In response to this "thought experiment" scenario
#226 -- parody of real life -- you said
One guy losing faith in his position isnt that interesting to me, even he's coming around toward seeing things my way.
People want to protect their intellectual turf. Even scientists behave that way. But scientists will come around to a different view before too long when the evidence starts to proliferate.
You may not be getting the full implication of the thought experiment -- in real life the tables are turned. The scientist in the real scenario is a world class atheist evolutionist speaking to a group that includes a number of his peers (not merely "students in a professors's class" ).
So let's make it easier to see the point. Switching contexts to remove all the hot buttons.
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Suppose that one of the leading Astrophysicists (let’s say
Neil deGrasse Tyson ) was speaking at a meeting with his own peers where a number of the leading Astrophysicists are in attendance. And “as it turned out” Tyson said something like this;
"we know that Astronomers often get accused by some of the anti-science folks of pleading ignorance of the means and affirm only the fact of a flat earth or some other offbeat idea."
“But let me be honest with you about something. It seems me that this is the same feeling I get when talking to Astrophysicists about the Cosmos today. They plead ignorance of the means , but affirm only the fact (saying): 'Yes it has...we know the big bang has taken place just as our cosmic inflation model describes!"
"...Now I think that many people in this room would acknowledge that during the last few years, if you had thought about it at all, you've experienced a shift from Astronomy as knowledge
to Astronomy as faith. I know that's true of me, and I think it's true of a good many of you here...
"...,
Astronomy not only conveys no knowledge, but seems somehow to convey anti-knowledge , apparent knowledge which is actually harmful to some of our key science claims about the origin and dynamics of the cosmos"
“Can you tell me anything you know about Astronomy or the Cosmos, any one thing…that is true?
"I tried that question on the Astrophysics department at one of our leading Universities and the only answer I got was silence. I tried it on the members of the Astrophysics Seminar at another one of our Universities, and all I got there was silence for a long time and eventually one person said “
I know one thing –
Astronomy should not to be taught in high school”
"... last year
I had a sudden realization. For over twenty years I thought that I was working on science related to Astronomy and the Cosmos. One morning I woke up, and something had happened in the night, and it struck me that I had been working on this stuff for twenty years, and there was not one thing I knew about it. "That was quite a shock that one could be misled for so long..."
“It does seem that the level of knowledge about the science of Astronomy and Cosmology is remarkably shallow. We know it ought not to be taught in high school, and perhaps that's all we know about it...
“about eighteen months ago...I woke up and I realized that all my life I had been duped into taking the science of of Astronomy and Cosmology as revealed truth alone rather than delving into it as science."
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So here is my question for evolutionists –
QUESTION1 : Is that “thought experiment” scenario even remotely possible in a real science such as Astronomy or Chemistry or Physics where a number of the leading scientists in that field are assembled.?
QUESTION2: If Tyson had actually asked a room full of his peers - “Can you tell me anything you know about Astronomy or the Cosmos, any one thing…that is true?” – is it even remotely possible that instead of everyone dishing out 20 or 30 hard facts known – they would have dead silence and the only response being “
I know one thing –
Astronomy should not to be taught in high school”
