The Chronicle: Colloquy: Responses

Ha, ha, ha! Profs. Okimoto (399, if I read it correctly) and Moody (404) agree on one pro-ID point: that ID hasn't been strongly falsified. They agree that there is a distinction between hard and weak falsification. I don't agree, since any case of one kind of falsification can be redescribed as a case of the other kind. That the earth is flat (or that the Ptolmeic cosmology is true, if you like) has been strongly falsified (i.e., shown to be irreconcilable with observation), but this is weak falsification (i.e., showing to be superfluous), too, in that we may acknowledge, albeit fancifully, that the earth might actually be flat but appear round due to a bizarre set of circumstances, even though so far we are justified in believing otherwise. Similarly, ID has been weakly falsified, as Profs. Moody and Okimoto would say, but it has also been strongly falsified, in that we know that life came from natural processes. The trouble with the distinction is that if you are justified in believing that the earth is round or if you know that life came from natural processes, then you are justified in believing that the earth is not flat and that ID is false. The distinction rests on the difference between direct falsification and roundabout falsification (i.e., requiring great detours into various assumptions and arguments, e.g., the falsification of Ptolmetic cosmology). But the latter difference, though real, is one of degree. Nor is the directest of falsifications made without assumptions and arguments. So, the strong-weak distinction doesn't hold. There's nothing weak about "weak falsification." It's just indirect. But it can be as utter and complete as "strong falsification."

What does this epistemology have to do with the colloquy? Well, ID will continue to pester us for a place in the curriculum if we allow that it hasn't been falsified as fully as the flat-earth theory (with high school curriculum managers saying, "Well, er, um, that's true, ID hasn't been strongly falsified. The ID people do have a point there..."). The abundance of evidence Prof. Okimoto and others have here so ably marshaled against ID is enough to place it squarely in the "falsified" basket. Prof. Okimoto at the last minute agrees with Prof. Moody that it does not, due to the idea that ID has not been "strongly falsified." But there's no such thing as "strongly falsified." ID has, however, been "completely" falsified (i.e., enough to justify the claim that we know it to be false). I wonder whether Prof. Moody or Prof. Okimoto would agree that it has if they were to agree with everything else I've said in this posting. I guess Prof. Okimoto would. I guess Prof. Moody would not, but he might just shock us. It would be a hoot if I managed to score his concession here in the 400's of postings. I won't bet on it.

: -- Jim Ryan, philosophy prof., Huron College (posted 2/11, 10:30 a.m., U.S. Eastern time)

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