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I don't believe that's a fact at all.
(For the purposes of this discussion, I assume that creationism refers to "young earth creationism" and not some old earth creationism.)
I think the vast preponderance of evidence points toward evolution. I think the vast majority of scientists consider evolution both the scientific theory with the greatest explanatory power and a collection of facts making some variation of the theory almost inescapable.
Further, I think that evolution, even if it is false, is still science. I think that creationism, even if it is true, is not.
This is not to say that I approve of the ridicule some "defenders of the faith" (Stephen Gould, e.g.) have used against creationists. (I don't recall the exact quote, but my poor memory recalls something like "If 95% of what I say against creationism is ridicule it's only because 95% of it is ridiculous.")
The very first message I ever posted on the net some twenty years ago was on this subject and I've written volumes since. I'm about argued out, but I state my undefended opinion. (Please don't infer anything about my opinions beyond what I've stated, though. I do not, for example, believe it is right or wise to foist evolution onto the children of those who do not approve of it.)
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here's a slightly more tangible example from the field of anthropology: Johanson discovers
"Lucy" and debunks the Leakey's view of the evolutionary tree; subsequently the Leakeys
debunk Johanson's methods -- wherein lies the bunk?
Dear trsuwm: I am painfully disappointed that you of all board members should use "debunk" as you did in the statement above. The Leakey's are highly regarded scientists and authorities. They may err, but they do not publish "bunk".
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In my haste to state that I disagreed with your assessment of the relative merits evolutionism and creationism, I forgot to mention that I agreed with your general premise and with your specific example with Lucy.
This kind of row is very common in scientific circles and it's pretty typical that the new guys claim they are debunking traditionalists, and that traditionalists claim the new guys' opinions are absurd.
Relativity was derided as jew physics, Copernican theory a heresy, continental drift an absurdity. It seems there's a lot of nasty behavior in legitimate science. That something is wrong does not make it unscientific, nor that it is right that it is.
OTOH, I recall reading somewhere (I don't recall the source) in which two nazi scientists were talking and agreed that even if Einstein was wrong, that he was still one of the greatest mathematicians of the century.
Further, when Einstein expressed incredulity at some conclusions from quantum mechanics, I think it was Dirac who asked Schroedinger whether perhaps Einstein just didn't understand the theory. Schroedinger's response was that he felt there were perhaps a dozen people in the world who understood it and that he was sure Einstein was one of them. (I'm not sure where I read this one either.) My point is that even when there is extreme disagreement between some scientists, they nevertheless acknowledge that their opponent is somehow on the same level as they are.
Maybe one thing that really separates one who is perceived a crackpot from one who is perceived eccentric, but possibly brilliant, is the extent to which he appears to demonstrate that he actually understands the problem space.
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The Leakey's are highly regarded scientists and authorities. They may err, but they do not publish "bunk".Johanson didn't think so! he thought (or wanted others to believe) that they were bunko artists. QED http://home.mn.rr.com/wwftd/
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ts>the fact of the matter is that there is not enough evidence one way or the other to unbunk the dialectic. ff>I don't believe that's a fact at all. I completely agree that the preponderance of evidence is on your side; but I think that my statement stands. [shrugs] http://home.mn.rr.com/wwftd/
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One can do many things to a manifest truth. One can deny it, defame it, defang it, derail it, degrade it, deride it or destabilize it. But one cannot "debunk" it. That is because the truth is not "bunk". Try as one might, whether sincerely or not, one cannot "debunk" what is not "bunk" to begin with.
One cannot deoxygenate hydrogen (as far as I know) and no effort to do so, however well intentioned, can be described as deoxygenation.
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I'm late into this thread, but I have read the posts and I now propose to debunk...???$%&#
Surely, in order to debunk something effectively rather than just getting up on your hind legs and saying "I don't think the Moon landings happened" or "I don't think the Holocaust occurred" you need evidence. In order to consider something thoroughly debunked, that evidence would need to have been absorbed and accepted by the majority of people, i.e. the majority has come around to your way of thinking through logic rather than persuasion.
You can't say that "So-and-so got up last night and debunked <choose your subject>". So-and-so might have attacked whatever it was, but it can't be considered to have been debunked at that point. Simply saying so isn't enough.
On the same basis, you couldn't debunk the idea that God exists unless you can present convincing evidence that no such being does exist. That appears to be unlikely. Debunking the opposite view - that God does exist -suffers similarly. Since theism/atheism is a matter of belief, it is incapable of being debunked. You may convince people, through rhetoric, that God doesn't exist, but you still haven't debunked the idea of God. There's no objective evidence.
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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But can you really debunk or refute a scientific theory...or just revise according to new evidence? Since the evidentiary basis of a theory is necessarily incomplete, thus preventing the theory form being recorded as fact, isn't the process of theory development one of evolutionary revision, rather than one of debunking or refutation and the re-establishment of a "new" theory.
Take the ongoing process of developing a theory on the mobility of the dinosaurs. Years ago it was generally accepted, due to the clues of a few fossil specimens used as a small keyhole of insight into millions of years of history, that dinosuars were slow, plodding, lugubrious beats. One of the heaviest known at the time, Brachiosaurus, was said to have spent 90% of his life ambling in deep lakes to buoy up his tons of weight, munching on aquatic vegetation. But in the 80's a new generation of sceintists began to uncover some fossils that led them to change the theory to a view of dinosaurs as highly mobile, agile, and capable of runing speeds never before considered. Were these scientists debunking or refuting a theory that is still onoging in it's development? Hardly, I think. Simply revising it, according to the evidentiary trail they've been following since the research on this particular aspect of the dinosaurs' life was first theorized.
And, today, after this vision of the dinosaurs' mobility gained precedent to the crescendo of the the running Tyrannosaurus Rex in Jurassic Park, there's suddenly been new evidence presented with the help of computer-technology that, yet again, reshapes the theory of the dinosaurs' mobility (at least, for now, in the case of the Tyrannosaur) into a vision of much less agility and speed capability. But the theory does not actually revert back to the original proposals. And, indeed, the fossil evidence since disovered of many smaller, birdlike predators may still adhere to the scenario of speed and agility in their respective species' case. So are these scientists debunking one another here, or just building their own stepping stones towards a greater ultimate understanding of this developing theory? Ditto anthropaleontology and the humanoid fossils. Are the Leakeys and other scientists (while we all know of the competitive posturing) really working to debunk or refute one another? Or simply working to discover new trails of evidence to add insight to the ongoing theory which ultimately leads to the answer they are all seeking?
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