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Origins of....Species (Life Sciences)
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jon_g_bray



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This is better than another reader who claimed that he read the first thirty pages non-stop standing up but then put it down and never read another word!


This is my second reading actually - the first was a couple of years ago. That post was before I reread the bit where you specifically use the lack of nonextinct ancestors as a model for languages.

Incidentally, the reason for this which I was always given was that, for any two species in a given niche, the one which is most ideally suited for that niche will outcompete and eventually usurp the other - which is why there is no ancestor cat.

No, this 'falsifiable' business is a red herring. Mounds of theories aren't falsifiable. It is just something modish people say. Can anyone come up with a theory that was actually found to be falsifiable?


The flat-earth theory was suspected to be false for some time but was eventually proven so by circumnavigation, and the resultant spherical earth theory was later disproven by empirical measurement after a theory suggesting its incorrectness was suggested by Newton. Newton's theory of gravity was later superceded by General Relativity which, in its original form at least, was shown to be incorrect by measurement of Red Shift.

By the common scientific definition if it ain't falsifiable it ain't a proper theory.

Most of us here believe in some-kind-of-evolution because the fossil evidence says that species change over time but it is natural selection that is the problem. Everybody (including you it seems) have been so brainwashed by Darwinism that they assume evolution equals natural selection. We say (or at any rate, I say) that natural selection is actually a rather poor mechanism for prompting species-change. I am a neo-Larmarkian. [sic]


Guilty as charged - although as you say, Darwinism might turn out to be correct. Natural selection is indeed a very slow, haphazard method of promoting species change; however evidence to support genetic Lamarkism in multicellular organisms unable to use tools seems rather sparse. To quote Tim Minchin (quite possibly after someone else) "if you open your mind too far, your brain will fall out".

That is the way they always proceed. If it works, it's a triumph for the system, if it doesn't work, (altogether now!) more research is needed.


Strange then that so few people seem to think that the world is flat these days.
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Grant



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By the common scientific definition if it ain't falsifiable it ain't a proper theory.


There's nothing scientific about Karl Popper's theory of falsifiability. It's just philosophy.

It's interesting that Popper himself said that Darwinism was not a theory because it was unfalsifiable. He said it was a metaphysical scientific research programme. I believe he got much criticism for this.

Strange then that so few people seem to think that the world is flat these days
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And they never bloody did. We've known that the Earth was round for two thousand years!
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jon_g_bray



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And they never bloody did. We've known that the Earth was round for two thousand years!

I read something similar myself. Just because the Greeks had worked it out though doesn't mean to say that at one point the flat earth theory predominated. One thing that gave the Greeks a clue was the fact that ships disappeared over the horizon bottom first, and to see that phenomenon you have to have boats (possibly boats that can sail out of sight of land, although I guess conceivably you could get the effect if the boat sailed far enough a long the shore and you were standing on a peninsula rather than in port).

There's nothing scientific about Karl Popper's theory of falsifiability. It's just philosophy.

Fair enough. I've checked a few definitions of scientific theory and not all of them have falsifiability as a requirement.
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Grant



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Fair enough. I've checked a few definitions of scientific theory and not all of them have falsifiability as a requirement.


There is no scientific definition of what a theory is because science is not philosophy. If you want you can study this for the rest of your life and collect thousands of volumes on the subject. On your death bed you will be no wiser than when you started. You will have been doing philosophy not science.

The question is "is Darwinism a true theory." And we don't care what "theory" means or what "true" means or even "is." It clearly isn't true for the reason Mick gave in THOBR.
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Mick Harper
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Of course a theory is shown to be 'false' when it is superceded by something better but people (ie scientists, academics etc) seem to think that the change comes about because the previous theory was subject to the falsifiability test. This is rarely so, possibly never so. Somebody just steams in with something better and everyone runs round saying, "Cor blimey, why we did we ever believe the previous version." Once a theory is blown everybody and his dog can show its in-built flaws.

Modern academia has however gone one better (according to AE) by adopting theories that are by their nature unfalsifiable, a principle first demonstrated in Ptolomey's epicycles (just add another one whenever an aberrant reading comes in). Evolution just opens a new box. Geology just stretches an 'aeon' (or splits it in half). And all this before 'more research is needed'.

Always remember, Mercury was 'falsifying' Newtonian physics for two hundred years and even then the theory was overthrown by a completely different route. Left to themselves astrophysicists would still be saying, "Goddamn, that observational error is still there despite our observational methods being increased a thousandfold in accuracy. Let's wait until it's a million-fold."
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jon_g_bray



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Of course a theory is shown to be 'false' when it is superceded by something better but people (ie scientists, academics etc) seem to think that the change comes about because the previous theory was subject to the falsifiability test. This is rarely so, possibly never so.


I would agree that this is so, but suspect that most scientists would agree with it too. A theory will not be abandoned while it is still the best theory available, even if it starts to show holes. It is probably wise not to do so, as the old theory may simply require refinement rather than replacement.

I read somewhere (can't remember whether it was your book, A Short History of Nearly Everything or elsewhere but apparently (and largely irrelevantly) one could use the epicycles theory to send a probe to Mars.
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Mick Harper
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I discovered from the Ricky Gervais Show that blind chameleons change colour with their surroundings. How is this possible?
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Ishmael


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Mick Harper wrote:
I discovered from the Ricky Gervais Show that blind chameleons change colour with their surroundings. How is this possible?


Sight is an interpretation of radiation. The skin of the chameleon itself must be sensitive to radiation.
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Mick Harper
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Yes, but this would represent a whole new branch of biology!
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Hatty
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Rupert Sheldrake might have some insights.
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Mick Harper
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Browsing amongst the google entries for blind chameleons I get the strong impression of 'careful ignoral'. There's plenty of amateur chat (and some perfectly reasonable explanations that don't change anything eg light sensitive pineal glands) but little in the way of proper experimental 'zoology'.

This is unlikely to be because of lack of professional interest in either chameleons or the phenomenon itself so may be (assuming it is not just down to my limitations as a researcher) because some paradigm or other is unconsciously in jeopardy.
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jon_g_bray



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Mick Harper wrote:
I discovered from the Ricky Gervais Show that blind chameleons change colour with their surroundings. How is this possible?


I heard from a vet with a particular interest in reptiles (who also breeds chameleons) that the camouflage thing is crap, and its actually just due to emotional mood.
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Mick Harper
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This is certainly untrue (though true of some chameleons). Relying on a vet! Huh! At least Ricky Gervais is a zoologist.
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Chad


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My father had a pet chameleon when he was in the navy... but it fell into a bucket of water and drowned.

However, before it took its last gasp, it turned translucent... At least that's what my dad told me.
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Mick Harper
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Chameleons change colour for all kinds of 'natural' reasons ie to cope with heat in the desert, to attract mates, to show aggression etc etc. All this is a) comparable to stuff other animals do eg birds and b) controllable by hormones or other internal mechanisms requiring no input from the chameleon.

A few species have extended this ability to be able to blend into the background for camouflage purposes. This cannot be done spontaneously by hormones but requires the eyes to 'report' the matter to the hormones. Or so it would seem. If blind chameleons can do it then the eyes are not doing the reporting so there must be another mechanism.
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