Talk:Creation science/Archive 13

Sections from August 2007:

Apply Common Sense

by Mike Martin, Former State Legislator

If there are scientific discoveries that back claims of a world-wide catastrophic flood taking place in history, should that evidence be excluded from students because it also backs the story of Noah's flood? NASA scientists were so convinced that the moon and earth were of the same age that they designed the first lunar lander's legs to be six feet longer than needed. There was no doubt at the time that solar dust would be ten feet deep. When it ended up being only six inches, did they rewrite theories of the age of the moon? No, they changed the theory by saying that solar dust has only been falling for the past twenty thousand years rather than 3.5 billion. What froze the mastodons so quickly that they were found standing up with buttercups still in their mouths? The vapor canopy theory explains such mysteries quiet well; however, evolutionists will not allow the theory because it clashes with too much of their stuff. According to them, the ice age came slowly.

There are thousands of theories taught in our public schools as "facts of science" when they are only guesses made by so called, educated people. When a God-believing educated person creates a theory on scientific finds that lends credibility to something mentioned in the Bible, he is a nut. The author of this Wikipedia article managed to get that across in his biased definitions of what Creation Science is and is not. "The science of evolution" is wrongfully defined. It should be called, "the religion of evolution". To accept most of the theories derived by evolutionists, you have to take each by faith. To accept any, you have to believe by faith that the earth is billions of years old without any scientific proof what-so-ever. I believe the "Creation Scientists" rely more on science than the evolutionists. At least they do not try to censor the other side.

Note: If you don't believe me, look into the history of this discussion page and see how many times the author and his buddies attempt to delete my comments. For crying out loud, I'm not editing the biased article. I'm just back here in the discussion page where no one goes. I even had the balls to put my name on this. I'm retired with lots of time on my hands. I will simply keep undoing their censorship. What they are doing is called "Secular Humanism", and it is taking over this country.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.112.62.246 (talk • contribs) 6 August 2007.

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a discussion forum. If you want to improve the article, you're welcome, but at least for now, "creation science" is considered by scientists to be pseudoscience. If you want to change that, you're at the wrong place. Also, there's at least two wiki for people who don't care about objectivity; Creation Wiki and Conservapedia. -PhDP ^(talk) 23:08, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Creation science article. This is not a forum for general discussion about the article's subject. Removal of material judged to be inappropriate is not at attempt to "supress the truth" - nothing so sinister. It sounds from what you've written as though you'd like it over at Talk.Origins - they just love discussing frozen mastodons there. Sheffield Steel^talkers_stalkers 23:16, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

So we have a regular Gish-gallop of idiotic and unsubstantiated assertions, purportedly written by somebody who must be the most incompetently corrupt sleazebag of a politician ever. Should we:

1. feed his martyr-complex by deleting his steaming pile of refuse; or
2. laugh ourselves silly at the idiot?

Hrafn42 11:53, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Better to leave it up. If we remove it, he'll just keep readding it until he gets blocked, resulting in a waste of everyone's time. Let's just leave it up to let its inanity speak for itself, and then conveniently skip over this section when this page is archived. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 12:45, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I have my doubts if this is by the person above who claims to have written it, although the IP address is from Austin Texas. I cannot imagine that this person would brag about his identity and even link his name to a pretty uncomplimentary article about himself. If he was to edit here, I would suspect he would edit his own article.--Filll 13:47, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Does it matter if he's a faux-sleazebag or the genuine article? Either way, you'd need to use a micrometer to measure his reputation. Hrafn42 15:04, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Peer Review

I removed a phrase that said basically that Creation science is found to be lacking when it is subjected to peer-review; after I found an AiG article stating that they do use peer-review. The questions then are: 1. Is this true? (we should AGF until opposing evidence is found). 2. Is the "common" definition of peer-review being used?

(two quotes copied from my talk page)

Sorry that is not peer review. That is having a few of your like minded friends proofread it for you. If you want this, make a case on the talk page. Thanks.--Filll 23:00, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

To expand on what Filll said, the reason peer review works like it does is that often the peers hold contrary views to those of the scientist who wrote the paper (or at the very least are neutral about it). This guarantees that the paper will be held up to a very high standard. What's being done in this case involves papers being sent only to people who hold the same conclusion as the authors, so they're likely to let it pass even if the science is sloppy. They may call it "peer review," but that doesn't make it such. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 23:23, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Filll, when non-creationists do peer-review - they are using like minded friends also. Infophile, creationist-peers may hold contrary views on a particular matter also. You are confusing "conclusions" with assumptions or presuppositions. Creationists share a number of common presuppositions. Non-creationists share a number of common presuppositions. We have an EXACT parallel situation between the two groups. ^rossnixon 03:12, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

That statement is so laughable I'm not sure it's even worth responding to. It's you who is confusing terms here, cretinists start from the pre-supposition of special creation, and look for any evidence that would support that supposition and discard or ignore any that doesn't ( pretty much all of it as it happens ). Further by positing a supernatural creator at all, they violate parsimony, and produce a hypothesis which makes no testable claims at all. Any "peer-review" they do is worthless, as whatever they are doing, it's not even remotely similar to science. ornis (t) 04:04, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I could write an essay about the unicorns helped build the moon out of toilet paper, and pass it on to a few people who actually believe that, but that still wouldn't make it scientific, nor would it be a "real" peer review. GSlicer (t • c) 04:54, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

The word "peer" just means people at the same standing, so it is valid to talk about a unicornist peer-review, a creationist peer-review or a scientific preer-review. Sheffield Steel^talkers_stalkers 05:06, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

In this case, the argument is specifically over whether or not creation science has been subjected to scientific peer review[1]. ornis (t) 05:11, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. That's what I meant by a "real" peer review. GSlicer (t • c) 07:06, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Ornis, so you agree that they do "peer review"? We are not discussing whether their articles have any worth or not. My take on the sentence, expanding it, was "it is found lacking when subjected to scientific criticism; and it is found lacking when subjected to peer review". Are you reading the "or" between the phrases to imply they are both the same thing? There is a difference in many cases - e.g. non-scientific peer review. That's why it should go. ^rossnixon 05:23, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Now what the fuck are you talking about? The sentence in question, clearly says that when it's subjected to scientific peer-review creation science falls flat. You made the ridiculous claim that creation scientists do their own scientific peer-review which (as has been pointed out to you) is bullshit. ornis (t) 05:29, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

When we're dealing with a scientific/pseudoscientific topic, saying "peer review" implies scientific peer-review, not just peer-review to anyone who'll listen. GSlicer (t • c) 07:06, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

According to Peer_review it is subjection of a work to scrutiny by people who are experts in the same field. If a journal article submitted by someone with a PhD in a scientific discipline is reviewed by several people who also hold PhDs in a relevant field then it would seem to indeed fall under "peer reviewed". There are at least a few "creationist" journals that would fall under that category that I'm aware of. Additionally, from what I've seen some of these "creation scientists" also publish their work in "normal" science journals as well so I'm not sure it can all be lumped together. J mantha 07:35, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Right, can you name any particular creationist works published in significant peer-reviewed journals? Everything they do is just cargo cult science, especially making their own "peer-reviewed" journals, which are well known to not be critical and to spread blatant lies. Reinis^talk 09:37, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

<undent> Now, if they could get it reviewed by some lords that'd be peer review, but somehow it seems unlikely that even the most antiquated denizens of the house of Lords would support it......... dave souza, talk 07:21, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Ornis, from several paragraphs up said "what are you talking about?" I will rephrase in an attempt to make it clearer. The phrase reads "subjected to the scrutiny of scientific criticism or peer-review". There are "invisible brackets" which change the meaning, depending where you put them:

1. (scientific criticism) or (peer-review)
2. scientific (criticism or peer-review)

I read it with the first meaning. You, apparently, read it with the second. This needs changing to make it clear to the reader. Since creationists don't submit articles for "scientific peer-review", the phrase needs changing to "scientific criticism" only (or similar). ^rossnixon 01:59, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

No one but you thinks the phrase needs to be changed. ornis (t) 02:03, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Could someone answer the point, thanks? Can you see the difference between 1. and 2.? ^rossnixon 02:27, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I see the difference. And it is just pointless word games. Why do you not read the section below that I wrote for your edification? Try to learn something. You are not going to get your way. Sorry.--Filll 02:51, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

The term peer review does not exist outside of the scientific context. Including it suggests that intelligen design has validity it does not have. -- Ec5618 06:04, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Humanities have peer-review too, but in this context, yeah we mean scientific peer-review. ornis (t) 06:49, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Fix the text to say that then! "Scientific criticism or peer-review" implies two things. (BTW, should peer-review be hyphenated, looks like 90%+ times it's not)?) ^rossnixon 01:57, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh please, that's a wilful misconstrual. Any reasonable person reading the whole sentence would understand it to mean scientific criticism and scientific peer review. ornis (t) 02:11, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Its too bad we dont have MPOV, then this could be easily solved. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.106.6.36 (talk) 04:37, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

What does that comment even mean? Adam Cuerden ^talk 16:25, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

What is peer review?

There seems to be a complete confusion about what peer review is here.

• First, if something is to be published in a peer-reviewed history journal, the reviewers with be professionally recognized historians. If something is to be published in a peer-reviewed linguistics journal, the reviewers will be professionally recognized linguists. If the journal is a peer-reviewed medical journal, the reviewers will be recognized experts in medicine. And if the journal is a peer-reviewed science journal, the reviewers will be scientists. Since creation science is NOT science, anyone who claims to be a "creation scientist" is not a recognized expert by the scientific community, and would be unsuitable for reviewing something that is supposed to be science.

• Typically you do not get to choose who your reviewers will be in peer-review. You do not get to personally choose the reviewers of your own articles.

• Not only must the reviewers be in a recognized field by the overall academic community, but they will be reviewers specializing in the same area your article is in. Which might not be your exact specialty. You might get a mainstream biology textbook author and a National Academy member with expertise in evolution and a junior biology faculty member as reviewers of an article claiming that evolution is wrong. You have to convince them ALL you are correct to get your article is published.

• Typically people are chosen who oppose your views, or are your adversaries/competitors, and also recognized experts in the same field. This means that someone who claims to have found a flaw in radioactive dating techniques, for example, would have a reviewer who is a world expert in scientific radioactive dating techniques and who has often expressed the view that such flaws are spurious.

• There are good reviewed journals, and bad. If a journal starts to always get easy softball reviewers, its reputation will go down and no one will want to publish anything of quality in that journal, because it will be meaningless to pass review in such a journal.

• A proper peer-review can mean that articles take a few months to write, and maybe a year or two or more to get through review. If ever.

• Most articles sent to properly peer-reviewed journals are rejected.

• Even good peer-reviewed journals publish some bad things, sometimes. To really count, people have to confirm it, and it has to be heavily cited by other peer-reviewed articles in high quality high reputation journals, over a long period of time.

• Some articles have 3 reviewers per article. Some have 5. Some have more. It can be a brutal, gruelling process.

• Just claiming your journal is peer-reviewed does not really mean that the academic community accepts it as "peer-reviewed". A journal will gain a reputation over time based on its quality of articles and what others in the academic community think of it. If the general community of scientists do not think a journal is peer-reviewed or produces high quality scientific articles, then it is not treated seriously by the scientific community. You cannot self-proclaim a book like "Explore Evolution" or "Origins" to be peer-reviewed. That is up to the community, not up to the authors or creationists etc. That is up to the science community at large. And if they do not think it is peer-reviewed, it does not matter what you personally claim.

Is this clearer? --Filll 13:11, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your effort, though a link to a definition would have sufficed. ^rossnixon 01:59, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

"Definition of a Scientist" - unsuitable material removed

Please note that this page is for discussing improvements to the article itself, not for soapbox speeches on the article's subject. The material removed here did not suggest improvements. Sheffield Steel^talkers_stalkers 14:04, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Even harsher than I would have been. But admittedly funny. Unfortunately, no WP:V and WP:RS sources for his assertions. --Filll 14:08, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Typical censorship by biased Wiki editors. Let all the anti-creationists garbage in the discussion page, but crop out reasonable discussion from the other side. I used to think Wiki was a great creation until I found out how they take sides on controversial subjects like creation science. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.93.32.58 (talk) 12:41, August 30, 2007 (UTC)

In the articles WP takes sides. Both sides, usually in proportion to how the community of which the article is part of is divided. It is part of WP:UNDUE. These talk pages are not for soap box arguments or proselytizing. There are many other places on the internet for that.--Filll 12:50, 30 August 2007 (UTC)