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05-28-2014, 11:35 AM
Brian and I had an email discussion of part of this. One of my pet peeves is the mis-use of the term "theory". But, this seems to be so pervasive, including amongst scientists, that it may be a lost cause. For example, the latest blind guess about what happened to the Malaysian airliner was always called "theory" on the news.
This mis-use is not harmless, because it allows people to think that the theory of evolution or the theory of plate tectonics are sets of knowledge that need not be taken seriously.
As suggested above by Brian, new data can show a theory to be incorrect: for example, geosynclinal theory was more accepted than plate tectonics until data on sea floor spreading and subduction were collected and analyzed. But today, there is massive evidence for plate tectonics, evolution, man-induced climate change. So, looking at one detail and then coming up with a hypothesis, based on little or no evidence, does not invalidate the theory.
Brian missed one term, though: paradigm. That is a model or set of hypotheses or whatever that are widely accepted. I like to go up against the paradigm. This includes the use of a certain kind of model for how folds and faults relate in California, (Seeber and Sorlien, 2000), or how long the north Branch of the North Anatolian fault has been active and how many km it has slipped (Sorlien and others, 2012, Kurt and others, 2013).
Chris
This mis-use is not harmless, because it allows people to think that the theory of evolution or the theory of plate tectonics are sets of knowledge that need not be taken seriously.
As suggested above by Brian, new data can show a theory to be incorrect: for example, geosynclinal theory was more accepted than plate tectonics until data on sea floor spreading and subduction were collected and analyzed. But today, there is massive evidence for plate tectonics, evolution, man-induced climate change. So, looking at one detail and then coming up with a hypothesis, based on little or no evidence, does not invalidate the theory.
Brian missed one term, though: paradigm. That is a model or set of hypotheses or whatever that are widely accepted. I like to go up against the paradigm. This includes the use of a certain kind of model for how folds and faults relate in California, (Seeber and Sorlien, 2000), or how long the north Branch of the North Anatolian fault has been active and how many km it has slipped (Sorlien and others, 2012, Kurt and others, 2013).
Chris