david f wrote;

"In science proof is never established we merely have plausible explanations which can be overthrown by new evidence or new insights."

Thusly you have defined proof.

If you are saying there is no objectivity, thus no inherent proofs, then l agree. All things are causal and conditional.

"Newton's laws of motion were unchallenged until the twentieth century when they proved to be a special case of..."

Hence, that which was plausably explained was subsumed by new knowledge. This l would call proof or if you prefer... proved.

l would suggest that proof is subject to the conditions of the environment in which it arises, namely consciousness. Consciousness may be possibly defined as subjective (the subject who possesses it), propelled by experience (the basis of knowing and knowledge). As experience and knowledge (consciousness) operate on a coninuous feedback loop, its 'proofs' are in a persistent state of flux or evolution.

Still they are established, the just dont last, like everything.

Thanks runner for the link to 'answers in Genesis'. I read it with an open mind as you suggested and noted the writer's interpretation of the data. The data shows that superbugs mutate to become antibiotic resistant, but the same mutations also cause a decrease in the superbugs' metabolic efficiency. That is the data on which we agree.

The writer believes this data demolishes evolutionary theory because the adaptations to the hospital environment are maladaptive in other ways. This view is based on the radical misunderstanding or misrepresentation that evolutionary theory requires organisms to adapt perfectly. It does no such thing. When a scientists misrepresents a theory and then use it to misinterpret data, it is a good example of the 'perversion of scientific debate' that Professor Brooks referred to.

Using the writer's logic, polar bears are also "proof" that evolutionary theory fails, since their adaptations to the arctic environment are hopeless for living at the equator. Well, polar bears don't live at the equator, and superbugs don't live outside hospitals.

Because the data shows organisms adapting, albeit imperfectly, to their environment, it supports the predictions of evolutionary theory. The superbugs do better in the antibiotic-saturated hospital environment. Outside the hospitals, regular bugs do better because of their more efficient metabolism that doesn't have antibiotic resistance.

Evolutionary theory entails that mutations are hit-and-miss affairs which may or may not result in benefits. The only reason we get the incredibly complex organisms we see is because so many mutations are churned out, and they are "saved up" down the generations. We have seen that long-dormant genes can 'switch on' again in response to environmental changes - even within a single generation. All part and parcel of the happenstance of mutation and natural selection, which are two things that the writer supports and affirms in the article.

In fact, the data raises more problems for proponents of intelligent design, since it's hardly intelligent design to give one feature while decreasing the efficiency of another essential one.

Barry Brook has misquoted me. I have not said that we will never understand climate. My exact words were these: 'it seems to me that we barely understand ‘climate’. It is too vast a domain. Satellites have given us a real sense of the movement of weather systems around the planet, and they are portrayed every night on the TV news, but we still know very little about the oceans, one of the crucial elements in climate processes, not much more about the atmosphere, another such element, a little about solar energy and the effect of the sun’s magnetic field on earth, and only a little about the land. The earth is a big place. We have only just begun to put these huge elements together, and have yet to develop a ‘science’ that does so satisfactorily.... as I see it, ‘climate science’ is most usefully seen as a developing area, with a great deal still to be done before it is agreed that we know what we are talking about.' I stick by those words.

And I give only two cheers for 'peer review', because it is a domain I know very well. It supports orthodoxy, other things being equal, and AGW is current orthodoxy. It seems, put simply, hard for anti-AGW scientists to get their work published in most journals, but quite easy for cofnirming articles to get published. That is par for the course in every displine: orthodoxy wins most times.

Trolls exist on both sides of the global warming argument. On one side are those who deny it. On the other are those who say "the argument is over, the science is settled". Flip sides of the same coin.

Barry Brooks, implicitly if not explicitly, argues for the latter.

There are many different factors to be considered, what is dangerous are the trolls on both sides. Algorians demand that we accept a whole package, and brand us as trolls if we don't. Science demands that we continue to debate each issue, not just the "whole package" as demanded by politicians and troll "scientists".

Good science surely requires vigorous continuing investigation and debate of the multitude of factors involved, and in this context Brook's article is of little value.

Trade215 “Article is an expansive ad hom attack, hence illogical.”

Well said, I agree with trade215.

David f “In science proof is never established we merely have plausible explanations which can be overthrown by new evidence or new insights.”

If that is the case, all “science” is really “art”, where sometimes “impressions, opinion and conjecture” substitute for truth.

Certainly, the supposed science of climate change modelling is pure “art” based on theories of consequences and effects and using samples the significance of which is ponderable / disputable.

Somehow, making predictions about the future of our climate on a process which is subjective suffers the variability of other arts, where the same woman is painted by a cubist, impressionist, realist or presented in any other manner. The outcome of the artistic analysis is as variable as the painter chooses and that not a good basis for deciding what the future may hold.

Reason is crucial to clear communication. Its very nature is connected to the concept of language and in this respect, if we believe in the importance of the human desire to communicate, we have to believe in reason. We have now a communications medium like the internet that is unlike others that were one to many forms. The internet is communications many to many. I find this truly significant.

The Enlightenment we understood as a struggle in the name of reason, against tyranny, superstition and inequity, and here I feel we are seeing our new enlightenment, the 360 degrees of an infinite meta-narrative with its global network of moderators and always connected, hopefully helping us to a better understanding of science.

However there still persists a priest class that promotes this belief in a finite, expanding universe, a la the big bang cosmological nonsense model. Now that is belief in belief or religion which generally builds down from some anthropic principle using deduction. Of course even though billions is spent, we simply do not find one skerrick of deductive evidence for a finite gravity only universe. It is not hard to see AGW alarmism similarly.
e.g.
All the people involved with the bigbang nonsense and AGW are not about DISCOVERY but are involved in an outcome directed pseudo science trying to force/fudge raw data to conform to something that is expected to be seen. I believe that good scientific knowledge is learned, by studying those things that do not fit what you expected. i.e. WHY this particular data set is not conforming to the conventional theories or .... gosh that's funny peculiar.