!"-http://p2c.com/students/blogs/kirk-durston/2015/03/should-we-have-faith-science-part-iii-citation-bias- "Citation bias: Greenberg discovered the tendency to ignore the results in the six papers that weakened or falsified the hypothesis had the effect of making the four positive papers, and the hypothesis they supported, reach authoritative status. Citation Diversion: Some papers cited the original, primary papers, but distorted them, an effect Greenberg describes as citation diversion. One of the primary papers that weakened the claim was cited as confirming the claim by three papers. Amplification: Amplification occurs when a belief is propagated by citing papers that lack any data that actually support it. Over a period of 10 years, the quantity of positive citations increased to 636 and 220,553 citation paths. It was not the results that established the scientific belief as ‘fact' but a phenomenon described as an information cascade of citations. Remarkably none of the papers refuted or discussed the data in the six primary papers that provided data negative to the belief!"-http://p2c.com/students/blogs/kirk-durston/2015/03/should-we-have-faith-science-part-iv-confusing-fantasy-science-"So the multiverse has become atheism's ‘god of the gaps' but some scientists are pointing out that multiverse ‘science' is not science at all. Mathematician George Ellis wrote of multiverse models, ‘they are not observationally or experimentally testable—and never will be.'[4]-"Responding to the testability issue, Physicist Sean Carroll proposes that we put less scientific emphasis on testable, falsifiable predictions, suggesting that a theory should be evaluated by how well it explains the data.... ‘In the end, this isn't science so much as philosophy using the language of science. -" To state that a theory is so good that its existence supplants the need for data and testing in our opinion risks misleading students and the public as to how science should be done.."-http://p2c.com/students/blogs/kirk-durston/2015/03/should-we-have-faith-science-part-v-corrupting-influence-scientism-"First, distinguished philosopher of science, Philip Kitcher, argues that the notion of a scientific “theory of everything' ‘is an absurd fantasy'. The claim that science is the best and only trustworthy way to discover truth is, itself, not a scientific claim, but a philosophical claim. Thus, scientism is self-refuting from the outset, as the Skeptic's Dictionary and many others have pointed out.-"Nevertheless, motivated by scientism/atheism, Darwinism is the only game in town so the lack of empirical data and an increasing number of serious problems with the Darwinian account are compensated for by creative story-telling and a profound lack of critical thinking,-"To avoid the circular fallacy, logic dictates that the cause of nature must be supernatural. That, right there, logically falsifies scientism but it also establishes the requirement that the supernatural must be taken into account in humanity's pursuit of answers, not just with respect to the origin of the cosmos and of life, but discussions of justice, beauty, morality, love and honour. Knowledge is an interconnected latticework of information and understanding, each facet of which influences and sheds light on other aspects. Scientism lobotomizes the quest for knowledge by turning a blind eye to God and the supernatural, and corrupts science with fantasy, countless just-so stories and promissory notes of what we ‘may' discover to make up for the absence of real data. Unfortunately, most people fail to distinguish between good science, bad science, science fiction, and scientism; in their minds it is all rolled into 'science', the result of which is the increasing corruption of 21st century science." (my bold)
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Tuesday, May 12, 2015, 09:06 (3274 days ago) @ David Turell
This post beautifully sums up my misgivings about most of the "scientific" research that I read.
--
What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by GateKeeper , Sunday, June 07, 2015, 01:12 (3248 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained
yes, I feel the same. When I address an atheist skewing science to support atheism it infuriates them. Then they get so mad at me when I clarify what it is saying and suggest that thiest have a right to science too. "Random" is a great example of this. Like it proves anything anyway.-I saw this and it describes me pretty good I think.-"no-nothing" < X > "omni-dude"-i don't know what "X" is.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Sunday, June 07, 2015, 04:47 (3248 days ago) @ GateKeeper
GK yes, I feel the same. When I address an atheist skewing science to support atheism it infuriates them. Then they get so mad at me when I clarify what it is saying and suggest that thiest have a right to science too. "Random" is a great example of this. Like it proves anything anyway. > > I saw this and it describes me pretty good I think. > > "no-nothing" < X > "omni-dude" > > i don't know what "X" is.-I wish you could explain yourself and where did that quote come from?
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by GateKeeper , Sunday, June 07, 2015, 14:12 (3248 days ago) @ David Turell
well, To tell ya truth I said it. But for anxiety reasons I always say somebody else said it. But that is unimportant to what it means.-I apologize, I am a sucky poor writer so I am unclear. I also assume plenty of background knowledge for people that are talking about why events are taking place around us over the age of 22. I don't give much lead way to people with big mouths talking about theist or atheist and don't know some basic words like electrostatic interactions and what virtual particles are. Let alone to those that can't draw a picture of what boiling means. so combine the two and "poof" ... I am a dork.-what part is unclear?-My main point is that I agree with you guys. we have so many people trying for PhD's they have to start making stuff up. Some, not all, PhD's are more about defending the "world changing claim" instead of actually being one. I mean we know so much that area's to study for the regular grad student to study are becoming confining. -The result is less than insightful science. Toss in fraud. "POOF" integrity is lost.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Sunday, June 07, 2015, 14:44 (3248 days ago) @ GateKeeper
> GK: My main point is that I agree with you guys. we have so many people trying for PhD's they have to start making stuff up. Some, not all, PhD's are more about defending the "world changing claim" instead of actually being one. I mean we know so much that area's to study for the regular grad student to study are becoming confining. > > The result is less than insightful science. Toss in fraud. "POOF" integrity is lost.-Thanks for the explanation. I follow. But I also disagree. I don't think that 'the areas for study are confining'. The real problem is grant money is not as plentiful as it once was, compared to the number of research folks who want it and to live on it. I had some grant money once for a cardiology project. It was a sideline for me, I didn't need it to live on. But today there is open warfare to get the grants and publish anything. We have a science-government complex just like the military-government complex Eisenhower warned about. And you are right. There are few chances for the 'great breakthrough' in new interpretations. String theory is a glorious relic.-Please read the current NY Times article for full clarification:-http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/opinion/a-crisis-at-the-edge-of-physics.html?_r=1-"A few months ago in the journal Nature, two leading researchers, George Ellis and Joseph Silk, published a controversial piece called “Scientific Method: Defend the Integrity of Physics.” They criticized a newfound willingness among some scientists to explicitly set aside the need for experimental confirmation of today's most ambitious cosmic theories — so long as those theories are “sufficiently elegant and explanatory.” Despite working at the cutting edge of knowledge, such scientists are, for Professors Ellis and Silk, “breaking with centuries of philosophical tradition of defining scientific knowledge as empirical.'”-*****-"Recall the epicycles, the imaginary circles that Ptolemy used and formalized around A.D. 150 to describe the motions of planets. Although Ptolemy had no evidence for their existence, epicycles successfully explained what the ancients could see in the night sky, so they were accepted as real. But they were eventually shown to be a fiction, more than 1,500 years later. Are superstrings and the multiverse, painstakingly theorized by hundreds of brilliant scientists, anything more than modern-day epicycles?"
Current science; poor planning, poor analysis, etc.
by David Turell , Wednesday, June 10, 2015, 14:59 (3245 days ago) @ David Turell
Poor reagents, poor design, poor analysis, poor reporting and up to half the studies can't be reproduced!-http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/43205/title/The-Cost-of-Irreproducible-Research/-"Just about half of all basic life science research is flawed to the point that it cannot be replicated, according to an analysis published in PLOS Biology yesterday (June 9). These “irreproducible” studies end up costing around $28 billion annually in the U.S.-“'While false positives are an inevitable part of scientific research, our study shows that the current level of irreproducibility in preclinical research is very costly,” study coauthor Timothy Simcoe, an economist at the US Council of Economic Advisors, said in a press release.- "The analysts used previous estimates of irreproducibility to arrive at their number. Poor quality reagents and materials were the biggest cause of flaws in experiments, mucking up more than one third of preclinical studies, the team found. Poor study design and insufficient analysis or reporting each afflicted a little more than a quarter of studies, while improper laboratory protocols took down one out of every 10 studies. “The four categories are decent, but the estimates are off,” John Ioannidis, a Stanford University epidemiologist, told Nature News. “I would put a much higher rate on the data analysis and reporting component.'”
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Sunday, December 13, 2015, 23:30 (3058 days ago) @ David Turell
There is hope. Here is an essay asking for replication:-https://cosmosmagazine.com/society/how-do-we-fix-bad-science-"Ten years ago epidemiologist John Ioannidis blew the whistle on science. -"His paper: “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False”, was published in August 2005, in PLOS Medicine. It became one of the journal's most-cited articles. While climate sceptics, anti-vaccination campaigners and the rest of the pseudo-science community have dined out on this paper, arguably it has been a shot in the arm for science. -"Ioannidis (then at the University of Ioannina, Greece, now at Stanford University, California) argued the inherent bias of researchers made them too flexible with their study design. Sample sizes were too small to be meaningful, say; or if the initial data didn't yield dramatic results, they re-analysed them until they got “better numbers”. In some cases, data that did not conform was eliminated (called “cleaning the data”). The tendencies were more pronounced if financial or ideological interests were at stake. -***-"A career in academic research is wildly competitive. University scientists have to raise grant money constantly, and to do so, you have to tell the funding agency that you think your project will work based on your past results. Only innovative work is funded. The rewards for success are huge: your salary depends on it. -***-"They began with psychology, selecting 100 experiments that had been published in peer-reviewed journals and 270 expert scientists to repeat them. To ensure they were doing the experiments correctly, they asked the original authors to participate. The findings were published on August 2015 in Science - 10 years after Ioannidis's first paper. They found more than 60% of the experiments did not reproduce the original results. Even in the successfully replicated studies, the effect was about half that of the original studies.-"The good news is that this seems to be the beginning of a new wave of making science accountable. Nosek says major psychology journals have started publishing replications alongside original research. A reproducibility project for cancer research is next."-Comment: Government-science complex. Too many people chasing too little money. I hope what I decide to present is reliable. At least we are not looking at survey material, but descriptive discoveries.
Current science; confirmation bias
by David Turell , Thursday, March 07, 2019, 01:06 (1879 days ago) @ David Turell
Definitely a real problem with lots of group think distorting scientific results:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/confirmation-bias-hurts-social-science-11551831789?mod=Mor...
"Humility can be hard to come by in professional research, which is why it’s worth noting the retraction last month of a major study on the social effects of attitudes toward sexuality. The journal Social Science & Medicine withdrew a 2014 analysis purporting to show that widespread traditional beliefs about sexual morality—or “structural stigma”—gravely imperil the health of people who don’t identify as straight, whom the study classified as “sexual minorities.”
***
"It was yanked because its key claim—that stigma reduces life expectancy for sexual minorities in the United States by an average of 12 years—came to naught. It was entirely the result of a coding error to which Mr. Hatzenbuehler himself, to his credit, owned up.
***
"This case has the marks of confirmation bias—a problem that bedevils social science, especially when research concerns controversial issues. Remember when UCLA graduate student Michael LaCour’s study indicated that people’s minds could be changed about same-sex marriage merely by gay canvassers engaging them in a simple conversation? Columbia political-science professor Donald Green signed on as a co-author of that study without closely scrutinizing the data. When those data were exposed as having been fabricated by Mr. LaCour, Mr. Green commendably called for the study’s retraction, which came swiftly.
***
"Confirmation bias—and its converse, the aggravated denial of unfavored results—flourishes when there is a lack of viewpoint diversity in scholarship. As such diversity has waned in the American academy, scholarly journals and federal funding agencies have too often become intellectually inbred. They sometimes constitute an academic version of interlocking directorates on corporate boards, in which decision makers who share the same outlook tend to view each other’s work with an insufficiently critical eye. Research that pleases everyone in the club sometimes doesn’t get enough scrutiny, even when its results are strikingly implausible.
"“Prudent” scholars are often afraid even to mention the rise of confirmation bias, much less try to do anything about it. Yet following the example of Mr. Regnerus, any hope of rescuing social-science research from further disrepute will require a little less “prudence” and more guts."
Comment: The worst cases are in the sociology and psychology sciences where much research cannot be confirmed. But this clearly points out skepticism is needed when reading any article with Darwin-inculcated authors.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
DAVID (QUOTE) "To avoid the circular fallacy, logic dictates that the cause of nature must be supernatural. That, right there, logically falsifies scientism but it also establishes the requirement that the supernatural must be taken into account in humanity's pursuit of answers, not just with respect to the origin of the cosmos and of life, but discussions of justice, beauty, morality, love and honour. Knowledge is an interconnected latticework of information and understanding, each facet of which influences and sheds light on other aspects. Scientism lobotomizes the quest for knowledge by turning a blind eye to God and the supernatural, and corrupts science with fantasy, countless just-so stories and promissory notes of what we ‘may' discover to make up for the absence of real data. Unfortunately, most people fail to distinguish between good science, bad science, science fiction, and scientism; in their minds it is all rolled into 'science', the result of which is the increasing corruption of 21st century science." (my bold)-Until this paragraph, I thought the articles were spot on. I would also say we have no way of knowing how far science can take us along the path of knowledge, and much of so-called science contains as many just-so stories as religion. But to claim that the cause of nature must be supernatural and therefore God exists and therefore science (presumably the writer means atheistic scientists) turns a blind eye to God is just about as fallaciously circular as you can get!
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Wednesday, May 13, 2015, 01:18 (3273 days ago) @ dhw
DAVID (QUOTE) "To avoid the circular fallacy, logic dictates that the cause of nature must be supernatural. That, right there, logically falsifies scientism but it also establishes the requirement that the supernatural must be taken into account in humanity's pursuit of answers, > dhw: Until this paragraph, I thought the articles were spot on. I would also say we have no way of knowing how far science can take us along the path of knowledge, and much of so-called science contains as many just-so stories as religion. But to claim that the cause of nature must be supernatural and therefore God exists and therefore science (presumably the writer means atheistic scientists) turns a blind eye to God is just about as fallaciously circular as you can get!-I suspect you did not read the preceding paragraphs where he set up his argument:-http://www.agnosticweb.com/index.php?mode=posting&id=18691&back=entry-"First, distinguished philosopher of science, Philip Kitcher, argues that the notion of a scientific “theory of everything' ‘is an absurd fantasy'. The claim that science is the best and only trustworthy way to discover truth is, itself, not a scientific claim, but a philosophical claim. Thus, scientism is self-refuting from the outset, as the Skeptic's Dictionary and many others have pointed out-"A much more serious consequence of scientism is that it has had a significant, corrupting influence on 21st century science.-"Example One: Good science reveals that nature, composed of space, time, matter and energy, had a beginning. Scientism requires a natural explanation for the origin of nature, a logically impossible task. One cannot provide a natural explanation for the origin of nature without assuming the existence of nature in that ‘natural' explanation; a circular fallacy. The result is a variety of arcane string, M-brane, and multiverse theories that have been conflated with science but are now being exposed as fantasy and a threat to the integrity of physics. (my bold)-[ Interpretation: you can't get something from nothing]-"Example Two: A few years ago I was visiting with a razor-minded, atheist professor of biology at one of Canada's top-ranked universities. In the course of our conversation, he expressed great frustration over how rampant creative story-telling has become in the field of evolutionary biology, to fill in for what he believes is the colossal failure of neo-Darwinian theory to explain the large scale disparity of life. Nevertheless, motivated by scientism/atheism, Darwinism is the only game in town so the lack of empirical data and an increasing number of serious problems with the Darwinian account are compensated for by creative story-telling and a profound lack of critical thinking, as Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini point out."-I have referred to Fodor and P-P before.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
DAVID (QUOTE) "To avoid the circular fallacy, logic dictates that the cause of nature must be supernatural. That, right there, logically falsifies scientism but it also establishes the requirement that the supernatural must be taken into account in humanity's pursuit of answers, not just with respect to the origin of the cosmos and of life, but discussions of justice, beauty, morality, love and honour. Knowledge is an interconnected latticework of information and understanding, each facet of which influences and sheds light on other aspects. Scientism lobotomizes the quest for knowledge by turning a blind eye to God and the supernatural, and corrupts science with fantasy, countless just-so stories and promissory notes of what we ‘may' discover to make up for the absence of real data. Unfortunately, most people fail to distinguish between good science, bad science, science fiction, and scientism; in their minds it is all rolled into 'science', the result of which is the increasing corruption of 21st century science." (my bold)-Dhw: Until this paragraph, I thought the articles were spot on, and I would also say we have no way of knowing how far science can take us along the path of knowledge, and much of so-called science contains as many just-so stories as religion. But to claim that the cause of nature must be supernatural and therefore God exists and therefore science (presumably the writer means atheistic scientists) turns a blind eye to God is just about as fallaciously circular as you can get! -DAVID: I suspect you did not read the preceding paragraphs where he set up his argument:- I read and agreed with everything else in your post. However, I did not log onto the website itself (I am struggling currently to find time), and so did not see the following:-QUOTE: "Example One: Good science reveals that nature, composed of space, time, matter and energy, had a beginning. Scientism requires a natural explanation for the origin of nature, a logically impossible task. One cannot provide a natural explanation for the origin of nature without assuming the existence of nature in that ‘natural' explanation; a circular fallacy. The result is a variety of arcane string, M-brane, and multiverse theories that have been conflated with science but are now being exposed as fantasy and a threat to the integrity of physics. (my bold)-I'm not at all convinced that “good science” reveals that Nature as he defines it had a beginning, but otherwise I agree completely with this. However, his own response to the fallacy as quoted in the paragraph at the head of this post is laughable. He has substituted one circular fallacy for another! If you assume the origin of nature is “natural”, it can't be supernatural (yah boo), and to avoid that mistake, you must assume that the origin of nature is not natural, and therefore it is supernatural, and therefore God exists (hurray). Everything else, though, is fine with me, and provides a sound argument for agnosticism.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Thursday, May 14, 2015, 14:27 (3272 days ago) @ dhw
> > dhw: I read and agreed with everything else in your post. However, I did not log onto the website itself (I am struggling currently to find time),-I try to present the pithiest to save time, and so miss some necessary parts.- -> > dhw: I'm not at all convinced that “good science” reveals that Nature as he defines it had a beginning, but otherwise I agree completely with this. However, his own response to the fallacy as quoted in the paragraph at the head of this post is laughable. He has substituted one circular fallacy for another! If you assume the origin of nature is “natural”, it can't be supernatural (yah boo), and to avoid that mistake, you must assume that the origin of nature is not natural, and therefore it is supernatural, and therefore God exists (hurray). > > Everything else, though, is fine with me, and provides a sound argument for agnosticism.-Except the universe had a beginning. It had to start from something and its energy had to derive from antecedent energy. It follows laws of physics and its evolution to its current state looks planned. The odds against natural occurrence are miniscule. Odds for agnosticism small.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
dhw: I'm not at all convinced that “good science” reveals that Nature as he defines it had a beginning, but otherwise I agree completely with this. However, his own response to the fallacy as quoted in the paragraph at the head of this post is laughable. He has substituted one circular fallacy for another! If you assume the origin of nature is “natural”, it can't be supernatural (yah boo), and to avoid that mistake, you must assume that the origin of nature is not natural, and therefore it is supernatural, and therefore God exists (hurray). Everything else, though, is fine with me, and provides a sound argument for agnosticism.-DAVID: Except the universe had a beginning. It had to start from something and its energy had to derive from antecedent energy. It follows laws of physics and its evolution to its current state looks planned. The odds against natural occurrence are miniscule. Odds for agnosticism small.-I notice you have ignored the silly circular fallacy, so I presume you agree that it is nonsense to promote one circular fallacy against another.-The author claims that “Good science reveals that nature, composed of space, time, matter and energy, had a beginning.” “Good science” already begs the question of criteria, but you yourself say the universe had to derive from antecedent energy, so is the antecedent energy not part of nature? I find it very difficult to make assumptions about what preceded our universe, but even if the Big Bang theory is correct (and it remains a theory, not a fact), I join with you in the belief that it must have had a cause. And I see no reason to assume that whatever caused it did not already exist in space and time, and did not consist of energy and matter. There are no odds for or against agnosticism, because agnostics don't bet. They remain neutral. Only theists and atheists bet.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Friday, May 15, 2015, 23:44 (3270 days ago) @ dhw
> dhw: I notice you have ignored the silly circular fallacy, so I presume you agree that it is nonsense to promote one circular fallacy against another.-I felt it had been discussed enough for a tiny point. > > dhw: The author claims that “Good science reveals that nature, composed of space, time, matter and energy, had a beginning.” “Good science” already begs the question of criteria, but you yourself say the universe had to derive from antecedent energy, so is the antecedent energy not part of nature? -I'm not sure what you mean by 'nature' in this context. Our universe 'in its nature' did have to come from antecedent energy, which is always my view. Isn't nature what appears after the universe starts?-> dhw: I find it very difficult to make assumptions about what preceded our universe, but even if the Big Bang theory is correct (and it remains a theory, not a fact), I join with you in the belief that it must have had a cause. And I see no reason to assume that whatever caused it did not already exist in space and time, -fine.-> dhw: and did not consist of energy and matter.-Really, is there anything more basic than energy particles? Yes, hot plasma. I don't follow you. > > dhw: There are no odds for or against agnosticism, because agnostics don't bet. They remain neutral. Only theists and atheists bet.-True, but they should look at odds for each theory.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
dhw: I notice you have ignored the silly circular fallacy, so I presume you agree that it is nonsense to promote one circular fallacy against another. DAVID: I felt it had been discussed enough for a tiny point.-The point was so tiny that you emphasized it in bold. There has been no discussion. I pointed out that the items you put in bold substituted one circular fallacy for another. May I assume you agree?-dhw: The author claims that “Good science reveals that nature, composed of space, time, matter and energy, had a beginning.” “Good science” already begs the question of criteria, but you yourself say the universe had to derive from antecedent energy, so is the antecedent energy not part of nature? DAVID: I'm not sure what you mean by 'nature' in this context. Our universe 'in its nature' did have to come from antecedent energy, which is always my view. Isn't nature what appears after the universe starts?-We have no idea. The meaning of the word dissolves when we start discussing the origin of the universe. That is why some folk describe the antecedent energy as “supernatural”, whereas materialists tell us there is nothing beyond the natural world. Even the word “universe” becomes fluid. Maybe the universe has existed for ever and ever, and the Big Bang (if it happened) was just one event in its history. Nobody knows what happened before (= time), or if/where the universe ends (= space). Hence the statement below, which perhaps you misunderstood. dhw: I find it very difficult to make assumptions about what preceded our universe, but even if the Big Bang theory is correct (and it remains a theory, not a fact), I join with you in the belief that it must have had a cause. And I see no reason to assume that whatever caused it did not already exist in space and time, DAVID: fine. dhw: and did not consist of energy and matter. DAVID: Really, is there anything more basic than energy particles? Yes, hot plasma. I don't follow you.-You have split my sentence. I see no reason to believe that space, time, energy and matter did not exist before the Big Bang.-dhw: There are no odds for or against agnosticism, because agnostics don't bet. They remain neutral. Only theists and atheists bet. DAVID: True, but they should look at odds for each theory.-I do. And because I see them as 50/50, I do not bet. The odds can be for or against theism or atheism. They cannot be for or against agnosticism.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Sunday, May 17, 2015, 19:33 (3269 days ago) @ dhw
dhw: I notice you have ignored the silly circular fallacy, so I presume you agree that it is nonsense to promote one circular fallacy against another. > DAVID: I felt it had been discussed enough for a tiny point. > > Dhw: The point was so tiny that you emphasized it in bold. There has been no discussion. I pointed out that the items you put in bold substituted one circular fallacy for another. May I assume you agree?-I do bold at times to stir discussion, bring out the author's viewpoint, and in this case I agree with his overall points. > > dhw:You have split my sentence. I see no reason to believe that space, time, energy and matter did not exist before the Big Bang.-This statement of yours is totally opposite to current philosophic and scientific belief. Space and time began with the Big Bang, and were created by it. Energy/matter in my view had to pre-exist it timelessly or there have been a series of Big Bangs.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
Dhw: I pointed out that the items you put in bold substituted one circular fallacy for another. May I assume you agree?-DAVID: I do bold at times to stir discussion, bring out the author's viewpoint, and in this case I agree with his overall points.-So do I. And I hereby give up trying to get you to admit that substituting one circular fallacy for another is not a good idea.-dhw:You have split my sentence. I see no reason to believe that space, time, energy and matter did not exist before the Big Bang. DAVID: This statement of yours is totally opposite to current philosophic and scientific belief. Space and time began with the Big Bang, and were created by it. Energy/matter in my view had to pre-exist it timelessly or there have been a series of Big Bangs.-Even if the Big Bang happened (it is a theory, not a fact), the moment you argue that something pre-existed it, you are embracing that concept of time which entails a progression from before to now to after, from past to present to future, from cause to effect to cause to effect etc. By hopefully shoving in the word “timelessly” you are glossing over the problem, especially since the word “timeless” is often used to denote independent of the passage of time. (Beethoven's music is said to be timeless). Since we do not and cannot know what happened before the Big Bang, any definitive statement such as space and time did not exist before it, is clearly pure speculation
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Tuesday, May 19, 2015, 00:53 (3267 days ago) @ dhw
dhw:Since we do not and cannot know what happened before the Big Bang, any definitive statement such as space and time did not exist before it, is clearly pure speculation-That may be your extraordinary viewpoint, and I think you will find few to accept it. Our time and space began at the Big Bang, which is, yes, a theory, but there is no current accepted alternative.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
DAVID: Space and time began with the Big Bang, and were created by it. Energy/matter in my view had to pre-exist it timelessly or there have been a series of Big Bangs. dhw: Even if the Big Bang happened (it is a theory, not a fact), the moment you argue that something pre-existed it, you are embracing that concept of time which entails a progression from before to now to after, from past to present to future, from cause to effect to cause to effect etc. By hopefully shoving in the word “timelessly” you are glossing over the problem, especially since the word “timeless” is often used to denote unending, or independent of the passage of time. (Beethoven's music is timeless). Since we do not and cannot know what happened before the Big Bang, any definitive statement such as space and time did not exist before it, is clearly pure speculation. -DAVID: That may be your extraordinary viewpoint, and I think you will find few to accept it. Our time and space began at the Big Bang, which is, yes, a theory but there is no current accepted alternative.-This is akin to the circular fallacies that you are so very reluctant to condemn. If the Big Bang theory is true, of course OUR time and space began with it, but that does not mean there was NO time or space before the Big Bang. You have ignored the first part of my post, and so I have repeated it. According to my concept of time, you cannot have a before-the-BB if time began with the BB. There is of course a common view that the universe came into being ex nihilo, which would confirm your belief that there was no time beforehand, but would run contrary to your belief that there was pre-existing matter and energy. No doubt that is why you try to wriggle out of the paradox by inserting the word “timeless”. Perhaps it would help if you would let us have your definition of time.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Wednesday, May 20, 2015, 20:01 (3266 days ago) @ dhw
dhw: According to my concept of time, you cannot have a before-the-BB if time began with the BB. There is of course a common view that the universe came into being ex nihilo, which would confirm your belief that there was no time beforehand, but would run contrary to your belief that there was pre-existing matter and energy. No doubt that is why you try to wriggle out of the paradox by inserting the word “timeless”. Perhaps it would help if you would let us have your definition of time.-Time as we know it exists in this universe. But I still can conceive of a timeless pre-existing energy we call God. We still gave to remember we got the universe from something.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
dhw: If the Big Bang theory is true, of course OUR time and space began with it, but that does not mean there was NO time or space before the Big Bang. You have ignored the first part of my post, and so I have repeated it. According to my concept of time, you cannot have a before-the-BB if time began with the BB. There is of course a common view that the universe came into being ex nihilo, which would confirm your belief that there was no time beforehand, but would run contrary to your belief that there was pre-existing matter and energy. No doubt that is why you try to wriggle out of the paradox by inserting the word “timeless”. Perhaps it would help if you would let us have your definition of time.-DAVID: Time as we know it exists in this universe. But I can still conceive of a timeless pre-existing energy we call God. We still gave to remember we got the universe from something.-Of course time as we know it exists in this universe. But you insist that time itself began with this universe, while you simultaneously insist that something preceded this universe. (The contradiction is not resolved by juggling with the word “timeless”, which can mean independent of time or unaffected by time.) If the universe came from something, that something must have existed BEFORE the universe, and my concept of time is a movement from before to now to after. What is your concept of time?
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Friday, May 22, 2015, 21:58 (3264 days ago) @ dhw
> dhw: Of course time as we know it exists in this universe. But you insist that time itself began with this universe, while you simultaneously insist that something preceded this universe. (The contradiction is not resolved by juggling with the word “timeless”, which can mean independent of time or unaffected by time.) If the universe came from something, that something must have existed BEFORE the universe, and my concept of time is a movement from before to now to after. What is your concept of time?-We are back to the same discussion as before. I believe in an uncaused first cause. The time we experience is in this universe. We have not and probably cannot imagine 'before' this universe. But if there is a first cause there is a 'before'. We experience time in this universe as a series of sequential events.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Saturday, May 23, 2015, 11:38 (3263 days ago) @ David Turell
We are back to the same discussion as before. I believe in an uncaused first cause. The time we experience is in this universe. We have not and probably cannot imagine 'before' this universe. But if there is a first cause there is a 'before'. We experience time in this universe as a series of sequential events.-I think all this just gets muddied up by thinking of time as some kind of tangible thing. It's not. It is simply the framework we use to explain a sequence of events. Even an uncaused first cause, would experience the same sense of a 'sequence of events'. It may not perceive them in the same manner as we do, because it's perspective would be vastly different from our own, but it would still perceive them.
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What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Saturday, May 23, 2015, 14:41 (3263 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained
David: We are back to the same discussion as before. I believe in an uncaused first cause. The time we experience is in this universe. We have not and probably cannot imagine 'before' this universe. But if there is a first cause there is a 'before'. We experience time in this universe as a series of sequential events. > > Tony: I think all this just gets muddied up by thinking of time as some kind of tangible thing. It's not. It is simply the framework we use to explain a sequence of events. Even an uncaused first cause, would experience the same sense of a 'sequence of events'. It may not perceive them in the same manner as we do, because it's perspective would be vastly different from our own, but it would still perceive them.-It seems as if you are equating God's perception of time with ours. I suspect God does not care about time nor perhaps even notice it.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Saturday, May 23, 2015, 17:24 (3263 days ago) @ David Turell
David: We are back to the same discussion as before. I believe in an uncaused first cause. The time we experience is in this universe. We have not and probably cannot imagine 'before' this universe. But if there is a first cause there is a 'before'. We experience time in this universe as a series of sequential events. > > > > Tony: I think all this just gets muddied up by thinking of time as some kind of tangible thing. It's not. It is simply the framework we use to explain a sequence of events. Even an uncaused first cause, would experience the same sense of a 'sequence of events'. It may not perceive them in the same manner as we do, because it's perspective would be vastly different from our own, but it would still perceive them. > >David: It seems as if you are equating God's perception of time with ours. I suspect God does not care about time nor perhaps even notice it.-Actually, I explicitly stated that his perception of time is NOT like our own. Although, all things considered I disagree about God 'not caring' about time. I think God cares about time the same way a designer who is living outside the framework of his design cares about any element of that design. He understands its importance and its relation to every other aspect of the design. From a biblical standpoint, God is indeed intimately aware of time, and is in fact quite punctual. Coupled with all of the biological, astrological, and geological events are extremely time dependent, I conclude that God cares about time very much indeed. Not the way we do, and not for the reasons we do, but he does care about it.
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What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Saturday, May 23, 2015, 17:34 (3263 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained
Tony: From a biblical standpoint, God is indeed intimately aware of time, and is in fact quite punctual. Coupled with all of the biological, astrological, and geological events are extremely time dependent, I conclude that God cares about time very much indeed. Not the way we do, and not for the reasons we do, but he does care about it.-In the sense you have described, you are correct. And as I think further about the sequence of the development of this universe, as a designer, God had to take timing events into account, but again not in the way we think about time.
Current science; fraudulent thinking
dhw: Of course time as we know it exists in this universe. But you insist that time itself began with this universe, while you simultaneously insist that something preceded this universe. (The contradiction is not resolved by juggling with the word “timeless”, which can mean independent of time or unaffected by time.) If the universe came from something, that something must have existed BEFORE the universe, and my concept of time is a movement from before to now to after. What is your concept of time?-DAVID: We are back to the same discussion as before. I believe in an uncaused first cause. The time we experience is in this universe. We have not and probably cannot imagine 'before' this universe. But if there is a first cause there is a 'before'. We experience time in this universe as a series of sequential events.-I know the time WE experience is in this universe, and we experience it as sequential events (cause and effect). You are convinced that first cause energy planned this universe and caused it to happen. In your scenario no-one can possibly know what plans and series of sequential events your uncaused first cause might have got up to in the eternal “before”, and so nobody can state as you do that time did not exist. Only atheists with their equally irrational belief that a universe can spring ex nihilo can claim that time began with this universe. You both shoot yourselves in the foot: you because you cannot reconcile belief in a ‘before' with belief that time did not exist; they because by denying the possibility of earlier universes, they increase the odds against chance producing life.-Xxxxx-I have fallen behind in this discussion, but the exchanges between David and Tony suggest to me that David is beginning to see the flaw in his thinking: -DAVID: God had to take timing events into account, but again not in the way we think about time. -Since by your own admission we cannot know how God thinks about anything, you are in no position to claim that he has a different concept of time from our own. Therefore you have no justification for asserting that time as a sequence from past to present to future, cause and effect, did not exist before the Big Bang (if it happened).
Current science; fraudulent thinking
by David Turell , Sunday, May 24, 2015, 19:06 (3262 days ago) @ dhw
dhw:Only atheists with their equally irrational belief that a universe can spring ex nihilo can claim that time began with this universe. You both shoot yourselves in the foot: you because you cannot reconcile belief in a ‘before' with belief that time did not exist; they because by denying the possibility of earlier universes, they increase the odds against chance producing life.-Not true re' atheists alone! St. Thomas states time began with this universe, and Thomists base their philosophy on cause and effect. Read Ed Fesser to see this. > > Xxxxx > > I have fallen behind in this discussion, but the exchanges between David and Tony suggest to me that David is beginning to see the flaw in his thinking: > > DAVID: God had to take timing events into account, but again not in the way we think about time. > > dhw: Since by your own admission we cannot know how God thinks about anything, you are in no position to claim that he has a different concept of time from our own. Therefore you have no justification for asserting that time as a sequence from past to present to future, cause and effect, did not exist before the Big Bang (if it happened).-I really know of no philosopher who thinks of a 'time' before our space time. The atheists want it "ex nihilo", therefore no 'time' before our time which agrees with me. And back to St. Thomas, an uncaused cause in timeless. I'm with him. I view your foot as having the hole in it!
Current science; lack of blinding
by David Turell , Wednesday, May 27, 2015, 17:48 (3259 days ago) @ David Turell
Single blind and double blind removes observer bias almost completely. It seems there are many studies down without it:-http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fevo.2015.00051/full-"We surveyed 492 recent studies in the fields of ecology, evolution, and behavior (EEB) to evaluate potential for observer bias and the need for blind experimentation in each study. While 248 articles included experiments that could have been influenced by observer bias, only 13.3% of these articles indicated that experiments were blinded. The use of blind observation therefore was either grossly underreported in the surveyed articles, or many EEB studies were not blinded. We hope that a concerted effort of the field of EEB—including researchers, peer-reviewers, and journal editors—will help promote and institute routine, blind observation as an essential standard that should be practiced by all sciences.-***-"To remedy underreporting of blind experimentation, we recommend that EEB researchers report for each experiment whether a study was blinded (or not blinded), and explain how any blinding was accomplished (or explain why blinding was not possible). We also recommend that peer-reviewers and editors require accurate reporting of blinding in the methods section and require that authors reveal in their methods any unblinded experimentation. Such accurate reporting of methods will permit readers to gain a better understanding of the strengths of a study and should facilitate progress in future research building on published work. Finally, we recommend that editorial policies of journals require reporting of both blinded and unblinded observation, and that journals improve guidelines that assist peer-reviewers to evaluate the need for blind observation. We hope that a concerted effort of the field of EEB will soon follow the same routine and standardized use of blind experimentation as in other fields, stimulate a more critical reading of the published literature, and thus establish in the near future a firm tradition of blind experimentation in ecology, evolution, and behavior."
Current science; Lancet editor comments
by David Turell , Friday, May 29, 2015, 19:13 (3257 days ago) @ David Turell
His conclusions are frightening:-http://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736%2815%2960696-1.pdf-"The case against science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn towards darkness. As one participant put it, “poor methods get results”. The Academy of Medical Sciences, Medical Research Council, and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council have now put their reputational weight behind an investigation into these questionable research practices.-***-"The conclusion of the symposium was that something must be done. Indeed, all seemed to agree that it was within our power to do that something. But as to precisely what to do or how to do it, there were no firm answers. Those who have the power to act seem to think somebody else should act first. And every positive action (eg, funding well-powered replications) has a counterargument (science will become less creative). The good news is that science is beginning to take some of its worst failings very seriously. The bad news is that nobody is ready to take the first step to clean up the system."
Current science; Lancet editor comments
by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Saturday, May 30, 2015, 13:57 (3256 days ago) @ David Turell
"The apparent endemicity of bad research behaviour is alarming. In their quest for telling a >compelling story, scientists too often sculpt data to fi t their preferred theory of the world. >Or they retrofi t hypotheses to fi t their data"-This... just ... this.
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What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.
Current science; a statistically correct fraud
by David Turell , Monday, June 01, 2015, 14:21 (3254 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained
A Ph. D. purposely created an incompetent statistical study to prove chocolate causes weight loss and got it published, and then blared all over the world.- http://io9.com/i-fooled-millions-into-thinking-chocolate-helps-weight-1707251800-&q... by Chocolate!” the headlines blared. A team of German researchers had found that people on a low-carb diet lost weight 10 percent faster if they ate a chocolate bar every day. It made the front page of Bild, Europe's largest daily newspaper, just beneath their update about the Germanwings crash. From there, it ricocheted around the internet and beyond, making news in more than 20 countries and half a dozen languages. It was discussed on television news shows. It appeared in glossy print, most recently in the June issue of Shape magazine (“Why You Must Eat Chocolate Daily,” page 128). Not only does chocolate accelerate weight loss, the study found, but it leads to healthier cholesterol levels and overall increased well-being. The Bild story quotes the study's lead author, Johannes Bohannon, Ph.D., research director of the Institute of Diet and Health: “The best part is you can buy chocolate everywhere.”-"I am Johannes Bohannon, Ph.D. Well, actually my name is John, and I'm a journalist. I do have a Ph.D., but it's in the molecular biology of bacteria, not humans. The Institute of Diet and Health? That's nothing more than a website."
Current science; fallacious thinking
by David Turell , Thursday, December 14, 2017, 01:08 (2327 days ago) @ David Turell
Jerry Fodor and the fallacies in Darwin theory. Fodor was an atheist:
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/postscript/jerry-fodors-enduring-critique-of-neo-Darw...
"Fodor first made his name at M.I.T., in the sixties and seventies, by pioneering a theory of the mind. He offered an updated version of what is sometimes called, in philosophy survey courses, rationalism. He didn’t think it was possible that we started our lives as blank slates and acquired, through experience alone, our mental repertoires; combining aspects of Chomsky’s theory of linguistic innateness with Turing’s insights into mathematical computation, he argued that there had to be a prior, unacquired “language of thought”—the title of his career-making book—out of which everyday cognition emerges.
***
"Fodor thought that the neo-Darwinists had confused the loyalty oath of modernity—nature is without conscious design, species evolve over time, the emergence of Homo sapiens was without meaning or telos—with blind adherence to the fallacy known as “natural selection.” That species are a product of evolutionary descent was uncontroversial to Fodor, an avowed atheist; that the mechanism guiding the process was adaptation via a competition for survival—this, Fodor believed, had to be wrong.
"Fodor attacked neo-Darwinism on a purely conceptual and scientific basis—its own turf, in other words. He thought that it suffered from a “free rider” problem: too many of our phenotypic traits have no discernible survival value, and therefore could not plausibly be interpreted as products of adaptation. “Selection theory cannot distinguish the trait upon which fitness is contingent from the trait that has no effect on fitness (and is merely a free rider),” he wrote. “Advertising to the contrary notwithstanding, natural selection can’t be a general mechanism that connects phenotypic variation with variation in fitness. So natural selection can’t be the mechanism of evolution.”
***
"Fodor was interested in how the distinction between an adaptation and a free rider might apply to our own behavior. It seems obvious to us that the heart is for circulating blood and not for making thump-thump noises.... did not believe this for was defensible, either, but that is for another day.) Pumping is therefore an “adaptation,” the noise is a “free rider.” Is there really a bright sociobiological line dividing, say, the desire to mate for life from the urge to stray? The problem isn’t that drawing a line is hard; it’s that it’s too easy: you simply call the behavior you like an adaptation, the one you don’t like a free rider. Free to concoct a just-so story, you may now encode your own personal biases into something called “human nature.”
***
"When I reread “What Darwin Got Wrong,” there were two sentences that I paused over longest. “What trait did evolution select for when it selected creatures that protect their young? Was it an altruistic interest or a selfish interest in their genes?” The oddity is asking the question in the first place. What sort of creature is it, after all, that must first ideate its own function before being able to fulfill it? ...Neo-Darwinism “affronts a robust, and I should think salubrious, intuition that there are lots and lots of things that we care about simply for themselves.”
***
"He was a naturalist, and he believed that with a proper understanding of Darwin we would never ask nature to tell us who or what to be. “We are artifacts designed by natural selection,” Daniel Dennett wrote, to which Fodor said no. “Darwin’s idea is much deeper, much more beautiful, and appreciably scarier: We are artifacts designed by selection in exactly the sense in which the Rockies are artifacts designed by erosion; which is to say that we aren’t artifacts and nothing designed us. We are, and always have been, entirely on our own.'”
Comment: As is obvious, like Fodor I'm not convinced natural selection is of any importance in the process of evolution. It does not explain our brain, as one paramount example.
Current science; fallacious thinking
David’s three posts yesterday all launched attacks on Darwinism, and so I am combining them here, though I object very strongly to the use of “fraudulent” in the heading. “Fallacious” if you like, since the word fallacy is used in the article, but you should not assume that everyone who disagrees with you is a liar and a cheat. With your permission, I’d like to change the wording.
DAVID’s comment (under “magic embryology”): […] Darwin does not explain any of this by his chance process theory.
I’m sure this was only one of many things that Darwin did not know about, which is why he was so reluctant to speculate even on such matters as how a nerve came to be sensitive to light. His “origins” concerned speciation, not the details of mouse embryology. Having said that, though, I am not defending his theory that speciation was caused by random mutations, let alone by natural selection (see later).
xxxxxx
DAVID (under "junk DNA"): Using viruses to explore the possible function of long non-coding RNA, 200 or more bases long, a study shows functions, a further dagger in the heart of Darwinist claims about junk DNA:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-017-07692-w
QUOTES: The other control layers are being uncovered and in doing so completely destroying the Darwinists claims that 'junk DNA' proves the Darwin theory of a purposeless chance mechanism etc.
"[…] If we permit the ENCODE consortium to claim 80% of non-coding DNA is useful, then Darwinists have lost' a game to ID?"
I hate this point-scoring by both sides. There is no dagger in the heart, complete destruction or losing a game. Whether “junk” DNA is or isn't junk proves nothing about the existence or non-existence of a designer. If it IS, a theistic evolutionist can say his God did not design every organism individually but simply created the mechanisms by which organisms have evolved; harmful elements were jettisoned by natural selection, and harmless elements were not. Or he can say science has not yet discovered the uses of so-called junk. If it is NOT junk, but you do not believe in a designer, you can say natural selection jettisoned anything that was not useful.
xxxxx
DAVID’s comment: As is obvious, like Fodor I'm not convinced natural selection is of any importance in the process of evolution. It does not explain our brain, as one paramount example.
A dead horse undergoing one more flogging. We have long ago agreed that natural selection does not create anything, and so it can't be called the origin of species. However, it does explain the continued existence of features that are useful in the quest for survival and/or improvement. ALL brains are examples of the latter, since bacteria have survived without brains since the year dot. If Darwin were alive today, I suspect that he would rewrite whole sections of his book, including the title (“The origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life”). So here’s a challenge for you. Think up a new title. How about: “The origin of species by means of genetic variation in response to environmental conditions”?
Current science; fallacious thinking
by David Turell , Thursday, December 21, 2017, 00:32 (2320 days ago) @ dhw
DAVID (under "junk DNA"): Using viruses to explore the possible function of long non-coding RNA, 200 or more bases long, a study shows functions, a further dagger in the heart of Darwinist claims about junk DNA:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-017-07692-w
QUOTES: The other control layers are being uncovered and in doing so completely destroying the Darwinists claims that 'junk DNA' proves the Darwin theory of a purposeless chance mechanism etc.
"[…] If we permit the ENCODE consortium to claim 80% of non-coding DNA is useful, then Darwinists have lost' a game to ID?"dhw: I hate this point-scoring by both sides. There is no dagger in the heart, complete destruction or losing a game. Whether “junk” DNA is or isn't junk proves nothing about the existence or non-existence of a designer. If it IS, a theistic evolutionist can say his God did not design every organism individually but simply created the mechanisms by which organisms have evolved; harmful elements were jettisoned by natural selection, and harmless elements were not. Or he can say science has not yet discovered the uses of so-called junk. If it is NOT junk, but you do not believe in a designer, you can say natural selection jettisoned anything that was not useful.
The quote comes from a very confirmed Darwinist Dan Graur. He means it. Don't slough it off! 'Junk' means a chance undirected process (Darwin evolution) which created all sorts of mistakes which were left behind in our giant DNA. It proves Darwin! The problem is 80% of DNA looks functional. The junk theory to support purposeless Darwin is out the window. Your theistic evolutionist is not my man. His reasoning is not mine, and natural selection did not jettison junk DNA because there isn't much.
dhw: We have long ago agreed that natural selection does not create anything, and so it can't be called the origin of species. However, it does explain the continued existence of features that are useful in the quest for survival and/or improvement. ALL brains are examples of the latter, since bacteria have survived without brains since the year dot. If Darwin were alive today, I suspect that he would rewrite whole sections of his book, including the title (“The origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life”). So here’s a challenge for you. Think up a new title. How about: “The origin of species by means of genetic variation in response to environmental conditions”?
I think if Darwin knew today's science about evolution, he could not have written any oart of his book. His theory has too many holes for that. Reminds me of swiss cheese.
Current science; fallacious thinking
DAVID : Using viruses to explore the possible function of long non-coding RNA, 200 or more bases long, a study shows functions, a further dagger in the heart of Darwinist claims about junk DNA:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-017-07692-w
QUOTES: The other control layers are being uncovered and in doing so completely destroying the Darwinists claims that 'junk DNA' proves the Darwin theory of a purposeless chance mechanism etc.
"[…] If we permit the ENCODE consortium to claim 80% of non-coding DNA is useful, then Darwinists have lost' a game to ID?"
dhw: I hate this point-scoring by both sides. There is no dagger in the heart, complete destruction or losing a game. Whether “junk” DNA is or isn't junk proves nothing about the existence or non-existence of a designer. If it IS, a theistic evolutionist can say his God did not design every organism individually but simply created the mechanisms by which organisms have evolved; harmful elements were jettisoned by natural selection, and harmless elements were not. Or he can say science has not yet discovered the uses of so-called junk. If it is NOT junk, but you do not believe in a designer, you can say natural selection jettisoned anything that was not useful.
DAVID: The quote comes from a very confirmed Darwinist Dan Graur. He means it. Don't slough it off! 'Junk' means a chance undirected process (Darwin evolution) which created all sorts of mistakes which were left behind in our giant DNA. It proves Darwin! The problem is 80% of DNA looks functional. The junk theory to support purposeless Darwin is out the window. Your theistic evolutionist is not my man. His reasoning is not mine, and natural selection did not jettison junk DNA because there isn't much.
Please explain the 20% of DNA that is considered to be junk.
Current science; fallacious thinking
by David Turell , Friday, December 22, 2017, 15:33 (2319 days ago) @ dhw
dhw: I hate this point-scoring by both sides. There is no dagger in the heart, complete destruction or losing a game. Whether “junk” DNA is or isn't junk proves nothing about the existence or non-existence of a designer. If it IS, a theistic evolutionist can say his God did not design every organism individually but simply created the mechanisms by which organisms have evolved; harmful elements were jettisoned by natural selection, and harmless elements were not. Or he can say science has not yet discovered the uses of so-called junk. If it is NOT junk, but you do not believe in a designer, you can say natural selection jettisoned anything that was not useful.DAVID: The quote comes from a very confirmed Darwinist Dan Graur. He means it. Don't slough it off! 'Junk' means a chance undirected process (Darwin evolution) which created all sorts of mistakes which were left behind in our giant DNA. It proves Darwin! The problem is 80% of DNA looks functional. The junk theory to support purposeless Darwin is out the window. Your theistic evolutionist is not my man. His reasoning is not mine, and natural selection did not jettison junk DNA because there isn't much.
dhw: Please explain the 20% of DNA that is considered to be junk.
We didn't know that 80% was functional to some extent until the past few years of research. We don't know that the 20% isn't of some importance. Coding for proteins doesn't explain life. It doesn't explain embryologic development of the fetus. There is a huge blank slate still to be explored. Dan Graur's comment highlights his discomfort at the new discoveries, as they destroy his Darwin theories.
Current science; fallacious thinking
dhw: I hate this point-scoring by both sides. There is no dagger in the heart, complete destruction or losing a game. Whether “junk” DNA is or isn't junk proves nothing about the existence or non-existence of a designer. If it IS, a theistic evolutionist can say his God did not design every organism individually but simply created the mechanisms by which organisms have evolved; harmful elements were jettisoned by natural selection, and harmless elements were not. Or he can say science has not yet discovered the uses of so-called junk. If it is NOT junk, but you do not believe in a designer, you can say natural selection jettisoned anything that was not useful. (dhw's new bold]
DAVID: The quote comes from a very confirmed Darwinist Dan Graur. He means it. Don't slough it off! 'Junk' means a chance undirected process (Darwin evolution) which created all sorts of mistakes which were left behind in our giant DNA. It proves Darwin! The problem is 80% of DNA looks functional. The junk theory to support purposeless Darwin is out the window. Your theistic evolutionist is not my man. His reasoning is not mine, and natural selection did not jettison junk DNA because there isn't much.
dhw: Please explain the 20% of DNA that is considered to be junk.
DAVID: We didn't know that 80% was functional to some extent until the past few years of research. We don't know that the 20% isn't of some importance. [dhw's bold]
Your theistic response is exactly as I forecast above in bold. Theists and atheists can always find an answer, and so whether some DNA is junk or not won’t make the slightest difference to their or your beliefs.
DAVID: Coding for proteins doesn't explain life. It doesn't explain embryologic development of the fetus. There is a huge blank slate still to be explored.
Agreed. Anyone, theist or atheist, who claims to know all the answers is to be treated with suspicion!
DAVID: Dan Graur's comment highlights his discomfort at the new discoveries, as they destroy his Darwin theories.
Then he should comfort himself that even if 100% of DNA proves to be functional, it merely proves the efficiency of Darwinian natural selection in discarding unwanted material. But if he feels uncomfortable because of all the complexities of these various processes, I for one would share his scepticism concerning the efficiency of Darwinian random mutations as their originator.
Current science; fallacious thinking
by David Turell , Saturday, December 23, 2017, 16:12 (2318 days ago) @ dhw
DAVID: Dan Graur's comment highlights his discomfort at the new discoveries, as they destroy his Darwin theories.dhw: Then he should comfort himself that even if 100% of DNA proves to be functional, it merely proves the efficiency of Darwinian natural selection in discarding unwanted material. But if he feels uncomfortable because of all the complexities of these various processes, I for one would share his scepticism concerning the efficiency of Darwinian random mutations as their originator.
You obviuosly don't know Graur. His entire faith in Darwin is based on the existence of much of DNA as junk. You are thinking about him through your biases. He is not skeptical about random mutation, but insists they created junk which had to be left behind.
Current science; fallacious thinking
DAVID: Dan Graur's comment highlights his discomfort at the new discoveries, as they destroy his Darwin theories.
dhw: Then he should comfort himself that even if 100% of DNA proves to be functional, it merely proves the efficiency of Darwinian natural selection in discarding unwanted material. But if he feels uncomfortable because of all the complexities of these various processes, I for one would share his scepticism concerning the efficiency of Darwinian random mutations as their originator.
DAVID: You obviuosly don't know Graur. His entire faith in Darwin is based on the existence of much of DNA as junk. You are thinking about him through your biases. He is not skeptical about random mutation, but insists they created junk which had to be left behind.
Of course I don’t know him, but if his entire faith in Darwin is based on junk DNA and he is not sceptical about random mutations, then I’m sorry, but why bother? There are thousands of people whose views you could bombard me with, and I can only offer you my personal response.
Current science; fallacious thinking
by David Turell , Sunday, December 24, 2017, 18:58 (2317 days ago) @ dhw
DAVID: Dan Graur's comment highlights his discomfort at the new discoveries, as they destroy his Darwin theories.
dhw: Then he should comfort himself that even if 100% of DNA proves to be functional, it merely proves the efficiency of Darwinian natural selection in discarding unwanted material. But if he feels uncomfortable because of all the complexities of these various processes, I for one would share his scepticism concerning the efficiency of Darwinian random mutations as their originator.
DAVID: You obviuosly don't know Graur. His entire faith in Darwin is based on the existence of much of DNA as junk. You are thinking about him through your biases. He is not skeptical about random mutation, but insists they created junk which had to be left behind.
dhw: Of course I don’t know him, but if his entire faith in Darwin is based on junk DNA and he is not sceptical about random mutations, then I’m sorry, but why bother? There are thousands of people whose views you could bombard me with, and I can only offer you my personal response.
He is a confirmed atheist and a close friend of Larry Moran. I'm just showing you their viewpoint.
Current science; overenthusiastic interpretations
by David Turell , Saturday, February 23, 2019, 19:27 (1891 days ago) @ David Turell
edited by David Turell, Saturday, February 23, 2019, 19:59
From a recent authoritative review:
https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/02/19/blame-academia-junk-science-and-media-hype-13826
"Though we've been debunking junk science for more than 40 years, we never cease to be amazed by the amount of hype and exaggeration that continues to permeate the mainstream press.
"The following constitute just a tiny sample of the nonsense we read on a daily basis: Multiple international news outlets, such as The Guardian and The Times of London, reported that asparagus (yes, that disgusting but quite healthy vegetable) causes breast cancer; Reader's Digest reported that vegetable oil will turn girls into lazy, TV-watching diabetics; and media outlets all over the world breathlessly reported that the popular Nutella spread is linked to cancer.
"How on Earth does the media print such inanity over and over again? Two reasons immediately come to mind. First, the media cares more about internet traffic (and money) than anything else, which is why they write "clickbait" headlines and push sensationalist scaremongering. They want these stories to go viral; accuracy is of secondary importance. Second, science journalists often have no formal education in the field, so they have no idea if what they're reporting is sensible or hogwash.
"But there's another place we should be assigning blame: University press offices.
A paper published in 2014 in The British Medical Journal analyzed 462 press releases issued by universities in the UK. They found that "40%... of the press releases contained exaggerated advice, 33%... contained exaggerated causal claims, and 36%... contained exaggerated inference to humans from animal research."
"The authors also discovered that if a press release contained exaggerated information, news reports were also likelier to contain exaggerations. Specifically, the odds of exaggerated advice were increased 6.5 times, the odds of exaggerated causal claims were increased 20 times, and the odds of exaggerated inference to humans from animal research was increased 56 times. In other words, university press offices greatly influence the tone of subsequent media coverage.
"In an ideal world, universities perform serious research and don't worry about marketing themselves to journalists. But, that's not the world we live in. The ever-constant pressures of fame and fortune compel academics to behave in ways that are counterproductive to the scientific enterprise and public health.
"There are no easy solutions to this. Like hyperpartisanship, some problems require a fundamental shift in our culture and societal thinking. Let's hope we wise up sooner rather than later."
Comment: Always read scientific news with a critical eye, as this article shows. I have continuously presented origin of life lab results and pointed out the hype. Currently governments provide grant funds to push research. The result, due to the fact that many university labs must live on grants, the lust for money drives grant requests beyond what should rationally proposed. Read Sabine Hossenfelder to see her critiques of modern theoretical physics which seems to study 'head-of-the-pin' angels much too often.:
http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2019/02/never-again-confuse-dark-matter-with.html
Current science; overenthusiastic interpretations
DAVID:: Always read scientific news with a critical eye, as this article shows. I have continuously presented origin of life lab results and pointed out the hype. Currently governments provide grant funds to push research. The result, due to the fact that many university labs must live on grants, the lust for money drives grant requests beyond what should rationally proposed.
All this is now common knowledge. But at the same time, one should always be careful not to assume that any research which counters one's own fixed beliefs is the product of grant-hunting.
Current science; overenthusiastic interpretations
by David Turell , Sunday, February 24, 2019, 15:01 (1890 days ago) @ dhw
DAVID:: Always read scientific news with a critical eye, as this article shows. I have continuously presented origin of life lab results and pointed out the hype. Currently governments provide grant funds to push research. The result, due to the fact that many university labs must live on grants, the lust for money drives grant requests beyond what should rationally proposed.
dhw: All this is now common knowledge. But at the same time, one should always be careful not to assume that any research which counters one's own fixed beliefs is the product of grant-hunting.
I know the difference. Again , note all the junk research I've shown about origin of life.
Current science; overenthusiastic interpretations
by David Turell , Tuesday, March 19, 2019, 22:28 (1866 days ago) @ David Turell
An article from Sci. Am. analyzes:
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/whose-job-is-it-to-help-build-public-...
Science isn’t always practiced ethically or with social justice in mind. How can they, the journalists especially, perform a watchdog role, demand accountability of the scientific community, expose bad actors, bad science and adverse impacts and build public trust in science? How do they reconcile these roles in the Trump era, when science about the most urgent questions of our day is presented to the public as fundamentally flawed?
Many science journalists feel it is not their job to champion science. They give the public the truth, they say, and let people decide for themselves. Another line of argument is that it’s the scientist’s responsibility. In any case, they say, the public trusts scientists more than journalists.
***
For their part, researchers at Cardiff University found that press releases from scientists’ own academic institutions about their work were a significant source of exaggerated claims and spin, even though most scientists can approve their wording.
Their study of press releases from 20 leading British universities on health-related science news found that when the press releases exaggerated, it was likely the news stories would too.
An analysis of 41 news articles on randomized controlled trials based on 70 press releases showed only four articles that contained exaggerated claims not included in the press release or journal abstract. Interestingly, they also found the hype and spin intended to tempt the media did not result in more news coverage.
Jamieson turned to science writers,.. outlining three story lines that tend to dominate science news coverage:
The hero’s quest. The scientist pursues knowledge, overcomes challenges and obstacles and makes path-breaking discoveries.
The dishonorable quest. The dishonest scientist deceives his/her colleagues and hoodwinks reviewers and scientific journals by making claims that cannot be verified, promoting flawed science or pseudoscience, or concealing hidden financial interests that may influence research results.
Science is broken/in crisis. Widespread systemic problems and dysfunction within science are the source of these problems and are allowed to persist.
***
Scientists and science writers are both watchdogs of the integrity of the scientific process. Their thoughtful work and the criticism that may ensue is, paradoxically, a trust-building exercise. Scrutiny can result in corrective action. An individual scientist may violate norms, but legitimate processes by which scientific inquiry occurs can be strengthened, safeguards added and impacts assessed more thoroughly.
To make this happen, scientists, research institutions, science writers and journalists need to more clearly define their professional standards and civic roles to enable the public to more easily identify responsible practitioners and recognize value added. It’s a huge ask to expect the public to figure out without guidance what constitutes trustworthy science.
Jamieson says science can only be characterized as being truly broken when integrity-threatening problems are ignored. The same can also be said of science writing and science journalism.
Comment: Jamieson is too hopeful since university support systems continuously want grant money and exaggeration is a way to get it. Note the bolded paragraphs.
Current science; overenthusiastic interpretations
by David Turell , Monday, August 23, 2021, 14:35 (979 days ago) @ David Turell
A must watch Kirk Durston video (14 minutes) demolishing the key Darwin predictions. Durston is a genetics scientist:
https://uncommondescent.com/evolution/kirk-durston-on-evolution-and-faith/
His main point, discussed here many times is that breeding for improvement reaches endpoints beyond which only deterioration occurs. Secondly, more bad mutations occur naturally than good ones. So how did evolution go, naturally, from bacteria to humans? The implied answer is not naturally .