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Was stumped by a Creationist.

pinqy said:
Not quite. To say something has been falsified means it has been shown to be false.

Falsifiable means that if it were false, there is a singular test that could show it.
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To be fair, that user did say "could be falsified" instead of "has been falsified", but yes, I agree with you here. This is precisely how science works... One starts with a theory, comes up with a singular test that could falsify it (null hypothesis), and sees if the theory withstands (and continues to withstand) that null hypothesis testing. So long as the theory withstands null hypothesis testing, it remains a theory of science. If it fails even a single null hypothesis test, then the theory is utterly destroyed. -- I will point out that, even though many theories are "falsifiable" in the sense that a null hypothesis can indeed be formed, those theories are still (in practice) unfalsifiable because that null hypothesis test is not accessible to us, for example, a time machine to transport people through time...

pinqy said:
Example: “All swans are white.” Inductive reasoning showed this to be true: all swans encountered were white. But the statement was falsifiable in that the discovery of one non-white swan would prove it false. And eventually black swans were discovered in Australia. And the claim was falsified.
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Very good example of how science actually works... The theory "all swans are white" was a theory of science up until that point, but since that point, that theory was utterly destroyed due to conflicting evidence.

pinqy said:
The point is that there was never any way to show that “all swans are white.”
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Absolutely correct, and another great display of how science actually works. This is a good example of why science doesn't make use of supporting evidence. For every one more white swan that a person ran into, it didn't further legitimize, bless, sanctify, or make holy that swan theory. It simply remained unfalsified.

pinqy said:
Until black swans were found, the idea that all swans are white was perfectly reasonable and rightly accepted as true.
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Correct. There was good reason to believe that all swans were white (since there was no conflicting evidence to that theory).

pinqy said:
On the other hand, “I have an invisible, silent, non-corporeal dragon in my basement” is not falsifiable. If it is false, there is no test possible to show it is false.
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Correct. Here, you have a circular argument. If you would tack on other arguments which stem from that initial circular argument (such as ''you will go to hell if you don't believe in this dragon''), then you would have a religion...

Overall, a very good post... I don't come across too many good posts in these parts...
 
pinqy said:
Not quite. To say something has been falsified means it has been shown to be false.

Falsifiable means that if it were false, there is a singular test that could show it.

Example: “All swans are white.” Inductive reasoning showed this to be true: all swans encountered were white. But the statement was falsifiable in that the discovery of one non-white swan would prove it false. And eventually black swans were discovered in Australia. And the claim was falsified.

The point is that there was never any way to show that “all swans are white.” Until black swans were found, the idea that all swans are white was perfectly reasonable and rightly accepted as true.

On the other hand, “I have an invisible, silent, non-corporeal dragon in my basement” is not falsifiable. If it is false, there is no test possible to show it is false.
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Other than a quibble (that I addressed elsewhere in this thread) about the difference between falsified and falsifiable, and another about there being a "singular" test that would show a claim to be false (why not any number of perfectly ordinary tests?), I generally agree with what you say. I'm not sure what this has to do with the point of my posts, however. I posted a question because I'm skeptical of a dichotomy between assumed and confirmed alleged to obtain by gfm7175. It seems to me that there are some claims that are both assumed and confirmed. Is there something in what you post here that argues either for or against that claim?
 
gfm7175 said:
To be fair, that user did say "could be falsified" instead of "has been falsified", but yes, I agree with you here. This is precisely how science works... One starts with a theory, comes up with a singular test that could falsify it (null hypothesis), and sees if the theory withstands (and continues to withstand) that null hypothesis testing. So long as the theory withstands null hypothesis testing, it remains a theory of science. If it fails even a single null hypothesis test, then the theory is utterly destroyed. -- I will point out that, even though many theories are "falsifiable" in the sense that a null hypothesis can indeed be formed, those theories are still (in practice) unfalsifiable because that null hypothesis test is not accessible to us, for example, a time machine to transport people through time...


Very good example of how science actually works... The theory "all swans are white" was a theory of science up until that point, but since that point, that theory was utterly destroyed due to conflicting evidence.


Absolutely correct, and another great display of how science actually works. This is a good example of why science doesn't make use of supporting evidence. For every one more white swan that a person ran into, it didn't further legitimize, bless, sanctify, or make holy that swan theory. It simply remained unfalsified.


Correct. There was good reason to believe that all swans were white (since there was no conflicting evidence to that theory).


Correct. Here, you have a circular argument. If you would tack on other arguments which stem from that initial circular argument (such as ''you will go to hell if you don't believe in this dragon''), then you would have a religion...

Overall, a very good post... I don't come across too many good posts in these parts...
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He doesn't have a circular argument. He has an unfalsifiable claim. You don't know what a circular argument is if you label his claim an argument. Saying you will go to hell if you don't believe in something is not an argument, circular or otherwise. In this case it is an unverifiable claim. You are incorrectly calling statements arguments that are not arguments.
 
gfm7175 said:
The bolded is still ultimately an assumption though; it is not confirmed (proven). Evidence is not proof of anything... Evidence is subject to one's own unique perception of the universe (reality).
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Sure. Two points:

1. If you're making the point I think you're making, I would restate as: the evidence for or against an empirical claim is itself determined by other theories assumed to be true, as is how that evidence is understood. For example, a scientist looking at the data gathered about the orbital velocity of an object in our solar system, and who posits some claim about that data (forms a theory about it) must assume that the theories on which the instruments used to collect the data are based are also correct, must assume that no sui generis factors were involved, etc.

That's basically the Quine-Duhem thesis, and it's usually used in arguments against falsificationism. So it's rather odd that you advert to this view.

2. I'm still not sure why any of that means the claim in question is not confirmed. Confirmation isn't the same as proof (especially the way anglophone philosophers use the term "proof"). Hardly anyone thinks that something that is confirmed cannot possibly turn out to be false. Confirmation usually just means there are solid grounds for thinking something true.

gfm7175 said:
Because "could be falsified" is not the same as "proven".
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I think you must mean "confirmed" and not "could be falsified" since "could be falsified" and "proven" make no pretense of being synonymous.

gfm7175 said:
It is not 100% certain. We may have good reason to accept various theories which have continuously survived null hypothesis testing (theories of science), but that doesn't mean those theories are "confirmed" in any way; they simply haven't been falsified as of the present time.
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If your intent is to be descriptive here, I think this is just false--neither most scientists nor most philosophers of science, at least in my experience dialoguing with them, think this way. Typically, scientists tend to be Bayesians anymore.

If your intent is to be prescriptive, OK--I'd admit this is at least not a crazy position. But you'd need to say something about indeterminancy, at the very least. Right now, you seem to have posted a view consistent with indeterminacy, and inconsistent with falsificationism.

gfm7175 said:
That's still not proven... that's still an assumption...
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Only in some epistemic framework that few people actually believe in.

gfm7175 said:
Correct. That is very possible. I could look at you and assume that you are 5'9"...
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What I mean is that there is some possible world in which I am 5'9". Perhaps there's a possible world in which my feet got cut off at the ankles or something.

gfm7175 said:
Okay. Your height has now been confirmed (proven) through measurement (use of mathematics, which makes use of proofs). Your height is no longer an assumption.
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It's not really mathematics. It's just a measurement. It's not as if, the last time someone measured my height, they made a list of each inch and then summed them. They just had me stand against a rod and brought the little caliper down on the top of my head, and read 6'1".

It's still an assumption because I don't bother with re-measuring every time it becomes important.

gfm7175 said:
That "possible world" would then be operating under a different set of axioms for their mathematics than our world operates under... Their "playing by different rules" is irrelevant.
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That doesn't make sense, unless you think height is an essential property of human beings. It seems that I would still have been myself had I been 5'9". What I mean when I say there's a possible world in which I am 5'9" is that there is such a possible world in which inches and feet are still the same unit of measure as they are here, mathematics works all the same way as it does here, and in which I'm the same person as I am now, except that I am a different height. Perhaps in that world I didn't get as good nutrition as I got in the actual world. Perhaps I suffered some kind of injury as a child that affected my height. Or, if you don't like height as a property, run the same idea with hair color. Perhaps instead of dark brown hair, there is some possible world in which I (the same person, I) have light brown hair.
 
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devildavid said:
He doesn't have a circular argument. He has an unfalsifiable claim.
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An argument consists of predicate(s) and a conclusion. In this case, his conclusion (the dragon exists) is ultimately his predicate (the dragon exists). He has a circular argument no different in working than Christianity's initial circular argument or Atheism's circular argument...

devildavid said:
You don't know what a circular argument is if you label his claim an argument.
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Inversion Fallacy. You don't know what a circular argument is.

devildavid said:
Saying you will go to hell if you don't believe in something is not an argument, circular or otherwise. In this case it is an unverifiable claim. You are incorrectly calling statements arguments that are not arguments.
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Yes, it is.
 
ashurbanipal said:
Sure. Two points:

1. If you're making the point I think you're making, I would restate as: the evidence for or against an empirical claim is itself determined by other theories assumed to be true, as is how that evidence is understood. For example, a scientist looking at the data gathered about the orbital velocity of an object in our solar system, and who posits some claim about that data (forms a theory about it) must assume that the theories on which the instruments used to collect the data are based are also correct, must assume that no sui generis factors were involved, etc.

That's basically the Quine-Duhem thesis, and it's usually used in arguments against falsificationism. So it's rather odd that you advert to this view.
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I don't advert to that view. I believe that conflicting evidence falsifies falsifiable theories. If I see a black swan, then the once scientific theory "all swans are white" is now completely and utterly destroyed. Supporting evidence is disregarded by science, since supporting evidence doesn't bless, sanctify, or further legitimize any theory of science, nor does it magickally transform any theory into a theory of science.

ashurbanipal said:
2. I'm still not sure why any of that means the claim in question is not confirmed. Confirmation isn't the same as proof (especially the way anglophone philosophers use the term "proof"). Hardly anyone thinks that something that is confirmed cannot possibly turn out to be false. Confirmation usually just means there are solid grounds for thinking something true.
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Okay... Then you're using the term "confirmed" synonymously with "supporting evidence" rather than synonymously with "proof"... Ultimately, it doesn't matter in this discussion because science doesn't make use of supporting evidence nor does it have the ability to prove anything (science is an open functional system, and OFS's don't have the power of proof)... It only makes use of conflicting evidence, which falsifies falsifiable theories.

ashurbanipal said:
I think you must mean "confirmed" and not "could be falsified" since "could be falsified" and "proven" make no pretense of being synonymous.
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If "confirmed" is used with "proof", like I was using it, then "could be falsified" is not "confirmed"...

If "confirmed" is used with "supporting evidence", like you were using it, then "could be falsified" is "confirmed".

ashurbanipal said:
If your intent...
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My intent is to describe what science actually is and how it actually works.

ashurbanipal said:
Only in some epistemic framework that few people actually believe in.
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Okay.

ashurbanipal said:
What I mean is that there is some possible world in which I am 5'9". Perhaps there's a possible world in which my feet got cut off at the ankles or something.
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You are 5'9" using the axioms of Earth human mathematics or some other axioms?

ashurbanipal said:
It's not really mathematics. It's just a measurement. It's not as if, the last time someone measured my height, they made a list of each inch and then summed them. They just had me stand against a rod and brought the little caliper down on the top of my head, and read 6'1".
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And measurements are part of mathematics...

ashurbanipal said:
It's still an assumption because I don't bother with re-measuring every time it becomes important.
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It becomes an assumption once more time passes by...

ashurbanipal said:
That doesn't make sense, unless you think height is an essential property of human beings. It seems that I would still have been myself had I been 5'9". What I mean when I say there's a possible world in which I am 5'9" is that there is such a possible world in which inches and feet are still the same unit of measure as they are here, mathematics works all the same way as it does here, and in which I'm the same person as I am now, except that I am a different height. Perhaps in that world I didn't get as good nutrition as I got in the actual world. Perhaps I suffered some kind of injury as a child that affected my height. Or, if you don't like height as a property, run the same idea with hair color. Perhaps instead of dark brown hair, there is some possible world in which I (the same person, I) have light brown hair.
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Okay, so you could have grown up to be a bit shorter than you are now, but you didn't... so what? Not sure how this relates to anything...
 
Moderate71 said:
I was discussing Creationism with a friend. Put simply, he believes in it and I don't. He criticized the way I was comparing Creationism to Evolution in that I was pointing out that there is a considerable amount of verifiable evidence supporting Evolution, while there is basically none supporting Creationism. His point is that since Karl Popper re-defined how science is practiced, this is irrelevant. Scientists have stopped relying on verifiable evidence to support their theories and have switched over to assessing their theories instead on the basis of how little evidence there is against them, assuming that the theory is theoretically falsifiable to begin with. In other words, the lack of verifiable evidence in support of Creationism is now irrelevant, as is the amount of verifiable evidence in support of Evolution.

He then brought up many criticisms of Evolution which were hard to respond to. I was having difficulty criticizing Creationism to the same extent because he didn't offer any evidence to support it other than vague, hypothetical beliefs and anecdotal stories about things like this one guy that prayed, his illness went away, and the doctors can't currently explain it. How do you critique vague, hypothetical beliefs and anecdotes?

My response was that while I can't really argue with what he says, Creationism is not falsifiable and he responded that Evolution is not either. I didn't know how to respond to that.
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Evolution is easily falsifiable. If we find that the earth is only thousands of years old, it is falsified. If we find many fully formed mammals far below where they were supposed to evolve, that would falsify it. If the family tree didn't display mathematical hierarchy, that would falsify it.
 
gfm7175 said:
An argument consists of predicate(s) and a conclusion. In this case, his conclusion (the dragon exists) is ultimately his predicate (the dragon exists).
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The claim of a dragon existing is not an argument: it’s an assertion.
 
distraff said:
Evolution is easily falsifiable.
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No, it isn't. We have no access to a functional time machine to see what really happened all those years ago...

distraff said:
If we find that the earth is only thousands of years old, it is falsified.
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That wouldn't in any way falsify the Theory of Evolution. Evolution claims that the more complex life forms of today evolved from more primitive life forms. How is a particular age of the Earth able to falsify that theory?

distraff said:
If we find many fully formed mammals far below where they were supposed to evolve, that would falsify it.
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No, it wouldn't... We don't know when they were "supposed to evolve"...

distraff said:
If the family tree didn't display mathematical hierarchy, that would falsify it.
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No, it wouldn't...
 
gfm7175 said:
No, it isn't. We have no access to a functional time machine to see what really happened all those years ago...


That wouldn't in any way falsify the Theory of Evolution. Evolution claims that the more complex life forms of today evolved from more primitive life forms. How is a particular age of the Earth able to falsify that theory?


No, it wouldn't... We don't know when they were "supposed to evolve"...


No, it wouldn't...
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Evolution is a very slow process and the earth being thousands of years would make the development of life within a matter of just a few human generations extremely unlikely. In addition if we found human fossils in the lowest fossil layers, there would be virtually no time for them to evolve. You don't need a time machine for science, with science we can deduce what happened in the past, just like we can deduce who committed a crime in the past.

If we found fully-formed mammals without any transitional fossils and the only fossils below them were very simple, there would be no time for them to evolve. If evolution is true, we should find transitional fossils for general animal groups with lots of fossils because we have found so many fossils. At the very least we should find fossils for animals they may have evolved from.

If the family tree isn't hierarchial then inheritance couldn't have been used to develop it since inheritance naturally forms a hierarchial tree. A hierarchial tree is when branches that are more closely related don't share information with distant branches that they don't share with more related branches. Human family trees are unlikely to break hierarchy because people inherit their genes from ancestors and are unlikely to deviate from their ancestors in ways that match the devation of other people in more distant parts of the tree.

Another example of evolutionary falsifiability is that humans are two fewer chromosomes than apes. The only possibility here is that there was a chromosome fusion in the past if evolution is true. So we must expect to find a human chromosome that is nearly identical to two ape chromosomes fused together. That is exactly what we see.

Another example are inherited retroviruses. If humans share most DNA with chimps, we should have inherited retroviruses in the exact same locations. And in fact we do.
 
distraff said:
Evolution is a very slow process and the earth being thousands of years would make the development of life within a matter of just a few human generations extremely unlikely.
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We don't know what the speed of evolution is, or whether evolution has remained at the same speed over time... or whether evolution is even true or not... We weren't there to observe it.

distraff said:
In addition if we found human fossils in the lowest fossil layers, there would be virtually no time for them to evolve.
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You don't know how much time there would have been for them to evolve... You weren't there...

distraff said:
You don't need a time machine for science,
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Correct. We make regular use of science and yet we have no functional time machines.

distraff said:
with science we can deduce what happened in the past,
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No, we can't... Science doesn't make use of supporting evidence. It only makes use of conflicting evidence.

distraff said:
just like we can deduce who committed a crime in the past.
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Not how science works... Supporting evidence doesn't in any way bless, sanctify, make holy, or further legitimize any theory of science. Evolution is not science; Evolution is religion. Religion makes use of supporting evidence.

distraff said:
If we found fully-formed mammals without any transitional fossils and the only fossils below them were very simple, there would be no time for them to evolve.
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You don't know that to be true. You weren't there. It remains unfalsifiable.

distraff said:
If evolution is true, we should find transitional fossils for general animal groups with lots of fossils because we have found so many fossils. At the very least we should find fossils for animals they may have evolved from.
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You don't know whether one life form evolved into another more complex one or whether they happened to be completely separate life forms... You weren't there to observe it...

distraff said:
If the family tree isn't hierarchial then inheritance couldn't have been used to develop it since inheritance naturally forms a hierarchial tree. A hierarchial tree is when branches that are more closely related don't share information with distant branches that they don't share with more related branches. Human family trees are unlikely to break hierarchy because people inherit their genes from ancestors and are unlikely to deviate from their ancestors in ways that match the devation of other people in more distant parts of the tree.
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Irrelevant.

distraff said:
Another example of evolutionary falsifiability is that humans are two fewer chromosomes than apes.
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Doesn't make evolution falsifiable.

distraff said:
The only possibility here is that there was a chromosome fusion in the past if evolution is true.
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False Dichotomy.

distraff said:
So we must expect to find a human chromosome that is nearly identical to two ape chromosomes fused together. That is exactly what we see.
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Doesn't make evolution falsifiable or true.

distraff said:
Another example are inherited retroviruses. If humans share most DNA with chimps, we should have inherited retroviruses in the exact same locations. And in fact we do.
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Doesn't make evolution falsifiable or true.
 
gfm7175 said:
We don't know what the speed of evolution is, or whether evolution has remained at the same speed over time... or whether evolution is even true or not... We weren't there to observe it.


You don't know how much time there would have been for them to evolve... You weren't there...


Correct. We make regular use of science and yet we have no functional time machines.


No, we can't... Science doesn't make use of supporting evidence. It only makes use of conflicting evidence.


Not how science works... Supporting evidence doesn't in any way bless, sanctify, make holy, or further legitimize any theory of science. Evolution is not science; Evolution is religion. Religion makes use of supporting evidence.


You don't know that to be true. You weren't there. It remains unfalsifiable.


You don't know whether one life form evolved into another more complex one or whether they happened to be completely separate life forms... You weren't there to observe it...


Irrelevant.


Doesn't make evolution falsifiable.


False Dichotomy.


Doesn't make evolution falsifiable or true.


Doesn't make evolution falsifiable or true.
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You just keep denying falsifiability or calling things irrelevant without explaining why. That just doesn't cut it.

As for "you weren't there", let me explain science to you. Science is very practical. Science tries to discover truths about the natural world using whatever methods reliably discern truth. If science dogmatically excluded some methods because "they aren't part of the definition", then its being wrong and arbitrary for excluding perfectly valid ways of determining truth and making discoveries. We can use deduction and logic to determine what happened in the past and this has been used in thousands of criminal cases. In the same way, we can use deduction to determine what happened in the earth's past using deduction and logic without us actually being there.
 
gfm7175 said:
An argument consists of predicate(s) and a conclusion. In this case, his conclusion (the dragon exists) is ultimately his predicate (the dragon exists). He has a circular argument no different in working than Christianity's initial circular argument or Atheism's circular argument...


Inversion Fallacy. You don't know what a circular argument is.


Yes, it is.
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There is no such thing as an Inversion Fallacy. A claim is not an argument. You don't know what a predicate is. A conclusion is not a predicate.
 
gfm7175 said:
I don't advert to that view. I believe that conflicting evidence falsifies falsifiable theories. If I see a black swan, then the once scientific theory "all swans are white" is now completely and utterly destroyed. Supporting evidence is disregarded by science, since supporting evidence doesn't bless, sanctify, or further legitimize any theory of science, nor does it magickally transform any theory into a theory of science.
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In that case, it's not clear how evidence could also be subject to individual perspective, as you claimed earlier.

gfm7175 said:
Okay... Then you're using the term "confirmed" synonymously with "supporting evidence" rather than synonymously with "proof"
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Well, not exactly, but I'll leave quibbling aside. Of course, you can try to define "assumed" and "confirmed" in a way that they really will be mutually exclusive. But then just about anyone could make that kind of move to support practically any position at all. I don't think very many people believe that to confirm something, you have to prove it in the sense of proof you seem to employ (the sense in which, if something is proved, it is impossible it could be false).

For example, I may confirm my dinner reservations by calling the restaurant, and most people would think that doing so would be to confirm the reservation. But it would hardly prove that I have dinner reservations. Perhaps the restaurant employee was mistaken. Or perhaps they were being willfully malicious. Or perhaps I made a mistake about the date. Etc. If P confirms s, that usually just means that P has adequate evidence to warrant belief in s.

Part of what I think is going on here is that if something is proven (in your framework) that means it's impossible for it to be false, and hence only necessary truths can be proven. However, there are plenty of contingent propositions that are, in fact, true of the actual world, and there seems to be no reason to claim that we cannot know at least some of those contingent propositions are true of the actual world. That they are false in some possible world just means they might have been false. Not that they could still turn out to be false of the actual world.

gfm7175 said:
...[science] only makes use of conflicting evidence, which falsifies falsifiable theories.
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If you're being descriptive, this is incorrect. Scientists speak all the time as if some theory or other is true (like, for example, plate tectonics, or the heliocentric model of the solar system, etc.). If scientists didn't think that those theories are confirmed, they wouldn't be able to assert those theories as true.

gfm7175 said:
If "confirmed" is used with "proof", like I was using it, then "could be falsified" is not "confirmed"...

If "confirmed" is used with "supporting evidence", like you were using it, then "could be falsified" is "confirmed".
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That something could be falsified doesn't mean it's false in the actual world, nor does it exclude the situation in which we've come to know it's true of the actual world. The theory of evolution is confirmed--we are warranted in believing that evolution happened in the actual world. Evolution is nevertheless falsifiable--it could have been false, but turned out to be true.

gfm7175 said:
You are 5'9" using the axioms of Earth human mathematics or some other axioms?
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Being 5'9" means exactly the same thing in the possible world in which I'm 5'9" as it means in the actual world, axioms and all.

gfm7175 said:
And measurements are part of mathematics...
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Why do you think so?

gfm7175 said:
Okay, so you could have grown up to be a bit shorter than you are now, but you didn't... so what? Not sure how this relates to anything...
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It captures a basic point in modal logics--the point I think you don't grasp. "Could be falsified" just means that whatever could be falsified is false in some possible world. But it can still be true, and can still be known to be true, of the actual world. You seem to be saying that:

1. Confirmed is synonymous with proven.
2. Assumed is mutually exclusive with proven, and hence is mutually exclusive with confirmed.
3. What is proven cannot possibly be false, and hence what is confirmed cannot possibly be false, while anything that could be false is merely assumed.

That framework doesn't respect K semantics in the case where the proposition under discussion is contingent, as most propositions apparently are.
 
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distraff said:
You just keep denying falsifiability or calling things irrelevant without explaining why. That just doesn't cut it.
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I've precisely explained why I deny the falsifiability of evolution... We don't have a functional time machine to go back in time to observe what actually happened at that time. We weren't there to observe it, so we have no clue what actually happened, thus we have no way to falsify any theory about what actually happened before the existence of humanity.

distraff said:
As for "you weren't there", let me explain science to you.
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This'll be good...

distraff said:
Science is very practical.
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Okay.

distraff said:
Science tries to discover truths about the natural world using whatever methods reliably discern truth.
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Science attempts to falsify theories that are falsifiable (making use of conflicting evidence)... That's all science aims to do. Science is a set of falsifiable theories. A theory is an explanatory argument. The inspiration for that explanatory argument can come from anywhere, even while sitting on the couch watching a movie...

distraff said:
If science dogmatically excluded some methods because "they aren't part of the definition", then its being wrong and arbitrary for excluding perfectly valid ways of determining truth and making discoveries.
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Sure, one can make use of supporting evidence in an attempt to find truth, but we already have a particular way of reasoning for doing so; it is called religion. It is very different from science, which makes use of conflicting evidence in an attempt to find truth (through falsification of theories). If you are making use of supporting evidence, and NOT making use of conflicting evidence, then you are not being scientific; you are instead being religious...

distraff said:
We can use deduction and logic to determine what happened in the past
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No, we can't. Logic doesn't speak of what happened in the past, happens in the present, or will happen in the future. One can only use logic to come up with non-fallacious arguments as supporting evidence for those unfalsifiable theories... Evidence is not proof... In this case, you are speaking of using supporting evidence. You are being religious...

distraff said:
and this has been used in thousands of criminal cases.
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Criminal cases don't prove anything... Some criminal cases result in incorrect (untruthful) rulings... Also, a faulty comparison since criminal cases make use of both supporting AND conflicting evidence, while science only makes use of conflicting evidence and religion only makes use of supporting evidence.

distraff said:
In the same way, we can use deduction to determine what happened in the earth's past using deduction and logic without us actually being there.
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No, we can't. We can only use logic to come up with a non-fallacious argument as supporting evidence for any given unfalsifiable theory concerning past unobserved events... You are not "deducing" anything; you are being religious.
 
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gfm7175 said:
I've precisely explained why I deny the falsifiability of evolution... We don't have a functional time machine to go back in time to observe what actually happened at that time. We weren't there to observe it, so we have no clue what actually happened, thus we have no way to falsify any theory about what actually happened before the existence of humanity.


This'll be good...


Okay.


Science attempts to falsify theories that are falsifiable (making use of conflicting evidence)... That's all science aims to do. Science is a set of falsifiable theories. A theory is an explanatory argument. The inspiration for that explanatory argument can come from anywhere, even while sitting on the couch watching a movie...


Sure, one can make use of supporting evidence in an attempt to find truth, but we already have a particular way of reasoning for doing so; it is called religion. It is very different from science, which makes use of conflicting evidence in an attempt to find truth (through falsification of theories). If you are making use of supporting evidence, and NOT making use of conflicting evidence, then you are not being scientific; you are instead being religious...


No, we can't. Logic doesn't speak of what happened in the past, happens in the present, or will happen in the future. One can only use logic to come up with non-fallacious arguments as supporting evidence for those unfalsifiable theories... Evidence is not proof... In this case, you are speaking of using supporting evidence. You are being religious...


Criminal cases don't prove anything... Some criminal cases result in incorrect (untruthful) rulings... Also, a faulty comparison since criminal cases make use of both supporting AND conflicting evidence, while science only makes use of conflicting evidence and religion only makes use of supporting evidence.


No, we can't. We can only use logic to come up with a non-fallacious argument as supporting evidence for any given unfalsifiable theory concerning past unobserved events... You are not "deducing" anything; you are being religious.
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What if you found a dead body, the suspect's DNA under her finger nails, the murder weapon, and the suspect's DNA on the murder weapon, scratch marks on the suspect, many witnesses who claimed seeing the suspect enter with victim's house right before the murder, internet search history about how to cover up a crime scene the same day of the murder, and a confession by the suspect. You can know for 99.9% certain that the suspect killed the victim and make a claim in the past without actually seeing the event happen with just forensic evidence and witness (the suspect) testimony, and we could be very certain without any witness testimony at all. Sometimes criminal cases are done wrong, but I can argue that many of these occur because the evidence isn't extremely solid, and they are very rare, or else why even have court cases if they don't work.
 
distraff said:
What if you found a dead body, the suspect's DNA under her finger nails, the murder weapon, and the suspect's DNA on the murder weapon, scratch marks on the suspect, many witnesses who claimed seeing the suspect enter with victim's house right before the murder, internet search history about how to cover up a crime scene the same day of the murder, and a confession by the suspect. You can know for 99.9% certain that the suspect killed the victim and make a claim in the past without actually seeing the event happen with just forensic evidence and witness (the suspect) testimony, and we could be very certain without any witness testimony at all.
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Yup, that's all great supporting evidence. Still not proof though.

distraff said:
Sometimes criminal cases are done wrong, but I can argue that many of these occur because the evidence isn't extremely solid, and they are very rare, or else why even have court cases if they don't work.
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They generally work. This has gotten quite far away from the topic at hand, which is more or less a religion/science discussion regarding falsifiability of theories...
 
gfm7175 said:
Yup, that's all great supporting evidence. Still not proof though.


They generally work. This has gotten quite far away from the topic at hand, which is more or less a religion/science discussion regarding falsifiability of theories...
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Proof only exists in mathematics. Everything else requires evidence of some type which is not completely reliable. Even seeing something for yourself with your own eyes isn't completely reliable because eyes are just the brain's filter of light and is showing you what it wants you to see. If you require proof to believe, then you can believe almost nothing, only that which is logically obvious like, I think therefore I am. You can't even believe that someone with mountains of evidence murdered someone even when he confessed to it.
 
distraff said:
Proof only exists in mathematics. Everything else requires evidence of some type which is not completely reliable.
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You're definitely on the right track here, but still missing the mark slightly. Proof doesn't only exist in mathematics. It also exists in logic. Proof, in fact, exists in any closed functional system, including your favorite board games. Closed functional systems are defined by their axioms, which are the set "rules of the game" if you will... Proof is simply an extension of those foundational axioms.

distraff said:
Even seeing something for yourself with your own eyes isn't completely reliable because eyes are just the brain's filter of light and is showing you what it wants you to see.
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That is correct. More-so than the explanation you provided, this is also the case because of Phenomenology. Phenomenology shows us that, for example, four different people can make the exact same observation, make use of the exact same data from that observation, make use of the exact same evidence from that data, and yet come up with four completely different conclusions regarding that exact same observation. This is because we each have our own unique model of the universe and how it works. This model is what we call "reality", and it is as unique to each individual as a fingerprint is. A chunk of reality is commonly shared, but many fine details of reality are different for each individual, making reality uniquely experienced by everybody.

distraff said:
If you require proof to believe, then you can believe almost nothing, only that which is logically obvious like, I think therefore I am. You can't even believe that someone with mountains of evidence murdered someone even when he confessed to it.
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That is correct. That is why I don't require proof in order to believe in things, such as the existence of God. Plus, many things, such as the existence of God, are unable to be proven. They must be believed on a faith basis, using supporting evidence.
 
The evidence for the existence of evolution as a process of change between species is writ large in the fossil record. As we now understand the DNA basis of heredity, we can see mechanisms at work in all living things that drive inevitable change & variation. That Nature & the environment does a very effective job of weeding out the unfit is clear to anyone who has eyes & a brain. So the fittest survive & thereby pass along their genetic variations to later generations.
 
gfm7175 said:
You're definitely on the right track here, but still missing the mark slightly. Proof doesn't only exist in mathematics. It also exists in logic. Proof, in fact, exists in any closed functional system, including your favorite board games. Closed functional systems are defined by their axioms, which are the set "rules of the game" if you will... Proof is simply an extension of those foundational axioms.


That is correct. More-so than the explanation you provided, this is also the case because of Phenomenology. Phenomenology shows us that, for example, four different people can make the exact same observation, make use of the exact same data from that observation, make use of the exact same evidence from that data, and yet come up with four completely different conclusions regarding that exact same observation. This is because we each have our own unique model of the universe and how it works. This model is what we call "reality", and it is as unique to each individual as a fingerprint is. A chunk of reality is commonly shared, but many fine details of reality are different for each individual, making reality uniquely experienced by everybody.


That is correct. That is why I don't require proof in order to believe in things, such as the existence of God. Plus, many things, such as the existence of God, are unable to be proven. They must be believed on a faith basis, using supporting evidence.
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Proof and logic alone can only confirm principles of mathematics and some facts (e.g. I think therefore I am) that are so obvious, they can be verified without the senses or external evidence. I don't have a problem with faith. Faith is just belief without proof and we do this in our daily lives all the time. For me, what separates something good to have faith in and something bad to have faith in, is the supportive evidence. If I were to make a mathematical formula for this, it would be Faith = (Proof or 100% probability of being true) - (Probability it is true given the evidence e.g. 97%).

So for everything outside the realm of proof, things like criminal justice, religion, using our five senses, daily life, and science, we need faith and supportive evidence. If faith and supportive evidence can potentially verify the existence of God and questions to the meaning of our lives and where we came from, and if it can verify to a high degree of certainty that someone is guilty and should be punished, then this is an extremely powerful method that can be used to make discoveries about the natural world. Scientists already use faith and external evidence, they just use different words because they don't want to admit the reliance on any faith.
 
Moderate71 said:
I was discussing Creationism with a friend. Put simply, he believes in it and I don't. He criticized the way I was comparing Creationism to Evolution in that I was pointing out that there is a considerable amount of verifiable evidence supporting Evolution, while there is basically none supporting Creationism. His point is that since Karl Popper re-defined how science is practiced, this is irrelevant. Scientists have stopped relying on verifiable evidence to support their theories and have switched over to assessing their theories instead on the basis of how little evidence there is against them, assuming that the theory is theoretically falsifiable to begin with. In other words, the lack of verifiable evidence in support of Creationism is now irrelevant, as is the amount of verifiable evidence in support of Evolution.

He then brought up many criticisms of Evolution which were hard to respond to. I was having difficulty criticizing Creationism to the same extent because he didn't offer any evidence to support it other than vague, hypothetical beliefs and anecdotal stories about things like this one guy that prayed, his illness went away, and the doctors can't currently explain it. How do you critique vague, hypothetical beliefs and anecdotes?

My response was that while I can't really argue with what he says, Creationism is not falsifiable and he responded that Evolution is not either. I didn't know how to respond to that.
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Well, the simple answer is that evolution and creation are not really mutually exclusive concepts. There are certainly versions of creationism that are falsifiable, but the general notion that the universe, life and humanity were created by a supreme being is not really at odds with evolution.
 
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