Answering McLean v. Arkansas

Creation vs. Evolution: Answering McLean v. Arkansas · New blog on the kid: How Can People in This Day and Age be Anything But Communist? Because we Can!

Dr. Nathaniel Jeanson is giving his defense of Traced:

Evolutionists Do NOT Want You to Know This . . . | Traced: Episode 16
Answers in Genesis, 17 Febr. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sbiHj_0r4o

In it he mentions that ...

A Court ruled "creation science is not science"
https://bertie.ccsu.edu/naturesci/evolution/unit16creationsci/overton.html#Heading10

and I look up this quote:

More precisely, the essential characteristics of science are: (1) It is guided by natural law; (2) It has to be explanatory by reference to nature law; (3) It is testable against the empirical world; (4) Its conclusions are tentative, i.e. are not necessarily the final word; and (5) Its is falsifiable. (Ruse and other science witnesses).

Let's start with the last.

Ruse and other science witnesses

This is the kind of testimony that's called "expert witness" ... which is highly overrated in courts.

For one thing, there can be things there is no expertise on. Romans had no word for "expert" - while the word "expert" comes from Latin "expertus" that word was an adjective meaning experienced, not a nouns referring to a specific status. There were words for specific types of expertise. Medicus is physician, architectus is architect, faber is ... none of these things are close to what Ruse and the rest pretended to be experts on. I'll respect, usually, as a matter of general principle, an expert in ballistics - was the bullet fired at close or far range and such things.

Next to the points. The more specific ones.

(1) It is guided by natural law;

I am indifferent as to whether a statement that God omnipotent did a certain thing is labelled "science" or "philosophy" - if it is admissible in science, fine, if not, I ask scientists to not impinge on philosophy.

The idea that all that is and happens is there or happens because of "natural law," (the phrase actually means something different), or because of constants or processes described by natural laws (like Ohm's law or a Maxwell equation) is what in philosophy is called "materialism" it is one school and not the only one, it is also a false school. Scientists who are amateur philosophers and confessional atheists shall not have the audacity to first dismiss all philosophical objections to materialism by "we are doing science, not philosophy" and then turn around and do bad philosophy while pretending to do science.

The conclusion that some thing or even ultimately every thing is there or happens for a reason not reducible to either natural laws or more properly causalities described by such is one that one must be able to reach.

Otherwise this first criterium violates criterium "(5) Its is falsifiable" - very blatantly.

(2) It has to be explanatory by reference to nature law;

Synonymous to previous.

(3) It is testable against the empirical world;

Materialism isn't.

Any explanation that explains parts of the empirical world, which includes the fact we have consciousness and the fact we reason and the fact we make moral judgements, and a lot of historic allegations, such that Hume cannot safely state that absence of miracles is an empirical given, it's just that Hume was ignorant of empirical history, any explanation that explains parts of it, is ipso facto testable - if it explains what is there, and doesn't explain sth which according to it should be there and isn't.

Materialism isn't testable against the empirical world, since it ignores:

• the fact we have consciousness
• the fact we reason
• the fact we make moral judgements
• a lot of historic allegations,

Or rather, is refuted by these.

(4) Its conclusions are tentative, i.e. are not necessarily the final word;

Unlike the philosophical part, and the theological part ... well, can science know its limits?

Apparently not.

Some want to state:

• "God created" is part of a religious dogmatic system
• religious dogmatic systems are not science
• therefore "God created" is not science
• therefore science must discuss the question as if "God didn't create"

Which for one obviously conflates "science" with "any discipline that deals with objective reality" and on top of that conflates "being part of a religious dogmatic system" with "being a religious dogmatic system" ... again, if science is only for things that are non-final (which would mean Mathematics is no science, since it is final that 2 + 2 = 4), so be it, provided that one accepts other disciplines having the capacity to make final decisions. AND those other disciplines dealing with the natural world. AND they would be relevant for science class, since "natural science" as a school subject is more concerned with the observable constants in the natural world, and less with the philosophical minutiae about how we arrive at truths about them. Note, I don't pretend it would be totally irrelevant, in fact, I think too little is stated in specific cases on how people with the status of scientist arrive at certain conclusions. But this five point rigmarole programme has probably been repeated more than once in science classes after January 5, 1982.

But the worst equivocation is obviously pushing one answer outside the subject and pretending its opposite is to be assumed as true inside the subject. Affirming and negating a thing answer the same question, and the subject matters are about the questions. The very idea of science is against this way of deciding a fact question based on a pure formality.

(5) Its is falsifiable.

If nothing existed, God existing would be falsified. We wouldn't be there to do the falsification, but it would be falsified. Again, if nothing except God existed, "God created" would be falsified. We wouldn't be there to do the falsification, but it would be falsified, and God would do the falsification.

If no minds existed, it would be falsified to say "we have minds because God gave us them" - we wouldn't be there to make the falsification, but it would be falsified.

So, lots of bad or ambiguous criteria are on top of that shoddily applied in that judgement - because the judge refused to treat expert witnesses as if they were themselves on trial. He bowed down to them, as if they were his judges.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
St. Alexis Falconieri
17.II.2023

Florentiae natalis sancti Alexii Falconerii Confessoris, e septem Fundatoribus Ordinis Servorum beatae Mariae Virginis; qui, decimo supra centesimum vitae suae anno, Christi Jesu et Angelorum praesentia recreatus, beato fine quievit. Ipsius tamen ac Sociorum festum pridie Idus Februarii celebratur.

Answers in Genesis Seems to Claim, a Few Centuries Back All Who Have Descendants Have All As Descendants

The British are French, and the French are British! (Part 2)
23rd March 2020 | Answers in Genesis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upQWyxaVEWc

Now, the idea is, follow the branchings out back as far as possible with theoretic numbers, reach a point when ancestors were more than the actual world population, and from there go back a bit further to a time when everyone alive then either has everyone or no one now as descendant.

There was such a time, sure enough, and it is called the Flood. Noah and his wife have everyone as descendants. Arguably all of the three sons and daughters in law have so too, since sons of Shem would marry daughters of Cham or Japheth, sons of Cham marry daughters of Shem and Japheth, sons of Japheth marry daughters of Shem and Cham. Though this is not necessary.

If Shem, Cham and Japheth had brothers and these were not fathers of Noah's daughters in law, that is if they did not marry their nieces, these brothers have no descendants. But it is obviously also possible Noah had no children earlier on, and had these so late because he was long stopped from marrying.

Now, there were certainly very many alive 2241 after Creation who have no descendants today. This would obviously include the Solo Man version of Homo erectus, since the potassium argon dates point to volcanic activity and rapid cooling of lava during the Flood. From 2242 after Creation, they are gone.

But the video basically claims that a few centuries earlier than 1100's, we get to a point where this is true for a wider community of people than Noah and his sons. I don't think this is true. It does not take into account, sufficiently, the actual degree of inbreeding in most localities. Cities are untypical, a city person will arguably have a very branched out ancestry, if he's not a newcomer from the countryside. I think royalties are very much more typical. The available "households" would be roughly equivalent to those in a couple of villages near each other.

Marie-Antoinette* had among the "64 ancestors" (2 - 4 - 8 - 16 - 32 - 64, sixth generation exclusive or seventh inclusive of her and back), 42 different persons known to wikipedians by name and date, 4 totally unknown, one woman unknown to dates, and her husband probably lived to 60 by an estimate so, 42 people I did demographic age statistics about and 6 more, adds up to 48 actual different people.

Louis XVI** seems to have had no unknowns in that generation, no more recent addition from recently reichsunmittelbar principality Öttingen, wait, 90 ? / 91 ? were actually unknown even to Polish wikipedians, but he had the following coincidences : 72/73 = 70/71 (-2), 76/77 = 64/65 (-2), 104/105 = 98/99 (-2), so, 64 - 6 = 58. Both of them - Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette - had ancestry from a daughter of James VI & I, with his wife who was a Danish princess, the one who married the Winter King, and both of them also had ancestry in Mantua, the Gonzagas.

For George III*** the 64 ancestors involved 44 non-coinciding ones, Mary I*** of Portugal 30 different ones, Sisi*** 46 different ones.

(58 + 48 + 46 + 44 + 30)/5 = 45.2. So, 150 years back (if you count 25 years by generation) = 45.2 ancestors. Let's use this medium and let's round off to actual people.

2000 - 150
= 1850 45
1850 - 150
= 1700 2043
1700 - 150
= 1550 92,345
1550 - 150
= 1400 4,174,012
1400 - 150
= 1250 188,665,362

This is less than 400 or 416 million as estimated by UN° and by Biraben°°.

1250 - 150
= 1100 8,527,674,379

At 1100 one would be at 8 billion, more than today's population, therefore against the estimates ranging 301 to 353 million. Here one would have to have more connections between lines leading up to today, but this only works that way if you insist on treating the globe as a whole.

The thing is, most populations in most localities would have come up to such a limit far more recently, going back, meaning, they are far more connected inside, but on the other hand need not be as connected to other communities.

The more local communites or religious ones or so on and so forth are not watertightly separated, but connections between them are before very recent times, less ubiquitous. And not having any descendant in your own community sometimes simply means you or your whole offspring moved or was removed to another one. Turks and Austrians are connected, partly because some Turkish militaries became prisoners of war and some stayed, and partly because Turks took slaves around Vienna and brought them to Turkey. This certainly doesn't mean every one in Turkey and every one in Austria have the same set of ancestors, they have different sets partly overlapping.

After the Roman Empire connected people from Atlantic to Euphrates, the Middle Ages started to sort out more local attachments. How widely or narrowly a set is connected as claimed in video for whole of mankind depends on the century.

The geneticist claimed the Mongol invasion shows up ... does it in Japan? In South African non-Whites? In Esquimaux and Amerindians? You see what I mean.

Obviously this also means, the Old World's Northern Hemisphere's Whites are the most and its Yellows the second most widely connected population.

And to some extent, less connected communities may be less likely to survive in the long run. But this does not mean the modern rate of connection is a fatality or necessity any more than it means it is per se sinful or deplorable - it depends on what you do with it. However, Covid and other considerations might mean connections might slow down after a while.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Feast of Mary the Blessed Virgin as Queen
31.V.2021

PS, their PhD, probably geneticists is called Nathaniel Jeanson./HGL

* Φιλολoγικά/Philologica : Sur les Dévanceurs de Marie-Antoinette
http://filolohika.blogspot.com/2015/01/sur-les-devanceurs-de-marie-antoinette.html ** Φιλολoγικά/Philologica : Et les ancêtres du roi martyr? Regardons aussi la parité entre les sexes ... ou même le privilège féminin
http://filolohika.blogspot.com/2015/01/et-les-ancetres-du-roi-martyr-regardons.html *** Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : Two Videos Denouncing "Inbreeding"
http://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2019/04/two-videos-denouncing-inbreeding.html ° https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimates_of_historical_world_population Footnote 16 : "The World at Six Billion", 1999.
https://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/sixbillion/sixbillion.htm °° Footnote 20 : Slightly updated data from original paper in French: (a) Jean-Noël Biraben, 1980, "An Essay Concerning Mankind's Evolution", Population, Selected Papers, Vol. 4, pp. 1–13. Original paper in French: (b) Jean-Noël Biraben, 1979, "Essai sur l'évolution du nombre des hommes", Population, Vol. 34 (no. 1), pp. 13–25.