Her first email read like this:
“You are grossly uninformed and uneducated on this topic:
There is NO SUCH THING as “THE Scientific Method.” There is NO SINGULAR method that scientists follow. What we all learned in 6th grade is WRONG.
Laws, theories and hypotheses have NO HEIRARCHY WHATSOEVER. NOTHING is upgraded. THEY ARE LIKE APPLES ORGANES AND KUMQUATS.
Science and spirituality are NOT at war, you uneducated Internet fool. They are totally SEPARATE entities and areas of life. Dawkins is blatantly and COMPLETELY MISUSING and ABUSING science for his AGENDA. The man should know better.
I STRONGLY SUGGEST that you EDUCATE YOURSELF about what science actually is and is NOT- what it can and cannot do.
THIS link, from the University of California at Berkeley is the BEST ON THE INTERNET ( and it is reputable) for information about what science is. YOU simply do NOT understand that God falls WAAAAAY BEYOND THE BOUNDARIES of what science can actually address. Science is SILENT on the matter- COMPLETELY SILENT. It does NOT get involved , NOR IT IS EVEN ABLE TO.
SCIENCE HAS LIMITS, YOU LAUGHABLE INTERNET GEEK A**HOLE. PLEASE EDUCATE YOURSELF, YOU FOOL !!!!!!!!
http://undsci.berkeley.edu/article/0_0_0/whatisscience_12″
[Censorship is my own]
Well that was lovely, calm, thoughtful and respectful!
On her first point, that there is no one ‘scientific method’ that all scientists follow. I have since challenged her in multiple emails she has replied to on that claim, each time she has restated her claim, but with no evidence what-so-ever. I asked her for one piece of published, peer-reviewed science that didn’t follow the Hypothesis-Test-Conclusion structure, but she has not presented anything. She has no evidence for her claim.
“Laws, Theories and Hypothesises have no hierarchy whatsoever, nothing is upgraded.” She then states. She’s right, I have never said anything to the contrary on my blog, or anywhere else, ever. So I don’t know what relevance it has to the topic. It is true, hypothesises are not the same as theories or laws, but that bares no relevance to the topic.
“Science and spirituality are not at war you uneducated internet fool” she goes on to say. Like I said earlier in response to a comment, I think that they are polar opposites and must necessarily be at war, because their beliefs and claims are in stark contrast to each other.
Its also worth saying that she claims science and spirituality are not at war, and then goes on to attack science in defence of her spiritual beliefs. Ironic really.
I suggest you all visit the link she sent me, it not that long so its not heavy reading. After you read it, formulate your own opinion as to the intent of the link.
okay… Its pretty weak isn’t it, and like her emails and comments, it has no evidence to back up its claims, and just says what it wants to say. It’s not in-depth, its not thorough, its quite a poor page, and its credibility is not great, seeing as there is no author. It may be on a university website, but some universities also endorse homeopathy and other ridiculous alt-med claims, so it is of little value credibility-wise.
On to the next email.
“You are a total fool. The best cream of the crop theories we have are ONLY APPROXIMATIONS AT BEST. There are many theories outright WRONG.Even accepted quality science has been very wrong.
Our best scientific genuises in history were ONLY fog fighters struggling mightily to understand the world.
Get off the pedestal. Scientists are EXTREMELY FALLIBLE and no better than anybody else.”
and followed shortly after, before I could respond, was this:
“YOU ARE WRONG, A**WIPE. THERE IS NMO NEED FOR YOU TO MAKE SOME STUPID POST ABOUT THIS.
THE UNIVERISTY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELY HAS COMPLETELY DISCREDITED YOUR INTERNET BLOGGING A**, YOU F*CKING STOOGE.
YOUR UNDERSTANDING OF WHAT SCIENCE IS, IS P*SS PORR.
YOU LOSE.”
The first email she sends is a lot nicer, I wish she wrote like that more often.
I’ll talk about it first.
Her first claim, that our best scientific theories are estimations at best. This is just wrong. Our cream of the crop theories, Evolution, the Big Bang Theory, Germ Theory of Disease, General and Special relativity, these have all been tested countless times before, over and over again, to the utmost detail, and never has an experiment contradicted any of them to date. This doesn’t mean they are right, we can never prove anything completely correct in science, but it suggests that they are. Even if they are not, they are pretty close to how it would be. Just like Newtons Laws of motion, they’re pretty good, but relativity is just a little bit better. So if they are wrong, they are basically right because they fit every aspect of the universe that we have measured with precision.
Her second argument made in the email is that scientists are fallible, just like any other human beings. Again, she’s right, but it doesn’t prove her point at all. Scientists are fallible like the rest of us, but science was designed to eliminate those errors, and other things like bias which would interfere with observation. Science is the perfect way to eliminate the fallibility of humans.
I will now address her second email.
This is no more than a blatant ad hominem attack, it makes no arguments, it assumes it is correct without any evidence, and it uses vulgarity to try and beat me as opposed to actual evidence. Nothing needs to be said about this email other than that it demonstrates her style of argument, the level of her intelligence when faced with actual reason, and the rigidity of her arguments.
I made short responses to her again, warning her that vulgarity was not the wisest thing for her appearance. She responded to my thus:
“YOU SILLY TEENAGER A**HOLE. SCIENCE ( as well as scientists) ITSELF IS VERY FALLIBLE. SCIENCE IS A HUMAN CREATION AND ENDEAVOR, YOU STUPID A**, PRACTIED BY SCIENTISTS.
SCIENCE ITSELF IS FALLIBLE- VERY FALLIBLE . IT IS FAR FROM PERFECT AND CONSIDERABLY LIMITED. Your views are SO ERRONEOUS AND UNINFORMED I FEEL BAD FOR YOU.
The best scientific theories we have are ONLY APPROXIMATIONS- NOTHING MORE. Even they CAN be either wrong or need work . And some of the lesser theroies are likely wrong.
Don’t you understand ANYTHNING?
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS “THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD” BY THE WAY ……..”
In another email shortly after
“SCIENCE CANNOT AT ALL ADDRESS GOD, YOU SILLY TEENAGE A**WIPE. IT DOES NOT DEAL WITH THAT- AND CAN’T. IT IS NOT EQUIPPED. SUCH QUESTIONS FALL FARRRRRRRRRRRRRRR BEYOND THE BOUNDARIES OF WHAT SCIENCE CAN ACTUALLY DO , YOU SILLY TEENAGE A**HOLE.
YOU NEED TO GET THAT THROUGH YOUR HEAD.
Science does NOT “prove” OR “disprove” ANYTHING ( including even scientific subject matter- which the supernatural and God are NOT ).
Furthermore, science CANNOT disprove God. This is BASIC knowledge. It does NOT deal with that. It is SILENT and NEUTRAL. YOU ARE A STOOGE. DAWKINS IS A TOTAL HACK AND ABUSING SCIENCE. HE IS A DISGRACE AND HAS AN AGENDA.
EDUCATE YOUR PATHETIC ASS:
http://undsci.berkeley.edu/article/0_0_0/whatisscience_12
READ UP. YOU HAVE A LOT TO LEARN.
SCIENCE AND SPIRITUALITY ARE NOT AT WAR, YOU PATHETIC INTERNET BLOGGING STOOGE.”
and one more!
“YOU SHOULD ALREADY KNOW that there is NO SUCH THING AS “THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD” IF YOU WERE EDUCATED.
There are MANY, MANY, MANY methods used in science, YOU FOOL. You have OVERSTEPPED THE BOUNDARIES OF WHAT SCIENCE CAN ACTUALLY DO. YOU HAVE AN INFLATED SENSE OF IT.
EINSTEIN HAD A DREAM OF TEAHCING PHILOSOPHY NA DLOVED – ABSOLUTELY LOVED READING KANT.DID YOU KNOW THAT, FOOL?”
She makes no new arguments in her first email in this series, other than bringing up a new layer to an old argument, that science itself is fallible too, because it is a human creation. Okay, lets look at that. Yes its a human creation, but it has been refined over the years to because a flawless way of testing reality. How do we know its flawless? Well we know it is prefect because the evidence surrounds us, if science was even a little bit long I surely wouldn’t be writing to you on my iPad, and you wouldn’t be seeing it almost instantaneously wherever you might be in the world. We wouldn’t be able to send probes across the solar system and track them precisely, reading from their instruments from billions of miles away. If it was even a little off, it wouldn’t work, so if it is wrong, its PRETTY DAMN CLOSE.
On to the second email in this series.
Her only claim here in this aggressive email is that science does not disprove god. Obviously, nothing can be disproved completely in science, just like nothing can be completely proven. But, in over 2000 years of observation of the natural world, we have not one scrap of evidence that god does exist, save a few holes in theories which always get plugged up over time. If there is no evidence for something, it doesn’t disprove it, but it very strongly suggests that it is incorrect.
Her response to this would be that God falls beyond the boundaries of science, and therefore cannot be tested by science. Well, like I have said before, If science tests reality (which it does) and God has an effect on reality (sure it would seeing as he made it all and performs miracles on it) then we should be able to find some ‘God’ lying around, but we haven’t. We haven’t seen anything. Anybody who denies that there is no substantial proof for god is clearly kidding themselves, as they can never produce any evidence themselves.
And her final email.
Her only interesting and non-ad hominem filled argument in this email is that Einstein dreamed of teaching philosophy and enjoyed Kant. SO WHAT?! I like Harry Potter, I like the moral story it teaches, just like I like the moral stories in Animal Farm, and I want every child to read both of these books, because they are amazing. It doesn’t mean I think any of it is science.
Philosophy is a broad topic, and the philosophy if Kant is a long way off the philosophy of your religion. This is also a prime example of the argument from authority, she seems to believe that Einstein is the be-all and end-all on what science is.
One more email remaining, this one came after the others.
This is it:
“You need an EDUCATION badly. Feel free to use this because it IS TRUE:
THERE IS NO SUCH THINGS AS “THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD.” There are MANY, MANY, MANY METHODS used in science. What we all learned in 6th grade is NOT an accurtae representation of how science works in the real world as used by professional scientists…….. IT IS WRONG.
You Internet twats are either STUPID or MISINFORMED.”
Worth noting that this is all in 30pt red text, but I cannot make it appear this way with the iPad version of wordpress, and I didn’t pack my laptop when I came to Germany.
Also note the complete arrogance demonstrated on her behalf by saying “feel free to use this because it is true”, despite this claim she has presented no evidence to prove it, so she may as well be shooting herself in the foot.
That’s all, also note that I have once more challenged her to prove her main claim in the last email, and she has not replied yet. She has had plenty of time and opportunity, so I will assume she has none.
Summing up, Ashley has given no substantial evidence to support any of her claims, nor has she demonstrated any level of basic debating skills, quickly resorting to derogatory, ad hominem and vulgar attacks in order to try and prove her point. I look forward to her future response to this blog post, I’m sure she will be rather vocal, and I think I can say there will be another follow-up blog post when she replies again.