Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site dciem.UUCP Path: utzoo!dciem!mmt From: mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) Newsgroups: net.misc Subject: Re: More on Creationism Message-ID: <688@dciem.UUCP> Date: Wed, 8-Feb-84 18:20:37 EST Article-I.D.: dciem.688 Posted: Wed Feb 8 18:20:37 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 9-Feb-84 19:52:13 EST References: <1636@cbscc.UUCP> Organization: D.C.I.E.M., Toronto, Canada Lines: 35 =============== conversation that I had with him. But here I am tempted to believe that his view of creationism is largley a product of anti-creationist writing and not of an objective reading of both creationist and anti-creationist. Paul Dubuc =============== Are we then to assume that reading non-creationist literature is a bad thing? Or that all creationists came up with the same ideas from their own objective consideration of the evidence (not the scientific literature)? How on earth are we supposed to understand even a tiny fraction of what science has discovered, without reading about it? We can't replicate all the experiments ourselves, and according to Larry Bickford, we can't even in principle replicate the experiments that might lend some credibility to the creationist view. I agree with Dubuc that this "debate" is getting boring, but it is also frustrating to see people misconstruing science so badly as the creationists do. If science isn't enquiry into things that seem odd, then what is it? They seem to think science is a recitation of facts, and since they have the facts (from their Good Book), they also should be considered to be scientists. Scientists have been known to consider data pointed out by creationists as difficult to explain by current theories. Usually, as with ESP data, they turn out to be naively misinterpreted, fraudulent, or otherwise untrustworthy. But there always may be some nugget on which a revolution in scientific understanding may turn. That revolution will not come about by accepting the assertion that there is nothing to explain, because it was God's work. -- Martin Taylor {allegra,linus,ihnp4,uw-beaver,floyd,ubc-vision}!utzoo!dciem!mmt