by unstopableravens 273 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
to be honest, i haven't read any of dawkins books (even though i'm an atheist and i'm a big fan of his youtube vids and i'd recommend his books to anyone anyway). he usually talks about overwhelming evidence. one eye witness account doesn't count. neither do 10. but for the holocaust, there's hundereds of thousands who witnessed it and told the same story, this is overwhelming evidence.
as for the gospel "eye witness accounts" - we can't even be sure who wrote those gospels.
i just dont think its an honest way to start the book. hes trying to say evolution is fact not theory,for that to be the case and really the first chapter is the foundation, its has to be accurate and if something is open to change and it can change its a theory,for example i can say this last superbowl the ravens won,if i say next year the ravens will when because of x y and z its a theory not fact.
as said, i haven't read the book (mea maxima culpa), but what i think he is trying to establish is that in the scientifical sense, a "theory" is not just some unfounded idea, but pretty much the same thing as a fact, just the theoretical part of it. in common language, we often use "theory" in the same way sience uses the term "hypothesis". it's probable one of the most used "arguments" you hear about evolution, "it's JUST a theory". in science you won't get anything better than a theory EVER. in this context, theory = fact.
Hello unstop. It sounds as if you may have missed the whole point that Dawkins makes about the term "theory". He explains this at some length in order to clear up any misunderstanding from the start.
As J.Hoffer has said, a theory is the very highest possible status of any scientific discovery.
There are two quite distinct definitions of the word “theory”. When referring to evolution scientists mean something very different from its common meaning of a “mere hypothesis, speculation or conjecture”. A scientific “theory” is a system of statements held as an explanation of a group of facts or phenomena. It is a hypothesis that has been confirmed by observation or experiment.
The heliocentric Theory of the solar system is an example of this meaning of “theory”. The earth and other planets orbit the sun; this is a theory. Evolution is likewise a theory in this sense. It too has been confirmed by observation and experiment and it accounts for a massive group of facts.
It is necessary to acknowledge the pedants who claim that scientific theories, unlike mathematical theorems can never really be proved. The best scientists can do is to fail to disprove things. Pythagoras’ theorem can be proved; the claim that the sun is bigger than the earth cannot, but any reasonable person would accept the evidence and credit it with the status of fact. Evolution is a fact in the same sense that it is a fact that Paris is in the Northern hemisphere.
The two senses of “theory” can be illustrated by the mathematical terms “conjecture” and “theorem”. For example the Goldbach conjecture (any even integer can be expressed as a sum of two primes) has been demonstrated to be true for all numbers up to 300 thousand million, million, million but has never been proven mathematically and therefore is denied the status of theorem. But does anybody doubt it is a fact? Dawkins proposes “borrowing” the term theorem (but spelled theorum) for scientific “theories” such as photosynthesis, the earth is not flat, and evolution by natural selection.
“As Bertrand Russell said “We may have come into existence five minutes ago, provided with ready-made memories, with holes in our socks and hair that needs cutting”. Given the evidence now available, for evolution to be anything other than a fact would require a similar confidence trick by the creator, something that few theists would wish to credit.”
To deny the fact of evolution requires a very similar level of ignorance as it takes to deny the Holocaust. The rest of his book lays out some of the evidence that his readers may be ignorant of.
In this chapter of the book he explaining what a scientific theory is.
His statement "The evidence for evolution is at least as strong as the evidence for the Holocaust, even allowing for eye witnesses to the Holocaust" is stating very succintly that there is so much evidence for evolution that to deny it is folly, in the same way that to deny the holocuast is. He is setting the reader up for all the strands of evidence that he later explores in the book.
His statements are extremely accurate since there is indeed as much evidence for evolution as there is of the Ravens winning the superbowl!
Throughout the ancient era in the middle east, there were many gods self imagined and accordingly worshiped, entwined within
those beliefs of these gods, stories were told by the select worshipers to create an identity and relevance toward those gods.
This is also what the ancient Hebrews did toward their god YHWH, you could even say there was a competition of whose god was the
greatest and most powerful among these distinct civilizations.
What makes the Hebrew civilization stand out a little bit more is that these people scribed
their stories as they were told as a means to create a sacred text (word of God). Other civilizations eventually followed in this same manner such as the
writing of the Quran, the word of Allah toward the chosen prophet Mohammad.
The point is these ancient scribes were under an initiative to create as much relevance toward their god of choice and in doing so they created
their own relevance within their own set social societies.
So when someone says that certain sacred writings were actual eye witness accounts, one should take this information into account.
so cofty and company: would you say yes or no, is the information in this book subject to change?
The theory of evolution is a fact. Some of the detailed mechanisms by which it occured are still to be unravelled. The great thing about science is it is always open to re-evaluating the evidence in order to refine the answer.
Are you not glad that we never stopped refining Bairds Television or Bell's telephone?
cant leave the tv or phone is not fact or theory, a fact can not change a theory can, so the info that dawkins presents can it change,if you say yes than your doing what the wt does "present truth" . think about it bro
Details in our understanding of the physics behind phones are subject to change, yes. That phones exist is not.
details in the holocaust are subject to change, that holocaust happened is not.
deatils of evolution is subject to change, the fact of evolution is not.
is that more clear?
