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Author Topic:   "Creation Science" experiments.
Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 5 of 396 (578481)
09-01-2010 8:21 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by hooah212002
09-01-2010 8:59 AM


To be fair to creationists, even if creationism had any merit then surely the proof would have to lie principally in observation rather than experiment.
They'd be pointing to the fact that radiometric dating showed that the Earth was 6000 years old, and to the well-marked flood layer found on all continents dated to around 2500 BC, and to the fact that the biogeographical distribution of species was consistent with dispersal from the mountains of Ararat, and to the genetic analysis showing that every land species went through a population bottleneck around 2500 BC, and to the fact that the most distant visible stars were no more than six thousand light-years away ... and so on.
And then if you had any lingering doubts they could take you to the Zoo and show you the talking snakes.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by hooah212002, posted 09-01-2010 8:59 AM hooah212002 has replied

Replies to this message:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 47 of 396 (580593)
09-10-2010 7:56 AM
Reply to: Message 31 by slevesque
09-04-2010 6:09 PM


Re: What's a creation experiment exactly?
However, here's how I understand it. It's not about using a different, ''creationist'', scientific method, as you are saying. It is more about a different set of assumptions behind what could be called ''secular science'' and ''creation science''.
For example: secular science assumes naturalism, that only nature exists (matter and energy, to put it simply without going too deep into the physics of it).. This assumption leads to another corrollary; God has never intervened into nature in the past.
''creation science'' will assume something different, God exists and has in fact acted in the creation of this universe. (through different ways, depending if you're christian or something else).
But none of this is really true.
On the one hand, lots of what you would call "secular scientists" and what I would call scientists manage to believe in God and miracles and still do science perfectly well.
Creationists, on the other hand, do not merely think that God exists, they believe that he has done certain specific things, and will advance any hypothesis, no matter how unevidenced, that will protect that belief.
This is why there is no general creationist method for doing science. If there was it would look like this:
Scientist : The boiling point of water at sea level is 100C.
Creationist : God says that it is 80C, so you are wrong.
Scientist : But I did the experiment. Here's the data.
Creationist : God says that it is 80C, so you are lying about the data. You evil atheist liar.
Scientist : Come and look. Look here. Boiling water. Thermometer. See?
Creationist : Clearly the devil or God or some form of magic pixie is tampering with your thermometer.
Scientist : But look, I can calibrate it against objects of known temperature, so I know it works.
Creationist : Well, that rests on your materialist atheistic assumption that calibration works and that God never does miracles to confute your secular materialistic calibration.
Scientist : I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended into hell. On the third day he rose again. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
Creationist : ATHEIST! ATHEIST! ATHEIST! I don't have to listen to what you say about the measurements you've made because you assume naturalism! This is secular science! You have the wrong assumptions!
---
The only reason that this particular scenario has never played out is that creationists are only obliged to be wrong about some things, not everything.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 31 by slevesque, posted 09-04-2010 6:09 PM slevesque has replied

Replies to this message:
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 Message 61 by slevesque, posted 09-10-2010 4:59 PM Dr Adequate has replied

Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(2)
Message 70 of 396 (580711)
09-10-2010 8:00 PM
Reply to: Message 61 by slevesque
09-10-2010 4:59 PM


Re: What's a creation experiment exactly?
Particularly, you make it seem as though because they reject one particular scientific theory, they therefore reject science in it's entirety. (fallacy of composition)
No: I explicitly said that they're not required to be wrong about everything. This is why the creationist method is not required when it comes to the boiling point of water.
Not only that, but your are conflating historical science and operational science.
They're both science, they both work exactly the same way, and it's equally silly to apply the creationist method to either.
Besides which, creationists always are wrong about the here-and-now when it bears any relevance to the there-and-then. From the distance of stars to the existence of beneficial mutations to the density of cosmic dust to the existence of intermediate forms to the genetics of bullfrogs to the strong nuclear force ...
(In case you're wondering, "the answer" is that Jesus is personally holding together all the atomic nuclei. The cartoon ends with the evil (and ugly) atheist professor seeing the error of his ways and leaving academia because he can no longer live a lie.)
OR maybe creationists aren't nearly as retarded as you make them out to be, and this is why such a profoundly stupid scenario was never actually witnessed.
Sadly, scenarios just that stupid are witnessed regularly.
As an example, let us turn to the much-vaunted RATE project of the Institute For Creation Research. Amongst their findings, they admit:
A large amount of nuclear decay did indeed occur in the zircons. Other evidence strongly supports much nuclear decay having occurred in the past [14, pp. 335-337]. We emphasize this point because many creationists have assumed that "old" radioisotopic ages are merely an artifact of analysis, not really indicating the occurrence of large amounts of nuclear decay. But according to the measured amount of lead physically present in the zircons, approximately 1.5 billion years worth at today’s rates of nuclear decay occurred.
This is the point at which an actual scientist would start to think that maybe the Earth wasn't all that young. But no, they have a better idea --- "highly accelerated nuclear decay". Though the details are somewhat sketchy:
These diffusion data are not precise enough to reveal details about the acceleration episodes. Were there one, two, or three? Were they during early Creation week, after the Fall, or during the Flood? Were there only 500 to 600 million years worth of acceleration during the year of the Flood, with the rest of the acceleration occurring before that?
The details of how this could have happened are not so much sketchy as non-existent.
At this point I should like to mention that the slogan of the Institute For Creation Reasearch is "Biblical. Accurate. Certain."
It has of course been pointed out to the folks at the ICR that this "accelerated decay" would have melted the Earth, boiled the seas, and killed off Noah and his maritime menagerie. As RATE member Larry Vardiman admits:
The amount of heat produced by a decay rate of a million times faster than normal during the year of the Flood could potentially vaporize the earth’s oceans, melt the crust, and obliterate the surface of the earth.
But they are equal to the challenge:
The RATE group is confident that the accelerated decay they discovered was not only caused by God, but that the necessary removal of heat was also superintended by Him as well.
"With one bound, Jack was free!"
How exactly God achieved this is unclear even to them. As they admit:
The removal of heat was so rapid that it likely involved a process other than conduction, convection, or radiation. (Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth, vol. II, p.763, my emphasis.)
In short, they have discovered the principle of Smacco's Rozar: To any hypothesis, no matter how contrary to reality, further hypotheses may be added to explain away the discrepancy. Which is just the attitude I was parodying: and I question whether the satire is actually sillier than the reality.

This message is a reply to:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(3)
Message 72 of 396 (580765)
09-11-2010 1:21 AM
Reply to: Message 59 by slevesque
09-10-2010 4:37 PM


Re: What's a creation experiment exactly?
But, and this is where assumptions come into play, you will interpret the data and evidence differently depending on what assumptions you make. You won't look at the same places, you won't look for the same things ...
You would, however, look in the same way in the same places at the same things --- you'd just be hoping to get different answers; and one's private hopes and wishes do not affect the scientific method.
After all, the same observations which would tend to confirm a theory if they turned out one way would tend to disconfirm it if they turned out another way. If I claim that water boils at 100C, and you claim it doesn't, then we should both be interested in the obvious experiment involving a beaker, a bunsen burner, and a thermometer. If you had no interest in the experiment, I should think that you were lacking in conviction.
Similar remarks might be made about evolution. When the techniques of molecular phylogeny were developed, what should have happened is that creationists should have said to themselves: "According to those silly, silly evolutionists, crocodiles should be more like birds than like lizards on the molecular level, and coelacanths should be more like dogs than like dogfish. Let us rush to our laboratory and test it, and put an end to this Darwinian nonsense once and for all."
Meanwhile scientists should have been saying: "According to us clever, clever scientists, crocodiles should be more like birds than like lizards on the molecular level, and coelacanths should be more like dogs than like dogfish. Let us rush to our laboratory and test it, and then everyone back to my place for drinks and gloating."
Of course, this is not what actually happened. Instead, scientists rushed to their laboratories, whereas creationists (I imagine) held urgent conclave in their Secret Underground Lair with but one item on the agenda --- "Can even we manage to obscure the significance of this?"
But if creationists were interested in science, they would have wanted to do the same experiments. They'd just have been hoping for a different result.
Or take paleontology. While scientists were sifting through the fossils of the Devonian looking for fishapods, the creationists could have been on their hands and knees right next to them looking for modern mammals. But they scarcely seem interested in looking for anything in the fossil record that might contradict evolution, finding it a better use of their time to sit cosily indoors on their indolent backsides writing stuff like this:
The links are missing. Nearly all the fossils are just our present animals, and the links between them are just not there. Few scientists today are still looking for fossil links between the major vertebrate or invertebrate groups. They have given up!
What this statement lacks in truth, it more than makes up for in irony.
Again, if creationists wanted to do science in this area, they'd be doing just the same things as scientists. They'd just be hoping to find something different: and this would have no effect on what they actually found. Pro-evolution and anti-evolution science should be indistinguishable, just as our experiments to find the boiling point of water should be indistinguishable. The only discernible difference would be that the evolutionists would be significantly happier in their work than the creationists, because it is more agreeable to be continually proved right than continually proved wrong. But this should not affect the way in which science is practiced.
What it does apparently affect is the willingness to practice it in the first place.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 59 by slevesque, posted 09-10-2010 4:37 PM slevesque has not replied

Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 74 of 396 (580803)
09-11-2010 11:58 AM
Reply to: Message 73 by jar
09-11-2010 11:16 AM


Re: Y to X
Another Creation Science experiment might be to develop the model for changing YX to XX.
Unfortunately the experimental apparatus would need to include:
* A deity with miraculous powers.
* Er ...
* ... that's it.

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 Message 73 by jar, posted 09-11-2010 11:16 AM jar has seen this message but not replied

Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 80 of 396 (580971)
09-12-2010 5:46 PM
Reply to: Message 78 by jar
09-12-2010 9:22 AM


Re: Making Sand
How long does it take to create sand equal to 1/100th of the original volume or mass of the rock?
That would be the control experiment. The real question is what happens if you try the same thing in the presence of Magic Water.

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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 141 of 396 (581714)
09-17-2010 6:26 AM
Reply to: Message 139 by slevesque
09-17-2010 12:07 AM


Re: Experiment
''The RATE research tried to do science, but ended up saying godidit to explain away their own data. So it's BS''
And then I'll say
''I disagree. You are misrepresenting what they said,. stupid strawman is stupid''
At which point I'll point out that I quoted what they said. At length. With extensive links and references. And that the members of the RATE project whom I quoted are real people who are not at all made out of straw.
Your move.

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 Message 139 by slevesque, posted 09-17-2010 12:07 AM slevesque has not replied

Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 142 of 396 (581723)
09-17-2010 7:47 AM
Reply to: Message 138 by slevesque
09-16-2010 11:59 PM


Re: Creation/ID "Science" and Discovery
Baumgardner's Catastrophic plate tectonics model, which he modeled in the 80's predicted that the tectonic plates subducted at great speed into the earth's mantle. In other words, with such a quick subductions so recent in the past, we should be able to detect this 'cold plates' at the base of the mantle.
This was in fact observed 10 years later, when the required technology was developped, the cold material was found as predicted. (S.P. Grand, Mantle shear structure beneath the Americas and surrounding oceans, Journal of Geophysical Research 99:11591—11621, 1994; J.E. Vidale, A snapshot of whole mantle flow, Nature 370:16—17, 1994.)
I have been unable to read the second of your citations. Nor, of course, have you --- couldn't AnswersInGenesis have quoted one single word from it?
However, the first citation seems flatly contrary to it:
The high-velocity lower mantle anomalies seem to be associated with subduction during the last 150 Ma. Comparing the location of past subduction with the location of lower mantle anomalies, the identification of lower mantle anomalies with old subducted slabs suggests slow sinking of slabs in the lower mantle (about 1 to 2 cm/yr).
Could it be that some unfortunate creationist has not understood what "high velocity anomalies" means? It does not mean that they are moving quickly, but rather that P and S waves move through them quickly.
This is in fact contrary to the uniformitarian view of plate tectonics, since at today's slow rate, the plates would simply melt inch by inch as they slowly went into the mantle.
The word "bollocks" comes to mind.
No. They wouldn't.
Let us for now leave alone the time it takes for heat to flow through 100 km of rock, and concentrate your mind on the fact that most of the lithosphere is not crust but mantle.
Do please tell us all about the "uniformitarian view" that peridotite would melt if submerged in non-molten peridotite.
Real, not-made-up "uniformitarianism" does not involve an inexplicable violation of the laws of nature. That would be more the kind of thing that you guys advocate.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 138 by slevesque, posted 09-16-2010 11:59 PM slevesque has not replied

Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 144 of 396 (581732)
09-17-2010 8:34 AM
Reply to: Message 138 by slevesque
09-16-2010 11:59 PM


Re: Creation/ID "Science" and Discovery
Thousands of donations isn't much when you consider the amount of employees they have ...
Now, think about this.
Yes, I'm sure that creationists have lots of employees whom they are not paying to do science in any way.
That doesn't really excuse them from the charge of not using their ample financial resources to do science, does it?
It kind of ... proves it ... doesn't it?

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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 164 of 396 (581831)
09-17-2010 6:29 PM
Reply to: Message 157 by Just being real
09-17-2010 3:36 PM


Re: Creation/ID "Science" and Discovery
In truth all theories start as a sort of a "myth," which makes some claims in reality and as the evidence is compiled, that myth becomes more and more believable until we no longer regard it as a myth. So creation started as a myth which made claims about the origin of the universe, the solar system, Earth, and life... So what? The question then becomes, "Is there any evidence to suggest that this myth is real?" But if you start with the attitude that no matter what the evidence seems to suggest, it has to mean something else...
... then you might be an imaginary strawman living in the mind of a creationist with a depressingly low level of self-awareness.
I understand the apprehension. I mean if you allow the evidence to point to an intelligent designer, then that means creation is true, and if creation is true that means the Bible is the word of God, and then that means we are culpable for what we do. OOOOOps!!!! We're all in a load of deep doo doo.
Golly, what a mess.
(1) As presumably you knew full well when you wrote this disingenuous nonsense, creationism is rejected by plenty of theists, and your ill-spirited attempt at amateur psychoanalysis could not of course apply to them.
Their reason for rejecting creationism is obviously because although it would provide a gratifying support for their religious beliefs, they can't manage to believe something which on honest investigation turns out to be a load of rubbish.
(2) No, the existence of an intelligent designer does not, in fact, imply that the Bible is the word of God any more than a talking rabbit would imply that Alice In Wonderland was the word of God. Your fallacy is technically known as "affirming the consequent".
(3) If the Bible is true, that means that I'm not culpable because Jesus took responsibility for my sins, and all I have to do is believe that (salvation comes from faith not works, y'know) and all my sins are automagically forgiven me and when I die I will not in fact die but rather live in a state of indescribable bliss for ever.
Oh, and I could get one of these rather snazzy T-shirts:
Why would anyone not want a belief the main tenet of which is that you get absolution of sins and eternal perfect happiness just as a consequence of believing that belief?
If you were a Muslim then there might be some excuse for your rhetoric, but it is the height of hypocrisy for you to come out with this stuff when the one really distinctive feature of your religion is the belief on the part of its devotees that they have successfully evaded having to take moral responsibility for their actions.

This message is a reply to:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 194 of 396 (582446)
09-21-2010 12:31 PM
Reply to: Message 191 by Just being real
09-21-2010 5:24 AM


Being hungry does not prove that we have bread.
---
Now, back to the topic?

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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 195 of 396 (582447)
09-21-2010 12:33 PM
Reply to: Message 193 by hooah212002
09-21-2010 9:10 AM


Re: Still off topic........
I understand you are the only creationist participant in this thread ...
What about slevesque?

This message is a reply to:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 222 of 396 (583406)
09-27-2010 12:30 AM
Reply to: Message 215 by Just being real
09-26-2010 11:37 AM


Re: Not "pseudoscience" -- it IS pseudoscience
They suggest that if several of the "world clocks" suggest a young earth and several suggest an old one, it is not being very responsible to only "cherry pick" the one's that best suits your world view.
Which is purest hypocrisy, because just what they are doing. Having got conflicting results, they propose that the results they don't like were faked up by God using a series of miracles.
Which is stepping outside the boundaries of science, because it makes all observations irrelevant. Someone who can do that can also believe that God made pigs with wings but that he also deludes everyone into not being able to see them ("God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie", 2 Thessalonians 2:11). Everything then becomes a matter of opinion -- or faith, if you will.
And of course it would be no less (or more) legitimate for a believer in an old Earth to do the same thing in reverse. Whenever a YEC claimed to have evidence for a young Earth, they could say: "Ah, well, God did that by a miracle for reasons that we mere mortals cannot understand, it has nothing to do with the natural processes by which we measure the real age of the Earth". But they do not do so, do they? Because they don't need to. Instead, they look at the question scientifically and find out where the YECs went wrong in the production of their "evidence" --- something that is not usually at all hard to do.

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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 226 of 396 (583424)
09-27-2010 4:58 AM
Reply to: Message 224 by Just being real
09-27-2010 4:07 AM


Re: A few guidelines
No you didn't. What you laid out were examples of scientific experiments. But you did not define what qualifies as science in your eyes. And this is what I seem to not be able to convey to you people. Your beginning post of this thread lays out the question like the old childhood school bully who asks, "Does your Daddy know your so dumb?" The very question postulates itself in such a way that a plain yes or no answer sets up the person to fail either way. To answer no means that the kid is admitting he is dumb but just that his daddy doesn't know it.
As bad excuses go, this absurd not-actually-an-analogy is a bad excuse for a bad excuse.
A better analogy would be this: a persistent liar who claims to have a pet unicorn is asked: "Why won't you show us your pet unicorn?". Yes, he's being "set up to fail", but only because he's a liar who doesn't own a pet unicorn. It's his own silly fault.
You are doing the same thing in your request for "creation/ID science experiments." On the one hand you are asking for the experiments, but on the other you define science in such a way as to exclude ID or creation as even being a possibility.
Quote, please?
If that is not true then you would have no problem just defining science in a way that does not exclude ID or creation.
The Scientific Method For Beginners.
If you genuinely don't know what science is, then feel free to post any questions you may have on that thread.
On this thread, perhaps you could stop making feeble excuses for not answering the question, and either start answering it or admit the real reason you can't answer it.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 224 by Just being real, posted 09-27-2010 4:07 AM Just being real has not replied

Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 227 of 396 (583427)
09-27-2010 5:02 AM
Reply to: Message 223 by Just being real
09-27-2010 4:07 AM


Re: Not so nice a subtitle
If it was as well defined as you think, then there would not be people like me claiming that creation and ID are scientific theories ...
And I guess if "flat" was as well-defined as we think, there'd be no flat-Earthers.
A disagreement as to whether X is Y need not involve ambiguity in the definition of Y. It can also be because some people are ludicrously wrong about whether X is Y.
(and yes even Richard Dawkins the atheist admits it)
Quote, please?
This is why I insist on having the person I am discussing "science" with, define exactly what they view as science.
See my previous post.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
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