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One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

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Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#61

Post by asjw »

BaronSamedi wrote: post #14
normalnorm wrote: post #5

Scientific theories are not "proven", that is not how science works. All theories are always and forever open to falsification. The scientific attitude is one of eternal doubt. "Proof" is something that only exists in the realm of pure math.

I think the reality is more subtle than this. Is, for example, the discovery of DNA going to be falsified? I don't think so. Is the notion that living organisms evolve going to be falsified? Again, I doubt it. The case of Newton and Einstein is relevant here. Einstein didn't "falsify" Newton but rather enriched our understanding of physics. A better model seems to be that scientific theories fit into a spectrum of ce…

The nucleus of the atom turned out to be made by other particles, it was believed to be atomic, but it wasn't

In the same way in the future we might discover that what we know about DNA is wrong

Or maybe not

We'll never know for sure

We only know that we approximated our knowledge of it at the best of our current understanding of it

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#62

Post by msla »

vikramkr wrote: post #54
msla wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The existence of DNA will never be falsified. The experiments which discovered DNA happened. New experiments don't make old experiments un-happen. Similarly, the fact DNA->RNA->protein is how it works at least some of the time isn't going to become false.

Those experiments could be wrong. They likely aren't and are like however many sigma accurate to the point that for all intents and purposes it's guaranteed to exist, but there's a reason that physisicts waited for 5 sigmabaccuracy before announcing the higgs for example. Other things people were really confident about existing because they thought they saw it, like a bacteria that causes influenza, with their own ey…

OK, let's explore this concept a bit more: Could a future experiment disprove the existence of Mount Everest?

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#63

Post by yarrel »

keiferski wrote: post #9
normalnorm wrote: post #5

Scientific theories are not "proven", that is not how science works. All theories are always and forever open to falsification. The scientific attitude is one of eternal doubt. "Proof" is something that only exists in the realm of pure math.

Yes, thank you. I really wish scientists (and the general public) learned more about the fundamentals of their field. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_science

While the history of science emerges from and has an ongoing productive dialogue with that of philosophy, the humanities dept. status panic confection of "philosophy of science" has very little to do with this.

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#64

Post by anchpop »

msla wrote: post #62
vikramkr wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those experiments could be wrong. They likely aren't and are like however many sigma accurate to the point that for all intents and purposes it's guaranteed to exist, but there's a reason that physisicts waited for 5 sigmabaccuracy before announcing the higgs for example. Other things people were really confident about existing because they thought they saw it, like a bacteria that causes influenza, with their own ey…

OK, let's explore this concept a bit more: Could a future experiment disprove the existence of Mount Everest?

Sure, the existence of Mount Everest could be an international conspiracy for example. Or, you could be dreaming right now, and when you wake up you'll google "Mount Everest" and find no such thing exists

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#65

Post by bayesian_horse »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #30
bayesian_horse wrote: post #23

One problem when discussing species and subspecies is that there is no clear-cut definition between species, subspecies and "just some genetic diversity". The best hint is the genetic distance between any two individuals. In general, that distance is bigger between species than between subspecies. But no clear thresholds can be applied to the whole tree of life. Taxonomy is still mostly defined through differences a…

> there is no clear-cut definition between species It's not clear-cut in all cases. But it's clear cut bilaterally. Two organisms are in the same species if they can successfully reproduce, i.e. produce an offspring that can itself produce offspring. If they can't, they're in different species. (Multilateral fuzziness arises if A can reproduce with B, and B with C, but A not with C.)

In some animals it's impossible to observe breeding at all.

In other cases, two different species can breed.

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#66

Post by bayesian_horse »

phkahler wrote: post #43
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there is no clear-cut definition between species It's not clear-cut in all cases. But it's clear cut bilaterally. Two organisms are in the same species if they can successfully reproduce, i.e. produce an offspring that can itself produce offspring. If they can't, they're in different species. (Multilateral fuzziness arises if A can reproduce with B, and B with C, but A not with C.)

So why are different ethnicities of humans not considered sub-species? They developed in different geographic regions with barriers, the can interbreed successfully, and they have different appearances, not just in skin color, but in things like facial features. And yet the article specifically states that humans don't have subspecies.

First of all, calling ethnicities subspecies creates a political mess and such arguments have often been used for all kind of injustices.

Secondly I'd say that the differences are very fluid and it's hard to pinpoint any hard barriers. The "European" ethnicity only developed in the past 4000 years. Migrations during all that time make the picture even more difficult.

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#67

Post by munk-a »

piokoch wrote: post #50
BaronSamedi wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the reality is more subtle than this. Is, for example, the discovery of DNA going to be falsified? I don't think so. Is the notion that living organisms evolve going to be falsified? Again, I doubt it. The case of Newton and Einstein is relevant here. Einstein didn't "falsify" Newton but rather enriched our understanding of physics. A better model seems to be that scientific theories fit into a spectrum of ce…

There is a difference between discovery and theory. Discovery of Americas or Mars cannot be "falsified", they are scientific, objective, observable facts. Theory makes always some assumptions that can be invalid under some conditions - for instance Newtonian mechanics is not valid on quantum size scale or in case of huge masses or near speed of light velocities.

I don't know - I think that at some level our discovery of Mars could be dis-proven if you think that Mars is a solid terrestrial planet then in all likelihood you are correct, but you may be wrong - Mars could be gaseous with a floating mantel and some very strange properties... That all said I'm happy to tell bible thumpers that evolution has been proven since they aren't approaching the question from a legitimate point of skepticism and trying their best to misinform others.

For everyone who is earnest though - discoveries (even the earth being round) are only accepted until they're disproven, and there have been widely accepted theories that have been disproven in the past - like how relativity blew holes in Newtonian understandings.

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#68

Post by keiferski »

yarrel wrote: post #63
keiferski wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, thank you. I really wish scientists (and the general public) learned more about the fundamentals of their field. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_science

While the history of science emerges from and has an ongoing productive dialogue with that of philosophy, the humanities dept. status panic confection of "philosophy of science" has very little to do with this.

I'm not sure what "status panic confection" is supposed to mean. Nor does philosophy generally fall under humanities departments.

The philosophy of science is an established field that is hundreds of years old and includes pretty serious thinkers like Kant, Popper, Kuhn, and quite a few others. Ignore it at your own peril.

https://plato.stanford.edu/search/searcher.py?query=philosop...

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#69

Post by prostheticvamp »

vikramkr wrote: post #18
BaronSamedi wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the reality is more subtle than this. Is, for example, the discovery of DNA going to be falsified? I don't think so. Is the notion that living organisms evolve going to be falsified? Again, I doubt it. The case of Newton and Einstein is relevant here. Einstein didn't "falsify" Newton but rather enriched our understanding of physics. A better model seems to be that scientific theories fit into a spectrum of ce…

Dna could be falsified. It's incredibly low chance but it could. Just like the discovery of the bacteria that causes influenza was falsified once it became clear it's a virus. Just like the so called central dogma of DNA->RNA->protein turned out to be not so central or not so dogmatic. And Einstein definitely falsified Newton with the famous experiment with the eclipse and with more correctly showing Mercury's orbit,…

> Dna could be falsified

Cool! That’s an interesting idea. I could see particular attributes of DNA being corrected, but How would a molecular basis for inheritance be disproven? After all, we see the molecule on microscopy, we modify it, etc. A dis-proof would have to remain consistent with all of that. What would that look like?

Re: One of Darwin's evolution theories finally proved by Cambridge researcher

#70

Post by vikramkr »

msla wrote: post #62
vikramkr wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those experiments could be wrong. They likely aren't and are like however many sigma accurate to the point that for all intents and purposes it's guaranteed to exist, but there's a reason that physisicts waited for 5 sigmabaccuracy before announcing the higgs for example. Other things people were really confident about existing because they thought they saw it, like a bacteria that causes influenza, with their own ey…

OK, let's explore this concept a bit more: Could a future experiment disprove the existence of Mount Everest?

Yes. It could all be a conspiracy or some sort of insane natural illusion. Or a dream.

Will a future experiment disprove it though? Of course not. But could one? Sure. There's an important distinction.

Also, we could end up redefining what we mean by a mountain, or come to some scientific consensus that somehow redefines mount Everest as not a mountain or something. I know that's not in the spirit of the question you posted (Pluto may be declared to not be a planet, but nothing actually changed and it doesn't know we put it in a different bucket). The height could be redefined, etc. All that is super nitpicky and of course, I'm being a bit unreasonable in this response, there will not be any experiment that disproves its existence. But there still could. In the binary of is there any possibility however minuscule or not, the coin lands on the side of there is a possibility.

The important point is falsifiability works as a tool here that actually helps continuously support the mountain's existence. If it was impossible to falsify and you could not conduct experiments where you would be able to evaluate whether or not the mountain is actually there, you'd have no way of being actually sure. One experiment is just looking at it. You could not see anything and falsify it, but because it's a testable hypothesis, you have run an experiment providing more evidence for its existence. It's why non-falsifiable statements are looked down on science. If it wasn't possible for a future experiment to disprove the existence of the mountain, many or all scientists would say it's either a meaningless question or a question of faith instead.

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