Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Theories of Evolution and Gravity

Just to ensure that you understand where my true bias lies: I'm inclined to think that evolution has far far more evidence and usefulness than alternative theories. especially intelligent design which is little more than a devil-citing-scripture way to sneak a twisted form of creationism into public schools.

That said: I'm a bit annoyed by gravity and evolution comparisons, such as when someone defends the theory of evolution by pointing out that gravity is just a theory. I'll try analogy to explain.

The existence of life is to us not floating off into space as evolution is to theories of gravity.
It is a fact that life exists and it is a fact that we do not float off into space. However we don't have much past that. Last I've seen we've still not detected gravitons nor have we managed to fit gravity into the framework of the other three major forces (I admit I'm a bit behind the times on this, so please, correct me if there's something new). In other words, the theory of gravity is entirely different from the fact that we do not float off into space.

That said, we've seen evolution and natural selection in progress, so perhaps the theory of evolution has more evidence than explanations of the phenomenon known as gravity, or as I've named it "not floating off into space".

That said, I cannot promise that I will never again respond with a snarky "so is gravity" when confronted with an "evolution is just a theory" stance.

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