The theory of evolution provides one possible explanation, it does not provide proof of that explanation.
Speculation is not proof, conjecture is not proof, educated guessing is not proof. Agreement among scientists of what constitutes a
best guess is not proof.
We know that science has very strict standards of what constitutes proof, and the theory of random chance unguided change has not met that criteria.
Really, when a reasonable person thinks about it, this explanation of "random chance unguided change" is just a full admission of ignorance of the hows and whys of the process of change.
No one is questioning that change we can observe is a fact.
However, to suggest that a change that 'may' have taken place in the past was necessarily a cause of some current effect is not logical.
250 years ago in this country, men like Jefferson who were recognized as scientists believed in the existence of God. The vast majority of the members of the scientific community accepted God's existence as an obvious fact. It was not disputed to any great extent, and if someone did dispute it, they were considered a minority opinion and as such invalid.
250 years later, the majority opinion is that God is not a fact.
So are we to suddenly conclude that the fact of Jeffersonian times were not facts but just just uneducated opinions, but today the educated opinions are necessarily facts?
Such utter nonsense.
A real scientific fact doesn't change, as observations don't themselves change.
Conclusions may change as new facts are revealed, but the old observations are not invalidated by new facts, we simply have a new paradigm in which to assemble the old and new facts to reach different opinions.
Scientific opinion may or may not be an
actual fact, time tells us what lasts and withstands the test of time and changes in data, and unless science has discovered all possible facts and has retrieved all the data, it is not reasonable to act in a dogmatic manner about processes of cause and effect.
The scientific community can decide whatever they want as a group, but that doesn't make their conclusions logical in the strictest sense nor necessarily true.
Quote from kjkent1:
We don't need to go to a dictionary -- I have a more authoritative source:
"The theory of evolution explains how life on Earth has changed. In scientific terms, 'theory' does not mean 'guess' or 'hunch' as it does in everyday usage. Scientific theories are explanations of natural phenomena built up logically from testable observations and hypotheses. Biological evolution is the best scientific explanation we have for the enormous range of observations about the living world.
Scientists most often use the word 'fact' to describe an observation. But scientists can also use fact to mean something that has been tested or observed so many times that there is no longer a compelling reason to keep testing or looking for examples. The occurrence of evolution in this sense is a fact. Scientists no longer question whether descent with modification occurred because the evidence supporting the idea is so strong."
See, attached. Science and Creationism, A View from the National Academy of Sciences, Second Edition (1999), at pg. 29
Therefore, based on the majority opinion of the most respected body of scientists in the U.S., your position on what a scientific theory/fact is, with respect to evolution is wrong.
Your logic is rejected by people who do logic for a living, i.e., scientists. This is the difference between dogmatism and practical reality. In the real world, philosophical logic frequently fails to satisfy.
If you're so convinced that you are right and everyone else is wrong, then get a PH.D in a science and start publishing. Until then, I'll be giving great weight to the opinion of the scientific community over yours.
