Basic
Worldview:
103
Science, the Bible,
and Creation
Origins
- Section Four:
Philosophical Preference
Origins - Section One: Introduction
and the Basics
Origins - Section Two: Premature
Dismissals
Origins - Section Two: Application
of the Basics
Origins - Section Three: Creation
Origins - Section Three: Evolution,
Origin of Life
Origins - Section Three: Evolution,
Environment for Life 1
Origins - Section Three: Evolution,
Environment for Life 2
Origins - Section Three: Evolution,
Another Planet
Origins - Section Three: Evolution,
Origin of Species
Origins - Section Three: Evolution,
Speciation Factors
Origins - Section Three: Evolution,
Speciation Rates
Origins - Section Four: Time and
Age, Redshift
Origins - Section Four: Philosophical
Preference
Origins - Section Four: Cosmological
Model 1
Origins - Section Four: Cosmological
Model 2
Origins - Section Four: Dating Methods,
Perceptions, Basics
Origins - Section Four: Global Flood
Evidence
Origins - Section Four: Relative
Dating
Origins - Section Four: Dating and
Circular Reasoning
Origins - Section Four: The Geologic
Column
Origins - Section Four: Radiometric
Dating Basics
Origins - Section Four: General
Radiometric Problems
Origins - Section Four: Carbon-14
Problems
Origins - Section Four: Remaining
Methods and Decay Rates
Origins - Section Four: Radiometric
Conclusions, Other Methods
Origins - Section Five: Overall
Conclusions, Closing Editorial
Origins - Section Five: List
of Evidences Table
Origins Debate Figures and
Illustrations
Focus
on Critical Evidence:
The Central Role of Philosophical Preference
Demonstrating
that philosophical preference plays a dominant role at the
foundation of formulating evolutionary theory is not really
a difficult point to prove. It is a fact that is widely and
often admitted to.
Earlier
we looked at a quote, which began its subsection on “Modern
Cosmology” with the opening statement that “modern
cosmologists base theories on” a mixture of observations,
“concepts,” “imagination,” and “philosophy.”
“Cosmology,
III MODERN COSMOLOGY – Modern
cosmologists base their theories on astronomical observations,
physical concepts such as quantum mechanics, and
an element of imagination and philosophy.” –
"Cosmology," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 99.
© 1993-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
Similarly,
we have also already seen the quote below, which specifically
states that the Einstein-de Sitter universe, which remains
the longstanding base model for evolutionary cosmology, is
preferred due to a “philosophical bent.”
“Cosmos,
Relativistic cosmologies, Relativistic cosmologies, Einstein's
model, The Einstein–de Sitter universe – Because
the geometry of space and the
gross evolutionary properties are uniquely defined in
the Einstein–de
Sitter model, many
people with a philosophical bent have
long considered it the most fitting candidate to describe
the actual universe.” – Encyclopaedia Britannica
2004 Deluxe Edition
The
next quote, which we looked at briefly near the beginning
of this section, begins by describing how evolutionary theory
for the origin of the universe is essential as the basis for
biological evolution. Then immediately after stating that
effectively, you can’t have biological evolution without
an evolutionary view of the origin of the universe, the quote
goes on to assert that public interest in the origin of the
universe is based upon the philosophical appeal of the joint
biological and astrophysical evolutionary theory. In other
words, from start to finish the theory of evolution is publicly
accepted because the public finds it philosophically appealing.
“Cosmos
– Events hypothesized
to have occurred in the first few minutes of the creation
of the universe turn out to have had profound
influence on the birth, life, and death of galaxies, stars,
and planets. Indeed, there is
a direct, though tortuous, lineage from the forging of the
matter of the universe in a primal furnace of incredible
heat and light to the
gathering on Earth of atoms versatile enough to serve as a
chemical basis of life. The
intrinsic harmony of the resultant worldview has great philosophical
and aesthetic appeal and perhaps explains
the resurgence of public interest in this subject.”
– Encyclopaedia Britannica 2004 Deluxe Edition
Earlier,
we also saw the following quote. In particular, this quote
asserts that the gravitational mechanism, which is favored
and central in evolutionary cosmology, is accepted, despite
the fact that it doesn’t work, simply because it has
“intuitive appeal.”
“Cosmos,
Unorthodox theories of clustering and galaxy formation –
Given the somewhat unsatisfactory state of affairs
with gravitational theories for the origin of large-scale
structure in the universe, some cosmologists have abandoned
the orthodox approach altogether and have sought alternative
mechanisms…In summary, it can be seen that mechanisms
alternative to the growth of small initial fluctuations by
self-gravitation all have their own difficulties. Most astronomers hope some dramatic new observation or new idea may
yet save the gravitational instability approach, whose
strongest appeal has always been the intuitive notion that
the force that dominates the astronomical universe, gravity,
will automatically promote the growth of irregularities. But,
until a complete demonstration is provided, the lack of a
simple convincing picture of how galaxies form and cluster
will remain one of the prime failings of the otherwise spectacularly
successful hot big bang theory.” – Encyclopaedia
Britannica 2004 Deluxe Edition
The
next quote explicitly states that the idea that the cosmos
had a beginning is so philosophically distasteful due to the
inherently implied (and inherently theological) “creation
event,” that even the Big Bang model was finally accepted
only once the alternative steady-state theory became impossible
on the evidence.
“Cosmos
– The observed expansion of the universe immediately
raises the spectre that the universe
is evolving, that it
had a beginning and will have an end. The
steady state alternative, postulated by a British school
of cosmologists in 1948, is no longer considered viable by most astronomers.
Yet, the notion that
the Cosmos had a beginning, while common in many theologies,
raises deep and puzzling questions for science, for it implies
a creation event—a creation not only of all the
mass-energy that now exists in the universe but also perhaps
of space-time itself. The
issue of how the universe will end seems, at first sight,
more amenable to conventional analysis.”
– Encyclopaedia Britannica 2004 Deluxe Edition
In
contrast, the philosophical appeal of the steady-state theory
was that it asserted that the universe was eternal, and therefore
avoided the philosophically undesirable “creation event”
with all of its inherent theological implications.
“Steady-state
theory – A
steady-state universe has no beginning or end in time;
and from any point within it the view on the grand scale—i.e.,
the average density and arrangement of galaxies—is the
same.” – Encyclopaedia Britannica 2004 Deluxe
Edition
And
as the next 2 quotes below explicitly state, there was never
an observational basis that made the steady-state theory more
valid than the Big Bang and its inherent beginning, but instead,
the only reason for the steady-state theory was that “the
idea of a sudden beginning of the universe” was “philosophically
unacceptable” to cosmologists.
“Steady-State
Theory, II THE STEADY-STATE THEORY – The steady-state
theory's main advantage is that it avoids the problem of having
to describe how the universe began. The theory's
appeal is largely philosophical-there have never been particular observations that implied it was better or more valid than the big-bang theory.”
– "Steady-State Theory," Microsoft® Encarta®
Encyclopedia 99. © 1993-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights
reserved.
“Cosmology,
III MODERN COSMOLOGY – When
the big bang theory was developed in the mid-20th century,
some cosmologists found the idea of a sudden beginning of
the universe philosophically unacceptable. They
proposed the steady-state theory, which said that the universe
has always looked more-or-less the same as it does now and
that it does not change over time. The steady-state theory could not explain
the background radiation, though, and essentially all cosmologists
have abandoned it.” – "Cosmology," Microsoft®
Encarta® Encyclopedia 99. © 1993-1998 Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
This
philosophical appeal of a universe with no beginning, and
therefore no “creation event,” was so strong that
the steady-state theory continued for a long time despite
mounting evidence of the expansion of the universe, which
was understood to be proof of the Big Bang theory. At first,
the desire to avoid a beginning and a “creation event”
was so strong that in order to reconcile the preferable “eternal
universe” with the observation of expansion, some cosmologists
preferred the steady-state concept that matter was “continually
created out of nothing.”
“Cosmology,
III MODERN COSMOLOGY, B Steady-State Theory – In the 1940s British scientists Hermann Bondi, Thomas Gold, and Fred
Hoyle were philosophically opposed to the requirements
that the big bang theory put forth for the
extreme conditions in the early universe. The big bang theory
was framed in terms of what they called the cosmological principle-that
the universe is homogeneous (the same in all locations) and
isotropic (looks the same in all directions) on a large scale.
Bondi, Gold, and Hoyle
suggested an additional postulate, which they called the perfect
cosmological principle. This principle stated that the universe
is not only homogeneous and isotropic but also looks the same
at all times. Since the universe is expanding, though, one
might think that the density of the universe would decrease.
Such a decrease would be a change that would not fit with
the perfect cosmological principle. Bondi, Gold, and Hoyle thus suggested that matter could be continuously
created out of nothing to maintain the density over time.
The rate at which matter would have to be created was
much too low to be observationally testable, however. They
called this theory the steady-state theory.” –
"Cosmology," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 99.
© 1993-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
However,
as the quote below plainly states, the very reason for the
final demise of the steady-state theory was either a “conscious
or unconscious preference” to avoid numerous “creation
events,” which would have been necessary in order for
the steady-state theory to survive growing proof for expansion.
It would seem that if one creation event posed theological
implications, that the non-stop creation of more matter out
of nothing multiplied that distasteful concept literally to
an infinite degree.
“Cosmos,
Cosmological models, Steady state theory and other alternative
cosmologies – By that year, of course, the universe
was known to be expanding; therefore, the
only way to explain a constant (steady state) matter density
was to postulate the continuous creation of matter to
offset the attenuation caused by the cosmic expansion. This
aspect was physically very unappealing to many people, who
consciously or unconsciously preferred to have all creation
completed in virtually one instant in the big bang.”
– Encyclopaedia Britannica 2004 Deluxe Edition
And,
as indicated in the quote below, even Einstein’s model
of the universe was fundamentally based upon assumptions that
were not necessitated by his mathematics. Furthermore, the
quote goes on to assert that the first two of Einstein’s
assumptions of were based upon an “attractive”
and “appealing” “philosophical notion.”
In fact, these assumptions were so philosophically appealing
that other scientists took them even further in the effort
to assert the steady-state theory.
“Cosmos,
Relativistic cosmologies, Einstein’s model –
To derive his 1917 cosmological model, Einstein
made three assumptions that lay outside the scope of his equations.
The first was to suppose
that the universe is homogeneous and isotropic in the
large (i.e., the same everywhere on average at any instant
in time), an assumption that the English astrophysicist Edward
A. Milne later elevated to an entire philosophical outlook
by naming it the cosmological principle. Given the success
of the Copernican revolution, this outlook is a natural one…The second assumption was to suppose
that this homogeneous and isotropic universe had a closed
spatial geometry. As described in the previous section, the
total volume of a three-dimensional space with uniform positive
curvature would be finite but possess no edges or boundaries
(to be consistent with the first assumption). The third assumption made by Einstein was that the universe as a whole
is static—i.e., its large-scale properties do not vary
with time. This
assumption, made before Hubble's observational discovery of
the expansion of the universe, was also natural; it was the
simplest approach, as
Aristotle had discovered, if one wishes to avoid a discussion
of a creation event. Indeed, the
philosophical attraction of the notion that the universe on
average is not only homogeneous and isotropic in space but
also constant in time was so appealing that a school of English
cosmologists—Hermann Bondi, Fred Hoyle, and Thomas
Gold—would call
it the perfect cosmological principle and carry its implications
in the 1950s to the ultimate refinement in the so-called steady
state model.” – Encyclopaedia Britannica 2004
Deluxe Edition
Moreover,
as indicated by the quote above, Einstein’s original
model was also based upon the assumption “that the universe
as a whole is static” which means that “its large-scale
properties do not vary with time.” Einstein’s
original model could suppose this third assumption because
Hubble had not yet discovered the expansion of space. But
most importantly, as we can see from the quote, even in Einstein’s
model, this assumption is present as part of a longstanding
desire to avoid “a creation event.”
Consequently,
not only do the quotes presented above sufficiently demonstrate
that philosophical preference plays a role at the foundation
level of theories, but perhaps more importantly, the quotes
above also demonstrated the extent to which much of the philosophical
preference is a desire to avoid a “creation event”
and its theological implications.
Before
we leave this topic and move on to explore the actual modern
model of the universe and how it works, there are a few more
items to briefly comment on. All of these items relate to
the issue of philosophical preference and they also return
to the scientific criterion of falsifiability.
First,
having seen that philosophical preference plays a formative
role on the foundation level of cosmology theories, it is
important to note that its role is a solitary one. Or, in
other words, concerning the foundational points of evolutionary
cosmology, observation does not play a joint role with philosophical
preference because its principle components simply cannot
be observed.
As
we have already seen, the Big Bang explosion itself cannot
be modeled.
“Cosmology,
III MODERN COSMOLOGY – Cosmologists believe that they
can model the universe back to 1 x [10 to the -43rd power]
seconds after the big bang; before that point, they would need a
theory that merges the theory of gravity and the theory of
general relativity to explain the behavior of the universe.
Scientists do not actually study the big bang itself, but
infer its existence from the universe's expansion.”
– "Cosmology," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia
99. © 1993-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
And,
like the origin of life, no human was around to observe the
Big Bang explosion. Furthermore, the other foundational concept
of Big Bang evolutionary cosmology concerns the formation
of the major structures of the universe such as superclusters,
clusters, galaxies, and even stars, which also has not and
cannot be observed. Like the origin of species, these processes
take too long to actually observe or identifiably observe
and any processes that might relate to or even hypothetically
simulate these core concepts occur at locations in the universe
that are inaccessible to our observation.
“Astronomy,
Computer modeling – This kind of model can help
astronomers because many
important processes occur much too slowly for astronomers
to observe. Other important processes that can be simulated occur in inaccessible
places, such as the interiors of stars.” –
Worldbook, Contributor: Jay M. Pasachoff, Ph.D., Field Memorial
Professor of Astronomy and Director, Hopkins
Observatory of Williams College.
Consequently,
with no observations for the core concepts of an initial explosion
or the subsequent formation of the structures of the universe,
the basis for the Big Bang theory remains solely philosophical
preference. This becomes even clearer given the fact that
the only 2 points that are observable don’t fit the
Big Bang theory any better than they do the creationist model.
The only 2 points that can be observed are current expansion
and isotropy. As we will see later, isotropy is a term that
refers to the fact that every direction that we look into
space, we seem to see a roughly even distribution of matter,
at least on the largest scale.
“Cosmos,
Relativistic cosmologies, Einstein’s model –
To derive his 1917 cosmological model, Einstein
made three assumptions that lay outside the scope of his equations.
The first was to suppose
that the universe is homogeneous and isotropic…Indeed,
the philosophical attraction of the notion that the universe on average
is not only homogeneous and isotropic in space but also
constant in time was so appealing that a school of
English cosmologists—Hermann Bondi, Fred Hoyle, and
Thomas Gold—would call it the perfect cosmological
principle and carry its implications in the 1950s to the ultimate
refinement in the so-called steady state model.” – Encyclopaedia Britannica
2004 Deluxe Edition
“Cosmology,
III MODERN COSMOLOGY, B Steady-State Theory – In the 1940s British scientists Hermann Bondi, Thomas Gold, and Fred
Hoyle were philosophically opposed to the requirements
that the big bang theory put forth for the
extreme conditions in the early universe. The big bang theory was framed in terms of what they called the
cosmological principle-that
the universe is homogeneous (the same in all locations) and
isotropic (looks the same in all directions) on a large scale.”
– "Cosmology," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia
99. © 1993-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
Moreover,
as we pointed out earlier, the only other truly observable
fundamental concept to the Big Bang model is the current expansion
of the universe, but expansion at the present time simply
does not necessarily imply expansion all the way back in time
to a starting explosion. And, as we will see later on, expansion
fits perfectly with the creationist model as well. Since the
only 2 observable evidences for the Big Bang theory fit with
creation theory as well, we can see that philosophical preference
was not only the sole determining factor for the basic evolutionary
cosmology, but that philosophical preference, not observation,
remains the only reason to choose Big Bang theory over creation
theory today, specifically the philosophical bias to avoid
a “creation event” with its theological implications.
It is that preference that has been the driving force from
the beginning and remains so today. And it is purely philosophical,
not observational.
Here
it would at first seem that creationism is on the same footing
as evolutionary cosmology. However, that is not really the
case. As we have pointed out, the Big Bang is based upon assumptions
that go beyond what is observed and observable. One primary
example of this was the observation of current expansion,
which does not necessitate expansion all the way from an initial
explosion, especially since Big Bang theory has to assert
a drastic change in expansion from what we observe today.
And throughout this segment, the larger point that we’ve
been building toward is that Big Bang cosmology, which uses
expansion as its observational base, actually ignores known
observations about expansion. Once factored in, the previously
ignored observations about expansion inherently indicate teleology
and foresight. We will see exactly why this is the case later
on when we cover the ignored observations. However, the result
is that because observations about expansion inherently indicate
teleology, unlike evolutionary cosmology, creationism is not
relying solely on assumptions for which there is no observation.
Instead, the core concepts of creationist cosmology rely on
the observation of expansion, the observation of isotropy,
and one other known observation that the Big Bang evolutionary
theory has to ignore.
Given
what we have seen so far, that the Big Bang cosmology is formulated
and accepted on the grounds of philosophical preference not
observation and that the competing theories are rejected on
the grounds of those same philosophical preferences, it is
important to note what this means for the Big Bang in terms
of the scientific criterion of falsifiability. When a theory
is accepted or rejected on the grounds of how well it fits
the observable evidence, that theory can be falsified. Philosophical
preferences, however, cannot be falsified, even as indicated
by the quotes below.
“Positivism,
Logical Positivism and Logical Empiricism, The earlier Positivism
of Viennese heritage, The verifiability criterion of meaning
and its offshoots – It was in coming to this juncture
in his critique of Positivism that Karl Popper, an Austro-English philosopher
of science, in his Logik der Forschung (1935; The Logic of
Scientific Discovery, 1959), insisted
that the meaning criterion should be abandoned and replaced
by a criterion of demarcation between empirical (scientific)
and transempirical (nonscientific, metaphysical) questions
and answers—a criterion that, according to Popper, is to be testability, or, in
his own version, falsifiability; i.e., refutability. Popper
was impressed by how easy it is to supposedly verify all sorts
of assertions—those of psychoanalytic theories seemed
to him to be abhorrent examples. But the decisive feature, as Popper
saw it, should be whether
it is in principle conceivable that evidence could be cited
that would refute (or disconfirm) a given law, hypothesis,
or theory.” – Encyclopaedia Britannica 2004 Deluxe
Edition
“Science
– A theory
developed by a scientist cannot
be accepted as part of scientific knowledge until it has been
verified by the studies of other researchers. In fact,
for any knowledge to
be truly scientific, it must be repeatedly tested experimentally
and found to be true. This
characteristic of science sets it apart from other branches
of knowledge. For example, the humanities, which include
religion, philosophy, and the arts, deal with ideas about
human nature and the meaning of life. Such ideas cannot be scientifically proved.
There is no test that tells whether a philosophical system
is "right." No one can determine scientifically
what feeling an artist tried to express in a painting. Nor
can anyone perform an experiment to check for an error in a poem or a symphony.” – Worldbook,
Contributor: Joseph W. Dauben, Ph.D., Professor of History
and the History of Science, City
University of New
York.
When
a theory is formulated out of correspondence with actual observable
evidence, then that theory is likely to be falsifiable by
its nature. But when a theory is formulated merely from philosophical
preferences without any observations necessitating it, then
that theory is likely to be un-falsifiable by its nature.
Similarly, when a theory is accepted merely out of philosophical
preference while competing theories are rejected merely out
of philosophical preference and not because of the evidence,
then that theory is most certainly un-falsifiable. And this
is the picture that has emerged concerning the Big Bang model
particularly in contrast to the Steady-State model and the
creationist model.
The
Big Bang model has no actual working theory for the initial
explosion, the fractions of seconds that immediately follow
the explosion, or the formation of the structures of the universe
since that time – all of which are the areas where the
theory makes its defining claims. The evidence in these areas
has so far proved to be irreconcilable with evolutionary Big
Bang cosmology, yet as we have seen the Big Bang model has
continued to be accepted due to philosophical preferences,
despite its “unsatisfactory status.” Meanwhile,
those who have accepted the Big Bang model have rejected the
competing Steady-State theory for philosophical preferences.
And although it is admitted by secular and evolutionary sources
that the observations, which pose problems for the evolutionary
Big Bang model, require foresight and fine-tuning balance
in order to be solved, and although current expansion and
isotropy, the only 2 actual observations incorporated into
the Big Bang model, are equally fitting to the creationist
model, the creationist model is similarly rejected out of
a philosophical preference to avoid its theological implications.
Consequently,
the Big Bang theory has proven to be un-falsifiable because
the basis of its acceptance is not observation and evidence
but philosophical preference, which cannot be tested or falsified.
And as we have seen from the numerous quotes above, unlike
creationists who repeatedly argue for how the observed evidence
actually proves creationism, evolutionists admit that they
accept the theory despite the fact that its central claims
do not fit with the observable evidence and also fail to provide
a functional explanation. This meets the criterion for un-falsifiability
that we described early on in the segment entitled, “Premature Dismissal in the Origins Debate:
Is Faith Unscientific? (Part 2)” In that segment,
we stated that a theory becomes un-falsifiable when its claims
become detached from the evidence. This happens in one of
2 ways. First, when a theory’s primary claims are defined
in such a way that they have no relationship to the observable
evidence. Or second, when the theory itself is accepted despite
the fact that its primary claims have been disproved by the
evidence. When we consider whether or not creationism is a
theory that is detached from the evidence in either of these
ways, we find out that it clearly is not. As evidenced by
the quotes above, evolutionists admit that they accept the
Big Bang theory despite the fact that the observable evidence
disproves its current formulations.
However,
the next quotes will demonstrate that the Big Bang theory
is also un-falsifiable with regard to the first scenario as
well. Particularly, some of its claims are defined in such
a way as to avoid making any assertions specific enough to
be tested and potentially disproved by the observable evidence.
The long quote that follows begins by affirming that
the evolutionary Big Bang theory, augmented by inflation theory,
is accepted as “the theory of choice among nearly all
astronomers” despite its “unresolved internal
difficulties,” lack of an actual working theory for
the formation of the universe’s structures, “shortcomings,”
the “need for major modifications,” and the resulting
“incompleteness.” The quote then goes on assert
that the problem with the Steady-State model, the alternative
to the Big Bang model, was that it “had the virtue of
making very specific predictions, and for this reason it was
vulnerable to observational disproof.”
“Cosmos,
Cosmological models, The very early universe, Inflation –
As influential as inflation has been in
guiding modern cosmological thought, it has not resolved all
internal difficulties…Steady state theory and other
alternative cosmologies – Big bang cosmology, augmented
by the ideas of inflation, remains the theory of choice among nearly
all astronomers, but, apart from the difficulties discussed above, no consensus has been reached concerning
the origin in the cosmic gas of fluctuations thought to produce
the observed galaxies, clusters, and superclusters. Most astronomers
would interpret these shortcomings as indications of the incompleteness
of the development of the theory, but it is conceivable
that major modifications are needed…However, the
apparent difficulty motivated Bondi,
Hoyle, and Gold to offer the alternative theory of steady
state cosmology in 1948. By that year, of course, the
universe was known to be expanding; therefore,
the only way to explain a constant (steady state) matter density
was to postulate the continuous creation of matter to offset
the attenuation caused by the cosmic expansion. This
aspect was physically very unappealing to many people, who
consciously or unconsciously preferred to have all creation
completed in virtually one instant in the big bang. In the
steady state theory the average age of matter in the universe
is one-third the Hubble time, but any given galaxy could be
older or younger than this mean value. Thus,
the steady state theory
had the virtue of making very specific predictions, and for
this reason it was vulnerable to observational disproof.”
– Encyclopaedia Britannica 2004 Deluxe Edition
It
is hard to overlook the fact that Britannica Encyclopedia’s
comment that “making predictions,” which are “specific”
enough to be “vulnerable to disproof” by observations,
is intended as a contrast
to Big Bang cosmology, which has survived when Steady-State
has not. The obvious point from Britannica is that Big Bang
cosmology has survived while Steady-State cosmology has not,
because Big Bang cosmology does not suffer from this same
“virtue” of “making very specific predictions”
which make it “vulnerable to observational disproof.”
On this note, it would appear that the Big Bang theory has
moved from falsified to un-falsifiability. In other words,
in light of the admissions by evolutionists that Big Bang
theory does not work with the observed evidence, apparently
Big Bang theory has shifted its claims to be less specific
so that the theory will no longer be vulnerable to disproof
by testing it against observations.
As
a side note, we should also point out the further implication
from Britannica that adherents to Big Bang cosmology criticize
Steady-State theory as both un-falsifiable and yet falsified
with regard to the very same point. The quote above from Britannica
asserts that Steady-State theory was “vulnerable to
disproof” regarding its “very specific prediction”
in which it “postulated the continuous creation of matter.”
However, the next 2 quotes from Microsoft Encarta both directly
assert the exact opposite, that Steady-State theory’s
claim about the continuous creation of matter was “much
too low to be observationally tested” or “verified.”
“Cosmology,
III MODERN COSMOLOGY, B Steady-State Theory – In the 1940s British scientists Hermann Bondi, Thomas Gold, and Fred
Hoyle were philosophically opposed to the requirements
that the big bang theory put forth for the
extreme conditions in the early universe. The big bang theory
was framed in terms of what they called the cosmological principle-that
the universe is homogeneous (the same in all locations) and
isotropic (looks the same in all directions) on a large scale.
Bondi, Gold, and Hoyle
suggested an additional postulate, which they called the perfect
cosmological principle. This principle stated that the universe
is not only homogeneous and isotropic but also looks the same
at all times. Since the universe is expanding, though, one
might think that the density of the universe would decrease.
Such a decrease would be a change that would not fit with
the perfect cosmological principle. Bondi, Gold, and Hoyle thus suggested that matter could be continuously
created out of nothing to maintain the density over time.
The rate at which matter would have to be created was much
too low to be observationally testable, however. They
called this theory the steady-state theory.” –
"Cosmology," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 99.
© 1993-1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
“Steady-State
Theory, II THE STEADY-STATE THEORY – Therefore,
the steady-state theory says that new matter
must form as existing matter spreads apart…The amount of mass that would form under
the steady-state theory is
so small that it would be too small for scientists to measure
for verification.” – "Steady-State Theory,"
Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 99. © 1993-1998 Microsoft
Corporation. All rights reserved.
It
is one thing to say that particular points of a theory have
been falsified but that the theory as a whole is un-falsifiable.
Here there is a distinction between an individual point and
the whole theory. And this distinction allows for the 2 different
objects (the individual point and the whole theory) to be
categorized separately. But, it is another thing to say that
a particular point of a theory is itself both falsified and
un-falsifiable. Here there is no such distinction, but the
same object, the particular point, is deemed as both un-falsifiable
and as having been falsified at the same time. And, as we
can see, that is what evolutionary theory is doing. It is
asserting that Steady-State theory is un-falsifiable in its
prediction that matter is continuously created out of nothing
and at the same time regarding that very same prediction as
being falsified because it was so specific that it was “vulnerable
to disproof by observation.” This is very much similar
to the common charge by evolutionists that creationism’s
main claims are both un-falsifiable while also simultaneously
charging that those very same claims have been falsified.
Ultimately,
it seems that Big Bang evolutionary theory suffers from the
criticisms that it levies against its competition. Big Bang
evolutionists admit that their theory does not fit with observations
and yet they hold to it anyway, thus revealing that the theory
is un-falsifiable because it is held without regard for what
the evidence actually indicates. And, in light of the extent
to which Big Bang theory is recognized by evolutionists not
to work with the observable evidence, it would also appear
that the definition of Big Bang theory is shifting to a vaguer
series of claims so devoid of specifics that the theory is
no longer vulnerable to falsification by the evidence.
Specifically,
this shift to vaguer claims, which don’t specify a testable
relationship to the evidence, manifests in terms of the lack
of any actual working theory on central issues of the universe’s
formation, its origin and the development of its major structures.
As we have seen evolutionary Big Bang cosmology lacks any
specific theory on these points and, in the absence of any
specific theorization for these events, Big Bang cosmology
has simply reverted to the vague, bare minimum claim that
the universe came into existence by unobserved, undefined,
unidentified automatic, routine processes that proceed without
foresight. This is the exact same status that we have seen
concerning the evolutionary claims about the origin of life
and the origin of species as well. On both of those issues,
we have seen that evolution lacks any specific, working theory
but instead reverts merely to the vaguer, un-testable claim
that life and species originate from undefined, unidentified
automatic, routine processes that proceed without foresight.
Because this is the case for evolutionary cosmology, our second
definitional point for evolutionary theory is not biased but
accurate when it asserts the following conclusion.
2)
…Despite the lack of even a working speculation for
how automatic, routine processes could cause the existing
structures and their distribution, nevertheless an automatic,
routine process is advanced as the cause and it is hoped that
a working scenario can be conceived and articulated at some
point in the future.
Having
finished our commentary concerning the philosophical and pre-suppositional
nature of evolutionary cosmology, we are ready to move forward
to describe the model itself so that we can understand how
the ignored information about expansion impacts that model.