Centerfield

I don't see that Democrats need to reject religious explanations of creation, especially a religiously-oriented explanation of evolution. But I don't see why they need to embrace it either. Simply say, evolution existed and the origin is unknown or irrelevant. I wouldn't go out of my way to reject ID, of course, but don't try to pretend that it's some sort of scientific theory. Just say that we are concerned about having science being taught in schools. Anthing that is not science shouldn't be taught. We don't need to say that ID does or does not make sense, just that it's not relevant to the question. I agree with you Rick that it's an improvement over Bible literalism and I have no problem with people, as a tactical device, touting ID. But don't pretend it's science.

I don't think this is about whether it is science, or religion, for that matter. Rather, it is about politicians remaining relevant to those they purport to lead. I am not talking about rolling over on well-defined and strongly held principles. I suggest that ignoring that need for relevance is potentially fatal.

Rick,

You bring up some good arguments, but here's my fundamental problem: you claim to "believe" that God has a role in evolution, but that's all it is--a belief. Evolution may be a theory, but it's a theory supported by 150 years' worth of rock-solid empirical support. Needless to say, this isn't the case for either creationism or ID. To put either of them on the same pedestal as evolution (by fatuously claiming, in the case of ID, that it's merely a "rival theory"), is both insidious and fundamentally misguided. If you think evolutionary theory is flawed, fine. But you can't replace something with nothing and, in a scientific sense, this is all that creationism and ID amount to.

Nice review Rick. Read the satire letter and it reveals more about the authors condesencion than anything. Its emblematic of how the left deals with "fly over land". This is a very interesting political issue. A book I read about a year ago had a comprehensive and fairly balanced look at the politics (and a little bit of the science) of the debate. I beleive it was this book:
Where Darwin Meets the Bible: Creationists and Evolutionists in America

As someone who has scientific training I appreciate the science behind evolutional theories. As a Christian I understand how evolution can make some of one's beleif's difficult, especially if you're a biblical literalist. Like abortion, neither side really talks to or listens to the other side. Generally, their simply speaking to their constituents.

A funny personal side bar, I still recall after severe college physics classes trying to understand relativity and the uncertainty principle and their applications, I thought it odd how this hard science had me beleiving things that just didn't make sense. Funny how both religion and science took as certain amount of faith.

c3 makes an excellent point (although I may be reading some stuff into his comment he didn't mean to be there). Both of these perspectives operate on a type of faith: one - faith in the innerracy of the Bible; the other - faith in the scientific method. As Yuval's response shows, you're probably never going to convince a hard and fast biblical literalist that the answers lie in science, and on the other side you're going to have an equally difficult time convincing a rationalist that the Bible is the direct word of God and everything in it has happened exactly as written or will happen as such.

The best chance the left has of bringing in biblical literalists (which really probably isn't even worth it given that they only make up about a tiny portion of the population - you can't necessarily equate disbelief in evolution with biblical inerrancy) would be to attempt to frame any rationalist ideals religiously. For example, argue that the scientific method is mentinoed in the Bible. You'll have a much harder time convincing someone you're right based on your own perspective than you will convincing them they're *right*.

I worry that this Evolution vs. ID is really a proxy for a different fight between the left and the right: the fight between (what's a good description?) church-attenders and non-CA's (sorry, that's about the best I can do).

Perhaps what the polls cited by Rick indicate is that there is a large majority of Americans who attend church and derive value from it, consequently are reluctant to ignore that side of their lives even in discussing science.

Unfortunately, this has intruded into schools under a false controversy. ID is not science, it is a belief, maybe even a philosophy (a cosmology). Evolution is not religion, or even a philosophy. It is an attempt to describe the origin and development of some species (what I'm talking about here is Darwinism, which is a little separate from evolution).

Proponents of ID and Scripture-based cosmologies want schools to acknowledge that their is an unscientific basis to science. Proponents of evolution think that is a hallmark of the uneducated.

It's been said before, on this blog, that evolution, the Theory of Darwin, can be taught in science classes, ID belongs in philosophy classes.

They don't contradict each other, they don't even argue with each other. They are used by people of both sides who, ultimately, have contempt for the political views of each other.

I recently published a book, By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004) on why the intelligent design controversy is growing.

I just want to clarify a few points :

The Discovery Institute's theory of intelligent design (ID) is NOT based on a notion of irreducible complexity, "postulating a God of the Gaps to produce small miracles in order to allow evolution to go forward."

Irreducible complexity is biochemist Michael J. Behe's challenge to specifically Darwinian evolution, not to all possible types of evolution. Darwin said that if anyone could show any aspect of a life form that could not have arisen by a slow series of steps - entirely by natural selection acting on random mutations - his theory would utterly fall to the ground.

Behe refers to the flagellum (outboard motor, essentially) of the bacterium as an example of just such thing. Irreducible complexity means that the motor won't work if all the parts aren't there already. But a blind and purposeless process would not assemble all those parts in advance, he argues. This is not a God of the gaps theory because there is no gap. We know exactly what the flagellum consists of and how it works. We don't know how it originated.

Darwinian evolution asks us to believe that it happened within the timeframe of life on Earth by chance processes alone. That is what Behe doubts. It is a legitimate question.

Incidentally, Behe agrees with your contention that everything that evolution requires might have been coded in at the beginning. But once you say that, you are no longer defending Darwinian evolution. You are defending a theory of evolution consistent with the idea of purpose (teleology), and that is just what Darwin was trying to get rid of.

The reason so few people believe in Darwinian evolution is that they doubt that a pondful of amoebas can turn into the French academy, in George Bernard Shaw's famous phrase, entirely by chance mutations, without any intelliigente design.

Intelligent design theory is based on information theory, rather than opposition to evolution. The question of whether purely random processes will produce a given result in a given timeframe is researchable. If the answer is no, then information must have been coded in. The ID guys argue that highly specified information always proceeds from an intelligence; other views (self-organization, structuralism) are possible, of course.

Darwin's theory, properly understood, is in trouble, and I do not think that politicizing the issue will save it.

Hope this helps,

cheers,
Denyse O'Leary
Toronto
author of By Design or by Chance?
www.designorchance.com/press.html

I'm with Lit, keep 'em separated. I just don't see what there is to be gained by "embracing" this idea. At the present time, neither the democratic party nor the GOP need to take an official position on this, unless it is related to policy regarding what should be taught where in the schools.

And if they DO take a position, it should be that ID is NOT science, so if you wanna teach it in schools, it better be in a philosophy or comparative religion course.

Frankly, I find the idea that science educators should be more humble to be extremely insulting. The very nature of scientific method is humbleness before the facts and data that you carefully collect and scrutinize. It's even more insulting when the alleged reason for this extra measure of humbleness is that a quasi-majority composed of the poorly informed doesn't agree with the theory. Even those these people have little to no knowledge of the breadth and the depth of the supporting data.

It's the people who want to dictate that science be subordinate to religious philosophy that need to be more humble.

The theory of evolution states exactly nowhere that God can't have a role. Science makes no statements about God, because there's nothing to measure, no empirical data to collect. And that's the thing that really rankles the literalists.

And I repeat, if religious fundamentalists want to try to mix their religion in with the science of scientists, they need to be prepared for scientists turning the tables and demanding that the religious come up with data to explain how a variety of bible stories could possibly be true given what we know about how the world works.

Look, everyone go to their OWN churches. White lab coat wearers can go to the lab churches of science, and white robe wearers can stick to the steepled cathedrals. Let's not break the truce between science and religion. There will not be any winners, only strife leading to another uneasy truce.

If you arerunning for office, my advice is to avoid touching this like the plague...

bk,

Sorry if it feels insulting, but my point is that science educators are failing if 45% reject evolution entirely. They ought to think about ways of getting through to those people, instead of just shouting louder.

Science education is not simply to prepare people to be future scientists and engineers. Only a minority of people will go on to that. It's part of civics for the majority of people who won't be scientists, so science educators need to come to grips with their failure to communicate to a near-majority of the people of this country.

It would be interesting to see a poll of people under 30, and their views on evolution. I would not count on them being more rationalist than their elders. There is a trend toward conservative religion in this country, so literalists might be a clear majority among the young.

Denyse O'Leary,

The only people that consider Darwin's theory to be "in trouble" are creationists and intelligent design ideologues. No scientist considers it to be in trouble; indeed it has become more and more solid. The fact that there are specific facts about evolution that have not yet been explained does not make Intelligent Design a scientific theory or mean that it has any meaningful explantory value. As far as talking about Darwin's theory "properly understood", I think you mean as understood by intelligent design advocates. If you want to believe in Intelligent Design, that's your business. But don't try to sell your snake oil as some sort of rational response to evolutionary theory.

Rick,

It is of course possible that your ballyhooed 45% figure is due to a failure of teaching on the part of scientists, as you suggest. But I find that to be an extremely unlikely explanation.

Rather, the reason so many do not accept it is because they are continually exposed to an alternative "explanation" which they are repeatedly told they must accept as true, based on faith, and which they should not question. They are taught this for many years PRIOR to being taught about evolution theory, and they continue to be reinforced on this count for the rest of their lives AFTER being taught about evolution.

The fact that only 45% reject evolution under such circumstances might as easily be sold as an astounding victory for scientific reason in the face of the unequal time given to each view.

Suppose evolution teachers were given time equal to that of preachers to further expound upon their views, and upon the evidence for their views, and the lack of evidence for the other view. What do you suppose would happen to that 45% number, huh?

How about if, every time a preacher decides to expound on ID and its alleged superiority to evolution, an expert on evolution is given equal time in the pulpit? How would go over? Oh, not so smoothly? Would hilarity ensue?

What if science "comes to grips' with its "failure" by demanding equal time, and making strong efforts to combat the spread of unfounded religious claims and misrepresentations of evolutionary theory? Do you REALLY want this fight? Huh? Do you? I mean really, does our nation want to go down this road? Notice that it is the deeply religous who are driving the conflict, and if they keep pushing hard, science will push back. Science will NOT be bullied. Anyone who suggests otherwise seriously misunderestimates the passion of scientists. How much more evidence do you think science has collected since the scopes monkey trial?

Your 45% number is simply a reflection of the percent of people who have given their ears to their religious preachers, versus giving their ears to empirical science.

The idea that it's science that needs to do the re-thinking is, quite simply, a grotesque miscasting of the nature of the issue.

If the information for evolution is "coded in", where and how is it coded? If you don't have an answer to that, then ID has bigger gaps than the theory it purports to replace. ID isn't based on information theory, it's based on using half-understood (or deliberately misunderstood, if you want to be less charitable) information theory to disguise the fact that at the bottom it's plain old creationism. Saying that something displays irreducible complexity, or can only be the result of intelligent design, begs the question (in the old-school philosophical sense of petitio principii, since it assumes that the designer explains the origin but needs no explanation itself. In other words, it smuggles the conclusion in as part of the premise.)

bk,

I'm not saying that scientists need to do much rethinking, since they have a pretty successful theory. I am saying that EDUCATORS need to do much rethinking, because science education fails to communicate to at least half of the public. Maybe science education needs to start earlier, so students are exposed to it at the same time they're first exposed to the creation account.

With regard to rethinking that scientists themselves might with to do, one issue is the assumption that life crops up effortlessly given the right primeval circumstances. One if the failure of SETI after about 30 years to find any signs of extraterrestrial intelligence. The universe is about 12 billion years old, and the earth about 4 billion years old. So there ought to be plenty of stars and planets out there that had a head-start in producing intelligent civilizations. And yet there are no credible signs of extra-terrestrial life. Thus, evolution might be more rare than we tend to think.

One if the failure of SETI after about 30 years to find any signs of extraterrestrial intelligence. The universe is about 12 billion years old, and the earth about 4 billion years old. So there ought to be plenty of stars and planets out there that had a head-start in producing intelligent civilizations. And yet there are no credible signs of extra-terrestrial life. Thus, evolution might be more rare than we tend to think.

The number of unknowns is far too vast to do any sort of realistic probabilistic calculations that would allow us to assess the sgnificance of SETI 's failureso far to find evidence of extraterrestrial life.

We really have no clue as to how often a star is accompanied by a planet of the proper size and distance from its sun to act as laboratory for life.

We've been listening for 30 years, which is a flyspeck of time in universe terms. Basically all we know is that there don't seem to be any close enough to us in distance and type of civilization to have produced radiowaves etc that have reached us while we were listening in a particular direction. I would conclude very little from that.

I just want to know what percentage of the voters would reject a gay atheist.

Seriously, I don't get the whole thing. Whether evolution accounts for every aspect of every species or not, it does happen and in an observable way. Grey moths become black moths when their forrest habitat becomes covered with soot. Evolution depends on two things - genetics and natural selection. I don't think any reasonable person would dispute those two things on a scientific basis.

Maybe God or some other force is involved. When there is some evidence, even if it's purely mathematical (like much of the evidence for string theory), maybe we can start teaching it in science class. This information theory crap doesn't cut it at this point. Get your scientific consensus before you start filling kids head with it.

Any position a political party takes on this issue is pandering. They shouldn't even touch it.

You can lead a literalist to science, but you can't make 'em think....

One thing too many people are not considering in this coversation (beyond just this blog) are the large number of scientists who are also devoutly religious. Yes, they are out there and I'd bet they are primarily the ones behind most of the ID ideas. This group has helped foster the idea of evolution being just one of the many "tools" used by the Creator.

MWS: The only people that consider Darwin's theory to be "in trouble" are creationists and intelligent design ideologues. No scientist considers it to be in trouble; indeed it has become more and more solid.
This is really not true. Although most scientists accept many parts of evolution, there are several other widely-accepted theories that conflict with some of the basic tenets of evolutionary thinking. I'm not trying to argue against evolution here, but some examples include entropy (2nd Law of Thermodynamics), Vegetative Succession, and simple timing (small evolutionary steps are often estimated to take much longer to have occured than the currently accepted age of the earth and/or universe).

I'm of the "evolution is a tool used by God" camp and believe that if science educators at least prefaced lessons on evolution with discussions about the definition of the word "Theory", much of the controversy can be defused. Students can go away without as many internal conflicts about what they believe and see evolution and creationism as just two different explanations for life that cannot be debated within a single frame of view.

Not everything one believes can be studied scientifically. On the other hand, science itself is very dependant on a system of hunches and beliefs that feed research ideas.

This discussion points out the very issue of which we write. It's funny, this past election "values" theoretically played a big part in people's votes. We as centrist try to find the moderate position in a lot of realms but we seem to shy away from the "values" ones. Its as if we belief there is no middle ground, just polarized camps. Consequently, we seem to say that the "centrist" position is just to not talk about those issues? Does anyone else have this sense? (Or am I just confused?)

The problem is that creationists and ID people treat "Darwin's Theory" as if it hasn't changed since 1854. I probably should not have referred to "Darwin's Theory." It's really the theory of evolution that was first advanced by Darwin. You can't disprove evolution by punching holes in Darwin, any more than you can disprove gravity by punching holes in Newton. The science has advanced and it's clearly a different theory (although the same basics) today than when Darwin first wrote.

I know of no scientists that believe that current evolutionary theory is the best explanation for the development of life. The fact that there are specific theories that may contradict portions of evolutionary theory simply means that scientists need to do more work on the theory.

If you want to say that creationism and evolution are two different explanations for life, that's fine and your own business. If you want to say that "evolution is a tool used by God" that's fine. But don't pretend that this is anything but a belief. Creationism (or ID) is not a scientific explanation. Science does not rely on "hunches and beliefs" at least not at the experimental level. It relies on a system of verifiable experimentation. It's religion that relies on hunches and beliefs. Anyone that attempts to equate the two is simply engaging in sophistry.

Evolution is a THEORY. How did the whole thing start? How is the theory that there was a "big bang" and different from "God created the world in 7 days" BOTH of these explanations require a levl of faith in something that can't really be proved. I suppose I have no problems with both theories being taught, and using the opportunity to critically analyze both. There's not a practical need to understand how the world came to be. But developing critical thinking skills- that is necessary. I could point out holes in both...I could also make a pretty good argument that both say the same thing, one coached in the language of religion, one in the language of science. World was created, step by step, in seven days. World evolves, through stages, to become what it needs to be. Both say pretty much the same thing, imo.

"I know of no scientists that believe that current evolutionary theory is the best explanation for the development of life."

My mistake. I intended to say "I kow of no scientists that believe that current evolutionary theory is NOT the best explanation for the development of life."

Stephanie,

Saying that the Big Bang and Creationism is the same thing is like saying that the gravity and Harry Potter is the same thing. The Big Bang (which is clearly not without controversy) is based on replicable, verifable experimentation. Creationism is simply a philosophy based on faith. You have a serious misunderstanding with the use of the term "theory" in science. Scientific usage does not take "theory" to mean something that is simply someone's idea. It means something that is accepted as the best scientific understanding of a particular phenomena until something better comes along. Gravity is a theory; are you going to say that gravity is just someone's idea with no support?

As far as saying you can point out holes in the Big Bang, no you can't unless you are a scientist. All you can do is point to holes that YOU THINK exist based on a lay person's understanding of the Big Bang. That's like me saying that I could poke holes in the germ theory of disease because, after all, I can't see germs.

As far as saying Creationism and Big Bang say the same thing, that is not correct. Creationism says that we believe, based totally on faith that God created the world in 7 Days. The Big Bang says that, based on our knowledge and experimentation, we understand this is how the universe formed. It is simply not the same thing. Again, take two statements: (1) demons cause disease; (2) germs cause disease. I guess you can say these are two explanations for the same phenomena, but one is based on magic and folklore and the other is based on science. Unless you think that such things as airplanes and other items based on science don't exist, you simply can't equate the two statements.

Again, when you say that Creationism and the Big Bang require a level of faith in things that can't be proved, again, you are assuming based on a lay person's knowledge that the Big Bang cannot be proved. Scientists don't say that--there is substantial proof that the Big Bang happened. Even those scientists that doubt the Big Bang base their conclusion on verifiable experimentation. It is simply false to say that the Big Bang is bases imply on unverifiable assumptions. On the other hand, Creationism is based on NOTHING but faith. There is no possible way of proving it other than through self=reference to the Bible.

Look, I'm not trying to dissuade anyone from believing in God. I'm simply saying there is a difference between taking something on faith and taking something on scientific evidence.

Stephanie, you're not quite right. Evolution is in some instances much more than a theory, it's observable fact. It's been observed and documented under microscopes and in the field as an accurate description of the way in which various forms of life change over time. In other aspects it is a theory, one with varying levels of evidence to support it. In some areas, TONS and tons of evidence.

"God created the world in 7 days" is not a theory in the scientific sense. It' entirely unverifiable. It's not really explanatory in any sort of a utilitarian way. You can't use it to predict planetary motion or the existence of phenomena we have yet to actually discover. The big bang is a theory about how we got to where the universe is, and what it's made of, and where objects are headed, and so on. But they are not incompatible. God could have initiated the big bang. Science isn't challenging that.

Here's the thing: even assuming that God created everything we now collectively perceive, he quite obviously left us without the mechanical operator's manual. He only left the MORAL operators's manual with the bible. Because in god's eyes, that's the important stuff...how you live, how you treat others. As a gift, he left the unexplained mechanical aspects for us to uncover, undiscovered wonders all. There's no need to see competition and conflict.

I have no problem with the "evolution is god's mechanism" camp. I think it's a great way to resolve this issue, by having this be the sort of thing that churches and the churches' teachers teach to their flock. That would be a great thing for churches to do.

But it's absolutely not something that science teachers should be teaching their students, because then they'd be indoctrinating. If I were a public science eacher and a student asked about God, I might say "this is a perspective on science that lots of people find useful," and if really pressed on it by kids, I might even consider admitting that it's a perspective that I share, but I'd be very sure to point out that it's absolutely NOT necessary that all my students adopt this perspective. That would absolutely be indoctrination, I'd be establishing a religious viewpoint for my class, and that would be wrong in a public school.

Chris, I think the centrist position isn't that we should not talk about it. I think the position sb that religion doesn't belong in public schools other than in a forum that surveys various forms of it and investigates how people of different faiths manage to get along with one another.

And vis-a-vis religion and science, the policy sb "keep 'em separated." No religion in science class. No scientists going into churches challenging the veracity of bible stories that some believe are literally true and others think are just metaphors. So maybe in a sense you are right, it is sort of a policy of "let's stick to the hard-earned truce."

I think we're going off on the tangent of attempting to demonstrate what the merits of the the explanations are. While the big bang cannot be experimentally verified, there is observable evidence that supports the theory in a scientific way. This is far different from the biblical, entirely faith-based explanation. Beleive what you like, but whether science and religion are attempting the explain the same things or not, the two are wholly different approaches. You may be able to make the argument that there is some sameness on a metaphysical level between the two, but that doesn't then mean that creationism or an undeveloped ID theory should be taught in science class.

Also, the theory of evolution has alway been taught as a theory. Science class is where you learn what scientists have done and are doing and how to understand those things. I remember learning about spontaneous generation in biology class. It was a theory that mice and such just popped up out of piles of hay and old rags. It was taught in an historical way to demonstrate how science progresses. We all knew it was a discredited theory that was entirely incorrect. The same holds for inheritence of aquired traits. I lift weights and produce muscular children. Baloney!

There is an on-going understanding in the sciences that today's theory may someday be proved wrong. This notion that evolution is taught as anything but just such a potentially disprovable theory is simply false. The only reason people are so sensitive to this particular theory and the aforementioned big band is that they directly contradict what's in the bible.

My last post was started before bk and MWS posted. My apologies for any redundancy and slow typing.

Playing devils advocate here for a moment, I just want to point out that Science, at it's core, DOES rely on a certain degree of faith (as much as many scientists would like to pretend it doesn't).

1) It relies on faith that the Laws of the Universe are entirely consitant..... i.e. if I perform action X 9,999 times and always recieve Y result that the 10,000th time I perform it the results will be the same...... and that this held true 10 billion years ago as it does today.

2) That the actual mechanics of the universe ARE observable by us. In the germs/demons example given above. Germs are observable by scientists, fit a logical, falsifiable rationale for mechanisms of disease and have not been successfully disproven, science presumes that it is the cause. However, it is entirely within the realm of possibility that demons (unobservable to science) are the actual cause of disease and germs are simply a non-causitive by-product of the presence of disease causing demons.

3) That our observations are factual and accurate representations of what is really occuring.... rather then something which is being manipulated to a specific end. For example, one of the classic arguements against Creationism is that the earth cannot be only 7,000 years old because there is plenty of observable evidence (fossils, carbon dating, geologic strata) that the earth is far far older. However, that all presumes that 7,000 years ago all that evidence wasn't created from whole cloth. It also presumes that you are actualy observing that evidence....rather then being a head in a jar somewhere whose observations are manufactured for it.

Now I'm a big fan of science... and I'm pretty comfortable, for practical purposes, with most of the things it takes as an article of faith. However, I don't for a second, try to pretend that it doesn't take certain things on faith.

Cengel,

There is no way to dispute what you've put forth, but how pertinent is it really to the argument? You're getting into the philosophical realm of "I think, therefore I am" and "Prove to me that I'm really sitting here." I know you're only playing devil's advocate, but it's a stretch, and a big one at that. Assuming that I'm really typing this, there is still a big distinction between totally faith-based beliefs and scientific theories.

WHQ,

No dispute there. I'm just trying to point out that even science at it's core, takes some things on faith.

The reason why I like to illustrate that is because a certain segment of the scientific community loves to ridicule faith.... without ever realizing that they rely on it to some degree themselves.

Me I'm agnostic. I'm in favor of teaching evolution and against teaching Creationism. More important then that, however, I think is teaching critical thinking and giving students the ability to challange assumptions....including assumptions about the very nature of science itself. FAR too often science curiculum contains alot of specific content about scientific theroms....but far too little about the nature of Science itself... what it is, what it isn't, what it's limitations are...what it's good at informing one about, what it's not good at informing one about.

I'm pickin' up what you're puttin' down. Question everything and verify the rest.

WHQ;

While the big bang cannot be experimentally verified, there is observable evidence that supports the theory in a scientific way. This is far different from the biblical, entirely faith-based explanation. Beleive what you like, but whether science and religion are attempting the explain the same things or not, the two are wholly different approaches.

I've read some of the underpinnings of "big bang" and its supposed to play out. What strikes me is the time line (from some incredibly dense relatively small thing to instantaneously enormous universe) and the initial thing (something that has no light, no time as we understand it etc.) This is all based on good science but stop for a second, does it make sense in human terms. It's incomprehensible. That is not to say its not true but it seems to require an acceptance of the incomprehensible. Some might call that "faith"

Much of theoretical physics and cosmology requires the ability to conceive of almost incomprehensible things. Although I love reading about it, it is almost impossible to really grasp. So, I suppose you could say it requires faith--at least for those of us not able to understand the science. But the point is, while the concepts may be difficult to grasp, they at least are based on initial hypotheses that, at least in theory, are subject to validation. It's quite possible, indeed probably, that some of the more exotic theories out there, such as string theory, are wrong. But it will be proven wrong through debate and testing of hypotheses. Scientists will accept these theories only when there is a reasonable consensus that the available evidence supports them. Obviously, they could still be wrong--lots of ideas that were at one time accepted have been shown to be incorrect. And I'm not a science-jock; science is certainly not free from political and ideological biases. But the point is that scientific statements reflect an analytical method that is within the human capacity to verify, unlike religious statements, which rely strictly on one's faith in biblical interpretation. Moreover, while particular scientific theories may be and often are shown to be wrong, we know that the scientific method has value in the world because we have airplanes and CT scanners, and computers, etc.

WHQ et al.,

I think that cengel's argument really does have a lot more relevance than you gave him or her credit for. The question of whether it is faith or not is important because it's one step closer to realizing (once we accept that it is an issue of faith not "fact") it's where we put that faith that is the real issue. As I mentioned in my previous post, you're not going to be very likely to change someones basis of faith (i.e. whether they believe in a religious text or the scientific method as the source of all knowledge), but if you can point them to a reinterpretation of a situation based on their own system of faith you have still changed their mind. Regardless of whether they believe the answer is the answer for the same reason you do or not. That would seem to me to be functional enough in most cases. And who would want philosophical and epistemological hegemony anyway? How boring would that be?

This thread is about played out, but I wanted to chime in that I agree with Cengel.

if you think hard about it, it's next to impossible to deny that science has a crucial component of faith at its core. I think the practice of science is enriched by an acknowledgement of this, not wounded in any sense.

Contra WHQm I don't think this can be dismissed as beside the point. If you ask me, science worships the scientific method as the embodiment of reason, as its highest good. There's nothing wrong with that. Science has a bunch of miracles on its side, which they can stack up easily in any contest with alternative faiths.

I mean come ON! The space shuttle, the internet, the PC, artifical insemination, DNA testing, microwave popcorn...the list goes on forever.