>Brian
>
>On Sun, 17 Mar 1996 00:08:41 -0500 you wrote:
>
>>SJ>I find it interesting that scientific research into a naturalistic
>>origin of life has been unsuccessful for 83 years...when does
>>dogged persistence become obsessive folly?...103 years? :-)
>
>>BH>Hmm... Inquiries into the supernaturalistic origins of life,
>>how long have they been going on and with what success? :-).
>
>>SJ>What "inquiries"? The "supernaturalistic origins of life" is a
>>revealed truth of the Bible (Jn 5:26).
>
>>BH>Sorry, I thought for some reason that we were talking about
>>scientific evidence.
>
>>SJ:We were - "scientific research into a naturalistic origin of
>>life has been unsuccessful for 83 years". There has been no
>>scientific research into a supernaturalistic origin of life AFAIK.
>
>BH>Why?
>
>Brian, whether you realise it or not, you are evading the point! :-)
One of us surely is. I hope to show it is you :). The point I think that
you are evading is that science cannot address the supernatural.
This is not defining to exclude it is just a recognition of the
limitation of science. Understanding this point is the key to
recognising the necessity of methodolical naturalism.
SJ:===
>Naturalism has a monopoly of the scientific resources of the State at
>its disposal and denies that there even "a supernaturalistic
>origins of life" can be a subject for "scientific research".
>
I also deny it yet I am not a Naturalist.
SJ:===
>I repeat my question, "when does dogged persistence become obsessive
>folly?". Is taxpayers money to be squandered forever in trying to
>prove that life originated spontaneously from non-living chemicals?
>
"... there are few sciences which have required so much
thought -- the conquest of a few axioms has taken more
than 2000 years."
-- Rene Dugas, <A History of Mechanics>, Dover, 1988.
>>SJ> But if the naturalistic program to find a plausible undirected
>>materialistic spontaneous generation scenario for the origin of life
>>consistently fails, does this not leave a supernaturalistic
>>ntelligent Designer origin the only alternative?
>
>BH>No, this is the argument from the false alternative.
>
SJ:===
>Why is this "false"? There can only be two alternatives: 1.
>naturalistic and 2. supernaturalistic. This is proved by your own
>counter-attack to my point:
>
> SJ>I find it interesting that scientific research into a
> naturalistic origin of life has been unsuccessful for 83 years
>
> BH>"...Inquiries into the supernaturalistic origins of life,
> how long have they been going on and with what success?
>
I think you misunderstood my point. I was not arguing that the failure
to find a supernaturalistic explanation for the origin of life
provides evidence for the naturalistic explanation. By turning the
situation around I was hopeing that you would see the fallacy. Perhaps
I was being too subtle ;-).
Let's discuss the argument from the false alternative a little.
First let me submit the following definition that I dug up:
Fallacy of limited (or false) alternatives:
The error of insisting without full inquiry or evidence that
the alternatives to a course of action have been exhausted
and/or are mutually exclusive.
First, I think its worthwhile to give an illustration. Later in
your post you try to use the argument from the false alternative
(AFFA) by specifying that there are only two alternatives for the
origin of life:
"The point is that if the origin of life did not happen by
chance, then it must have happened by intelligent design"
-- SJ
The problem (regardless of what Dawkins says) is that chance is
just one of many scenarios for the origin of life, so the argument
fails.
Clearly AFFA is not a fallacy if one can show that there are only
two mutually exclusive alternatives. Can one show this for the
more general case of naturalism vs. supernaturalism? If by
naturalism one means methodological naturalism then the argument
will fail since methodological naturalism is not mutually exclusive
with the supernatural in general or theism in particular. MN places
a limitation on science not reality. Please don't quote me chapter
and verse from Dawkins. The best way to undermine Dawkins is to show
he has violated the rules of science. This is just what Polkinghorne
does (to Wolpert instead of Dawkins) in his letter to _Nature_
that I quoted a while back.
Further, even if one could use methodological naturalism as one of the
two alternatives one will still have difficulties providing "evidence
that the alternatives to a course of action have been exhausted".
OK, so let's try to use philosophical naturalism as one of the two
alternatives. The problem here is that the methods of science cannot
test whether philosophical naturalism is true.
[...]
>SJ:===
>The point is that "theistic science" will *never* get an article in
>Nature until naturalists change their philosphy that nature is all
>there is.
>
But Polkinghorne published an article in _Nature_ attacking the
philosophy that nature is all there is.
[...]
>BH>The realization that the origin of life did not occur by chance
>>does not in any way suggest that the intervention of an Intelligent
>>Designer was necessary. Would we agree that the orbit of the earth
>>about the sun is not determined by chance? Does this require the
>>intervention of an Intelligent Designer?
>
>The "orbit of the earth" is not a unique, historical event, life the
>origin of life was. You are confusing *origins* with *operations*! :-)
>
I must be really bad at communicating since you continue to miss all
my points :). The point was that the orbit of the earth is determined
by law and not by chance. The origin of life may be deterministic
rather than stochastic or it may involve a combination of deterministic
and stochastic elements or it may involve something no one even has a
clue of or it may be undecidable.
[...]
>BH>Secondly, you say "If this goes on much longer ..." when it hasn't
>>even gone on at all yet.
>
>Sorry. I have re-read your post. It says that Yockey published his
>paper on the Internet in February 1996:
>
>-----------------------------------------------------------
>Subject: Priority of Walther Loeb on "Miller" Spark Discharge
>Experiment
>(Chemical Evolution)
>From: hpyockey@aol.com (HPYockey)
>Date: 19 Feb 1996
>-----------------------------------------------------------
>
>For some reason I thought it was a couple of years ago. I will
>await the self-correction that will give Loeb rightful priority.
>
Just another minor point. The clock doesn't start ticking until
the result is published in a refereed journal and one allows time
for independent verification.
SJ:===
>Nevertheless, I find it difficult to believe that Yockey was the first
>person to notice Loeb's mistranslation, considering there are many
>eminent German OOL researchers who surely must have read Loeb's
>report.
>
And I find it difficult to believe that you are not insinuating a
cover-up though you object whenever I mention the possibility.
>BH>Finally, and most importantly, you are much too quick in concluding
>>a cover up. This is a very serious charge and needs to be rigorously
>>substantiated. I for one fail even to find a motive for a cover up.
>
>As I said previously, I made *no* "charge" of "a cover up." I repeat:
>
>-----------------------------------------------------------
>>SJ>I was quite careful in what I said. I said "IF THIS IS IGNORED,
>>AND LOEB NOT GIVEN HIS RIGHTFUL PRIORITY", then it would seem to
>>indicate that here we have a case of paradigm blindness at best and
>>fraudulent cover up at worst?".
>-----------------------------------------------------------
>
And you also said:
SJ:=========================================================
That's OK, but let's not lose the main point here. Why has not
Loeb been given his rightful priority? Why is the Miller-Urey
experiment still hailed in school textbooks as the beginning
of OOL research? If this goes on much longer, then it is hard
to avoid the charge of a "cover up" to avoid providing support
for creationism, as Gould acknowledges does happen:
...
This continuing silence sounds more and more like a cover-up! :-)
...
Surely some *German* OOL scholars (of which there are many, eg.
Klaus Dose, Manfred Eigen, Karl Woese), would have read Loeb
and realised his priority? It's hard to believe that Yockey
was the first to pick it up. I suggest that this has been
another "trade secret" among OOL researchers that a comparative
outsider like Yockey would not have been aware of.
===============================================================
Sorry if I misrepresent your views but you sure do talk a lot about
cover-ups for someone who is not making a charge of there being a
cover-up.
========================
Brian Harper |
Associate Professor | "It is not certain that all is uncertain,
Applied Mechanics | to the glory of skepticism" -- Pascal
Ohio State University |
========================