RE: Science vs belief again

Hey Brandon,

This letter may not be very well written because of being busy with Stephen’s family and having an awful sore throat—I apologize up front.  One of the grandkids was sick last week, and now both Garry and I are under the weather.  :(   I even went to the doctor, which I almost never do.

And when did I admit that I was wrong about what entropy is?

As far as human civilization, just how is it becoming progressively more complicated over time?  The great civilizations throughout history have been born and died, as would be expected.  For example, the Roman empire became great then degenerated from within, making it more susceptible to conquering invasions.  How does this not fit with entropy?  Human nature has never changed over time—people have always related to each other in similar ways, being honest or dishonest, caring for family or not, reaching for power or not, marrying and having families or not, and so on.  There is no sign of increasing complexity here.  If you’re talking about scientific progress or technology, one might say that human civilization is more complicated—yet these things could not have occurred without outside intelligence—the new knowledge/technology didn’t appear by itself, but was the product of intelligent beings.  

Where the heck did you get those articles and why in the world do you think they present a fossil in the wrong layer? Nothing in the articles said anything of the sort.

Of course they didn’t say anything of the sort—they were written from an evolutionary perspective.  (If I had given you sources written from a creationist perspective, you would have rejected them out of hand.)  Each evolutionary scientist interpreted the evidence to make it fit the evolutionary position.  For example, the smaller T-rex was found in a lower layer than expected.  Rather than considering that this might indicate that the T-rex kind had always existed (from creation onward) and had exhibited almost no change over time other than body size, the scientist simply decided that this was an indication that T-rex had started evolving millions of years earlier.  In the case of the simple creatures in the Burgess shale, the assumption (interpretation of evidence) was that while some of these creatures evolved into more complex creatures, some did not evolve at all, ending up with parallel lines over time, one line not changing at all and the other evolving over time.  

Both you and Dawkins said that if a fossil were found in the wrong layer, it would be evidence against evolution.  Yet there is apparently never a time when an evolutionist would actually consider a fossil to be in a wrong layer—evolutionary scientists always seem to have a reason why this or that fossil isn’t really where it shouldn’t be.  What would it take to believe a fossil was in the wrong place?

you keep on saying that we are looking at the same evidence and coming up with different conclusions. I actually disagree with this. I believe you are NOT looking at the evidence for evolution. I believe that you are glancing at it, and then staring profoundly at the "evidence" that is given to you by creationists. 

The evidence is the direct data—the layers, the fossils, the measurements of K-Ar,  amount of salt in the ocean, and so on.  How are we not looking at the evidence and coming to different conclusions?  For that matter, how are you not ‘glancing at it’ and then staring profoundly at the “evidence” that is given to you by evolutionists?  I think we can agree on most of the direct data—where we differ is in the meaning/interpretation of that data.

the author of the genetic entropy book is not a well-respected anything. He never even got tenure at his university.

Perhaps seeking  tenure wasn’t a major goal for him—could be he was more interested in the practical/business end of genetics than in the academic end.  According to Wikipedia, Sanford is a prolific inventor with more than 30 patents. At Cornell Sanford and colleagues developed the "Biolistic Particle Delivery System" or so-called "gene gun".[1][2]  He is the co-inventor of the Pathogen-derived Resistance (PDR) process and the co-inventor of the genetic vaccination process. He was given the "Distinguished Inventor Award" by the Central New York Patent Law Association in 1990 and 1995. He has founded two biotechnology  companies, Sanford Scientific and Biolistics.  [And when he sold those companies, he was able to retire, although he continued at Cornell as an associate professor.]
Based on this it would be difficult to say that he isn’t well-respected.  

Yes, smaller objects might find their way with a higher probability to the bottom of a bunch of mud, and objects that float would have the property of showing up more often in the upper layers of mud. This does not explain why only less and less complex structures are found in lower and lower strata. Giant trees are found in very low layers, suggesting giant trees have been around for about 400 million years, but the giant trees with complex structures are only found in the upper strata representing more recent evolutionary adaptations. On the other side of the scale, small plants are found throughout the strata, but as you travel further and further down you come across simpler leaves, simpler vascularization, simpler mechanisms of fertilization. That is profound evidence that evolution is real.

Many of the less complex creatures live in or around water and would be the first to be affected by a major flood (such as Noah’s flood).  The giant trees found in lower layers might easily have lived closer to water to begin with, while the more complex trees might easily have lived at higher elevations.  What would you say if a complex tree were found in a lower layer (just as the smaller T-rex was found in a lower layer) than expected?  Everything you said about the significance of giant trees vs more complex trees being in different layers is merely conjecture.

I read Dawkins’ ‘The Greatest Show on Earth’.  Dawkins assumes Darwinian evolution to be a given, a fact rather a theory, then proceeds to interpret the evidence from a Darwinian perspective.  Sometimes he ignores evidence which doesn’t fit.  He insists that newly formed rock doesn’t contain Ar, even though data from a number of studies show otherwise.  He states that fossils are formed in sedimentary rock which is gradually laid down on the floor of a sea or other body of water, and that “corpses trapped in the mud have a chance of fossilizing.”  While it is true that fossils form in sedimentary rock, it doesn’t necessarily follow that the layers were gradually formed over long periods of time, and Dawkins doesn’t explain the conditions under which fossils are formed—how dead animals avoid rotting or being eaten by scavengers long enough to turn into fossils—does he really believe that a dead fish (or whatever organism) sinks to the bottom of a lake or river, then stays there for many years without decaying or being eaten, as the mud gradually covers it up so that it can turn into a fossil?  And how does he account for the occasional patches of fossilized tree trunks having the bottom ends in one layer and the top in another? (I’m sure he’d provide some sort of answer by interpreting the data to fit his position.)  

Okay, this is all I feel like writing right now.  Hopefully, this sore throat will go away soon...

Susan

RE: Science vs belief again

Susan,

Where the heck did you get those articles and why in the world do you think they present a fossil in the wrong layer? Nothing in the articles said anything of the sort. At least one article did say that scientists were surprised by the finding, but nothing was said about the dating of the fossils throwing off a century of work.

Second, I didn't bring it up before because god forbid I make an ad hominem attack on a crank, but the author of the genetic entropy book is not a well-respected anything. He never even got tenure at his university. I checked it out. That's the academic equivalent of failure at life.

Third, your explanation of how the strata got the way they are is very simply reasoned away as false. Yes, smaller objects might find their way with a higher probability to the bottom of a bunch of mud, and objects that float would have the property of showing up more often in the upper layers of mud. This does not explain why only less and less complex structures are found in lower and lower strata. Giant trees are found in very low layers, suggesting giant trees have been around for about 400 million years, but the giant trees with complex structures are only found in the upper strata representing more recent evolutionary adaptations. On the other side of the scale, small plants are found throughout the strata, but as you travel further and further down you come across simpler leaves, simpler vascularization, simpler mechanisms of fertilization. That is profound evidence that evolution is real. By the way, you don't ever have to prove evidence as you suggested in your last email. Evidence is evidence. You only have to "prove" theories based on evidence. That is, you have to make sound deductions from the evidence at hand. Your "the bigger things end up at the top" idea doesn't even fit the evidence. It is not a strong enough assumption to explain the evidence in the strata, I'm sure you see this. Evolution and evolutionary time, though, does give a very clean reason as to why the fossils in the strata are arranged the way they are.

I've got to say that I was very excited by your last email. You attempted to tackle my argument about the evolution of plants in a very direct way. You gave me articles (that you first interpreted for me) and you gave me a third explanation. I was extraordinarily disappointed, though, when I actually read the articles and realized what your third option was going to be. Surely you see how weak they are?

Listen, I have a great idea. Why don't we go to an archeological dig? We can look at the darned strata, and look at the fossils coming out of them. You will see that there are objects of the same size in many of the strata, but the more complex structures (irrespective of size!) only exist in the upper levels. Of course, it would probably be easier to go to a museum, but you've probably been to museum with fossil layers and it hasn't convinced you of much.

Finally, you keep on saying that we are looking at the same evidence and coming up with different conclusions. I actually disagree with this. I believe you are NOT looking at the evidence for evolution. I believe that you are glancing at it, and then staring profoundly at the "evidence" that is given to you by creationists.

OK, one last thing, you were wrong about what entropy is. You admitted it. Yet you still want to halt science in its tracks by hailing entropy again. I will give you another example where something has gotten progressively more complicated over time: human civilization. If you bring it up again, I will give you another example. You are simply misusing the idea of entropy to try to make a point. You've got to bring yourself to stop it. Things can and do become more complicated. Period. (I know saying "period" is redundant when writing, but you get the rhetorical gist.)

As for Jon, of course you could say the same thing about him, but he doesn't care. I do. He's wiling to write you off as a crank; I think you're better than that. That was my point. My point was certainly not to start a dialog between you two. He doesn't want one. But we can have one:)

Also, Jon says that orbits don't degrade unless there's some drag, and he claims there is none with the earth.

Oh! And I forgot to mention, having simple plants and animals in upper strata should in no way be shocking. There are, for example, creatures called "living fossils" that have not changed much in millions and millions of years and therefore their living bodies match their ancestors' fossils very closely. But regardless of the example, common sense would say that if something with a simple structure exists, then it will likely exist for a good while to come. Evolution only makes the prediction that more complex structure will appear at later dates, not that simple structures will disappear at a set time.

Also, Dawkins wrote an entire book explaining how evolution works and presenting evidence for why it is true! He is not engaging in circular thinking in"The Greatest Show on Earth". How can you claim that? He does belittle those he disagrees with, but not as any sort of argument, but for entertainment value! He does present cogent arguments for all of the belittling, though!

Dawkins for instance comes up with a direct attack on the evolutionary entropy guy's argument that evolution can't create new information. Dawkins gives an example of a laboratory study where a bacterium evolved so that it could eat citric acid! By the way, something I listened to recently on NPR suggested that cancer cells end up evolving (very quickly!) into more and more deadly cells, even to the point of developing acid to release the cancer cells from the original cyst and spread further around the body.

I personally love when Dawkins takes on the scientific consequences of events in the Bible. The section on what the dispersal patterns of the animals coming off the Ark would be? Awesome. Totally unlike what we see in the world. Did you read that? Read it again!

-Brandon

"Weak coffee is fit only for lemmas." -Paul Turan

Science vs belief again

Hey Brandon,

Stephen and his family are staying with us for most of June, so I still may be slow to respond at times, even though things are much less hectic than this past weekend.  I want to spend as much time with them as possible, since we don’t often get to see them.

He thinks there is absolutely nothing that could convince you that you are wrong. He says that you are entirely too happy to come up with science that matches your theories rather than looking at evidence and coming up with theories based on that.

It’s really kind of funny—I could easily say the exact same thing about y’all...  :o)   But accusing  or belittling each other won’t do much to advance our conversation and our search for the truth.  I certainly don’t think that if I were to accuse you of being overly biased or closed minded, you would accept that as a valid defense of my position—it would probably anger you.  

The thing is that we both are often looking at the same evidence and coming to different conclusions.  You think your conclusions are correct, and I believe mine are.  Hopefully, we’ll eventually come to an agreement about something—but even if that doesn’t happen for a very long time, just the fact that we are discussing this is a good thing, an experience from which we’ll both learn.  I’m not concerned.  And I’m very much enjoying our discussion.

I therefore think that you must be building an extreme form of cognitive dissonance in your mind. This cognitive dissonance surely will lead to a coming-to-god moment where you see your own ideas contradict each other. I believe that happened with our conversation on entropy, and I believe it will happen again.

I have to disagree with you here—I’m experiencing no cognitive dissonance at all, because I see no contradiction between science and Biblical creation.  From my perspective, scientific evidence fits very well with the creationist viewpoint, and I believe that evolutionists have to jump through too many hoops in order to interpret the evidence in a way that fits their perspective. I think all the evidences I’ve provided so far fit much better with the creationist perspective than with Darwinian evolution.  I still think entropy is a very good evidence against evolution, and you have yet to explain scientifically how evolution can overcome entropy.  Dawkins seems to assume that evolution is true and makes little effort to provide a logical basis for his assumption—he merely interprets evidence from an evolutionary perspective and belittles those who disagree, which isn’t much of an argument.

You can, though, prove with a mountain of evidence to the fullest extent that anything can be proved scientifically that evolution did in fact occur. With equal rigor but much less effort can one prove that the earth is certainly not, not, not 10,000 years old.

Again, I have to disagree with you.  Neither of us will ever be able to account for all the unknowns in either perspective, but in my mind, scientific data—the evidence that scientists have observed—fit much better with Biblical creation.   If you can scientifically prove that the earth is very old, then do so and explain to me how my evidences for a young earth are invalid—tell me why there isn’t more salt in the oceans, how the earth managed to stay in the proper orbit for life to exist, and so on.   

you'll bring up a scientific tool (like carbon dating, or any other atomic clock, or fossil strata), and then you'll say that there has been at least one instance where this tool gave an incorrect result (such as scientists having gotten a date wrong or one instance where the strata were upside down). Just because something fails once doesn't mean that it doesn't work.

You’re quite correct that a single failure doesn’t necessarily mean anything—it could just be an outlier.  On the other hand, when a particular scientific tool, such as the K-Ar dating method, is found to be faulty a number of times, one has to consider the possibility that something is wrong—basic assumptions may be wrong (such as assuming no Ar in newly formed rock, as Dawkins did), the data may be being misinterpreted, or there may be other unknown factors affecting the tool.  I can give you a list of a number of relatively recent rock formations which were incorrectly dated by the usual methods used by evolutionists.  I mentioned only Mt. St. Helens because it is most well known and has been extensively studied.

Over the course of our discussion, I’ve gone overboard in using secular sources to support my positions.   The book I sent you is supported by  mostly secular research.  I’m trying to do everything possible to be as objective as possible and to let the data speak for itself.   Even the book’s author was a respected scientist in his field, not just “some Christian nutcase working for a creationist think tank”, and he started off accepting evolution as truth—he has looked at the evidence from both sides.   

In an earlier letter, you admitted that if fossils could be found in the wrong layer, it would be a good evidence against evolution. (Even Dawkins said this.)  So, here are several examples of fossils found in wrong layers, either earlier or later than the time expected by evolutionists.  However, rather than accepting that these fossils could be evidence against evolution (and for creation), the scientists  involved simply adjusted their interpretation of the fossil finds in order to make them fit with evolution.  
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/science/09/17/tiny.t-rex.dinosaur.discovered  “Tiny T-rex Fossil Discovery Startles Scientists”  In this article, the T-rex fossil was found at a much lower (older) level than expected.
http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/teeth-of-tyrannosaurus-ancestor-datingback-140-mil-years-found-in-hyogo  This is similar to the find in the above article.
Van Roy, P. et al. 2010. Ordovician faunas of Burgess Shale type. Nature. 465 (7295): 215-218. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v465/n7295/full/nature09038.html (if you don’t have access at school, you’d have to pay to read the whole article)  While this article interprets this find from an evolutionary perspective, it’s still a case of a fossil found at the wrong level (simple organisms were found at a much more recent age than expected).

One of the claims of the book is that the lower or more ancient strata contain fossils of much simpler plants (and no complex plants!) and the higher or more recent strata contain much more complicated fossilized structures in plants. The book is then able to date the evolution of the first trees to about 365 million years ago. It seems to me that you have two choices: 1) you don't believe the evidence that the book claims, that is you don't believe that there is strata of dirt across the globe where the lower layers have simpler plants (of course you could check it yourself), or 2) you agree that this is powerful evidence of evolution of plants!

I do have another choice.  Yes, there are strata of dirt where lower layers generally have simpler plants (this is the data), but my interpretation of these layers would be different.  An evolutionist would say that these layers were deposited over long periods of time, with lower layers containing much simpler plants and higher layers containing more complex plants that had evolved from the earlier plants.  A creationist would say that the various layers were deposited during the flood year, and in the time after the flood as the waters receded. A creationist would say that all the different kinds of plants/animals existed from the very beginning (with relatively minor variations of adaptation), but they ended up in different layers due to factors such as flood conditions, ability to float, or ability to live longer in water.  It’s natural for smaller, weaker organisms to be drowned and/or settle to the bottom first—these would end up in the lower layers.  (if you’ve ever noticed how rocks sort out in water, you’ll see that the sand settles underneath the larger pebbles and rocks)  The larger, stronger, more complex creatures would be able to survive in the floodwaters longer before finally getting stuck in a higher layer.  Some plants, such as trees, might even float on the surface for quite awhile before finally sinking and being embedded in an even higher layer.    This is another example of how the same data (layers with different types of organisms) can be interpreted in different ways.  How would you prove the evolutionist interpretation of the data?  

(Somewhere I’ve read that pollen grains were found in layers below where they should have been from an evolutionary perspective—this would be another example of fossils in the wrong layer.  This could easily happen in a flood situation, with smaller pollen being deposited in lower layers of silt. When I get a chance I’ll try to find the article again. )

Okay, this is enough for this letter, and I need to get some sleep. :)

Susan

Re: article on science vs belief

Hey Susan,

I imagine you enjoyed the hectic change of pace you just lived through. It's nice to have my email buddy back, though. 

Well, back to evolution. I suggested to Jon that y'all should have a conversation about the topic since he is so knowledgable. His response was: what's the point? He thinks there is absolutely nothing that could convince you that you are wrong. He says that you are entirely too happy to come up with science that matches your theories rather than looking at evidence and coming up with theories based on that.

I must say that I'm prone to believe him. I hold out some wild hope, though, that he's wrong. This is the definition of madness or delusion, though. Why should I be the one person who is able to convince a devout young-earth creationist that they are completely and wildly wrong? It's like our damn cat. Everyone thinks they're going to be the one person Meechi doesn't bite, inspite of all the warnings otherwise. And then they get bitten. Sometimes twice!

But I think that it's not me that's the special case here but you. You are intelligent, yes, but thats not all. You seem to believe in science. You want to fight evolutionists on their own terms, using science. You never resort to appeals to a god's magic. I therefore think that you must be building an extreme form of cognitive dissonance in your mind. This cognitive dissonance surely will lead to a coming-to-god moment where you see your own ideas contradict each other. I believe that happened with our conversation on entropy, and I believe it will happen again. 

You mentioned "proof" in your last email. I think you hold in too high esteem the idea of proof. There is no way to prove undeniably, irrevocably anything outside of mathematics. If you are claiming that no one can prove mathematically that evolution occurred, then you are right. You can, though, prove with a mountain of evidence to the fullest extent that anything can be proved scientifically that evolution did in fact occur. With equal rigor but much less effort can one prove that the earth is certainly not, not, not 10,000 years old. 

All of this is talking AROUND the issue, though. Why don't you tell me what you think are the flimsiest parts of your own argument, and then argue against them as if you were me. Then at least I would know if and where the cognitive dissonance lies. At least then I'd know there's a reason to keep on writing you about this, other than for odd entertainment value.

There are very simple clear things we can focus on, and yet we waste so many words on stuff that gets us nowhere. 

One thing that will never convince me of anything and shouldn't convince you either is this idea that you bring up over and over: you'll bring up a scientific tool (like carbon dating, or any other atomic clock, or fossil strata), and then you'll say that there has been at least one instance where this tool gave an incorrect result (such as scientists having gotten a date wrong or one instance where the strata were upside down). Just because something fails once doesn't mean that it doesn't work. I've seen broken wristwatches, but I still believe in the forward motion of time! Yes, these instances are interesting, but they shouldn't cause you to completely disregard the science behind the tools! Do you agree?

If you agree let's go back to fossil strata. I'm reading a book right now that's pretty awesome that's called The Evolution of Plants. It's actually more of a text book, actually. You'd probably go gaga for all the footnotes. I'm reading the chapter about the evolution of trees, and it's pretty exciting stuff. One of the claims of the book is that the lower or more ancient strata contain fossils of much simpler plants (and no complex plants!) and the higher or more recent strata contain much more complicated fossilized structures in plants. The book is then able to date the evolution of the first trees to about 365 million years ago. It seems to me that you have two choices: 1) you don't believe the evidence that the book claims, that is you don't believe that there is strata of dirt across the globe where the lower layers have simpler plants (of course you could check it yourself), or 2) you agree that this is powerful evidence of evolution of plants!

Do you agree? Or do you have some third thing I haven't thought of?

By the way, I just read about the evolution of the leaf, and it was pretty exciting! It seems about 400mya it was too hot for it to be reasonable to have a broad flat leaf because it would presumably burn up, but then the atmosphere and climate dramatically changed, it got cooler and co2 levels got higher, so the needly plants developed webbing between the "needles" and the needles became the vasculature of the leaves! Very exciting! You'd probably have to read the book to get a real feel for it. It's got very good pictures, too. I got the book from interlibrary loan, btw. 

-Brandon

Re: article on science vs belief

Hey Brandon,

Sorry about taking longer than usual to reply—it was very hectic here this weekend with a houseful of relatives—things have mostly  calmed down now.

Have you had time to fix the wallpaper on our blog so that the posts can be read?

The article about science vs beliefs made some good points.  People on both sides do tend to reject science and resist persuasion when it doesn’t fit their pre-determined beliefs, and that can definitely be a problem.  On the other hand, the author seems to have pre-determined beliefs of his own—he’s not as objective or unbiased as he would like his readers to think.  It’s almost as if he has put his readers in a box—if they agree with his ideas about science, they’re fine, but if they disagree, they are automatically assumed to be unfairly biased or unscientific—thereby shutting down any meaningful conversation before it can even get started.

Evolution doubters present science as an atheistic conspiracy; antivaccination advocates consider the biomedical research community to be hopelessly corrupted by the pharmaceutical industry...

The author seems to assume that all evolution doubters and antivaccination advocates ignore science and base their beliefs on other factors instead.  He is painting with too broad a brush and mislabeling many people.  While there  may be some evolution doubters and antivaccination advocates who ignore science, there are many more who do not.  Same for those who have doubts about manmade global warming. The author doesn’t seem to allow for the possibility that people can disagree with (what he considers to be) current scientific consensus for scientific, and not just ideological, reasons.

What Munro examines here is an alternative approach: the decision that, regardless of the methodological details, a topic is just not accessible to scientific analysis. This approach also has a prominent place among those who disregard scientific information, ranging from the very narrow—people who argue that the climate is simply too complicated to understand—to the extremely broad, such as those among the creationist movement who argue that the only valid science takes place in the controlled environs of a lab, and thereby dismiss not only evolution, but geology, astronomy, etc.

Again, the author paints with an overly broad brush, and also seems to misunderstand what science can and cannot do.  He does not seem to understand the difference between inductive and deductive (empirical) science, nor does he seem to understand the limitations of science.  

An excerpt from an  earlier email fits well here:

At its foundation, science is the search for truth. It is a given that no one can know all truth, as the sphere of knowledge is far too big.  Therefore, it is quite likely that truth exists for which we have no conclusive scientific proof.  

There are two basic forms of scientific study: empirical (deductive) science and inductive science.   In empirical science, one makes an hypothesis, then runs an experiment to test the hypothesis.  Such experiments may be replicated many times, giving increasing confidence that the hypothesis is true.  Inductive science is what one does when an hypothesis cannot be tested in the present.  In inductive science, one makes an hypothesis, then  looks at available evidence to see if it fits the hypothesis.  The more evidence fits the hypothesis, the more confident one can be that the hypothesis is correct.  This is something that archeologists, forensic scientists (Mr. Green, in the kitchen, with the candlestick), evolutionists, and creationists do.  One cannot go back and observe a past culture, geologic formation, crime in action, or development of species, but must come to a conclusion based on evidence available in the present.  Neither evolutionists nor creationists can conclusively prove their perspective solely on the basis of inductive science.  

Some things cannot be proven by empirical science.  While empirical science can show how things work now, it cannot prove how things happened in the past.  The presence or absence of God cannot be proven by empirical science.  My love for my family cannot be proven.  What I’m thinking or how I make the choices I make cannot be proven.  How the first living organisms came into being cannot be proven. While one can make inferences about these based on observed evidence, the evidence itself doesn’t prove, or disprove, anything.  The idea that the only way to know something for sure is through empirical science has not been proven empirically.

Everyone, including you and me, carries some bias—it’s a given.  We can’t help it.  However, if we truly want to find the truth, we will, eventually.  Good scientists recognize the tendency toward bias and try to account for it in their research.  Those who cherry pick or misinterpret data to make it fit with their preconceived ideas stray from good science and mislead many people.

In our discussion here, I’m working from the basis of a mutual desire to find the truth.  You have a certain perspective, and I expect you to provide evidence and a logical foundation for it, just as  you expect me to provide evidence and a logical rationale for my viewpoint.  Unlike the author of this article, I’m not putting you in a box (and I hope you don’t put me in one).  Again, as I’ve said in an earlier email,

That we come to different conclusions is not a sign that one of us lacks intelligence, has no curiosity, or hasn’t studied the evidence.   The only difference between us is that we are each looking at the evidence through a different set of lenses (different worldviews, if you will).  We each see our perspective as being the correct one, and we’d each like the other to come to our own way of seeing things.  It’s a given that you’ll try to persuade me, and I’ll try to persuade you.  That’s a good thing—in the process of trying to persuade each other, we’ll each become exposed to new ideas and evidence, will be forced to examine the evidence and our logic and worldview to see where our thinking may have gone astray, and will eventually see what is the actual truth.  If we don’t go through this process, we run the danger of becoming closed-minded and of failing to see and correct our own blind spots.  A person who has the attitude of “I’m right, you’re wrong, and that’s that”, no matter what his/her perspective, is on the way to becoming an arrogant fool, incapable of learning or developing wisdom.  I don’t think either of us wants to fall into that category. :)

Normally, I don’t copy so much from past emails, but I thought that this would be a good way to incorporate some of our discussion that took place before you started the blog, especially since it seemed to fit so well here.

Susan