On Sun, 12 Apr 1998 13:33:32 -0500, Glenn Morton wrote:
[...]
GM>Short examples of Apologists denigrating scientists
Yet more "examples" of *you* "denigrating" "Apologists"! You seem
not to realise that these are God's *servants* you are attacking. You
better be 100% right that they are all 100% wrong, otherwise you will
be called to account for all that you have publicly written against
these fine Christian leaders. I would *tremble* if I were in your shoes!
[...]
GM>"The German biochemist Bruno Muller-Hill tells a memorable
>story to illustrate his thesis that 'self-deception plays an astonishing
>role in science in spite of all the scientists' worship of
>truth':~Phillip E. Johnson, "The Emperor's New Theories," Books
>& Culture, March April 1997, p. 11--(Muller-Hill's story is about
>children in school some of whom were destined to become
>scientists. But in the entire story, not a single child was yet a trained
>scientist.)
Obviously a group of children did not include any "trained
scientist"! Who claimed that it did?
But again you miss the point. As you yourself say in the above
quote, it was "The German BIOCHEMIST Bruno Muller-Hill" who "tells a
memorable story to ILLUSTRATE his thesis that 'self-deception plays
an astonishing role in science in spite of all the scientists'
worship of truth". (my emphasis)
The point is that it wasn't an "apologist" who told the original
story. It was a *scientist*, speaking from his own experiences.
All the "apologist" Johnson did was take up this *scientist's*
"illustration" and use it. Are you claiming that evolution is a
sacred cow that is off-limits to Christian apologists?
For those interested, here is a fuller context from Johnson's
web page at http://www.mrccos.com/arn/johnson/hartprec.htm:
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"The German biochemist Bruno Muller-Hill tells a memorable story
to illustrate his thesis that "self-deception plays an astonishing role in
science in spite of all the scientists' worship of truth:"
When I was a student in a German gymnasium and thirteen years old,
I learned a lesson that I have not forgotten.... One early morning our
physics teacher placed a telescope in the school yard to show us a
certain planet and its moons. So we stood in a long line, about forty
of us. I was standing at the end of the line, since I was one of the
smallest students. The teacher asked the first student whether he
could see the planet. No, he had difficulties, because he was
nearsighted. The teacher showed him how to adjust the focus, and
that student could finally see the planet, and the moons. Others had
no difficulty; they saw them right away. The students saw, after a
while, what they were supposed to see. Then the student standing just
before me -- his name was Harter -- announced that he could not see
anything. "You idiot," shouted the teacher, "you have to adjust the
lenses." The student did that and said after a while "I do not see
anything, it is all black." The teacher then looked through the
telescope himself. After some seconds he looked up with a strange
expression on his face. And then my comrades and I also saw that the
telescope was nonfunctioning; it was closed by a cover over the lens.
Indeed, no one could see anything through it. [From "Science, Truth,
and Other Values," by Bruno Muller-Hill, Quarterly Review of
Biology, Sept 1993 (Vol. 68, No. 3), pp. 399-407.]
(Johnson P.E., "Harter's Precept," Review of Richard F. Hamilton,
"The Social Misconstruction of Reality: Validity and Verification in
the Scholarly Community," Yale University Press, 1996.
http://www.mrccos.com/arn/johnson/hartprec.htm)
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[...]
>GRM again, Why would anyone want to listen to a bunch of biased,
>ignorant, decepitive scientists like those described above? So when
>a scientist disagrees with creationism, he is working out of his
>biased, ignorant, deceptive nature, not from honesty!!!
Muller-Hill's "illustration" that Johnson uses is about "*self-
deception*" not necessarily lack of "honesty." One can be "honest"
as well as "biased, ignorant," and self-deceived!
Steve
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Stephen E (Steve) Jones ,--_|\ sejones@ibm.net
3 Hawker Avenue / Oz \ Steve.Jones@health.wa.gov.au
Warwick 6024 ->*_,--\_/ Phone +61 8 9448 7439
Perth, West Australia v "Test everything." (1Thess 5:21)
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