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Originally posted by Fidel:
I think this sort of subject material deserves a forum all on its own, since mainstream science isn't focused on proving or disproving the existence of god, whether he or she or it exists or not.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Scientific theories of human origins are not about proving or disproving the existence of god.

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Exactly, and so ...

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They are about using evidence to explain human origins without resorting to divine or supernatural intervention.

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Exactly, and which is why mainstream science isn't focused on proving the unprovable. Therefore, the thread subject isn't considered mainstream science, but the topic of evolution is. Maybe we can have a forum for tabloid journalism, like the recent AIDS conspiracy thread that was closed because people couldn't tell the real issues from journalistic sensationalism.

[ 12 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

quote:

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Scientific theories of human origins are not about proving or disproving the existence of god.

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Interestingly enough, modern scientific thought was started to prove the existence of God.
ETA: modern

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: remind ]

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Originally posted by remind:
Interestingly enough, scientific thought was started to prove the existence of God.

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Originally posted by Fidel:
Exactly, and which is why mainstream science isn't focused on proving the unprovable. Therefore, the thread subject isn't considered mainstream science, but the topic of evolution is.

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Maybe we can have a forum for tabloid journalism, like the recent AIDS conspiracy thread that was closed because people couldn't tell the real issues from journalistic sensationalism.

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[ 12 February 2007: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
That would indeed be interesting if it were true.

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It is absolutely true.

And the sensational article about AIDS sourced by the poster June apparently didn't achieve its real purpose, because I fear most posters felt the thread was an odd commentary of anti-racism, instead believing it was all about two people's inane obsession over picking a fight with me instead of realizing that millions have died in Africa senselessly, and that millions more continue to endure meaningless suffering. Apparently virtual egos are larger than the suffering of millions, and that's sad.

[ 12 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

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Originally posted by quart o' homomilk:
Asking who the first scientist was, is like asking who the first artist was.

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Originally posted by remind:

Again you are also wrong, there is a first scientist.

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Edited to return the thread to the OP:
As far as I'm concerned, using religion to explain/refute science is as stupid as using science to explain/refute God. They have different tasks in this world and are in no way competing ideologies. They conceive of the word "origin" in completely different ways, and anyone who equates the two, or uses one to dispute the other, misses the point.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: Catchfire ]

The danger could come if a large enough body of creationists with Ivy League PhD's succeed in altering the definitions of scientific inquiry, and start altering the fundaments upon which curricula are designed.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: jas ]

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Nothing came of it, Dr. Dini said in an interview, adding, “Scientists do not base their acceptance or rejection of theories on religion, and someone who does should not be able to become a scientist.”

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Originally posted by Fidel:
Creationism is not mainstream science, and therefore has nothing to do with what mainstream scientists are pursuing. Ask any scientist if he or she is working on disproving the existence of god. They'll tell you to get a life.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
You still don't get it, so I'll type it slowly: Disproving creationism is not the same thing as disproving the existence of god.

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That's very condescending coming from someone who once tried to tell me in so many words that atoms hold no potential for large scale releases of energy.

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And there are many "mainsteam" scientists who devote most of their time to debunking creationism - not because creationism is mainstream science, but precisely because it isn't science at all.

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Well they wouldn't be doing mainstream science then, would they ?.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

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Originally posted by jas:
Amazing that a dyed-in-the-wool creationist could get through that many years of advanced university operating impeccably within the scientific framework.

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All he had to do was compartmentalize his brain into two mutually-exclusive areas: one where evidence and logic prevail, and another where blind faith and superstition run free, each watertight compartment blocked from contaminating the other.

It's the same thing that happens in the brains of many psychopathic killers, who are able to have loving family lives, successful careers, and an appreciation for arts and culture, while at the same time having a part of their brain that allows them to commit acts of depravity and cruelty, without anyone ever suspecting.

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on February 23, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) will be the keynote speaker for the most prominent creationism advocacy group in the country. The Discovery Institute, a religious right think-tank, is well-known for its strong opposition to evolutionary biology and its advocacy for “intelligent design.” The institute’s main financial backer, savings and loan heir Howard Ahmanson, spent 20 years on the board of the Chalcedon Foundation, “a theocratic outfit that advocates the replacement of American civil law with biblical law.”

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http://thinkprogress.org/2007/02/12/mccain-creationism

It would be nice if Cathfire were right, and science and religion were entirely independent spheres. But all we have to do is look at things like stem cell research and opposition to it, to see that religion competes with, and even threatens science.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: jeff house ]

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Originally posted by Fidel:
Well they wouldn't be doing mainstream science then, would they?

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Originally posted by marzo:
The first scientist was an unknown hominid who lived many thousands of years ago. His or her scientific research would have been observations and conclusions about the properties of various materials for tool-making, animal behaviour, edible plants, weather patterns, and the motions of the stars and planets.

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Originally posted by jeff house:

But all we have to do is look at things like stem cell research and opposition to it, to see that religion competes with, and even threatens science.

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Originally posted by jeff house:
It would be nice if Cathfire were right, and science and religion were entirely independent spheres. But all we have to do is look at things like stem cell research and opposition to it, to see that religion competes with, and even threatens science.

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I suppose my position is a little more nuanced. I don't see "religion" as threatening stem-cell research. As many have shown, there is nothing in the Christian religion, for example, that prohibits stem cell research, or even hints that it should be bad. What is threatening stem-cell research and the like is alarmist, reactionary close-mindedness. Certainly science and religion inform one's world view (which is where they intersect), but when religion has a tyrrannical hold over one's outlook, that's not religion, that's fundamentalism.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: Catchfire ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Catchfire:
Adam was the first scientist.

Edited to return the thread to the OP:
As far as I'm concerned, using religion to explain/refute science is as stupid as using science to explain/refute God. They have different tasks in this world and are in no way competing ideologies. They conceive of the word "origin" in completely different ways, and anyone who equates the two, or uses one to dispute the other, misses the point.

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Originally posted by Fidel:
Isaac Newton and company represent the old story of science. A lot of it is still valid, yes, but there have been some earth shaking changes since.

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My point was simply that Issac Newton was the father of scientific methodology that is still in use today.

If they would be earth shaking to Issac Newton, I do not know. I suspect not though. Moreover, I suspect he knew much more than perhaps some scientists know today, in some areas.

"I have studied these things. You have not"

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Newton wasn't the first scientist, though he was obviously a good one; some people regard him as the best one. He drew on work from Boyle, Hooke, Kepler, and others, and they based their stuff on earlier scientists like Tyco Brahe, who himeself studied Copernicus...etc. Some of what they did had already been done by really ancient cultures.

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Come on guys, this is a really narrow view of science. Do you really believe that middle-class European men invented science? Get your head out of the hegemonic sand. Women weren't doing science before they were burned as witches? Indigenous people were doing science before Europe even had apple trees.

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Originally posted by Le Téléspectateur:
Come on guys, this is a really narrow view of science. Do you really believe that middle-class European men invented science?

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Science as a method of experimenting with alternatives and testing hypotheses, although perhaps not formally, predates written history — and certainly modern European scientists.

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Originally posted by Le Téléspectateur:
Interesting the Martha mentioned Indigenous knowledge again.

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Originally posted by Sven:
Not to put words in M. Spector’s mouth...

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
So how is IK transmitted over centuries without writing any of it down in books?

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Then there's Richard Dawkin's take, which essentially says a universe with a god is very different from a universe without a god, and the possible difference comes very much into the perview of science.

Personally, I leave this stuff alone these days, at the instruction Wornhilde, who rides the invisible dragon in my garage. She knows all, sees all, and wears low cut outfits made of dark green latex.

Other indigenous peoples didn't write stuff down. Yet they claim to have centuries-old indigenous knowledge.

As Le Téléspectateur said:

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IK is based on a relationship with the living world....and is not based on a relationship to a book.

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Originally posted by Sven:
Not to put words in M. Spector's mouth...

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Good idea. I never said there's no such thing as IK or aboriginal science.

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Sorry, it was Tommy_Paine:

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Originally posted by Tommy_Paine:
I wouldn't, however, qualify this as "aboriginal science".

It's science.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
As far as I can see, writing stuff down (or making some other kind of enduring representation to convey information) is the most efficient way of preserving information for later generations.

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Was Theodoric of Freiberg a scientist? He was certainly the first person in recorded history to test an idea with practical instrumentation.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: Bobolink ]

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Isaac Newton's discoveries were so numerous and varied that many consider him to be the father of modern science. A graduate of Trinity College, Cambridge, Newton developed an intense interest in mathematics and the laws of nature which ultimately led to his two most famous works: Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687) and Opticks (1704). Newton helped define the laws of gravity and planetary motion, co-founded the field of calculus, and explained laws of light and color, among many other discoveries. (A famous story says that Newton uncovered the laws of gravity after being hit on the head by a falling apple. There is no proof that this story is true. However, his assistant John Conduitt later wrote that Newton had said he was inspired to think about gravity after seeing an apple fall in his garden around 1666.) Newton was knighted in 1705 and upon his death in 1727 was the first scientist given the honor of burial in Westminster Abbey.
Extra credit: Newton is often ranked 1-2 with Albert Einstein among history's leading physicists

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http://www.who2.com/sirisaacnewton.html

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Why was the father of modern science obsessed with turning base metals into gold?
IT LOOKS a curiously clumsy anachronism, set among the modern Pyrex glass and fume cupboards. Surely this chemistry lab at Indiana University in Bloomington shouldn't contain a crude furnace constructed from bricks and mortar. It gets worse: look past the furnace and you'll see a couple of people hunched in a corner, poring over what appear to be the scrawlings of a madman. What's going on - is this the rebirth of alchemy?

Well, yes, in a way it is. The writings, set out in a laboratory notebook, describe an alchemical experiment that chemists William Newman and Catherine Reck are hoping to carry out. But Newman and Reck are perfectly sane, and so was the man who wrote the scrawls they are trying to decipher. In fact he was arguably the most famous scientist of all time, Sir Isaac Newton.

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http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19025461.500.html

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Newton, Sir Isaac (1642-1727), English natural philosopher, generally regarded as the most original and influential theorist in the history of science. In addition to his invention of the infinitesimal calculus and a new theory of light and color, Newton transformed the structure of physical science with his three laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation. As the keystone of the scientific revolution of the 17th century...

Other Researches. Throughout his career Newton conducted research in theology and history with the same passion that he pursued alchemy and science. Although some historians have neglected Newton's nonscientific writings, there is little doubt of his devotion to these subjects, as his manuscripts amply attest. Newton's writings on theological and biblical subjects alone amount to about 1.3 million words, the equivalent of 20 of today's standard length books. Although these writings say little about Newtonian science, they tell us a good deal about Isaac Newton

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Originally posted by Le Téléspectateur:

Come on guys, this is a really narrow view of science. Do you really believe that middle-class European men invented science? Get your head out of the hegemonic sand. Women weren't doing science before they were burned as witches? Indigenous people were doing science before Europe even had apple trees.

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Originally posted by remind:

Interestingly enough, scientific thought was started to prove the existence of God.

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Originally posted by Le Téléspectateur:
Come on guys, this is a really narrow view of science. Do you really believe that middle-class European men invented science? Get your head out of the hegemonic sand. Women weren't doing science before they were burned as witches? Indigenous people were doing science before Europe even had apple trees.

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It was called alchemy, and other individual names/labels that "science" now covers, prior to the advent of Newton.

There was no such things as "science" as a field/type of endeavour.

It's clear that Newton contributed alot to math and science. That's an understatement.

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Originally posted by remind:
Again you are also wrong, there is a first scientist.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
As far as I can see, writing stuff down (or making some other kind of enduring representation to convey information) is the most efficient way of preserving information for later generations.

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I think it was the Muslims who brought paper making to Spain. Before that it was leather parchments, scrolls, and tablets before that. Mesopotamians recorded the epic of Gilgamesh in clay tablets. Like Noah, Gilgamesh and his family survived a flood. The Chinese have a video game today, Dynasty Warriors 3, with one mythical character named Nuwah. Nuwah was supposed to have re-populated the world at some time in prehistory, and interestingly enough, it was after a great deluge. Besides being a slave driver, first emperor Chin was a book-burner. So perhaps something important was lost besides Chin's mind after ingesting mercury capsules prescribed for immortality.

And there are similar flood stories in existence around the world, and like Greek mythology, they are as strange if not stranger than science fiction today. Which is also interesting because what's known about pre-recorded history is what archaeologists have assumed by consensus agreement and assumptions based on very little evidence. And yet, there are these fantastic myths involving supernatural events and mythical creatures handed down by real people to one another through the ages. And there is typically some connection between their ancestors and benevolent (and sometimes not so) relatives who came from the stars to help out from time to time. We have a scientific credo today, and it says the best explanation makes as few assumptions as possible.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

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Originally posted by quart o' homomilk:
It was not called "science" during Newton's time either. "Natural philosophy", just like Aristotle called it.

It was a spectrum of development, and Newton cannot be said to be the first scientist, only the first proponent of certain paradigms within science like Newtonian Mechanics.

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Originally posted by remind:

My point was simply that Issac Newton was the father of scientific methodology that is still in use today.

If they would be earth shaking to Issac Newton, I do not know. I suspect not though..

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No doubt. Newton was a pioneer, a giant in scientific history. But his thirst for new knowledge was limited by time. I think he would have been a scientific leader in any century. But science in his day still viewed material objects as indestructible bits of non-living matter, bits that meant nothing without comprising the whole. Until the turn of the last century, the field of chemistry knew only a few basic elements, and scientists believed there were no more to be discovered.

In 1911, Ernest Rutherford established that a whole new universe existed at the sub-material level, and that atoms consist of a nucleus surrounded by electrons. Newtonian atomic theory was overthrown by quantum mechanics by new age thinkers like Neils Bohr and Werner von Heisenberg in the 1920's.

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My point was simply that Issac Newton was the father of scientific methodology that is still in use today

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When I was young, everyone used to say that Leonardo Da Vinci was the "first scientist".

More recently, I have heard it responsibly argued that Francis Bacon merits that name.

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Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban, KC (22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626) was an English philosopher, statesman and essayist but is best known for leading the scientific revolution with his new 'observation and experimentation' theory which is the way science has been conducted ever since.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Bacon

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
As far as I can see, writing stuff down (or making some other kind of enduring representation to convey information) is the most efficient way of preserving information for later generations.

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As far as I can see, having some system of preserving and replicating information over time is necessary to empirical science. It is not necessary to, nor a defining feature of "knowledge".

[ 15 February 2007: Message edited by: jas ]

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
.... to be able to claim ...

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I don't think Newton was the first modern scientist, though important. He wrote a lot about religion, too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_science

Wiki about Newton

[ 15 February 2007: Message edited by: Contrarian ]

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If I don't know something, but claim to know it, then I am simply guessing, or lying. That is not knowledge.

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Originally posted by Fidel:
We have a scientific credo today, and it says the best explanation makes as few assumptions as possible.

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Originally posted by jas:
As far as I can see, having some system of preserving and replicating information over time is necessary to empirical science. It is not necessary to, nor a defining feature of "knowledge".

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If we are looking at methodology alone, then we no doubt have to reach past our own species and start looking at some hominid ancestor. It's hard to imagine tool making without the process of hypothesising, observing, testing and experimenting.

And maybe we shouldn't confine the search to hominids past and present.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
If you think there is some way of knowing stuff that was known centuries ago without any permanent physical record having been made of such knowledge back then, I'd like to hear your explanation, in any language you choose.

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Are you deliberately ignoring oral history? Obviously indigenous law, legal codes and geographical knowedge was passed down through Canadian aboriginals through oral history. British working class history has also been reconstructed through oral testimony. This kind of knowledge has been acknowledged and embraced in Western courts, and by the population at large. Maybe you made a concession for oral history somewhere in this thread, but I've missed it.

[ 15 February 2007: Message edited by: Catchfire ]

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Originally posted by Martha (but not Stewart):
Of course, having some system of preserving and replicating information is not necessary for knowledge: I know lots of stuff in other ways.

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But any knowledge transmitted to you by others must of necessity involve "some system of preserving and replicating" that knowledge, whether it's stone tablets, songs, epic poetry, nursery rhymes, books, petroglyphs, or whatever.

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Originally posted by Catchfire:
Are you deliberately ignoring oral history? Obviously indigenous law, legal codes and geographical knowedge was passed down through Canadian aboriginals through oral history. British working class history has also been reconstructed through oral testimony.

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Oral histories have the most relevance when interviewing individuals who personally experienced a particular event (for example, interviewing veterans who landed at Normandy about the events of D-Day). But, even then, memories are fragile and imperfect and the events experienced are not remembered exactly as they occurred. In addition to a GI having an imperfect memory about events that GI personally experienced, there is the additional problem of the GI only having seen a tiny portion of the event and it may be very inaccurate to make a general conclusion about D-Day based on that individual’s recollections.

Even eye witness testimony of an alleged crime that may have recently taken place is imperfect and is frequently dead wrong. How close was the witness to the event? Was the witness’s vision impaired in any way? From what angle did the witness see the event? Did the witness see the entire event or just a portion of it? What time of day or night was it? Could the witness clearly hear all of the words spoken or just pieces of the conversation? Has the witness’s memory of the event been augmented or distorted by talking to others who saw the event differently? Was the witness under extreme emotional stress at the time of the event or was the witness able to calmly observe the event?

As a result, witnesses often forget (or never observed in the first place) crucial facts about an event and witnesses often erroneously “remember” details of an event that never even occurred.

And, those problems are with people who were personally at the event.

Those observation and memory problems are significantly magnified when the events “remembered” by a witness to the event is subsequently described to someone who wasn’t at the event. Bill says, “Jane told me that it was a blue car that ran the red light.” It may or may not have been a blue car (Jane’s memory may be incorrect or she may have had difficulty clearly viewing the event, or both). Then, the memory issues are compounded by Bill’s own fallible memory of what Jane told him. She may have actually said it was a “blue-green” or a “green” car but, months later, he distinctly remembers her saying it was a “blue” car.

If a event is more complex than determining whether a car that ran a red light two months ago was blue or green and if the event occurred many centuries or millennia ago, all of those observation and memory problems become so overwhelming that very little reliance can be put on current conceptions of those events if they only exist because of generation-to-generation oral communication. Those conceptions are, necessarily, more “legendary” than “factual”.

1. Is knowledge memorization? Can you learn how to perform heart surgery by a book? Or does someone usually show you? Don't you think that if you knew a particular plant provided particular heatlth benefits, you could just tell people about it, and they'd remember, without trying to write down what you thought it looked like?

2. Words are hardly stable meanings either. Consider the "Persons" Case 1927-29. Essentially, the case hinged on what the state thought a "person" was. Certainly, in the 1800s, a woman was not considered a person, yet eventually society learned something new about the meaning of "person" and women were allowed to be Senators. If we just relied on the "word," and not on what we learned, we'd still be stupid.

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In a paper presented Nov. 1 at the U of M titled "The 50-Day Expert: Oral History, the Courts, and Alexander Von Gernet," historian Robin Jarvis Brownlie discussed how the Canadian government has created an expert in Aboriginal history - anthropologist Alexander Von Gernet - for the sole purpose of defeating Aboriginal claims in court. Brownlie showed how, by employing Western standards of critique, Von Gernet decontextualizes Aboriginal oral history, making it appear an unreliable source of historical information. Von Gernet then uses that to deny the use of oral history as evidence in Aboriginal land claims. However, Brownlie turned the tables on Von Gernet, by revealing the many correctional methods used by Aboriginal peoples with respect to Treaty information in order to preserve historical accuracy, and the valuable subjective information included in oral history which is absent in much of written history. In the end, Dr. Brownlie made a convincing case for the legitimacy of oral historical accounts as evidence in Aboriginal land disputes.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
The stuff you know in other ways comes from your own empirical experience.

But any knowledge transmitted to you by others must of necessity involve "some system of preserving and replicating" that knowledge, whether it's stone tablets, songs, epic poetry, nursery rhymes, books, petroglyphs, or whatever.

Those who try to say "knowledge just IS - it doesn't have to come from somewhere" are just ducking the issue.

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Originally posted by Catchfire:
There are so many things wrong with those presuppositions I don't know where to begin.

1. Is knowledge memorization? Can you learn how to perform heart surgery by a book? Or does someone usually show you? Don't you think that if you knew a particular plant provided particular heatlth benefits, you could just tell people about it, and they'd remember, without trying to write down what you thought it looked like?

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There is an important distinction to make regarding knowledge. If there is aboriginal knowledge (which I would simply call “knowledge”) about the health benefits of a particular plant, it doesn’t matter how or when the knowledge came to be known. It doesn’t matter if the knowledge was discovered last year or two hundred years ago, or whether it was knowledge that was transmitted by writing or orally, because its truth can be objectively analyzed today: Either the plant does have — or it does not have — health benefits. In contrast, the accuracy of a claim of current knowledge about a past event (if it happened at all) is more suspect the more time that has passed since the time the event is claimed to have occurred. In the absence of any corroborating evidence, there is no way to confirm the details of the claimed event.

quote:

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Originally posted by Catchfire:
2. Words are hardly stable meanings either. Consider the "Persons" Case 1927-29. Essentially, the case hinged on what the state thought a "person" was. Certainly, in the 1800s, a woman was not considered a person, yet eventually society learned something new about the meaning of "person" and women were allowed to be Senators. If we just relied on the "word," and not on what we learned, we'd still be stupid.

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If we are to know of a change in the meaning of a word from, say, 500 years ago, the only way of ascertaining that is to look at how its usage evolved in the written record over the last 500 years. So, while words do not have static meaning, the only reason we know that is through written documents (other than words that have changed meaning in our life time or the life time of our very recent ancestors — such as the change in the meaning of the word “gay”). So, a long ago written record about an event still has significant value because we can put the meaning of the words used in the context of the time they were used.

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Originally posted by Catchfire:
3. Memory is fragile in a literary culture because it's a faculty we no longer require. We write things down so that we don't have to remember. To compare our memories to those who relied on them for the survival of their people is laughable. Certainly, writing didn't help the Europeans when they tried to survive in Eastern Canada's hostile winters (has anyone looked outside lately? Christ). But the oral culture of the Aboriginal peoples certainly did.

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[ 15 February 2007: Message edited by: EriKtheHalfaRed ]

Think that's why early Protestants were so big on getting the Bible translated into 'vulgar' local vernaculars and dialects, instead of church Latin. Idea of truly mass education didn't occur for some reason, till well after the industrial revolution was underway.

ETA: Heard about the Keas, but then parrots are one of the smartest bird brains around. We got wild pigeons that are Always trying new ways of getting at grub. So much for the idea that animals can't Learn. Funny though cause regular Rock Doves are considered among the dumbest.

[ 15 February 2007: Message edited by: EriKtheHalfaRed ]

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Originally posted by Catchfire:
Adam was the first scientist.

[ 13 February 2007: Message edited by: Catchfire ]

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Originally posted by Southlander:
Is this not science?

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Originally posted by Papal Bull:
No, but it is ADORABLE!

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Originally posted by Catchfire:
2. Words are hardly stable meanings either. Consider the "Persons" Case 1927-29. Essentially, the case hinged on what the state thought a "person" was. Certainly, in the 1800s, a woman was not considered a person, yet eventually society learned something new about the meaning of "person" and women were allowed to be Senators. If we just relied on the "word," and not on what we learned, we'd still be stupid.

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Society didn't learn anything new about the meaning of "person" as a result of this case. The word had the same meaning after the case as it had had before.

In fact, the Persons Case was not about deciding "are women persons?" but "on a proper interpretation of this particular statute does 'qualified persons' include women?" It may seem stupid to us today, but the issue arose not because there was any doubt as to whether women were persons, but because it was questioned whether the provision for "qualified persons" to be appointed to the Senate actually allowed for the appointment of women, since at the time the statute was written in 1867, women weren't "qualified" even to vote or own property, and were not recognized as having the same "rights and privileges" as men. Apart from their inferior legal status, nobody in 1867 would have said that women were not "persons".

If the thesis you were defending by reference to the Persons case is that the meanings of words change over time, I don't think anyone would disagree. You contradict this thesis, however, in your later post when you say:

quote:

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Language always predates humanity, we come into it already formed. It inhabits and colonizes us. As Costas Douzinas says, "Language, that uncanny thing, speaks us."

In this sense, we do learn what family means, what history means, what a "child" means, not because someone told us, but because we found these things in language.

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Words do not have eternal Platonic meanings that are there for us to discover by learning language. The meanings attached to words are culturally determined, and have to be learned the same way we learn everything else about culture - by observation and instruction.

To say that "language always predates humanity" is to suggest that it is eternal and unchanging, and that its words have meanings that are not assigned by us. Words like family, history, and child can mean different things to different people, all of whom are native speakers of English.

I learned language from my parents, who learned it from their parents, who learned it from theirs. And yet that simple observation does not permit me to claim to possess any particular knowledge that my grandparents had. More evidence would be required in order to establish such a proposition.

Sven, you referred to it at the general level of eyewitness vs. hearsay evidence, albeit not in the context of Canadian aboriginal-rights litigation, which is understandable as I would expect you to be more familiar with the law of evidence in the US context. (Do you know what the American law is with regard to the use of aboriginal oral history as evidence, either generally or in the specific context of aboriginal-rights cases? I’d be interested to hear whether it differs from the Canadian law.)

M. Spector, I’d be curious to hear whether you think the courts’ recognition of oral history as evidence (under certain limited conditions) constitutes a recognition of its validity, and if so, whether you agree with that. I’d also be curious to hear whether you agree with von Gernet’s efforts to severely restrict the admissibility and weight of oral histories.

quote:

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Originally posted by Papal Bull:

No, but it is ADORABLE!

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http://youtube.com/watch?v=gRW4ztbY8Ok
So why isn't it science?

[ 16 February 2007: Message edited by: Southlander ]

And, no, I do not believe I contradicted myself. By saying language predates humanity I am not saying there is some kind of ultimate meaning, or origin of meaning in the Platonic sense, but rather the "origin" of words is always before us. Which means words do have a meaning not "assigned" by us. They are not "assigned" at all, but rather words and their meaning already exist before we come to them. It's not up to us, it already was up to our cultural history, and this history informs us of its meaning through the language it provides us. We can never find out what words mean exactly. But we come into a network of interconnected meanings in constant flux, and by learning language, we retain cultural and social memory as a matter of course. I would equate this with the idea that knowledge is maintained as a culture grows over time.

[ 16 February 2007: Message edited by: Catchfire ]

quote:

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Originally posted by obscurantist:
M. Spector, Sven – what do you think of Catchfire’s (and my) point about the use of aboriginal oral history as evidence at trial? There’s an interesting philosophical discussion going on in this thread, but Catchfire has provided an example of where this debate is occurring in a practical context, in an activist context, and in a profession that at least three of us have worked in.

Sven, you referred to it at the general level of eyewitness vs. hearsay evidence, albeit not in the context of Canadian aboriginal-rights litigation, which is understandable as I would expect you to be more familiar with the law of evidence in the US context. (Do you know what the American law is with regard to the use of aboriginal oral history as evidence, either generally or in the specific context of aboriginal-rights cases? I’d be interested to hear whether it differs from the Canadian law.)

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I think that the use of aboriginal oral history in court is very intriguing and I would like to read the reasoning of the (appellate?) court that made that ruling. Is the case available online for free? I would also be interested to understand the limitations that the court put on that usage.

To address your second point, yes, we know that words have changed over time because we wrote them down. But, to use your own point, it doesn't matter that these meanings have changed, only that we know what they mean now. That is, the fact that we know words have changed their meanings--something that writing taught us--is irrelevant. But what we take from those words now has been communicated to us not from a dictionary, but from the social text of language. Written texts, like the Persons Case, no longer make sense, and we don't know that because it was written down, we just know it. The discrepancy from the written document to our contemporary interpretation remains simply a curiosity, not a significant piece of knowledge that allows us to define a "Person" under law.

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Aboriginal rights claims give rise to inherent evidentiary difficulties. However, the rights protected under s. 35(1) should not be rendered illusory by imposing an impossible burden of proof. The rules of evidence must therefore be applied flexibly, in a manner commensurate with the inherent difficulties posed by aboriginal claims. Since claimants must demonstrate features of pre-contact society in the absence of written records, oral histories may offer otherwise unavailable evidence of ancestral practices and aboriginal perspectives. Oral histories are admissible as evidence where they are both useful and reasonably reliable, subject always to the exclusionary discretion of the trial judge. In determining the usefulness and reliability of oral histories, judges must resist facile assumptions based on Eurocentric traditions of gathering and passing on historical facts. Here, the parties presented evidence from historians and archeologists. The aboriginal perspective was supplied by oral histories of elders such as the respondent. The respondent’s testimony, confirmed by archaeological and historical evidence, was useful and the trial judge did not err in finding the respondent’s evidence to be credible and reliable.

There are no precise rules or absolute principles governing the interpretation or weighing of evidence in support of aboriginal claims. The laws of evidence must ensure that the aboriginal perspective is given due weight but consciousness of the special nature of aboriginal claims does not negate general principles governing evidence. Claims must still be established on persuasive evidence demonstrating validity on a balance of probabilities. In the present case, the evidence indicates that the Mohawks travelled north on occasion and trade was a distinguishing feature of their society. The evidence does not show, however, an ancestral practice of trading north of the St. Lawrence River. Mohawk trade at the time of contact fell predominantly along an east-west axis. The relevant evidence supporting the claim consists of a single ceremonial knife, treaties that make no reference to pre-existing trade, and the mere fact of Mohawk involvement in the fur trade. While appellate courts grant considerable deference to findings of fact made by trial judges, the finding of a cross-border trading right in this case represents, in view of the paucity of the evidence, a “palpable and overriding error”. Evidentiary principles must be sensitively applied to aboriginal claims but they cannot be strained beyond reason.

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Go here and type in "Mitchell v. M.N.R."

I might add that the Supreme Court's reasoning here does not really abruptly depart from what is going on in the law of evidence generally, which is a departure from the old formats where those have been shown to be insufficiently flexible.

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Originally posted by jeff house:
Go here and type in "Mitchell v. M.N.R."

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quote:

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Originally posted by Southlander:

Surely it was god?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Frustrated Mess:

There was/is no God. And BTW, for those who still hold those beliefs, there was but one God. The ony true God. And he was a jealous God. What was he jealous of?

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quote:

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No, but it is ADORABLE!

So why isn't it science?

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This, and why not only should 'intelligent design' not be part of the classroom, and how science doesn't include or exclude God is easily answered.

They are different branches of thought. You don't learn Shakespeare in Biology class, you don't learn basketball in history class. You also shoudn't learn religion and spirituality in science class as science is the branch of learning dedicated to examining and theorizing possibilities based on imperical data.

God, based on all of the major religions is not something/one that can be a part of an imperical data discussion. As well, science has NO right to discuss whether God exists or not. They are NOT mutually inclusive or exclusive, they are entirely different questions.

As soon as God is brought into one classroom, the possibility must be brought into all of them. Eg. "Why did God chose to have Daniel score that goal instead of me?"
"Why did God allow Canadians to have univeral healthcare but not it's neighbours?"

quote:

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Originally posted by Frustrated Mess:
In any case, I don't know why the value of aboriginal oral history ought to rest on the validation of the dominant culture either legally or otherwise.

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Litigation is an instrument for aboriginal people to obtain tangible benefits such as protection of hunting and fishing rights, or compensation for the infringement of those rights. It's an extremely blunt instrument, to be sure -- one that often produces results that are neither appropriate nor fair -- but it can be a way of forcing governments to change their behaviour. Because governments drag their feet, and concede things only very grudgingly.

Unfortunately, they don't just drag their feet at negotiations, but also at trial. And the evidentiary burden in aboriginal rights and title cases forces aboriginal people to present in meticulous detail what Tom Berger once called "the tedious proof of the obvious" -- namely, that they've lived in roughly the same area and carried on the same activities for centuries or millennia. (The Crown, has no such similar burden to prove its own underlying title -- that's just assumed, because of course everyone knows that European settlers just magically acquired sovereignty over North America. )

My point here (and I am getting to it!) is that in this situation, every little bit of evidence helps. And the courts have at least taken some steps toward acknowledging that aboriginal oral history can be used in support of proving the occurrence of historical events, patterns of resource use, and the existence of aboriginal governments and laws.

[ 16 February 2007: Message edited by: obscurantist ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Frustrated Mess:

There was/is no God. And BTW, for those who still hold those beliefs, there was but one God. The ony true God. And he was a jealous God. What was he jealous of?

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Well, the God of the old testament was jealous of other gods. We tend to think today that the thrust of that was to found monothiesm, but it spoke to an earlier time when people believed that gods were territorial. A good Elohim fearing Hebrew, for example, would think it perfectly okay-- or even mandatory-- on a visit to Caanan to worship Malak, for example.

There is a specific word for this belief that gods are territorial, but it eludes me at the moment.

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Okay, I just spent some time googling for that word, and the closest I came was animism, but I know it's not that.

Frustrated Mess, you set me upon this path, you must now find me that word.

[ 16 February 2007: Message edited by: Tommy_Paine ]

Now the time has come, and the word has faded from my skull bone.

Damn your eyes.

quote:

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Originally posted by obscurantist:
M. Spector, I’d be curious to hear whether you think the courts’ recognition of oral history as evidence (under certain limited conditions) constitutes a recognition of its validity, and if so, whether you agree with that. I’d also be curious to hear whether you agree with von Gernet’s efforts to severely restrict the admissibility and weight of oral histories.

(von Gernet sets out his views in this article; for another approach to the topic, see for example this article by John Borrows.)

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Both authors recognized that the Supreme Court of Canada in Delgamuukw opened a huge can of worms by opening the door wide to evidence of oral traditions (albeit, I hasten to add, on a case-by-case basis). Von Gernet is concerned that by putting oral traditions "on an equal footing” with historical documents the Supreme Court was lowering the standard of proof in cases that turn on historical fact-finding. Borrows notes that oral history serves several different functions - not just the recording of historical fact - and he worries that courts may not understand the challenges and difficulties of dealing with its interpretation. He seems to think that ultimately the Supreme Court's new test for Aboriginal oral history is likely to strain our legal and constitutional structure, despite the Court's intention that it not do so.

To answer your specific questions, I agree with the court's recognition of oral history as admissible evidence in an appropriate case and its recognition that it may have probative value in relation to the particular issue before the court. I don't see this necessarily as a recognition of its "validity" (whatever that may mean) in general, outside of the context of the litigation.

I share von Gernet's concern, however, with the Court's "equal footing" formulation, which is capable of all kinds of confusion and mischief. I do not think, for example, that "equal footing" should mean "equal weight" in all cases. In any event, evidence of oral history can support and corroborate other forms of evidence, and can in turn be corroborated by those other forms of evidence, but it is rarely definitive on its own in establishing historical fact. Indeed, as von Gernet remarks, "I have never encountered a case in which oral traditions were absolutely necessary because they were 'the only record of their past.'”

But I fear we are straying off the topic of "Science and Creation Myths."

[ 16 February 2007: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

quote:

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Originally posted by jeff house:
Go here and type in "Mitchell v. M.N.R."

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quote:

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
I share von Gernet's concern, however, with the Court's "equal footing" formulation, which is capable of all kinds of confusion and mischief. I do not think, for example, that "equal footing" should mean "equal weight" in all cases. In any event, evidence of oral history can support and corroborate other forms of evidence, and can in turn be corroborated by those other forms of evidence, but it is rarely definitive on its own in establishing historical fact.

But I fear we are straying off the topic of "Science and Creation Myths."

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quote:

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Originally posted by obscurantist:
But I agree with the historian I referred to above that von Gernet decontextualizes aboriginal oral history to make it appear an unreliable source of information. He caricatures it, essentially, and omits any reference to the corrective methods contained within it.

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quote:

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Dr. von Gernet was put forward by the Crown as an expert witness in the areas of anthropology and ethnohistory. Samson sought to limit the qualification of Dr. von Gernet as an expert witness....

Dr. von Gernet did not write an expert Report, instead writing Rebuttal Reports that addressed the testimony of Samson elders.... Samson objected to the admissibility of Dr. von Gernet’s Rebuttal Reports for three main reasons. Firstly, that the Reports are argumentative, rather than an expert opinion; secondly, issues of credibility, which is the responsibility of the judge, and thirdly, that the Report tends towards advocacy of the Crown position rather than an opinion of the author.

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quote:

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evidence of oral history can support and corroborate other forms of evidence, and can in turn be corroborated by those other forms of evidence, but it is rarely definitive on its own in establishing historical fact.

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[ 16 February 2007: Message edited by: obscurantist ]

quote:

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Originally posted by quelar:

This, and why not only should 'intelligent design' not be part of the classroom, and how science doesn't include or exclude God is easily answered.They are different branches of thought. You don't learn Shakespeare in Biology class, you don't learn basketball in history class. You also shoudn't learn religion and spirituality in science class as science is the branch of learning dedicated to examining and theorizing possibilities based on imperical data....

Belief is a different area than science, it needs to be distinct.

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quote:

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
In most cases it's a matter of using aboriginal oral history to prove historical facts from before the contact with the white settlers. There would thus be no documentary records available from the settler (government) side.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy_Paine:
Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahaah! I thought it would drive me mad (gasp gasp gasp) But I found it, I found it!

Henotheism.

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It's been an interesting thread, even with the lawyers taking charge. I'm not sure if the subject is about religion, science, memory or the law. It's all history to me.

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Originally posted by Farmpunk:
We don't lose Homer if his\her books are all burnt.

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It's the theme of Ozymandias that's important, not the fact that it was put into writing.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Wrong. Unless someone's got it all memorized and can write it down again, we lose it.

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M Spector reminds me of the rubes who do their research all on the net.

I wouldn't be a very happy person without writing, or reading. But a lot of people in the world don't give a fuck about either.

I vote for Spector, obviously, but will bow to the democratic process.

quote:

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Originally posted by Farmpunk:
Fear Spector, he knows ALL! Bow down before his powerful mastery of language and online researching prowess, ye babbling rubes! Spector's words will live evermore! Someday someone will demand his collected posts from an internet forum be published for ALL to whorship in their properly printed form.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Farmpunk:
Drama and art are older than the written use of language.

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A means of expression is not superior to writing merely because it existed before writing. Stone axes predated steel axes but the latter is far superior to the former as a tool to chop wood.

Blue bloods like to speak about important matters in French and other languages with one another. The uneducated peasant class was less likely to discover their oppressive agenda.

[ 17 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]