Why Would An Agnostic Doubt the Theory of Evolution

[Zosimus]

NotedStrangePerson, in response to http://www.christianforums.com/t7817482-20/#post65454608 I provide you with this answer:

Evolution, the fact, is simply that the frequency of alleles changes from generation to generation. In most areas of science the theory of a known phenomenon is a possible explanation for why something occurs.

In this case, however, the Theory of Evolution (hereinafter "Neo-Darwinism") does not attempt to explain why the frequency of alleles changes from generation to generation, but rather attempts to fuse several theories together to explain all life as we see it around us. Neo-Darwinism is made up of such theories as the theory of common descent, the theory of natural selection.

The only valid reason for someone to believe in common descent would be if it could be proved that there was one (and only one) incidence of life arising from non-life in the past (hereinafter "abiogenesis"). If life did not arise spontaneously on its own, then an intelligent being (such as Odin) must have created it. Once one postulates a creator, Neo-Darwinism is no longer needed to explain the origin of life and its complexity. Additionally, if there were multiple past incidences of abiogenesis then there is similarly no reason to believe that all life shared a common ancestor.

Abiogenesis is a very difficult concept. I have not read any discussion of how life came about that suggests that nucleotides (the building blocks of DNA) occur in nature much less in sufficient quantities to have the necessary raw materials for these materials to self-organize into a virus, much less the simplest cell that could have survived and reproduced. The chances of such hypothetical nucleotides self-assembling are so small as to make the idea that it occurred laughable. Dawkins, to his credit, attempts to tackle the problem by suggesting that an infinite number of universes exist and therefore one of those universes almost certainly had to have abiogenesis.

However, I cannot agree with his logic. Saying that an infinite number of tries eventually leads to abiogenesis is like saying that given an infinite number of swings at a baseball you will eventually be able to hit it into a stable orbit around the Earth. Additionally, Dawkins rules out God as being astronomically remote. However, given an infinite number of universes, wouldn't one of them contain a god of some sort?

If someone begins to discuss Neo-Darwinism with apologists for Neo-Darwinism (hereinafter "Darwinists") they immediately assert that abiogenesis is not part of Neo-Darwinism and that they do not have to defend any such theory. Rather the following argument is offered as proof for common descent:

Premise: Natural processes create nested hierarchies.
Premise: Life on Earth is in a nested hierarchy.
Conclusion: Life on Earth was created by natural processes (aka Neo-Darwinism).

There are at least two problems with this argument. First, the conclusion does not follow from the premises. Second, the initial premise is in doubt. In order to support this premise Darwinists normally make a claim like: Horses all share a common ancestor. Horses fall into a nested hierarchy. This proves that common ancestor + natural processes create nested hierarchies.

Unfortunately horses have only partially been created by natural processes. Humans have been selectively breeding horses and using all of the combined intellect of humankind to try to make horses into the animals we see today. Accordingly that horses fall into a nested hierarchy is far more likely to disprove the idea that it all happened naturally than the idea that an intelligent force has directed the whole affair.

Another argument used by Darwinists to support Neo-Darwinism is the claim that macro-evolution has both occurred and been observed. Macro-evolution, in comparison with micro-evolution, is when evolution occurs and results in a new species. The problem with this argument is that no one can clearly define what a species is. The most common claim is that "members of the same species are recognizable as such because they can actually or potentially interbreed with one another."

However, this simple definition raises a host of problems. Bacteria never breed with one another, yet they are defined as the same species. Upon viewing two fossils, scientists cannot know whether the creatures that made the species were capable of interbreeding. Additionally many animals are defined as part of the same species, even though breeding is not possible (think very large vs. very small dogs). Finally articles such as http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/14/s...rare-hybrid-of-two-other-dolphin-species.html in which two species of dolphins interbreed to create a third species, something that is clearly impossible according to a simple definition of species since the interbreeding of the two different "species" of dolphins should prove that they are NOT distinct species.

Accordingly you will see hundreds of posts between Christians and Darwinists arguing whether macro-evolution has occurred. You will not, however, see my name as part of the argument. I cannot determine what a species is, much less whether random mutations can create new ones. With at least 21 species concepts floating around, who can blame me?

These are just a few of the doubts that lead me to believe that Neo-Darwinism still has a lot of work to do before it can convince a logical and non-biased person that it really is the only possible explanation for life as we know it.

 

[Notedstrangeperson]

Thanks for answering my question.

I'm sure lots of people (including myself at some point) will debate you about the actual science behind Darwinism, or neo-Darwinism. But if you don't mind me asking another question...

If life did not arise spontaneously on its own, then an intelligent being (such as Odin) must have created it. Once one postulates a creator, Neo-Darwinism is no longer needed to explain the origin of life and its complexity.
...
Saying that an infinite number of tries eventually leads to abiogenesis is like saying that given an infinite number of swings at a baseball you will eventually be able to hit it into a stable orbit around the Earth. Additionally, Dawkins rules out God as being astronomically remote. However, given an infinite number of universes, wouldn't one of them contain a god of some sort?

If you are uncertain both about the existance God and evolution, what other ideas are there about the origin and development of life? Do you think it's possible other intelligent being from other planets started life on Earth? Or is it just Darwinism you doubt - maybe a different kind of evolutionary theory would work better?

 

[poikilotherm]

"Rather the following argument is offered as proof for common descent:

Premise: Natural processes create nested hierarchies.
Premise: Life on Earth is in a nested hierarchy.
Conclusion: Life on Earth was created by natural processes (aka Neo-Darwinism)."
Zosuimus

Not quite. Science cannot make absolute statements of truth. The following is more accurate;


Premise: Evolutionary processes create nested hierarchies

Observation: Extant life on earth forms nested hierarchies using genetics and morphology. The fossil record shows that extinct species also fit within nested hierarchies, moreover, there are no known exceptions.

Conclusion: The observed taxonomic categorisations are consistent with the theory of evolution.

"These are just a few of the doubts that lead me to believe that Neo-Darwinism still has a lot of work to do before it can convince a logical and non-biased person that it really is the only possible explanation for life as we know it."
Zosuimus

Neo-Darwinism is not the only possible explanation for life as we know it. It is the best explanation we have for life as we know it. If you have evidence to dispute the theory then please provide it. If you don`t then, as a logical and non biased person, you must accept it, if only provisionally.

 

[Zosimus]

"Rather the following argument is offered as proof for common descent:

Premise: Natural processes create nested hierarchies.
Premise: Life on Earth is in a nested hierarchy.
Conclusion: Life on Earth was created by natural processes (aka Neo-Darwinism)."
Zosuimus

Not quite. Science cannot make absolute statements of truth. The following is more accurate;


Premise: Evolutionary processes create nested hierarchies

Observation: Extant life on earth forms nested hierarchies using genetics and morphology. The fossil record shows that extinct species also fit within nested hierarchies, moreover, there are no known exceptions.

Conclusion: The observed taxonomic categorisations are consistent with the theory of evolution.

"These are just a few of the doubts that lead me to believe that Neo-Darwinism still has a lot of work to do before it can convince a logical and non-biased person that it really is the only possible explanation for life as we know it."
Zosuimus

Neo-Darwinism is not the only possible explanation for life as we know it. It is the best explanation we have for life as we know it. If you have evidence to dispute the theory then please provide it. If you don`t then, as a logical and non biased person, you must accept it, if only provisionally.

Ridiculous.

Imagine that we have a man who owns a raven, which is black, and he is convinced that all ravens are black. He hires me to search the world to provide him with evidence that all ravens are black. I return with a large number of birds, but no ravens of any kind. He is thrilled. He says, "You have provided me with red robins, white doves, blue blue-jays, green parrots, and yellow canaries. Any of these could have been a non-black raven. As such, they are part of the overwhelming evidence that all ravens are black."

You are there. Do you accept this man's logic? Why or why not?

Assuming that he says, "All right, so we haven't PROVED that all raven are black, but as a logical and non-biased person, you must accept it, if only provisionally" then how would you respond to that?

 

[juvenissun]

Ridiculous.

Imagine that we have a man who owns a raven, which is black, and he is convinced that all ravens are black. He hires me to search the world to provide him with evidence that all ravens are black. I return with a large number of birds, but no ravens of any kind. He is thrilled. He says, "You have provided me with red robins, white doves, blue blue-jays, green parrots, and yellow canaries. Any of these could have been a non-black raven. As such, they are part of the overwhelming evidence that all ravens are black."

You are there. Do you accept this man's logic? Why or why not?

Assuming that he says, "All right, so we haven't PROVED that all raven are black, but as a logical and non-biased person, you must accept it, if only provisionally" then how would you respond to that?

You can not just doubt this and doubt that (very easy thing to do) but having not a promising idea to explore. You do not need to believe everything. But it is illogical either to not believing everything. WHAT do you think is a more likely answer?

 

[loktai]

Using your raven analogy no it is not rediculous. If he has only ever seen black ravens, and a worldwide search for non-black ravens has not produced any, then it is completely logical to provisionally accept that all ravens are black. If someone were to produce a non-black raven, then that would be evidence against the idea that all ravens are black and this idea would then be rejected by the community in light of this new evidence.

 

[PsychoSarah]

Using your raven analogy no it is not rediculous. If he has only ever seen black ravens, and a worldwide search for non-black ravens has not produced any, then it is completely logical to provisionally accept that all ravens are black. If someone were to produce a non-black raven, then that would be evidence against the idea that all ravens are black and this idea would then be rejected by the community in light of this new evidence.

It isn't logical to assume all ravens are black unless being that color is a prerequisite for being considered a raven, regardless as to whether or not you never find a non black raven. This is because it is possible you just didn't find the ones that weren't black, perhaps an albino raven.

 

[biggles53]

Good grief.....who taught you how to structure a syllogism...!?

Whoever it was, if they charged you a fee, go immediately and demand your money back...!

You have NOT constructed a logical argument...what you have done us to play semantics with the words "created" and "is in"...

You are a fraud....and not a very good nor clever one.....

Start with some honesty...biological science makes NO reference at all to the "creation" of life in its expression of evolutionary theory. The theory makes NO pretence about having an answer to the appearance of first life...in fact, biologists make it quite clear that we have little idea about the processes involved in abiogenesis.

However, and this is the key factor, the theory works perfectly without any reference to abiogenesis...!

Now....if you are interested in a genuine search for knowledge, rather than adolescent word games, try answering this question....

If the theory of evolution, including the implication of common ancestry, is bogus, then what is the alternative explanation for the observed location of ERV's in primate species...?

 

[Atheos canadensis]

NotedStrangePerson, in response to http://www.christianforums.com/t7817482-20/#post65454608 I provide you with this answer:

Evolution, the fact, is simply that the frequency of alleles changes from generation to generation. In most areas of science the theory of a known phenomenon is a possible explanation for why something occurs.

In this case, however, the Theory of Evolution (hereinafter "Neo-Darwinism") does not attempt to explain why the frequency of alleles changes from generation to generation, but rather attempts to fuse several theories together to explain all life as we see it around us. Neo-Darwinism is made up of such theories as the theory of common descent, the theory of natural selection.

The only valid reason for someone to believe in common descent would be if it could be proved that there was one (and only one) incidence of life arising from non-life in the past (hereinafter "abiogenesis"). If life did not arise spontaneously on its own, then an intelligent being (such as Odin) must have created it. Once one postulates a creator, Neo-Darwinism is no longer needed to explain the origin of life and its complexity. Additionally, if there were multiple past incidences of abiogenesis then there is similarly no reason to believe that all life shared a common ancestor.

Abiogenesis is a very difficult concept. I have not read any discussion of how life came about that suggests that nucleotides (the building blocks of DNA) occur in nature much less in sufficient quantities to have the necessary raw materials for these materials to self-organize into a virus, much less the simplest cell that could have survived and reproduced. The chances of such hypothetical nucleotides self-assembling are so small as to make the idea that it occurred laughable. Dawkins, to his credit, attempts to tackle the problem by suggesting that an infinite number of universes exist and therefore one of those universes almost certainly had to have abiogenesis.

However, I cannot agree with his logic. Saying that an infinite number of tries eventually leads to abiogenesis is like saying that given an infinite number of swings at a baseball you will eventually be able to hit it into a stable orbit around the Earth. Additionally, Dawkins rules out God as being astronomically remote. However, given an infinite number of universes, wouldn't one of them contain a god of some sort?

If someone begins to discuss Neo-Darwinism with apologists for Neo-Darwinism (hereinafter "Darwinists") they immediately assert that abiogenesis is not part of Neo-Darwinism and that they do not have to defend any such theory. Rather the following argument is offered as proof for common descent:

Premise: Natural processes create nested hierarchies.
Premise: Life on Earth is in a nested hierarchy.
Conclusion: Life on Earth was created by natural processes (aka Neo-Darwinism).

There are at least two problems with this argument. First, the conclusion does not follow from the premises. Second, the initial premise is in doubt. In order to support this premise Darwinists normally make a claim like: Horses all share a common ancestor. Horses fall into a nested hierarchy. This proves that common ancestor + natural processes create nested hierarchies.

Unfortunately horses have only partially been created by natural processes. Humans have been selectively breeding horses and using all of the combined intellect of humankind to try to make horses into the animals we see today. Accordingly that horses fall into a nested hierarchy is far more likely to disprove the idea that it all happened naturally than the idea that an intelligent force has directed the whole affair.

Another argument used by Darwinists to support Neo-Darwinism is the claim that macro-evolution has both occurred and been observed. Macro-evolution, in comparison with micro-evolution, is when evolution occurs and results in a new species. The problem with this argument is that no one can clearly define what a species is. The most common claim is that "members of the same species are recognizable as such because they can actually or potentially interbreed with one another."

However, this simple definition raises a host of problems. Bacteria never breed with one another, yet they are defined as the same species. Upon viewing two fossils, scientists cannot know whether the creatures that made the species were capable of interbreeding. Additionally many animals are defined as part of the same species, even though breeding is not possible (think very large vs. very small dogs). Finally articles such as http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/14/s...rare-hybrid-of-two-other-dolphin-species.html in which two species of dolphins interbreed to create a third species, something that is clearly impossible according to a simple definition of species since the interbreeding of the two different "species" of dolphins should prove that they are NOT distinct species.

Accordingly you will see hundreds of posts between Christians and Darwinists arguing whether macro-evolution has occurred. You will not, however, see my name as part of the argument. I cannot determine what a species is, much less whether random mutations can create new ones. With at least 21 species concepts floating around, who can blame me?

These are just a few of the doubts that lead me to believe that Neo-Darwinism still has a lot of work to do before it can convince a logical and non-biased person that it really is the only possible explanation for life as we know it.

You assert that the only logical reason to accept common descent is if it were proven that there were only a single abiogenesis event. You haven't supported this assertion however. There could have been any number of abiogeneses with the current biota having arisen from one such event. Or Odin could have poofed life into existence after which point it evolved (as you say, invoking such an entity obviates the need for evolution, but it doesn't negate the evidence for evolution). Neither of these scenarios impact the evidence for evolution.

You note that proponents of evolution are quick to point out that evolution is not reliant on abiogenesis and you give the impression that this is wrong, but you don't support that position. Merely noting that evolution is not considered to be reliant on abiogenesis is not a sufficient critique of that position. Perhaps you can expand on this in your next post.

You question the premise that evolution should produce a nested hierarchy. I don't see where you have substantiated your skepticism, unless that's what you were trying to do with the horse example. If that's the case, you need to rethink it. Horse lineages prior to artificial selection still fall into a nested hierarchy. And of course there's all the plants and animals that have not been subjected to artificial selection by humans and still fall in to a nested hierarchy.

You say that the conclusion that life's diversity was produced by evolution does not logically follow from the observed nested hierarchies. I assume this is related to your points about affirming the consequent in the other thread. As you have pointed out, the possibility of other explanations makes it untenable to be certain that evolution is the cause of the nested hierarchy of life, but I know others have repeatedly pointed out that science doesn't do certainty. Science makes use of probability and parsimony, making provisional conclusions that are subject to review. Nested hierarchies don't prove that evolution occurred, but they increase the probability that it did. The same goes for all the evidence supporting evolution. To put it in the terms you've been using:

-If A, then Evolution
-A
-therefore P(Evolution) increases

But there are many lines of evidence for evolution, so it's more like

-If A, B, C, D, E, F then Evolution
-A, B, C, D, E, F
-therefore P(evolution) increases.

While it is fallacious to claim that these evidences prove evolution, they make it much more likely to be the case. So likely that it is practical to accept it as reality until something falsifies it. Parsimony is how we function in life so it seems reasonable to apply it here to.

 

[Zosimus]

Using your raven analogy no it is not rediculous. If he has only ever seen black ravens, and a worldwide search for non-black ravens has not produced any, then it is completely logical to provisionally accept that all ravens are black. If someone were to produce a non-black raven, then that would be evidence against the idea that all ravens are black and this idea would then be rejected by the community in light of this new evidence.

All right, then. If finding green parrots is evidence for the idea that all ravens are black, then I have substantial evidence that black holes do not exist.

Just today I walked out and noticed thousands of leaves on the ground (it's autumn here) and I carefully examined them. Not one of them was a black hole. Accordingly each new leaf I find will be part of the ever-mounting evidence that black holes do not exist.

After all "Black holes do not exist" is the same as asserting that "Everything that exists is not a black hole."

 

[Atheos canadensis]

All right, then. If finding green parrots is evidence for the idea that all ravens are black, then I have substantial evidence that black holes do not exist.

Just today I walked out and noticed thousands of leaves on the ground (it's autumn here) and I carefully examined them. Not one of them was a black hole. Accordingly each new leaf I find will be part of the ever-mounting evidence that black holes do not exist.

After all "Black holes do not exist" is the same as asserting that "Everything that exists is not a black hole."

Your raven analogy fails because the situation you're describing is not actually analogous to the evidence for evolution. In your analogy this fellow has a single black raven and a whole bunch of other birds and he concludes that all ravens are black. But evolution has several lines of evidence to support it, so a more pertinent analogy would be if this fellow had many black ravens from around the world and declared on that basis that all ravens are black. And of course, as you know, scientific conclusions like evolution are provisional, so to make your analogy pertinent the guy would have to provisionally conclude, based on the available evidence, that ravens are black.

 

[Zosimus]

Good grief.....who taught you how to structure a syllogism...!?

Whoever it was, if they charged you a fee, go immediately and demand your money back...!

You have NOT constructed a logical argument...what you have done us to play semantics with the words "created" and "is in"...

You are a fraud....and not a very good nor clever one.....

Start with some honesty...biological science makes NO reference at all to the "creation" of life in its expression of evolutionary theory. The theory makes NO pretence about having an answer to the appearance of first life...in fact, biologists make it quite clear that we have little idea about the processes involved in abiogenesis.

However, and this is the key factor, the theory works perfectly without any reference to abiogenesis...!

Now....if you are interested in a genuine search for knowledge, rather than adolescent word games, try answering this question....

If the theory of evolution, including the implication of common ancestry, is bogus, then what is the alternative explanation for the observed location of ERV's in primate species...?

Your argument is not only insulting but also logically flawed. Fundamentally there is no difference between your argument and the God of the Gaps logical fallacy often employed by Christians.

A Christian might argue as follows:

Since science cannot explain why the Big Bang occurred, you must accept that God did made it happen.

Fundamentally the argument says that unless you can explain "X" (to my satisfaction) then you must accept my explanation for X.

Your argument "what is the alternative explanation for the observed location of ERV's in primate species...?" is fundamentally no different.

Now it didn't take me more than 5 seconds of googling it to find the standard Christian anti-ERV argument. Let's assume, however, for the sake of argument, that this anti-ERV argument is wrong. So what? Just because an explanation is not known does not mean that an explanation does not exist or will never be known.

Fundamentally the HERV logic pattern is like this:

If (common descent) then (primates will share common ERVs).
(Primates share common ERVs).
Therefore (common descent).

What does that prove? Nothing.

If Richard Dawkins is American, he will speak English.
He speaks English.
Therefore he is American.

Is that sound logic? Obviously not.

 

[Dizredux]

Your argument is not only insulting but also logically flawed. Fundamentally there is no difference between your argument and the God of the Gaps logical fallacy often employed by Christians.

A Christian might argue as follows:

Since science cannot explain why the Big Bang occurred, you must accept that God did made it happen.

Fundamentally the argument says that unless you can explain "X" (to my satisfaction) then you must accept my explanation for X.

Your argument "what is the alternative explanation for the observed location of ERV's in primate species...?" is fundamentally no different.

Now it didn't take me more than 5 seconds of googling it to find the standard Christian anti-ERV argument. Let's assume, however, for the sake of argument, that this anti-ERV argument is wrong. So what? Just because an explanation is not known does not mean that an explanation does not exist or will never be known.

Fundamentally the HERV logic pattern is like this:

If (common descent) then (primates will share common ERVs).
(Primates share common ERVs).
Therefore (common descent).

What does that prove? Nothing.

If Richard Dawkins is American, he will speak English.
He speaks English.
Therefore he is American.

Is that sound logic? Obviously not.

Actually I think you have the syllogism wrong.

If primates share common ERVs
Then common descent
Primates share common ERVs
Therefore common descent.

Common descent is more of a conclusion from the evidence than anything else so the evidence would be the initial premise.

Also
If nested hierarchy
Then common descent
nested hierarchy
Therefore common descent.

The idea of the nested hierarchy was around far longer than the idea of common descent.

Dizredux

 

[Notedstrangeperson]

Zosimus: Sorry to pester you but would you mind answering my question - if Darwinian evolution and creationism are both wrong, then how do you personally think life began and developed?

 

[Zosimus]

You assert that the only logical reason to accept common descent is if it were proven that there were only a single abiogenesis event. You haven't supported this assertion however. There could have been any number of abiogeneses with the current biota having arisen from one such event. Or Odin could have poofed life into existence after which point it evolved (as you say, invoking such an entity obviates the need for evolution, but it doesn't negate the evidence for evolution). Neither of these scenarios impact the evidence for evolution.

You note that proponents of evolution are quick to point out that evolution is not reliant on abiogenesis and you give the impression that this is wrong, but you don't support that position. Merely noting that evolution is not considered to be reliant on abiogenesis is not a sufficient critique of that position. Perhaps you can expand on this in your next post.

You question the premise that evolution should produce a nested hierarchy. I don't see where you have substantiated your skepticism, unless that's what you were trying to do with the horse example. If that's the case, you need to rethink it. Horse lineages prior to artificial selection still fall into a nested hierarchy. And of course there's all the plants and animals that have not been subjected to artificial selection by humans and still fall in to a nested hierarchy.

You say that the conclusion that life's diversity was produced by evolution does not logically follow from the observed nested hierarchies. I assume this is related to your points about affirming the consequent in the other thread. As you have pointed out, the possibility of other explanations makes it untenable to be certain that evolution is the cause of the nested hierarchy of life, but I know others have repeatedly pointed out that science doesn't do certainty. Science makes use of probability and parsimony, making provisional conclusions that are subject to review. Nested hierarchies don't prove that evolution occurred, but they increase the probability that it did. The same goes for all the evidence supporting evolution. To put it in the terms you've been using:

-If A, then Evolution
-A
-therefore P(Evolution) increases

But there are many lines of evidence for evolution, so it's more like

-If A, B, C, D, E, F then Evolution
-A, B, C, D, E, F
-therefore P(evolution) increases.

While it is fallacious to claim that these evidences prove evolution, they make it much more likely to be the case. So likely that it is practical to accept it as reality until something falsifies it. Parsimony is how we function in life so it seems reasonable to apply it here to.

Science is based on a logical fallacy. This has been known since David Hume posed what is now known as the Problem of Induction back in the 19th century. David Hume's solution was to abandon logic.

Karl Popper's solution was to embrace logic and switch to falsificationism.

Your solution is to rely on Bayesian statistics. You claim that finding a supposed confirmation for your theory increases the chance of its correctness. However, I doubt that you earnestly practice such a policy. I believe it is nothing more than a rationalization.

Your profile marks you as an atheist. However, if you really believed that Bayesian statistics could lead you to truth then you could not be an atheist. First you would be exposed to the idea that a Supreme Being existed. Using the Principle of Insufficient Reason you should conclude as a starting point that the chance of God existing is 50-50. Since God is not a testable hypothesis, however, no amount of experimentation would ever lead you to increase or decrease the chance. You should be forever stuck at 50 percent chance.

Second, history shows us that using statistics to ensure the accuracy of scientific belief doesn't work. As you can see at PLOS Medicine: Why Most Published Research Findings Are False , it can be proved that most published research findings are false. There are many reasons why, but part of the problem is the reliance on statistics as a standard for whether a real relation has been found. A second problem is that journals are not interested in publishing experiments in which nothing is found. It is far more interesting to publish a bad finding, for example, that green jellybeans cause cancer than to publish the good results that all other colors of jellybeans were duly tested and none were found to cause cancer. As such, "Claimed Research Findings May Often Be Simply Accurate Measures of the Prevailing Bias."

Additionally, as shown as http://www.strevens.org/research/simplexuality/Bayes.pdf we can see that Bayesian statistics is a way to measure the subjective probability of something. The article goes on to say that consensus opinion is that there is no convincing argument for accepting Bayesian conditionalization. If you have a convincing argument, I would very much like to hear it.

The article continues "...even when the likelihoods are fixed mechanically, the theorem of total probability may not apply if the rival hypotheses are either not mutually exclusive or not exhaustive. Lack of exhaustiveness is the more pressing worry, as it would seem to be the norm..." Accordingly we can see that under most circumstances, the theorem of total probability does not apply.

The article goes on to point out that none of the Bayesian confirmations work unless you presuppose the uniformity of nature -- something that we have no reason to assume. It also points out: "It is fine for scientists to disagree, at least for a time, on the plausibility of various hypotheses, but it is not at all fine that they disagree on the impact of the evidence on the hypotheses -- agreement on the import of the evidence being the sine qua non of science. In Bayesian terms, scientists may disagree on the priors for the rival hypotheses, but they had better not disagree on the Bayesian multipliers. But this is, for a Bayesian, impossible: the priors help to determine the multipliers. The usual conclusion is that there is no acceptable Bayesian theory of confirmation."

These are just a few of the problems facing the argument that you have made in support of the idea that evidence can support a probabilistic calculation of the viability of the theory in question.

 

[Atheos canadensis]

Your argument is not only insulting but also logically flawed. Fundamentally there is no difference between your argument and the God of the Gaps logical fallacy often employed by Christians.

A Christian might argue as follows:

Since science cannot explain why the Big Bang occurred, you must accept that God did made it happen.

Fundamentally the argument says that unless you can explain "X" (to my satisfaction) then you must accept my explanation for X.

Your argument "what is the alternative explanation for the observed location of ERV's in primate species...?" is fundamentally no different.

Now it didn't take me more than 5 seconds of googling it to find the standard Christian anti-ERV argument. Let's assume, however, for the sake of argument, that this anti-ERV argument is wrong. So what? Just because an explanation is not known does not mean that an explanation does not exist or will never be known.

Fundamentally the HERV logic pattern is like this:

If (common descent) then (primates will share common ERVs).
(Primates share common ERVs).
Therefore (common descent).

What does that prove? Nothing.

If Richard Dawkins is American, he will speak English.
He speaks English.
Therefore he is American.

Is that sound logic? Obviously not.

You're doing it again. You're characterizing these arguments as absolute statements rather than the provisional, probabilistic arguments they really are.

The 200 000+ shared ERV sites greatly increase the probability that we share a common ancestor with chimps and diminishes the probability that we don't.

Also I'm guessing that the standard creationist "refutation" involved discussion of hotspots and ignored the fact that such hotspots are hundreds of bases long.

 

[Zosimus]

Your raven analogy fails because the situation you're describing is not actually analogous to the evidence for evolution. In your analogy this fellow has a single black raven and a whole bunch of other birds and he concludes that all ravens are black. But evolution has several lines of evidence to support it, so a more pertinent analogy would be if this fellow had many black ravens from around the world and declared on that basis that all ravens are black. And of course, as you know, scientific conclusions like evolution are provisional, so to make your analogy pertinent the guy would have to provisionally conclude, based on the available evidence, that ravens are black.

First of all, this is not "my raven analogy" this is Hempel's Ravens Paradox and I can take no credit for it.

To simply the argument, let's imagine that you have a drawer that has two things in it. You draw out the first thing and you see that it is a pair of black socks. You hypothesize that all socks in the drawer are black. You draw out the second thing and see that it is white underpants. Since there were only two things in the drawer the white underpants confirmed the hypothesis that all the socks in the drawer were black since the underwear are not socks.

The problem arises if we find a large drawer with 10,000 things in it: 9,998 pairs of white underwear, one pair of black socks, and one pair of blue socks. In one hypothetical universe a person pulls out the black socks first whereas in the other universe the person pulls out the blue socks first. As time goes on and he continuously pulls out white underwear then (if induction is true) then he should grow more and more confident with each pair of white underwear that his theory is correct. Every item pulled out that does not falsify his original claim will be taken as evidence that he is correct.

 

[Atheos canadensis]

Science is based on a logical fallacy. This has been known since David Hume posed what is now known as the Problem of Induction back in the 19th century. David Hume's solution was to abandon logic.

Karl Popper's solution was to embrace logic and switch to falsificationism.

Your solution is to rely on Bayesian statistics. You claim that finding a supposed confirmation for your theory increases the chance of its correctness. However, I doubt that you earnestly practice such a policy. I believe it is nothing more than a rationalization.

Your profile marks you as an atheist. However, if you really believed that Bayesian statistics could lead you to truth then you could not be an atheist. First you would be exposed to the idea that a Supreme Being existed. Using the Principle of Insufficient Reason you should conclude as a starting point that the chance of God existing is 50-50. Since God is not a testable hypothesis, however, no amount of experimentation would ever lead you to increase or decrease the chance. You should be forever stuck at 50 percent chance.

Second, history shows us that using statistics to ensure the accuracy of scientific belief doesn't work. As you can see at PLOS Medicine: Why Most Published Research Findings Are False , it can be proved that most published research findings are false. There are many reasons why, but part of the problem is the reliance on statistics as a standard for whether a real relation has been found. A second problem is that journals are not interested in publishing experiments in which nothing is found. It is far more interesting to publish a bad finding, for example, that green jellybeans cause cancer than to publish the good results that all other colors of jellybeans were duly tested and none were found to cause cancer. As such, "Claimed Research Findings May Often Be Simply Accurate Measures of the Prevailing Bias."

Additionally, as shown as http://www.strevens.org/research/simplexuality/Bayes.pdf we can see that Bayesian statistics is a way to measure the subjective probability of something. The article goes on to say that consensus opinion is that there is no convincing argument for accepting Bayesian conditionalization. If you have a convincing argument, I would very much like to hear it.

The article continues "...even when the likelihoods are fixed mechanically, the theorem of total probability may not apply if the rival hypotheses are either not mutually exclusive or not exhaustive. Lack of exhaustiveness is the more pressing worry, as it would seem to be the norm..." Accordingly we can see that under most circumstances, the theorem of total probability does not apply.

The article goes on to point out that none of the Bayesian confirmations work unless you presuppose the uniformity of nature -- something that we have no reason to assume. It also points out: "It is fine for scientists to disagree, at least for a time, on the plausibility of various hypotheses, but it is not at all fine that they disagree on the impact of the evidence on the hypotheses -- agreement on the import of the evidence being the sine qua non of science. In Bayesian terms, scientists may disagree on the priors for the rival hypotheses, but they had better not disagree on the Bayesian multipliers. But this is, for a Bayesian, impossible: the priors help to determine the multipliers. The usual conclusion is that there is no acceptable Bayesian theory of confirmation."

These are just a few of the problems facing the argument that you have made in support of the idea that evidence can support a probabilistic calculation of the viability of the theory in question.

Parsimony and probability is the way you function every single day. It's how you consciously make decisions and how your brain makes interpretations about the world. I agree that probability does not provide a "theory of confirmation". But it does give us a shot at getting the real answer. It's also strange, as has been pointed out before, that you cite scientific studies while simultaneously denying their efficacy. I'm not claiming that probabilistic reasoning produces certainty or even that it is completely reliable (our brains often get fooled when making probabilistic judgments). But it is certainly sufficient to delineate between creationist and evolution arguments. You have posted sources that indicate that such reasoning should not be considered infallible or absolute in its conclusions; I have claimed neither of these things.

Your personal doubt as to whether I truly apply probabilistic reasoning is irrelevant.

 

[Zosimus]

Actually I think you have the syllogism wrong.

If primates share common ERVs
Then common descent
Primates share common ERVs
Therefore common descent.

Common descent is more of a conclusion from the evidence than anything else so the evidence would be the initial premise.

Also
If nested hierarchy
Then common descent
nested hierarchy
Therefore common descent.

The idea of the nested hierarchy was around far longer than the idea of common descent.

Dizredux

Are you arguing that nested hierarchies cause common descent?
Or are you claiming that common descent causes nested hierarchies?

If I could create a nested hierarchy in animals (through, let's say genetic manipulation) would that result in the animals sharing a common ancestor?

 

[Atheos canadensis]

First of all, this is not "my raven analogy" this is Hempel's Ravens Paradox and I can take no credit for it.

To simply the argument, let's imagine that you have a drawer that has two things in it. You draw out the first thing and you see that it is a pair of black socks. You hypothesize that all socks in the drawer are black. You draw out the second thing and see that it is white underpants. Since there were only two things in the drawer the white underpants confirmed the hypothesis that all the socks in the drawer were black since the underwear are not socks.

The problem arises if we find a large drawer with 10,000 things in it: 9,998 pairs of white underwear, one pair of black socks, and one pair of blue socks. In one hypothetical universe a person pulls out the black socks first whereas in the other universe the person pulls out the blue socks first. As time goes on and he continuously pulls out white underwear then (if induction is true) then he should grow more and more confident with each pair of white underwear that his theory is correct. Every item pulled out that does not falsify his original claim will be taken as evidence that he is correct.

This doesn't address the point I made; this analogy is not actually analogous. We're not finding one data point that supports evolution and declaring that evolution must have happened, which is what we would have to be doing for the analogy to be pertinent, we are finding many independent data points that support evolution.