quote:In October, for example, George Deutsch, a presidential appointee in NASA headquarters, told a Web designer working for the agency to add the word "theory" after every mention of the Big Bang, according to an e-mail message from Mr. Deutsch that another NASA employee forwarded to The Times.
posted
Ah, I see you did not read the link. After the bit I quoted, comrade Deutsch goes on to say
quote:The Big Bang is "not proven fact; it is opinion," Mr. Deutsch wrote, adding, "It is not NASA's place, nor should it be to make a declaration such as this about the existence of the universe that discounts intelligent design by a creator."
It continued: "This is more than a science issue, it is a religious issue. And I would hate to think that young people would only be getting one-half of this debate from NASA. That would mean we had failed to properly educate the very people who rely on us for factual information the most."
And yes, it is a theory. So is gravity a theory.
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posted
Considering the fact that scientists are continually reevaluating the big bang, and that scientists have other theories other than the big bang (such as a continually expanding/contracting universe without any needs for bangs), I don't see why it would bother anybody to call it a theory.
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posted
I think that they should use theory after it because there are some of us who believe in God (Me being one of them). Also there may be other theories which may form as technologies advance and such. All you have to do is look at what Arthur C. Clarke has done with his works. He uses his imagination to spectulate new ideas which may not have been discovered yet. So we have no proof, only assumption, that there was a Big Bang and not God or something else's influences on the creation of the Universe.
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posted
I think you are missing the point, which is that a Bush-appointed political hack is trying to discredit real science for religious-political reasons.
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quote:Originally posted by SoaPiNuReYe: I think that they should use theory after it because there are some of us who believe in God (Me being one of them).
And would you also argue that people should refer to the 'Round Earth theory because some people believe in a flat one?
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quote:I think you are missing the point, which is that a Bush-appointed political hack is trying to discredit real science for religious-political reasons.
It seems to me that anybody who understands what the word "theory" means in science wouldn't view calling the Big Bang a theory as discrediting at all.
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posted
I think there are valid scientific reasons for the use of the word "theory", notably the fact that there are other scientific theories about the life cycle of the universe. What confuses me is why did the guy have to bring ID into the picture.
quote: It continued: "This is more than a science issue, it is a religious issue. And I would hate to think that young people would only be getting one-half of this debate from NASA. That would mean we had failed to properly educate the very people who rely on us for factual information the most."
I don't see how it is NASA's responsibility to comment on any religious issue, and in this instance it seems like the person who ordered the alteration was making a political statement rather than recognizing the scientific issues at hand.
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posted
I'm with Friday. Okay, call it a theory, 'cuz that's what it is. But the reasoning behind the guy's decree is specious at best, and the fact that there's a presidential appointee with the capability to enforce compliance with the Bush Administration's religious party line is freakin' scary.
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posted
The more I think about it, the more this is a smart political move.
The religious people who want to marginalize this science are happy, because they think the word "theory" is discrediting, but the people who actually understand what the word "theory" means in this context don't really mind because, duh, it is a theory.
It's about the closest to a win-win I can think of.
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quote:I think you are missing the point, which is that a Bush-appointed political hack is trying to discredit real science for religious-political reasons.
It seems to me that anybody who understands what the word "theory" means in science wouldn't view calling the Big Bang a theory as discrediting at all.
True; I am asserting that this political guy does not, in fact, understand it at all, and is doing his best to discredit the Big Bang theory. And he'll succeed, too, because most people don't know what 'theory' means.
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posted
I don't worry about it too much. The theory ain't going away*. I don't see this influencing many people who didn't already actively disbelieve in the Big Bang.
edit: *Actually, it very well may if evidence is found which supports one of the competing theories and not the big bang.
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posted
Does it really need to influence any scientists? They are not the ones in power. The point here is that the 'active disbelievers' - and not on scientific, but on religious, grounds - have already got their people in a position to order the real scientists around.
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posted
I'm curious what other theories you mention. I don't think the one you offered (a continually expanding/contracting universe) is in direct conflict with the Big Bang theory. I think the "without any need for bangs" is you own addition. The way I understood the expanding/contracting model was that each collapse was followed by another Bang, which fueled a new expansion, etc. In your "without any need for bangs" model, what fuels the new expansion after collapse?
What are the other theories that seriously compete with the Big Bang?
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
.... umm separation of chruch and state.... NASA is an organization dedicated to trying to find out information both abstract and practical from the cosmos based upon the scientific method, untestable theories such as intelligent design or other religious origined.... stuff.... is not within the realm of science and thus NASA has no ethical responsibility towards that matter in my divine opinion.
Like I-D might be able to make a valid point in certain inconsistencies in the Theory of Evolution , but they're a far cry from disproving it, and thus should leave NASA alone.
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quote:What are the other theories that seriously compete with the Big Bang?
A Brief History of Time describes a universe with a finite but unbounded time dimension with no big bang.
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quote:I'm curious what other theories you mention. I don't think the one you offered (a continually expanding/contracting universe) is in direct conflict with the Big Bang theory. I think the "without any need for bangs" is you own addition.
No, that is not my own addition -- that was pretty the entire point of the theory I am talking about. The idea is that the universe contracts, but does not come together into a singularity. The various pieces of the universe come close to each other, but keep sailing past each other and the universe starts expanding again.
This is in opposition to the multiple big bangs theory of the expanding and contracting universe, where the universe pretty much starts all over with each bang.
This is a really dumbed-down version of the theory, because I don't remember much more about it. I don't know where I read about it.
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posted
The October 2005 e-mail from Mr. Deutsch reported in the linked article makes it obvious that there is a religious agenda behind his rewrite attempts. That is stated quite overtly in quoted portions of the e-mail. If that is being supported by the Bush administration - if Mr. Deutsch is not just a loose cannon in a job that he apparently does not have the credentials to handle (and why would I be surprised if that is the case, given recent examples) - I have a big problem with that.
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posted
What about the theory of the reaccuring universe? It is a theory I read about a while back, it suggested that the big bang has been happening forever. That it reaccurs every, well I can't remember how long they said. But the theory involved that our dimention colapses with another lower one and that the universe starts over again. So I think I took it to mean that the big bang has happened many times
Sorry if I may some of this wrong. I read the article a long time ago. Posts: 1941 | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
It is a fine theory not contradicted by any known facts, whose only problem is that it also doesn't explain any facts. We know there was one Big Bang; that is required to explain what we see of the universe. The need for additional cycles is exactly equivalent to the need for a god.
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posted
Okay. I was just confused for a second there. Good to know we atheist Hatrackers have an eductated person on our side.
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posted
Please, why is this always the point where someone tries drawing a line and insulting a bunch of people?
The fact is, this move is similar to Newt Gingrich's "liberal Democrat" idea. You see, our dear Newt insisted that Republicans never use the word Democrat in their speeches without preceeding it with liberal. At this time, liberals were very unpopular, and tying the word to Democrat created enough of a stigma that Clinton had to run as a "new Democrat". This in turn slowly discredits theories similar to evolution. In short, it is a foundation on which to pervert our scientific institutions for a political viewpoint.
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posted
King of Men -- you seem to assume that any theory that doesn't have a big bang is formulated for religious reasons. This is not the case.
From A Brief History of Time:
quote:Another attempt to avoid the conclusion that there must have been a big bang, and therefore a beginning of time, was made by two Russian scientists, Evgenii Lifshitz and Isaac Khalatnikov, in 1963. They suggested that the big bang might be a peculiarity of Friedmann’s models alone, which after all were only approximations to the real universe. Perhaps, of all the models that were roughly like the real universe, only Friedmann’s would contain a big bang singularity. In Friedmann’s models, the galaxies are all moving directly away from each other – so it is not surprising that at some time in the past they were all at the same place. In the real universe, however, the galaxies are not just moving directly away from each other – they also have small sideways velocities. So in reality they need never have been all at exactly the same place, only very close together. Perhaps then the current expanding universe resulted not from a big bang singularity, but from an earlier contracting phase; as the universe had collapsed the particles in it might not have all collided, but had flown past and then away from each other, producing the present expansion of the the universe that were roughly like Friedmann’s models but took account of the irregularities and random velocities of galaxies in the real universe. They showed that such models could start with a big bang, even though the galaxies were no longer always moving directly away from each other, but they claimed that this was still only possible in certain exceptional models in which the galaxies were all moving in just the right way. They argued that since there seemed to be infinitely more Friedmann-like models without a big bang singularity than there were with one, we should conclude that there had not in reality been a big bang. They later realized, however, that there was a much more general class of Friedmann-like models that did have singularities, and in which the galaxies did not have to be moving any special way. They therefore withdrew their claim in 1970.
So, I remembered the theory right. I just forgot that it hasn't been a current theory during my entire lifetime.
Still, it shouldn't surprise anybody if some day other scientific theories come out that elimiate the need for a big bang.
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posted
There can certainly be non-religious competing theories. But the particular one you mentioned multiplied entities un-necessarily; so does the theory 'God set off the big Bang'. The objection I made is the same, but I don't think I implied that the two are the same in other ways.
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posted
MPH, there's another one in the book that has not been withdrawn (in the book - it might have been withdrawn since) that does not posit a big bang and does not multiply entities.
Edit: Look in the place where he talks about his audience with the Pope.
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posted
MPH, I really don't think anyone has any issue with the idea that there are credible alternative theories to the Big Bang. The only thing that's getting people riled up is Deutsch's explicit statement that his motivation was purely religious in nature. In this particular instance, no serious harm done, since there *are* scientific theories for the origin of the universe besides the Big Bang, and so it's useful to keep that in mind, but do you understand why, say, evolutionary biologists or developmental biochemists might find the intrusion of an openly religious agenda into scientific research to be disturbing? This isn't a case of a single whacko boss stepping out of line... the article makes it quite clear that this is a growing trend of Bush Administration appointees with the power and inclination to enforce a religious orthodoxy.
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quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: The more I think about it, the more this is a smart political move.
The religious people who want to marginalize this science are happy, because they think the word "theory" is discrediting, but the people who actually understand what the word "theory" means in this context don't really mind because, duh, it is a theory.
It's about the closest to a win-win I can think of.
Interestingly too, non-scientists frequently interject with the idea that "all theories are equal." Therefore if I call my religious idea a theory, its as good as your scientific theory. This further muddies the distinction between belief, theory, conjecture and opinion. As anyone with any sense knows, there is a huge distinction between a religious belief and a scientific theory; and though there are MANY people who are willing to treat theories like beliefs and beliefs like theories, the two things really don't equate on any level.
Why can we not seperate these two concepts in our minds and in public debate? Scientific understanding doesn't even attempt to trump religious beliefs, and faith has little to do with the scientific observations we make of our universe. DUh!
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quote:"This is more than a science issue, it is a religious issue. And I would hate to think that young people would only be getting one-half of this debate from NASA.
This is just weird. It seems to imply that people should be getting religious information as well as scientific information from NASA. I don't get the point ... I get my religion from church, and from NASA I expect to get what science has discovered. I have no problem with calling it a theory, but why would they imply that we should be getting both halves of the debate from one source? They don't demand that churches teach the "big bang theory" along with the "creation theory" in their Sunday-School classes.
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quote:do you understand why, say, evolutionary biologists or developmental biochemists might find the intrusion of an openly religious agenda into scientific research to be disturbing?
Yes I do. Absolutely. Even though the reasons behind are silly, I don't think that calling it the big bang theory should be a big deal to anybody, unless you see it as the first step in a slippery slope.
If the worst thing that Bush did to stifle science was to force NASA to call the Big Bang a theory, the scientific community would be pretty darn happy.
posted
Umm, and this web designer is supposed to do this how, exactly?
I've worked on a portion of NASA's website. It's a wonderful source of information, and it's also about as well organized, documented, and administered as an abandoned landfill.
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posted
Yes, the Big Bang is a Theory. But no one is forcing everyone to add the word "theory" after every mention of the word "god". I mean, the existence of god is a theory in the scientific sense of the word. It is not proven in any way to society as a whole. No one is forcing the use of "intelligent design theory". These things should not be forced. They are understood or misunderstood, but that should not be a political issue.
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posted
FYI KoM, I *did* read the link. I fail to see how two paragraphs penned by a journalist in an otherwise non-religious story show that ID is behind the 'theory' label. It sounds a lot like spin, especially when the way you present it tries to put ID-ers on the defensive.
I could be wrong, but I thought ID was strictly a biological theory. Just like Evofreakinglution is strictly a biological theory.
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quote:Yes, the Big Bang is a Theory. But no one is forcing everyone to add the word "theory" after every mention of the word "god".
In scientific parlance, theism doesn't even rise to the level of of theory, and doesn't deserve to be called a theory.
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quote:Yes I do. Absolutely. Even though the reasons behind are silly, I don't think that calling it the big bang theory should be a big deal to anybody, unless you see it as the first step in a slippery slope.
There's no reason to call slippery slope on this one, because there's no indication that this move is an attempt to "get the foot in the door," as it were. It's symptomatic of the Administration's general disregard for and ignorance of science, and demonstrates the frightening status quo of today's government research program, but I don't expect Bush to try to use it as precedent. He doesn't need to... as far as his administration is concerned, Deutsch is just doing what he should be doing. And that is extremely disturbing.
quote:If the worst thing that Bush did to stifle science was to force NASA to call the Big Bang a theory, the scientific community would be pretty darn happy.
No kidding. Does anyone really think that this is the worst that's going to happen, though?
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posted
It has always been my understanding that science doesn't consider theism as rising to the level of a theory because the scientific establishment doesn't consider it falsifiable. Now, I know that there are folks who believe that the existence of God can be proven, but I'll be darned if I can think of a non-subjective, falsifiable, scientific way to do it.
I think the problem comes because some (and please note that I said some, not all) scientists think that because God can't be proven scientifically, that means God does not exist. Conversely, some religious believers (and please note that I said some, not all) think that because they believe God exists, that constitutes all the proof necessary that God does exist and everyone must just take their word for it. In my opinion, neither one of these positions is tenable.
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quote:Originally posted by sarcasticmuppet: FYI KoM, I *did* read the link. I fail to see how two paragraphs penned by a journalist in an otherwise non-religious story show that ID is behind the 'theory' label.
Um, those weren't penned by the journalist, they were quotes from the memo.
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quote:Originally posted by littlemissattitude: I think the problem comes because some (and please note that I said some, not all) scientists think that because God can't be proven scientifically, that means God does not exist.
How many other entities do you know of that exist, but which cannot be proven scientifically to exist?
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posted
The only reason for objecting to this is political. The Big Bang *is* a theory. It's definitely the way to bet, but it's not as firm a theory as gravity, or evolution, or relativity. Although I think it's getting there.
When I was in college, I didn't like the way science was taught: it was taught as though the things in it were fact, rather than theory; as though there were no reason to call them into question. This was true even for theories that are no longer current, such as classical mechanics. It's easier that way, I suppose; but students do need to see that science is uncertain. It isn't evil to let them.
Still, once or twice is enough. Requiring qualification after every mention turns a readable document into an unreadable mess.
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First of all, science does not "prove" anything. It simply collects evidence that does not falsify a particular idea. If repeated experiments do not show that an idea is false, then evidence accumulates that it is probably a valid idea.
However, to answer your question (I think), it very well may be that life exists elsewhere in the universe besides on Earth. See the Drake Equation for probabilites on that (although it pretty much depends on how optimistic or pessimistic the numbers are that you plug in). Presently, there is no technology available to disprove that life does exist elsewhere. So, we cannot presently say scientifically that it does exist. That does not mean that it does not exist.
I don't know if God exists or not. But I certainly cannot conclude that because science currently cannot prove the existence of God, God categorically does not exist.
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posted
It's ridiculous because it's obviously religiously motivated. Everything science has to say is a theory, but we only bother to tack the word "theory" on to the ones that religious people are free to ignore.
Now I'll happily agree that science is a subject that is often not taught well, and is even more often misrepresented in the media. And that's the real problem here is that people don’t understand what a theory is, or how science is performed, or how what it has to say can be used. Ultimately, that's what Deutsch should be pushing for, if he really isn't pushing his own religious agenda.
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posted
Had the people at NASA decided on their own, or in response to a request for clarity from the scientific community, to add "theory" behind "Big Bang," I'd have no problem. It's accurate, and accuracy should be strived for.
It's the fact that it was ordered as a concession to religious voters that's grating, and should be. Not what is being asked for, but why.
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quote:It's the fact that it was ordered as a concession to religious voters that's grating
What is it that bothers you -- that it is a political move to appease voters, or that it is a political move to appease religious voters?
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