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Kairissi & Elenchus

discuss

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Editor’s note: This article is meant to follow a writing which offers Darwinism's defense of natural selection.

Elenchus. The newcomer to this subject will expect to review an objectively presented array of facts, leading to reasonable conclusion. However, as we’ve learned, and to our great dismay, so much of what we have to deal with in examining this subject is not science at all. Instead, in so many cases, it devolves to a process of dismantling some scheme of “how can we fool’em today?”

Kairissi. It’s very disturbing to see this.

E. These schemes by the Darwin lobby are typically wrapped in technical jargon, a minutia of misplaced data – all designed to befuddle and muddy the issue. In business they call it the “BBB” – pardon my language, but – “bullshit baffles brains.”

K. We're reminded of Einstein's comment that, if you can't explain something simply enough so that your grandma can understand, then you don't really understand it yourself - or, you don't want others to understand it.

E. It's like the Church constantly hiding behind the shield of "It's a mystery, you can't understand it" - when the real reason is, "We don't want you to understand what we're really doing."

K. (sighing) Unraveling these "how can we fool'em today" schemes is necessary to see what’s really happening in this debate. But, as you say, the tech-babble is so thick that it takes someone working in this field to expose the fallacies.

E. But, let's get into the specific topic at hand.

K. The sudden appearance in the fossil record, without intermediate forms, without any lead-up or notice, of legions of new species should have signaled the end of Darwinian gradualism.

E. The appearance of even one or a few new species might be labeled a debatable anomaly, but, as you say, we’re talking about a great multitude of new creatures suddenly entering the stage of planet Earth. This can't be explained away so readily.

K. It’s called the “Cambrian explosion.” It’s not a small thing. But Darwinists meet this gigantic counter-punch to their theory, in the main, with silence or with lame defense.

E. There are no intermediate species, and there should be a huge swarming number if Darwinism were true. Stated another way, there’s no such thing as “gaps” in the fossil record. The fossil record is what it is. But those who believe in gradualism are forced to frame the non-occurrence of intermediates species in terms of “gaps.” This is an artifice, a disingenuous one. It's a way of saying, "There's a missing space, we know it exists - because we know we're right - and it should be filled with intermediate species."

K. It's basing your theory on what does not exist. When they try to defend this, I’ll tell you what their argument reminds me of. It’s very similar in tone to the defense of reincarnation.

E. Tell us about this defense of “R.”

K. There is no evidence for “R.” Nothing that stands up to scrutiny. The arguments for “R” issue with plausibility similar to the “evidence” that the Sun seems to rise in the east, arcs its way across the sky, and then sets in the west.

E. Well, what further evidence do we need? Anybody can see that the Sun travels across the sky all day long. So there you have it. Proof that the Sun circles the Earth. Case closed.

K. Except that it doesn’t circle the Earth. And Darwinian gradualism is equally well defended. The materialists say, “Those gaps will be filled. We’ll find those intermediate species yet. It may take a long time, but we’ll hunt them down.” In principle, this is the argument of “R,” which says, “Ok, alright, there is no real evidence for reincarnation, and no one on the other side has actually seen this happen, and there’re no planning stations or advisory boards for 'R' over there that anyone has ever witnessed. Even so, we know 'R' will happen eventually. It may take a long time, way into the future, but it’s going to happen.”

E. I like the statement of one non-Darwinian biologist who addressed this slipshod reasoning: “They take refuge in the remote and the unobservable.”

K. Yes – “the remote and the unobservable.”

E. Rupert Sheldrake called this the “promissory note” argument. A promissory note is a pledge to pay a debt in the future, with no payments due today.

K. Those who “take refuge in the remote and the unobservable” are saying, “hey, don’t worry, we’re gonna pay that debt, for sure we’re gonna pay, but it’s way in the future.”

E. Like Alice being told "jam tomorrow!" - but tomorrow never comes. Or like Wimpy saying he’ll pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.

K. But we’ve stopped extending credit to the Darwinists as their FICO score languishes in the 200 range.

E. Some Darwinists attempt to mount a pseudo-science defense of gradualism and natural selection. It’s pretty slippery and is called “genetic drift.” They say that gradualism does in fact happen but the incremental changes are so extremely small that they cannot be detected.

K. Well, that is very convenient, isn’t it? This is just more “taking refuge in the remote and unobservable.” When you push everything into a realm of the non-detectible, you shield yourself from peer-review criticism. But when you do that, what you have isn’t “science” anymore because nothing can be tested or corroborated by independent third-parties.

Karl Popper's 'falsifiability'

E. You bring up a very important point: it isn’t science anymore.

K. This is really something. The materialists refuse to look at the scientific evidence for the afterlife, calling it 'hocus-pocus,' but then they run to hide in the tall grass of the "remote" and "unobservable."

E. When they do that, it's no longer science, because science is all about measurement and observation.

K. This is all very ironic.

E. Dr. Karl Popper, philosopher of science, made famous the concept of “falsifiability.” If you have a theory, and you want it to be considered scientific, it has to pass certain tests of investigation.

K. In other words, the theory has to operate in the open sunny air of facts and reproducible experiment – which means, you have to give others the chance to show that the concept is false. All good science has to live or die by this sword of Damocles.

E. If the theory is not falsifiable, then we don’t know what it is, but what we do know is that it’s not science.

K. For example, the hypothesis that “all swans are white” will be falsified with the appearance of a single black swan.

E. Popper said that science, to be worthy of the term, should attempt to disprove its own theories, rather than support current dogma as do churches or political parties.

K. If we do not allow for the principle of “falsifiability,” we’ve entered the murky realm of quasi-religious superstition and cultish belief-system.

E. The “one true doctrines” of religion are not falsifiable. They simply represent fiat declaration by some untethered "infallible" guru somewhere.

K. Darwin was the “infallible guru” and much of his theory is not falsifiable, which means that it’s not science.