{"id":282,"date":"2007-09-18T07:15:39","date_gmt":"2007-09-18T11:15:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=282"},"modified":"2008-08-05T19:25:10","modified_gmt":"2008-08-05T23:25:10","slug":"waiting-for-the-evidence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=282","title":{"rendered":"Waiting for the evidence"},"content":{"rendered":"

Daniel Jarvis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 second installment<\/a> in his series of articles about evolution and intelligent design is just as disappointing as his first<\/a>. What sticks most in my mind is that he entitles this series \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Consider the evidence\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and yet he hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t presented any evidence. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an odd incongruity to say the least.<\/p>\n

This article can be summed up as a long whine about the very nature of science. He doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t like how science sticks to the natural, observable world and leaves out anything supernatural. He says, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153As long as evolutionists are able to control the definition of science to keep its curiosity tightly reigned in by the boundaries of materialistic naturalism, they win the debate every time.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Yeah? And your point is?<\/p>\n

Jarvis, science has to be defined as materialistic, not because some cabal of scientists hate religion, but because it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what works. It really is as simple as that. Science is about measuring and experimenting and observing. And, contrary to Jarvis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 demeaning of the scientific method, curiosity is a driving force. Tell me how to measure God, Jarvis. Provide some special creation evidence. Do a supernatural experiment. Figure any of that out and you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be one very famous man.<\/p>\n

Jarvis likes to talk about scientists not being able to observe or experiment on past events. An often-used analogy to combat this silly argument is that of a crime scene. The detectives were not there to see the crime. In crimes where there are no witnesses to interview, the detectives need to examine the evidence and relate it all to what they know about the natural world. Trained investigators know about the physics of fires and bullets and blood splatter and all sorts of such things that could be related to the crime at hand. They never consider whether Bigfoot stopped by. They never consider angels pushing people out of the way or devils roasting people in midair. To bring in the supernatural would stop each and every investigation cold in its tracks.<\/p>\n

The same could be said for investigating evolution<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Evidence isn’t limited to seeing something happen before your eyes. Evolution makes predictions about what we would expect to see in the fossil record, comparative anatomy, genetic sequences, geographical distribution of species, etc., and these predictions have been verified many times over. The number of observations supporting evolution is overwhelming.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Jarvis makes the very common mistake of bringing in all sorts of extra claims to bolster his attack on evolution. The Big Bang? Honestly, Jarvis, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think evolutionary scientists spend much time in that area of science. Flailing around like this is a big clue that the writer hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t a clue what he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s talking about.<\/p>\n

The bottom line: Jarvis is wrong in supposing science is faith-based. And to use the supernatural to explain what is going on in our world requires Jarvis to come up with a way to measure and experiment with it. Good luck with that.<\/p>\n

These articles by Jarvis are actually great examples of why we need stronger science education. There are too many people out there who don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even know what science is or why the scientific method is our best tool for examining the world around us.<\/p>\n

I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m looking forward to some actual evidence in this series that asks us to consider the evidence …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Daniel Jarvis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 second installment in his series of articles about evolution and intelligent design is just as disappointing as his first. What sticks most in my mind is that he entitles this series \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Consider the evidence\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and yet he hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-4y","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":275,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=275","url_meta":{"origin":282,"position":0},"title":"Fact or fiction?","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"September 6, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Daniel W. Jarvis writes a regular column for a Marco Island community newspaper. I stumbled across his most recent piece, which announces that he will be poking evolution with a stick in his next few columns and promoting intelligent design. This first column doesn't present much hope for the series\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Analysis\/Commentary"","block_context":{"text":"Analysis\/Commentary","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":390,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=390","url_meta":{"origin":282,"position":1},"title":"The slow burn memo","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"January 16, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"A previous post announced that Mr. Gibbs would be releasing an updated version of a legal memo cautioning the state board of education against getting too cozy with evolution in the new draft of the state science standards. 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Last year, Bishop Thomas Wenski of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "\"ID Creationism\" bills '09"","block_context":{"text":"\"ID Creationism\" bills '09","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=27"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1000,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1000","url_meta":{"origin":282,"position":4},"title":"Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Greatest Menace VII: Causing the Nation to Fall!","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"April 14, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"(This is the seventh part in the Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Greatest Menace series. For an introduction to the series, go here.) \u00c2\u00a0Non-scientific theories The April 22, 1980 meeting of the Hillsborough County school board was a marathon one. The meetings the previous December paled in comparison to the flood of people wanting\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1000#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":167,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=167","url_meta":{"origin":282,"position":5},"title":"Interview with Wesley Elsberry","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"February 25, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"I had written a college paper on the subject of introducing intelligent design into the public school classroom. For that paper I had to do some primary research, which involved either an interview with a subject expert or a survey. I opted for an interview and I chose Wesley Elsberry\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Analysis\/Commentary"","block_context":{"text":"Analysis\/Commentary","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}