wenn man es nicht weitersagt, wird es keine Idee…

The following text is a comment I posted in the discussion-forum of the TED-Talk shown below. The talk is unsuspicious enough and, besides bioluminescent marvels beneath the thunder of the upper deep, documents the level of sophistication that cephalopods have reached in their ability to use not only colour, light, and shade for the purpose of becoming invisible, but also texture and mobility. They seem to literally meld into their proximity, mimicking rock as blithely as algae, coral or grass. How this kind of domumentary can induce a foaming argument about god, creation, intelligent design and their respective counterparts, is in itself an example for the human capacity to lift impossible weights on a single thread of hair. But the ongoing discussion also offered a chance to address some basic points regarding the differences between the faithbased and the scientific mindset. Since I consider the arguments I deliver to have value beyond the said discussion, I decided to indulge myself and post a duplicate here:

There is, for the most part, an interesting discussion going on about this talk. There are even some well-written articles about the difference between science and faith. But some fundamental differences should be clarified.

First of all one can’t help but be astonished by the cephalopod’s beauty and elegance. But, and this may be the most important aspect of their abilities to mimick their surroundings, the benefits they reap from this astounding adaptability are completely obvious. Richard Dawkins expounds this argument quite often in his “Blind Watchmaker” and “The Ancestor’s Tale”. It is perfectly conceivable that even a small portion of this mimetic capability increased the chances of an ancestral cephalopod to survive longer and procreate more prolifically than another cephalopod who lacked these abilities and thus, gradually and step by step, the bulk of surviving and procreating headfootkind was brought to the level of camouflaging-skill that can be observed today alongside with more and more sophisticated predators.

To address the matter of macroevolution in the real world outside the petri dishes I would like to point to Lake Victoria, where until the insertion of the Nile Perch in 1954 a large number of endemically evolved cichlid species made up the bulk of the lake’s fish population (see this WiKiPedia-Article for a short introduction). Another fine example are the several examples of so-called “ring species” Dawkins mentions in “The Ancestor’s Tale”.

As to the allegedly astronomical odds against our and, speaking of which, the existence of everything: Much more disturbing than the fact that everything seems so well ordained and subtly designed to work together like the mechanics of a very fine watch, would be if it were not so. I would instantly believe in an intelligent designer, which I don’t, if all our existence took place in a transparent dome squatting on the surface of an otherwise totally hostile planet. But it doesn’t. And the fact that everything seems to be just like it ought to be for life to emerge only shows that life doesn’t emerge and flourish under adverse conditions, adversity being a relative term, since some organisms thrive where others wouldn’t stand a minute chance of survival.

As to the difference of “Evolutionism” (which doesn’t exist, as has rightly been pointed out) and “Creationism” (which, sadly, does exist) one has to point out a fundamental difference between science and faith: The point of faith is to overcome doubt. Every moving and heart-rending success-story of a true believer has doubt as a central ingredient: It plays the part of the great deceiver, the adversary to be challenged and overcome. The story’s climax, the final victory, the catharsis of the proselyte is the overcoming of doubt, the slaying of the dragon, the revelation of the simple truth: I believe. The essence of believing truly is to continue doing so at all cost. This is, by the way, why theology disqualifies as a science: It can’t question its fundament, the existence of God.

But this readiness to question fundamental principles is the whole point of science. Contrary to popular belief science isn’t about formulating verifiable theories. It is about formulating theories in order to try and falsify them in order to find better ones. Those theories that can’t be falsified today may serve as preliminary explanatory models to guide the process of questioning. But scientific progress can only be achieved by doubting today’s accepted explanations and trying to falsify them tomorrow. This is how scientific progress is made. To bring it to a simple point: Faith requires the practitioner to believe what others have believed in the past, science requires the practitioner to doubt what has been thought proven in the past.

Thus, what has to be vanquished to become a believer, is what must be nourished to remain a productive scientist.

To clarify the claim of the existence and nonexistence of the “isms” above: An “ism”-type of thoughtmodel claims possession of a fundamental truth, making it possible to sort people into adherents and apostats. Creationism does this, as does its slyer cousin, “intelligent design”: “God made the earth” and “someone must have planned all this”, respectively. Evolutionary theorists don’t. They admit to not know everything. Obviously, not knowing everything makes it impossible to claim a fundamental truth. One of the things you don’t know might just be it. The Darwin quote about the “staggering difficulties” therefore illuminates what lies at the heart of the scientific method: To admit the enormous gaps in the knowledge about and understanding of what we can observe. That evolutionary theory leaves room for doubt isn’t its weakness, it’s its trademark. One can now either go the easy way and fill the gaps in one fell swoop as does the creationist’s argument or one can admit human limits of time and capacity and do what gapfilling is possible adhering to scientific method and leave the remaining gaps to other people’s curiosity and labour.

Sadly, religion in general and creationism in particular, apart from giving no real explanations¹, fail abysmally in conveying even a small glimpse of the vast and staggering complexity and beauty of the world around us. It is scientists, not preachers, who go out there and bring back pictures, movies and, occasionally, knowledge.

1. David Deutsch gives a short and concise definition for a good, a real explanation, in his TED-Talk from Ted-Global last summer. His crucial contention is that in order to really explain something, a theory must consist of hard to vary assertions about reality. Obviously a myth, such as genesis or the implication of an intelligent designer’s purposefully guiding hand, is an easy to vary story: There is no limit to the potential cast available to fill any role in the purported chain of events. How this is different from a scientific modus explicandi is best listened to in Mr. Deutsch’s words here [↩]