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Normal, operational science is studying and learing about observable and repeatable processes in the present. This is why we understand our environment, gravity, flight, space travel, computers, technology, etc. etc.
But evolution is speculation/conjecture/hypothesis based upon the unobservable and unrepeatable past. Evolution is not observable or repeatable and is the starting point or presupposition of many scientists who use evolutionary theory to draw conclusions of fossils and other evidences based upon evolution's presupposition that everything arose from nothing at random under naturalistic laws and discounts devine creation a priori.
Creationists don’t pretend that any knowledge, science included, can be pursued without presuppositions (ex: prior religious or philosophical beliefs). Creationists affirm that creation cannot ultimately be separated from the Bible any more than evolution can ultimately be separated from its naturalistic starting point.
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I think what is had here is a misunderstanding of the fundamentals of scientific inquiry. Such inquiry is not limited to only direct observation in present time. Such is only one aspect of the process of inquiry. Let’s look at observation. The laymanistic concept of observation is to watch – to active “see” something occur as an active observer with one’s own eyes. Such is based on the idealistic version of scientific methodology in simplified terms everyone is introduced to as a child and continually given throughout their public education. However, it is not that simplistic.
Observation itself in the context of science is not limited to seeing the “here and now”. Were it to be limited by this, our knowledge would be severely limited.
Observation can be divided into two basic categories – direct and indirect. Direct observation would encompass the “here and now” idea. An example would be a primatologist such as Jane Goodall observing her chimps in their day to day activities. Another would be a chemist observing the reaction of two chemical interacting.
Much of what is observed in science is not a “here and now” observation of a process. Plate tectonics has been mentioned. We cannot actively sit and watch the continental plates move and shift – they move too slowly, centimeters per year. Our observations from many other aspects of the process are culled together to provide us with the information on this process. Such is the same for evolution. We have indirect observation of a larger process.
Also, let it not be misunderstood that evolution happened only “in the past”. It is a continual process which continues on even now. Allele frequencies can be observed in populations rising to prominence over time such as a study done over a 30 year period of the Galapagos finches by Peter and Rosemary Grant (Grant and Grant, 2005). It would be ridiculous for someone to sit and watch for 30 years a population of finches – it wouldn’t seem as thought anything had taken place either due to our perceptual abilities therefore we develop methods to “show” us this taking place. Physicists developed the double slit experiment to examine the particle/wave duality of photons.
Geologists cannot sit and watch most of the processes they study take place – they occur over “geological time” in most instances and is far beyond the lifetime of a human being. Science is an inductive process for the most part. Parts are taken to give us a picture of the whole – hence the often used “puzzle” analogy.
Now, are observations made in evolutionary research? Of course they are – both direct and indirect. Direct observations can come in the form of experimental observations made in, say, genetic testing and comparison. The Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium did this in 2005 when they did a comparison of the human and chimp genomes and provided a divergence of ~1.23% between the two on a base by base comparison of the over 3 billion bases. This verified earlier studies which concluded nearly exact figures independently (Chen and Li, 2001; Ebersberger, Metzler, Schwarz and Paabo, 2002). Here we also have examples of independent verification through experimentation and observation.
Many people will not deny that “micro”evolution occurs. Which is simply evolution below the species level (Mayr, 2001). For some strange reason it is not considered “evolution”. However by the very definition of evolution:
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…the descent of modern organisms with modification from preexisting life-forms; strictly speaking, any change in the proportions of different genotypes in a population from one generation to the next (Audesirk, Audesirk and Byers, pp. G-9)
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Microevolution is evolution. It is a part of the whole, not some independent process. It is governed by the driving force of natural selection within a population. One of the most often cited examples is that of bacterial resistance to anti-biotics. This why a physician will tell you to take the anti-biotics until they are all gone and not to stop when you feel better. Any one that hasn’t heeded that advice may tell you that the illness can return and is harder to battle than before.
This assertion is usually followed by the denunciation of “macro”evolution. Which many will call “evolution” even though it is only one aspect of the whole. Macro is simply evolution above the species level. The separating event is the speciation event. That is the so-called dividing line between the two. Many will clain that speciation has never been observed. However this is from the ignorance of the term “observation” within science as well as the concept of speciation and of a species itself. Most will ask quite laughably for one organism to “give birth to” another organism such as asking to see a “monkey” give birth to a human. Which is quite ridiculous and the theory makes no such assertion. One example of observation of a speciation event happened in the lab of Theodosius Dobzhansky in an experimental population of
Drosophila (Dobzhansky and Pavlovsky, 1971). With the progress made in genetic analysis, evidence for speciation events can be and has been shown time and time again – even in our own lineage as I mentioned earlier. All this is supported by evidence found in other disciplines as well. Which support, predictions made by the theory – another aspect of science – prediction.
With evolution we also have a multi-disciplinary convergence of data to give us a “view” of the whole process. We have geological data, genetic data, biochemical data, ecological data, anatomical data, atomic data et cetera which all utilized to evaluate many aspects of the whole. And like science itself, the knowledge is built successively upon prior substantiated knowledge. These lines of evidence converge from many disciplines.
Now conceptual and conjectural would imply that there is no substantiation of these ideas by empirical means. No, data from experimentation and so forth to support these propositions – this view of evolution is simply incorrect.
Repeatability has been shown in many aspects of inquiry – one which I gave in the chimp/human genome comparison example. Were we not to find consistent results in inquiry – this would destroy the repeatability. That is to say as an example – were we to find continuously different divergence rates for related organisms – study one give 10% while study two give 30% and study 3 give 1% (assuming they were all looking at the same thing and utilizing the same methodology) then there would be a problem that would need to be examined. However, this is not what is seen. Relative and absolute dating methodologies show similarities in their estimates, genetic analyses show similar conclusions (such I showed earlier), timeframes agree with ecological changes such as the rise of habitual bipedalism and the change in climate and the transformation from a jungle to a savannah…on and on.
Can these aspects be falsified? Sure. We don’t find any Devonian mammals in the fossil record for instance. Were we to continually see mammal specimens predating what is known as the terrestrial transition – there would be a problem, obviously. However, we do not see this. People have attempted to manufacture falsifying examples such as the Paluxy man-tracks. Another example would be finding some true chimeric creatures as many evolution opponents often request to be presented with such as a “dog-duck” or something equally ridiculous. Another would be to have an organism give birth to an organism of another species, again as many evolution opponents claim evolution predicts should happen – a woman giving birth to a chimpanzee would definitely be a falsification of not only aspects of evolutionary theory but much of what we know about biology in reproduction, genetics, medicine et al.
One last thing is that evolution does not explain nor propose that “everything arose from nothing at random under naturalistic laws”. It makes no claims into the origin of life itself at all. It also does not assert that everything arose de novo from “nothing” – it is creationists that make this claim – the claim that God created life
ex nihilo and then fashioned man from clay and woman from a rib (it is surprising the amount of people that believe men and women have a different number of ribs because of this story).
Evolution has processes which are at work within it that are random and non-random – it is not some giant chaotic game of complete chance that some people would like to characterize it as. It also does not explain how planets form or the origin of the universe either. Contending that evolutionary theory does explain these items is completely incorrect and places skepticism on the accuracy or even existence of that individual's knowledge of the theory in the first place.
References:
Grant, P. and Grant, R. (2005). Evolution of Character Displacement in Darwin's Finches.
Science, 313, 224-226.
Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium (2005). Initial sequence of the chimpanzee genome and comparison with the human genome.
Nature, 437, 69-87.
Chen, F. and Li, W. (2001). Genomic Divergences between Humans and Other Hominoids and the Effective Population Size of the Common Ancestor of Humans and Chimpanzees.
American Journal of Human Genetics, 68, 444-456.
Ebersberger, I., Schwarz, C., Metzler, D. and Pääbo, S. (2002) Genome wide DNA sequence comparison between humans and chimpanzees.
American Journal of Human Genetics, 70, 1490-1497.
Audesirk, T., Audesirk, G., & Byers, B. (2002).
Biology: Life on earth. (6th ed.). Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall.
Dobzhansky, T. and O. Pavlovsky. 1971. Experimentally created incipient species of Drosophila.
Nature. 230, 289-292.
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LOL) I'm strong enough in my beliefs to read that and see what they have to say on the subject.
