Why do people get so personal about defending evolution?

[Agent Cooper]

The reason why most people are somewhat worried about creationism is probably because that way of thinking and reasoning belongs to the dark Middle Ages in Europe.

It has taken scientists centuries to develop and refine the scientific method and approach to nature and the cosmos, and it is almost heartbreaking to see a group of fundamentalists dismiss the scientific progress and understanding of our Universe that has been made over time, by some of the greatests minds ever to populate this planet.

For the fun of it, try visit the forums of Flat Earth Society (no joke) and read some hilarious comments about how gravity, thermodynamics etc. work:

Science and religion should never be integrated.

 

[Verbose]

I'm going to muddy the waters here a bit:

I think the Creationism-guys are absolutely right to be asking pointed questions about evolution, even the ignorant ones.

The way science operates in our societies does in fact mean that its proncouncements require to be treated as articles of faith, not by the scientists themselves, but by most of the public.

I submit that people these days need an "Electic Monk" — here bowing to the brainyness of Simon Schaffer, professor at the Dept. for History and Philosophy of Science (HPS), Cambridge University, and to Douglas Adams of "Hitchiker's"-fame who came up with the concept.
http://shpusa.com/press/Schaffer.pdf

The late Douglas Adams, an inspirational maître à penser of British science studies, once proposed a useful labour-saving device. Just as automatic dishwashers remove the tedium of cleaning up after meals, so Adams’ ‘Electric Monk’ would perform the highly demanding work of believing all the things in which modern citizens are expected to have faith. Electric Monks matter in current politics of science because each citizen has apparently become a Doubting Thomas. Scientific expertise is born trustworthy, yet everywhere it is in question.

(Thanks Simon, for putting your stuff out there.)

Mr. Blonde made a good exposé over how science works, at least on a conscious and slightly ideological level. But there are oblique passages in it. The main problem is that what most people are missing isn't really a knowledge of scientific theories about all and sundry, what they tend to be missing in information about how the process of research works, whereby the scientific pronouncements are made.

Thing is, scientists don't have to believe in science, ToE included, since they already know how it works. Believing in it would be somehow redundant. Instead they spend time discussing things like what results might be artifacts of the experimental process, and which results are actually real. So from the scientist POW belief is not required as they tend to know where the lapsuses and inconsistencies are located, and how far they can push a theory or a model before it breaks, while trying to work out improvements on it, or entirely new models.

From the outside however these activities, and the people engaged in them, do work like a form of modern secular clergy, producing dogmatic statements that have to be accomodated, or rejected as may be the case. So on some levels the scientific community does put it out there that they it Cartmanesque fashion requires you to "Respect mah' Authoritah'!" And there is of course always the possibility for people to embrace "Scientism" as a system of belifs analogous to a religious creed. It's just redundant to do so from the POV of doing science.

The apparent solution would seem to be to educate the public about the process of research rather than request them to swallow the end result of the process of research as articles of faith.

The thing is, it's not readily apparent that the professional academic elite of science would be too happy with having the Great Unwashed, the Hoi Polloi, hanging over their shoulders. It would require a democratisation of science and research that in some ways run counter to the interests of this elite. "Respect mah' Authoritha'!", and a popular creed of Scientism, is a lot simpler in many ways. Otoh there might be benefits of such a democratisation, but these are as yet unknown.

It's not even apparent that the critics of science, of ToE, would want to spend the kind of time and effort required to learn how science is done from the base up. It's actually very hard to disbelieve scientific results, once it becomes clear how the argument was constructed, how interlaced things are, meaning Shane's suggestion the anti-ToE-brigade would have to give things like modern medicine a miss has real merit, if they are going to be consistent in rejection.
Still, the opponents of ToE should perhaps be required to make such an effort to understand research in a more profound way, because this stuff is important.

What's on line isn't just "Is evolution real?" (or rather "Is the ToE correct?"), and "Does God exist?", which may both be dear to specific sets of people (palaeontologists and born again Christians for starters), but a much wider question of:

"How is the political economy of the production of knowledge going to be organised in our society?"

That one is a biggie, and it invloves all of us. It's also a major reason for the urgency with which many oppose creationism. The implications of it for this question is considerable. Even if it seems a safe bet not even the truest believer really wants to kill The Goose That Lays Golden Eggs of Science, the fear is that this is precisely what they may end up doing, if left unchecked.

Based on the hitherto track-record of science in the last couple of centuries, maybe they should be allowed to keep at it?

 

[Mr. Blonde]

Nice post, Verbose!

I agree that current problems come from a lack of communication and maybe control of the scientific process. But imo there is a big dilemma when communicating with the public.

A lack of knowledge from the public side means that the science community has inevitably to simplify data for explanations. this poses 2 problems for the scientist:

1) The simplified version can easily be proven wrong and I as a scientist must say that for this reason I refrain from it. From this follows

2) When the simplified version is proven wrong, it implies in the eye of the public that the more complex version is wrong - and you can be sure someone will prey on it.

So I think simplifying does not help at all, because it will lead to a general mistrust of the validity os scientific theories. The second alternative is to only communicate the more complex versions and just try to get rid of some overly complex teminology. It may not be understood completely but at least the public receives the image of a more coherent picture which means it can build up some faith in the work of us scientists.

One major problem are the current media, which will simplify and sometimes completely misunderstand articles made by researchers. And the worst thing is if esotheric advertisments which contain some scientific terminology are presented unreflected with the same validity as actual research. I am growing a stomach ulcer from reading lifestyle magazines when waiting at a haircutter.

 

[frob2900]

@Mr. Blonde
@Verbose:


Of course, an important facet of all this is that nobody, scientist or layman, wants to abandon the conveniences that the modern world allows us. It's just that it isn't obvious to most laymen that many scientific theories which on the surface seem abstract (and prone to politicalization) are intimately connected with other things that make life much better for everyone.

A good example is the Evolution-Biology-Medicine axis.

But the flipside of this is, I believe, that those sciences that obviously and immediately allow material comforts (and probably, importantly, military advantages) will be left untouched even by the most fervent believers.

Obvious utility outweighs faith for the vast majority of people (people who reject e.g. modern technology are bordering on cultism).

 

[drachasor]

I'm going to muddy the waters here a bit:

I think the Creationism-guys are absolutely right to be asking pointed questions about evolution, even the ignorant ones.

They aren't asking pointed questions. They believe, based on faith, that Evolution can't be right. Therefore they twist facts, distort evidence, misrepresent scientific discourse, and just plain lie to make Evolution look false. That's not asking honest questions or trying to dispel their own ignorance/doubts or otherwise deal with their concerns in an intellectual honest way. They have an agenda, and that's to get rid of the acceptance and teaching of evolution, and no amount of actual evidence or scientific answers is going to change that. By not seeing this, you are playing their game; they want people to think they are asking legitimate questions and having realistic concerns, that's the cornerstone of their strategy to get rid of Evolution.

The way science operates in our societies does in fact mean that its proncouncements require to be treated as articles of faith, not by the scientists themselves, but by most of the public.

Don't confuse different types of faith here. You can have faith in a religion, which is accepting things as true without any evidence. You can also have faith in a person, system, organization or something else. The latter type CAN be based on evidence. Do I have "faith", that is trust, that a well-accepted scientific theory is probably pretty much true? Sure I do, because I know that the scientific process is pretty darn good at coming up with good models of reality. I don't personally need to know all the evidence for the model and the lack of evidence. Just like I don't have to know all the details of indoor plumbing to trust that a Plumber knows to do his job (trust subject to changing evidence), I don't need to know every detail about some random field of science to trust the scientists there know what they are talking about.

In fact, it is generally a bit crazy to suppose that we have to be knowledgeable about everything to be able to rationally trust things. Human being simply don't have the time to learn enough about everything to do this. An individual has to be willing to delegate such matters to the experts in a particular field. That said, such trust can be eroded over time, if the people one trusts abuse it -- in terms of the field of science in general though, they do a pretty darn good job of remaining trustworthy.

Mr. Blonde made a good exposé over how science works, at least on a conscious and slightly ideological level. But there are oblique passages in it. The main problem is that what most people are missing isn't really a knowledge of scientific theories about all and sundry, what they tend to be missing in information about how the process of research works, whereby the scientific pronouncements are made.

Thing is, scientists don't have to believe in science, ToE included, since they already know how it works. Believing in it would be somehow redundant. Instead they spend time discussing things like what results might be artifacts of the experimental process, and which results are actually real. So from the scientist POW belief is not required as they tend to know where the lapsuses and inconsistencies are located, and how far they can push a theory or a model before it breaks, while trying to work out improvements on it, or entirely new models.

How is believing in the scientific process redundant if you know how it works? I think this is confusing religious faith and rational belief.

From the outside however these activities, and the people engaged in them, do work like a form of modern secular clergy, producing dogmatic statements that have to be accomodated, or rejected as may be the case. So on some levels the scientific community does put it out there that they it Cartmanesque fashion requires you to "Respect mah' Authoritah'!" And there is of course always the possibility for people to embrace "Scientism" as a system of belifs analogous to a religious creed. It's just redundant to do so from the POV of doing science.

It only looks like a "secular clergy" if your knowledge of science is extremely deficient. In this case the solution is better science education, which I fully agree with. That said, on scientific matters one should generally trust the scientists in the appropriate field; they are the experts after all. Does this mean that there are going to be disagreements that the laymen has a lot of trouble understanding? Sure it does, just like most people are lost in a disagreement in theoretical mathematics. Science is often more accessible, but not always. People sometimes simply have to trust scientists to know what they are doing, or accept their own ignorance in a scientific dispute.

The apparent solution would seem to be to educate the public about the process of research rather than request them to swallow the end result of the process of research as articles of faith.

A lot of it has to be accepted on (rational) faith. People don't need to know how their refrigerators work or cars work to use them. Most people don't have the time to learn. That said, there are plenty of scientists in every field who love talking about the intricacies of that field. Most people just aren't interested. Do we need better science education? Sure, it would certainly help people understand the nature of disagreements in science and a deeper understanding of science in general. Those are good things.

The thing is, it's not readily apparent that the professional academic elite of science would be too happy with having the Great Unwashed, the Hoi Polloi, hanging over their shoulders. It would require a democratisation of science and research that in some ways run counter to the interests of this elite. "Respect mah' Authoritha'!", and a popular creed of Scientism, is a lot simpler in many ways. Otoh there might be benefits of such a democratisation, but these are as yet unknown.

I think that's a pretty outrageous thing to say. Questions and discussion are a natural part of the scientific process and you have hundreds of scientists who are happy to talk about their research and what it means, what they were doing and how that fits into their field overall. Most people don't give a darn and only care about the results that affect them. To then label scientists as this elite class that wants the public to stay away from them and never ask questions is just plain false.

As for a democratization of science, I am not sure what you mean. The average person is no more qualified to wade into most scientific disputes than he is qualified to fix his own car. Heck, in general a scientist in one field isn't qualified to wade into the scientific disputes in another field. Expertise matters, especially in science, you really have to know a lot of stuff to do well, and you can't democratize the process in any sort of voting sense. Can the public ask questions? Sure, but the average member of society isn't fit to judge whether one scientific theory is better than another, because they just don't have the knowledge and experience necessary to do so.

Still, the opponents of ToE should perhaps be required to make such an effort to understand research in a more profound way, because this stuff is important.

To bad the opponents aren't open to a rational discussion of ToE or science in general. Third-world dictators should also be nice people and foster democracy......if wishes were horses...

-Drachasor

 

[Verbose]

They aren't asking pointed questions. They believe, based on faith, that Evolution can't be right. Therefore they twist facts, distort evidence, misrepresent scientific discourse, and just plain lie to make Evolution look false. That's not asking honest questions or trying to dispel their own ignorance/doubts or otherwise deal with their concerns in an intellectual honest way. They have an agenda, and that's to get rid of the acceptance and teaching of evolution, and no amount of actual evidence or scientific answers is going to change that. By not seeing this, you are playing their game; they want people to think they are asking legitimate questions and having realistic concerns, that's the cornerstone of their strategy to get rid of Evolution.

With all due respect, you have no idea what my game is here. Lets see if I can make it clearer below (or not).

Don't confuse different types of faith here. You can have faith in a religion, which is accepting things as true without any evidence. You can also have faith in a person, system, organization or something else. The latter type CAN be based on evidence. Do I have "faith", that is trust, that a well-accepted scientific theory is probably pretty much true? Sure I do, because I know that the scientific process is pretty darn good at coming up with good models of reality. I don't personally need to know all the evidence for the model and the lack of evidence. Just like I don't have to know all the details of indoor plumbing to trust that a Plumber knows to do his job (trust subject to changing evidence), I don't need to know every detail about some random field of science to trust the scientists there know what they are talking about.

Except distrust of science is on the rise. Once lost, confidence can't be restored by exhorting the doubters to be more trusting. That's the problem. It would of course be more practical if the legitimate authority of scince wasn't being questioned from the outside, but it is.
We could of course legislate against questioning science, but that would kill some of our most useful notions of science as disinterested truth-seeking. So we are back to arguing and negotiating with the doubters.

In fact, it is generally a bit crazy to suppose that we have to be knowledgeable about everything to be able to rationally trust things. Human being simply don't have the time to learn enough about everything to do this. An individual has to be willing to delegate such matters to the experts in a particular field. That said, such trust can be eroded over time, if the people one trusts abuse it -- in terms of the field of science in general though, they do a pretty darn good job of remaining trustworthy.

That's the feeling of the academic elite of course. The problem isn't that scientists aren't trustworthy, but rather that they do distrust the public to eventually make the right call on their own, when they face questioning. Which is why the public must continue to be kept at arm's length from science.

How is believing in the scientific process redundant if you know how it works? I think this is confusing religious faith and rational belief.

Nope. You tend to need faith to believe in something you cannot see or understand, like God or science, which tends to be the case if you are an outsider to the scientific process. Once in the inside belief in research is not really required, is it, just to know how to use the process.
I think you may be the one confusing the two here.

It only looks like a "secular clergy" if your knowledge of science is extremely deficient. In this case the solution is better science education, which I fully agree with. That said, on scientific matters one should generally trust the scientists in the appropriate field; they are the experts after all. Does this mean that there are going to be disagreements that the laymen has a lot of trouble understanding? Sure it does, just like most people are lost in a disagreement in theoretical mathematics. Science is often more accessible, but not always. People sometimes simply have to trust scientists to know what they are doing, or accept their own ignorance in a scientific dispute.

You're still trying to put it across that the Real Way Things Are here is the scientific insider's POV. Looking at function from an outside perspective, that doesn't hold up.

A lot of it has to be accepted on (rational) faith. People don't need to know how their refrigerators work or cars work to use them. Most people don't have the time to learn. That said, there are plenty of scientists in every field who love talking about the intricacies of that field. Most people just aren't interested. Do we need better science education? Sure, it would certainly help people understand the nature of disagreements in science and a deeper understanding of science in general. Those are good things.

Yes, and it works fine as long as they are simply happy using the gadgets. Problems arise when they start asking questions. Even if they are, and there is no stopping them, they shouldn't really be doing that, should they, as it's not a useful activity from your perspective?

This is about who is allowed to speak in the name of science, and under what conditions.

I think that's a pretty outrageous thing to say. Questions and discussion are a natural part of the scientific process and you have hundreds of scientists who are happy to talk about their research and what it means, what they were doing and how that fits into their field overall. Most people don't give a darn and only care about the results that affect them. To then label scientists as this elite class that wants the public to stay away from them and never ask questions is just plain false.

Being open to questions only really applies if you're an insider. If not, you can be ignored, and mostly you are. Science is an eltist activity. It's inherently designed to be so. It's even internally very stratified. The best and most successful scientists seek out their peers that can give them interesting input on things. As Francis Crick put it: "Don't mix with stupid people", as part of his list of advice on how to win a Nobel Prize.
One of the most salient features of how modern research is organised is actually how to restrict access to the star-scientists, or else they would become totally mobbed by every Tom, Dick and Harry. Restriction of access is essential, or nothing useful will get done.
You want in on the process of research, but can't really bring anything interesting to the table of these top guys? Forget it. You won't be invited to share in the process, but you are free to pick up the results in the other end.

All this of course gets interesting when the public doesn't accept the assigned roles anymore, which I believe is what we are talking about. This occurs on the level of public opinions and politics, from which the represenatives of science feel they should be securely insulated.
What offers this insulation? The public and political sphere for the most part. Science relies on these to uphold its autonomy, which is why the questioning in these spheres actually matters.

As for a democratization of science, I am not sure what you mean. The average person is no more qualified to wade into most scientific disputes than he is qualified to fix his own car. Heck, in general a scientist in one field isn't qualified to wade into the scientific disputes in another field. Expertise matters, especially in science, you really have to know a lot of stuff to do well, and you can't democratize the process in any sort of voting sense. Can the public ask questions? Sure, but the average member of society isn't fit to judge whether one scientific theory is better than another, because they just don't have the knowledge and experience necessary to do so.

Again, that's the inside perspective of the scientific elite, or at least the perspective of someone aspiring to belong to it. I'm not sure which category you personally fall in, but you do sound like deeply entrenched on the inside, so I'll go with scientist for now.

How does this not qualify as "Respect mah' Authorita'!", albeit being framed and presented in a much more reasonable and civilised tone of voice?

Democratisation implies that the way scientific research is organised can change. (And looking at the history of science it probably will, because it always has so far.)
It hasn't been attempted yet, so for the time being it is simply an intellectual exercise to try to think about as a way of catching out how science is organised and positioned in our society — not how scientists regard themselves and their activities, but how it actually operates.

 

[frob2900]

One of the most salient features of how modern research is organised is actually how to restrict access to the star-scientists, or else they would become totally mobbed by every Tom, Dick and Harry. Restriction of access is essential, or nothing useful will get done.
You want in on the process of research, but can't really bring anything interesting to the table of these top guys? Forget it. You won't be invited to share in the process, but you are free to pick up the results in the other end.

I don't understand.

Anyone can subscribe to e.g. Physical Review and read the latest physics research. Heck, its even free if you read the stuff on arXiv. And anyone can submit an article. It might be subject to more rigorous peer review if you're a non-academic, but you can bet your pants it will be accepted for publication if its good.

Einstein, Weierstrass, Ramanujan and Faraday are four examples of "outsiders" who rose to the very top of their fields in mathematics and physics simply on the quality of their work.

Your view on the scientific establishment is very, very glum indeed.

 

[Mr. Blonde]

I don't understand.

Anyone can subscribe to e.g. Physical Review and read the latest physics research. Heck, its even free if you read the stuff on arXiv. And anyone can submit an article. It might be subject to more rigorous peer review if you're a non-academic, but you can bet your pants it will be accepted for publication if its good.

Einstein, Weierstrass, Ramanujan and Faraday are four examples of "outsiders" who rose to the very top of their fields in mathematics and physics simply on the quality of their work.

Your view on the scientific establishment is very, very glum indeed.

Well... the access to publications in scientific journals is expensive, you would have to go to university libraries for free access (and not every Uni has every journal). To dig in primary sources is veeeery tedious, boring and time consuming.
There are of course reviews and books as secondary, refined sources available. But if you are really interested to go to the roots so to say, it is not easy.
Discussions with top-researchers is easy at conferences, as most scientists are a bit vain and very glad to prove their intellect. There are some other cases like Tanaka, the nobel prize winner from I think 2 years ago. He is now "owned" by Merck and refrains from publicity, because he got some troubles with violating his contract with uncensored photos going public (=not from their PR department); and they fear me might talk away some company "secrets" at conferences).

 

[frob2900]

To dig in primary sources is veeeery tedious, boring and time consuming.

Define primary sources. If you mean raw research articles that haven't been polished to textbook quality then I don't sympathize. Scientists have to dig through articles like that all day, so why feel sorry for laymen who have to?

[EDIT] And whats the fascination with "face-to-face" discussions with "top researchers"? That's like saying you are left out of the open source community because you don't have fireside chats with Linus Torvalds.

 

[Che Guava]

Define primary sources. If you mean raw research articles that haven't been polished to textbook quality then I don't sympathize. Scientists have to dig through articles like that all day, so why feel sorry for laymen who have to?

Well, first of all, for scientists, it's thier job! And second of all, most scientific peer-reviewed journals take a certain minimum scientific literacy to fully comprhend, which the average lay person doesn't always have (not to say that they can't get good info out of sci journals, its just harder to draw your own conclusions from the results if the methodology or analysis is too complex)

[EDIT] And whats the fascination with "face-to-face" discussions with "top researchers"? That's like saying you are left out of the open source community because you don't have fireside chats with Linus Torvalds.

If its a subject that you are studying or are working on, its nice to be able to meet the folks that write all those articles...

 

[frob2900]

Well, first of all, for scientists, it's thier job! And second of all, most scientific peer-reviewed journals take a certain minimum scientific literacy to fully comprhend, which the average lay person doesn't always have (not to say that they can't get good info out of sci journals, its just harder to draw your own conclusions from the results if the methodology or analysis is too complex)

But that does not imply a "closed priesthood" that some seem to think science is. If people are so concerned about being left out of science, maybe they should stop watching so much TV and spend some time actually reading. It costs ca $150 to stock up with a library of books that takes you from completely uninitiated to having a full grasp of e.g. quantum mechanics or general relativity. It costs nothing if you go to the library.

I'm not saying that everyone has to do this, of course not. But don't complain about being left out science if you can't bother.

It's a like grossly overweight chain-smoker complaining about being left out of the "sporting establishment".

If its a subject that you are studying or are working on, its nice to be able to meet the folks that write all those articles...

But a completely unrealistic one, and anyone who demands that is just spoilt. I doubt many working scientists have had fireside chats with nobel prize winners.

 

[Mr. Blonde]

Define primary sources. If you mean raw research articles that haven't been polished to textbook quality then I don't sympathize. Scientists have to dig through articles like that all day, so why feel sorry for laymen who have to?

[EDIT] And whats the fascination with "face-to-face" discussions with "top researchers"? That's like saying you are left out of the open source community because you don't have fireside chats with Linus Torvalds.

I did enough digging through papers for my PhD thesis and 3 publications as first author to know how tedious it is to go through scientific journals and PhD thesis. Primary sources are defined as publication that contains a new set of data with all the experimental parameters (at least due to the lecture on publishing I got) whereas secondary sources are compiled from these primary sources - like books and reviews.
Those secondary sources do not contain all data (cherrypicking) and lack information on experimental setups - good for a glance but usually biased towards the editors pov + I don´t trust data without seeing the experimental setup.

Face to face discussion are very valuable to get an informal view on the quality of your work and some suggestions on directions you could go, what the weak points are and how you could overcome them, ect. And sometimes it is just curiosity to see the human behind the name.

Edit: It is not unrealistic to meet the top researchers in your field. For those interested, I am working in the field of liquid chromatography and during my PhD I met Engelhardt, Unger, Svec and Busziewski. That´s 50% of the top people in my field. On 2 conferences I had presentations and got mostly positive feedback from them during coffee breaks.

 

[MobBoss]

The reason why most people are somewhat worried about creationism is probably because that way of thinking and reasoning belongs to the dark Middle Ages in Europe.

Absurd. Need I remind you that it was religious insitutions and religious men that kept science and learning alive during that period?

What brought about the dark ages wasnt that type of thinking, it was pestilance and ceaseless war.

Science and religion should never be integrated.

Some of the brightest scientific minds our world has ever known were religious men.

 

[frob2900]

Some of the brightest scientific minds our world has ever known were religious men.

Yeah, sure, Newton was one. But the thing is, most religious scientists manage to separate God away from the particular thing they are studying.

By that I mean that e.g. Newton believed that God was like a watchmaker who had built the universe to function according to specific mathematical laws. He then proceeded to examine those laws on their own merit and figure out how they worked.

Of course, a religious biologist can do the same thing w.r.t. evolutionary biology. And if the evidence then points to the fact that life is millions or billions of years old and has taken its current form through evolution, then he can accept that on its merits, just like Newton accepted astronomical measurements (of orbits etc.).

It goes bad when you start letting God fight the data.

[EDIT] Oh and re: your claim that its absurd to think that the religious establishment was anti-science during the Renaissance, read about Galileo. Of course, many scientists were also religious back then (like Galileo himself), but that doesn't matter, since the problem was with the religious establishment, who weren't scientists. The pope dictated dogma, and the clergy followed, science be dam-ed!

 

[Verbose]

But a completely unrealistic one, and anyone who demands that is just spoilt. I doubt many working scientists have had fireside chats with nobel prize winners.

On the contrary. If you are really working at the cutting edge in some area of research, then the meaningful stuff will be had in conversation, e-mail etc. within your network. Once it gets into print, it's old as dust.

The Nobel Prize winners, the to-be-Nobel Prize winners and their friends and attendants already make up networks sharing information and results. It depends a bit on what field and what problems they are dealing with (mapping tasks tends to require instant sharing of results, more experimental research can mean a more guarded attitude towards sharing), but on the whole science on this level can be a very intimate social activity. A specific problem may have something like half a dozen senior researchers, and their teams, even capable of understanding the latest research at any given moment.

It's not some fluke that some universities, a few, produce most of the Nobel Prize laureates. And it's not a matter of simply Raw Brainpower somehow mysteriously gravitating to these places. They are nodes where intellectual and material resources have been assembled, and due to this talent and money continue to seek these places out. The odds of winning a Nobel Prize increases dramatically if you get accepted for a position at the Rockefeller University in New York. Then you can get hammered on Saturday night with Nobel Prize winners if you like, or talk shop with the absolute elite in their field of research. That latter would seem to be effective.
Conversly, if you end up in some college at the back of beyond, you are so far out of the loop of this kind of research the best you can do is try to keep up with these guys in retrospect by reading publications. But then you are in no position to actually contribute to their work.

 

[Rhymes]

What pisses me off more then anything else is that creationists say the ToE is only a theory because there is the word "theory" in it.
But it's not theory anymore it's a fact.
It's just like saying that theory of gravity is only a theory and that therefore other theories should also be explored.... .... it's a freaking fact!!!!!!!!

 

[frob2900]

On the contrary. If you are really working at the cutting edge in some area of research, then the meaningful stuff will be had in conversation, e-mail etc. within your network. Once it gets into print, it's old as dust.

Now you are talking about working scientists. I was responding to what I perceived was a claim you made that "It's bad that laymen don't get access to Nobel Prize winners".

I agree with everything you just posted and I can't really respond in any other way to it as it does not address the argument I thought we were having.

 

[IglooDame]

Absurd. Need I remind you that it was religious insitutions and religious men that kept science and learning alive during that period?

What brought about the dark ages wasnt that type of thinking, it was pestilance and ceaseless war.

Some of the brightest scientific minds our world has ever known were religious men.

Like Copernicus and Galileo, right?

 

[frob2900]

What pisses me off more then anything else is that creationists say the ToE is only a theory because there is the word "theory" in it.
But it's not theory anymore it's a fact.
It's just like saying that theory of gravity is only a theory and that therefore other theories should also be explored.... .... it's a freaking fact!!!!!!!!

They aren't facts. They are theories.

Still, that doesn't really mean anything negative. The creationists have latched on to the word as a trump card, and playing that card shows that th rest of their deck is empty (deck of arguments, that is..)

 

[frob2900]

Like Copernicus and Galileo, right?

Copernicus was a catholic priest and Galileo remained a devout catholic all throughout his persecution.