CA230: Interpretation and observation

Claim CA230:

Source:

Response:

1. All observation requires interpretation. Even something as seemingly simple as seeing an object in front of you requires a great deal of interpretation to determine what it is, what properties it exhibits, how far away it is, and so forth (Sacks 1995). To dismiss absolutely everything we know because it is interpretation would be ludicrous.
   
   
2. Most of the evidence of evolution is not the sort about which interpretation is in question. The evidence consists of such things as the following:
   • certain trilobite species are found in certain geological formations;
   • many more varieties of marsupials are found in Australia than elsewhere;
   • bacteria in test tubes have been seen to change in certain ways over time;
   • flies share some traits that other insects do not;
   and millions of other such facts, none of which are in dispute.
   
   The sort of interpretation to which creationists object is how all the evidence fits together. They do not deny the evidence (not most of it, anyway); they deny that it is evidence for evolution.
   
   However, a fact gets to be considered evidence for a theory if it fits that theory and does not fit or is not covered by competing theories. (Ideally, the theory should predict the fact before the fact is known, but that is not essential for the fact to be evidence.) The millions of facts referred to above fit this criterion, so they qualify as evidence for evolution.
   
   
3. The interpretation on which creationism depends, in contrast, is based only on highly questionable and subjective ideas that do not fit together into a coherent whole.

Links:

References: