And climate change aren't settled science so I can understand the skeptics. .. doesn't mean Americans are stupid.....

In science very few things are ever "settled". An intelligent person would be at least somewhat confident in all those issues given the overwhelming weight of evidence.

If those poll results are truly representative, then a large number of Americans are VERY STUPID.

It is ignorant to say otherwise.

While nothing in science is ever "certain" these two are both on very firm ground. The Big Bang is moving towards as settled an issue in science as the idea that the Earth goes around the sun. While climate science isn't at that level yet it is moving in that direction and is certainly well supported by all scientific evidence. The "controversy" in climate science is all in the media. There is no controversy in the scientific community. Even the most extreme deniers in the scientific community now have to concede essentially all of the points of the scientific argument.

Of which I support but they still are just theories. .

What was understood by Newton to be "the law of gravity" was revised by Einstein and while it was not invalidated it was significantly revised in scope and terms.

As a result of this and other "Scientific Revolutions" we now call most everything a "theory" because we understand that sometimes deeper understandings are possible. In fact our current theory of gravity is known to be incomplete because it does not correctly describe what happens at the Planck scale ...

Or, there is a theory of gravity, and a law of gravity.

Here is an article on the difference between the two terms.

http://science.kennesaw.edu/~rmatson/3380theory.html

Quite well on a Theory, Thou Ludditic! Please educate thine self to the distinction of a postulate versus a theory. SMH... well that's part of the "Stupid" we were hearing about, wasn't it? IF I offended, please accept my apologies, but I've heard that argument too many times to just slough it off. It is NOW very OFFENSIVE to HEAR, and I have no more patience left with which to deal with it. Sorry...

Science is based on inductive reasoning, which is a method of drawing generalized conclusions based on finite observations. Inductive reasoning can be used to disprove a theory, but it cannot be used to prove one. for example, take the following observation:

The grass outside my window is green.
Using inductive reasoning I can conclude:

All grass is green.
This conclusion is valid in inductive reasoning so long as all observations support it. As soon as an observation contradicts the conclusion, the conclusion is proved false. However, the only way to prove theory is true would be to observe all grass. This limitation is due to the fact that a conclusion is being drawn from a subset of possible observations.

Since science, by its very nature, attempts to draw conclusions from observations of the natural world inductive reasoning is necessary. In science, though, it is literally impossible to make every possible observation to prove a rule. Therefore, it is also impossible to prove any theory in science. Every conclusion science has ever made is an unproved theory, including gravity.\

I see no inductive reasoning that disproves climate change, the big bang, and the age of the Earth/solar system.

Or for each and every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Science is much more than just a bunch of educated guesses.

Einstein's theories did not destroy Newton's theories. He extended them. But both could be "wrong" in the sense that we may have to extend them again.

Science can never prove a theory. At most, science can disprove a theory. It is our best educated guesses (best theories) that survive the most tests and explain the most facts.

That will fly in the face of "highly educated guesses".

http://www.officeplayground.com/Newtons-Cradle-5-inch-Wood-Base-Brown-P2490.aspx?utm_source=googlebase&utm_medium=comparisonshopping&utm_term=4032&gclid=COWOivuo870CFbBj7AodrVoAfg

you should watch last night's episode of Cosmos, just for age of the Earth

As to big bang, you missed the smoking gun two weeks ago, didn't you?

But if you doubt those two, having doubts about global warming is understandable too. The Oil Institute thanks you by the way

I have zero patience for this shit any more

As one example, the Earth IS warming. Just because corporate America has spent millions to cloud the issue doesn't mean the overwhelming scientific evidence is wrong.

creationism (the church) and climate change deniers (fossil fuel producers) have HUGE propaganda machines working in their favor.

Most of scientific testing/analysis confirms the accuracy of the big bang, age of the earth, and climate change.

Until new, proven data arise that contradicts or calls them into question, they stand.

They're as close to settled as science gets and have extremely strong consensus on each.

4.54 ± 0.05 billion years, from Pb204-Pb206 isotopic age dating.

If by "not settled" you mean the degree of uncertainty (i.e the +/1 0.05 billion years) then yes, there is some fine-tuning to be done (and is being done by geologists).

I can guarantee that we're not going to wake up one day to the revelation that the Earth is only 2 billion years old, or 10 trillion years old.

In that sense, it is definitely settled.

It would just depend on our perspective. If we were further away from the sun, closer to the sun, etc. Or, frankly, if we just wanted to. Our concept of time is very Human/Earth/Sun-centric, which obviously makes sense for us, but it isn't really exact. We can use the words that we made up to express how old we think Earth is, but we don't really know how old it is.

Semantics and all, but still.

We've established an accepted concept of "time" that has so far served us well.

Ken famously said,"In any given situation there are more dumb people than smart people." George said,"Think of how stupid the average person is...now understand that by definition half the people are dumber than that." Those quotes are years old folks. The media and schools have been purposefully dumbed down...add the degradation of our food and health and it all adds up to dumb, dumber and dumbest. Start with fixing the food and we may have a chance.

Thanks.

100 people with an IQ of 100
100 people with an IQ of 110
100 people with an IQ of 90

In this example, there 300 people with an average IQ of 100, but only 1/3 have an IQ lower than the average.

With a much bigger and varied sample ?

The below *median* average part of a population is going to be 1/2 the population minus 1 (representing the median instance).

And the population of average or above average and average or below average will be the same. 1/2 + 1, with the one being the average person.

It does make a difference whether the population is an odd or even number, but the general idea remains the same.

Now, if we used IQ scores, which are rounded to the nearest integer, then there would be huge clumps at 99, 100, 101, etc..

But we wouldn't use IQ scores for a hypothetical. The existence of an average is stipulated.

Stupid people are measured against average people.

It's not correct to set an arbitrary standard (often based on pet issues) for what is intelligent and measure everybody else against that standard. That makes no real sense.

dumb article is dumb.

The science behind global climate change, age of the earth, and big bang are not settled. Anyone that tells you otherwise is flat out wrong. We have strong evidence but is not settled and hotly debated inside the scientific community.

We can't even agree what caused the Permian-Triassic Extinction....

would you say you were "more confident" or "more skeptical" of any of those scientific theories?

That is the real question. It is not whether these things are proven facts, just whether there is enough evidence at this point to suggest that these theories are the best we have with what we know now.

there may be disagreements over the details but overall?

No.

Eg, maybe what kicked off the bang? Yeah, different POVs.

What was before? Maybe.

But whether there was one? Nope....except in church.

All three are as close to settled as science gets and have extremely strong consensuses supporting them.

a theory is not a law.

A theory can still be proven wrong. A law is less likely to be proven wrong however.

Clair Patterson proved the age of the Earth using the decay of Uranium to Lead in samples of meteorites. Meteorites bombarded Earth in the beginning and still land on the Earth today from the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Saturn. Latter on, Patterson showed how Lead in leaded gasoline was poisonous. Congress had the Lead removed, through Public Law.

http://frenchtribune.com/teneur/1422327-cosmos-how-clair-patterson-figured-out-age-earth

Not only is the show very well done, high production values and terrific effects, but Neil DeGrasse Tyson is just excellent and I'm learning quite a lot!

So, I am not sure I would put those two in the same category. The big bang may actually have a big overlay of wishful "In the beginning" and "Apocalyptic" thinking behind it. I consider Big Bang theory and Global Warming science.

And we extrapolate back to a source event.

With global warming we study different variables, do a regression analysis, come up with some associations, create a model, then test the model by seeing if certain changes in the variables are associated with the appropriate degree of temperature change. Not a physicist. Can we do the same thing with Big Bang science?

What variables to we change and what effect do we see in order to "prove" the big bang? Is not big bang sort of like evolution---the theory that makes the most sense to explain the way things are?

Scientists predicted that we would find evidence of the inflationary period right after the big bang. We looked for them and there they were.

Actually, [font size = "+1"]science does not prove theories.[/font] Science seeks to disprove theories and those theories that stand many tests are the ones remaining that best explain the facts.

First off, "Big Bang" does not describe the initial moment of creation. It describes the first few moments after creation, the spreading out of the universe from that origin point. Now, the "Big Bang", the spreading out, has been proven (as much as anything in cosmology ever gets proven). What's still up for debate, and is still theory, is what preceded that initial expansion. Current leading theory is a quantum singularity but if you want to say it was god, there's nothing that disproves that. Personally, I'm a believer in the cyclical universe model. That's where the Big Bang happens, hurls out a universe which keeps spreading until the momentum runs out and then, gravity draws it back together into a new singularity which then expands again, creating another universe.

the expansion of the universe would be a hypothesis. The current Theory of Cosmic Expansion describes the inflationary period and continued expansion of the universe that we currently observe. We only have hypotheses to account for the underlying cause of this accelerated expansion (this gets wrapped up in the concept of dark energy as well).

As you said we have multiple independent observations for accelerated expansion. Many of our theories are still looking for definite proof of causal agents. For example one of these is gravity. We have elegant theories (first Newton for non-relativistic effects) and then Einstein that observe the effect of gravity, but what causes it (it is speculated gravitons but this hypothesis has not been proven).

In fact we understand far better what is happening with evolution than we do with cosmology or particle physics. A recent article in Scientific American talks about how particle scientists are getting pretty close to having to throw in the towel on supersymmetry.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/supersymmetry-and-the-crisis-in-physics/

All observations do verify certain facts though. Within a reasonable margin of error the age of the universe and the age of earth are settled. AGW is a much more complicated situation, but we can conclude that the introduction of CO2 and other greenhouse gases is leading to additional trapped heat. Exactly what happens after that is still somewhat uncertain. Sea level rise is a certainty. Some shift of the growth belt as well (it is already occurring). I don't think we have enough information on the negative feedback potential in the various climate systems to conclude that we can get into a runaway situation though. We eventually are going to reach peak carbon output as the remaining carbon stores become uneconomical compared to other technologies.

Even if we somehow max out our carbon output (and you're more optimistic than I am there), the rising tempratures are now causing the release of methane from the arctic ice which accelerates global warming far more than carbon.

I'll be honest, I don't entirely understand the science behind climate change. I'm a psychologist, not a climatologist. But I understand enough to realise that we need to do something right fucking NOW or our civilisation in it's current form will not survive. We do not have time to wait and see what happens.

BTW, thanks for the article. I'll give that a proper read when I've finally gotten some sleep.

Quite a bit, actually: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang#Observational_evidence

The exact details are fuzzier, but we learn more all the time. And what came before the big bang seems to be outside the realm of science. However, given the weight of evidence, the only reason to be skeptical about it overall is if you are married to the number of 5,000-odd years that the bible gives for the age of the universe.

Predictions tend to be less reliable than than observations of history.

Both theories look pretty good. Just noting that there is nothing weak about the case for a big bang.

When I was a teenager science and scientists were believed to have the solution to just about every problem. And if they didn't know right off, give them some time to study the situation and they'll come up with a solution.

Proof: see any scifi movie from the 50s and 60s.

The next point was the idea of the collective solution to problems. Since I was born when the memory of WW2 was fresh, people believed in coming together. Unions were big also.

Then...gov't (society) is the problem, rugged individuals don't need help, etc.

And now?

Science is KNOWING and faith is about BELIEVING things beyond the reach of KNOWING.

====================================

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
Heb 11:1KJV
faith -it is evidence !

And the anti-science forces have the resources to repeat their message constantly. You've even got a couple of deniers on this thread. If you have sufficient money, it's child's play to create enough FUD to sway opinion. That's one of teh major problems with the US, you've allowed people to politicise facts.

Why?

I think a lot of the 42 percent who were not confident or against, were because many of those did not know what "natural selection" is.

If the question were...Do you thinks that humans evolved over many hundreds of thousands of years from other animals. I think that the results would be different. I think the question was bad. I do not believe that 42 percent think that the earth is 6000 years old. That is what I believe..

According to this poll, 46% believe that "3) God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so. "

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/05/americans-believe-in-creationism_n_1571127.html

We are not even talking about a more liberal interpretation where god guides evolution over many years. That is provided for in the poll questions. Religion is a plague on our society. Don't let your assumptions hide this fact from you.

Faith is a virtue! Why? The bible says so!

I'm a Luciferian Satanist, it's a tenet of my faith that god is a sadistic scumfuck.

""If the question were...Do you thinks that humans evolved over many hundreds of thousands of years from other animals. I think that the results would be different."""

no not really......

http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/Hold-Creationist-View-Human-Origins.aspx

10/23/4004 BC that is when it all went down according to the real hard core

These few-thousand-year-earthers do a major, insulting discredit to God. Just because THEY can't wrap their minds around the awesomeness of the universe, they simply box His magnificent creation into a human-scaled story. Y'know, because God in all his glory has to keep things simple like that for his followers.


==========================

Since I was not here 13.8 million yrs ago, however the theory does explain much of what we observe in the universe. As for climate change I have been around long enough to see it for myself, it is real, it is happening and it is man made.

"Not sure about the Big Bang Since I was not here 13.8 million yrs ago..."

Much as... I'm not sure about the existence of Saturn's third moon, since I've never been there.

I did not discount the Big Bang theory in my post but it is just a theory. It is a very plausible theory and it explains what we observe quite nicely. However M Theory/ String Theory are also very plausible... obviously something happened be it a Big Bang or two membranes touching or some other event turning energy into matter. As for climate change there is no debate on that it is happening and we are witnessing it with each passing year as weather patterns change due to increase in heat captured in our biosphere.

Published by Bishop Usher in the journal of the Royal Society in the 1700s, what passed for a peer-reviewed
science in its day, when radioactivity was unknown to the Natural History (Science) community. The goal was
To find the shortest time for the possible age of the Earth, using the generations as given in the Bible for calculation.
That was the days numerical best data....
Current age based on radioactive elements is 4.55 billion years. Science advances, Newton and in 1905 Einstein were
Attacked by the top dogs in Science of their day. One wag published that Einstein's papers were dissed by 90% of the
top 250 Scientists of his era.

AB

you dont need to have a poll to tell us swaths of America are dumber than rabbit droppings....

Of course their viewers are dumber than rocks.

Evolution, I am extremely confident on that.

On the age of the Earth as well as the age of the Universe... I am moderately confident in those.
My reasoning:

There has been recent publication in regards to life starting up much earlier than expected in Earth, given new evidence. So, considering that, it is possible that Earth could have been around longer that first mentioned. In fact, I posit that it is much older than the given age. I have no idea how long it has been a rock hurtling around space before it got trapped in to orbit with the Sun. Still, they may be right to basically base the age of the Earth through their readings and comparing it with the age of our Solar System. They are basing their time frame through oldest known terrestrial objects, so at the moment, I am moderately confident on the age of the Earth being 4.54 Billion years old, but am willing to be proven otherwise with new data showing that it is even older.

That, is the same way I feel about the age of the Universe. They mention 13.8 Billion years, which I again, am moderately confident about, till I am provided new data suggesting otherwise. I also have to consider that, that age, is when the Universe began its expansion or when the Big Bang happened. Which is completely different from when the universe was actually around. I have no idea what catalyst could have started the expansion/Big Bang, and thinking about what was there before is beyond me, and I can't even begin to think up of a method of figuring out what was there and the measurements that would be required to start.

So, I'll mention where I stand in this thing:


Smoking Causes Cancer - Somewhat Confident
A mental illness is a medical condition that affects the brain - Extremely Confident. Well of course it is. Heck, a spike on the brain can also be construed as a medical condition.
Inside our cells is a complex genetic code that determines who we are - Extremely Confident. Even if there is a ton of DNA within us that is not in keeping with who we are. We are a collection of various bacteria, operating in concert in a symbiotic relationship. I mean, even the bacteria in our stomachs affect our mental condition.
Overusing antibiotics causes the development of drug resistant bacteria - Extremely Confident. It also kills off helpful bacteria living within us.
The Universe is so complex there must be a supreme being guiding its creation - Not at all Confident. Thinking that it is so is lazy, and stops progress of thought. Saying that there is a supreme being and leaving at that, would basically stop individuals from trying to learn beyond that, which is DUMB. Besides, there can't be just one supreme being, there must be a Pantheon of them, at least a semi autonomous organization.
Childhood vaccines are safe and effective - Somewhat confident. I think they are mostly safe and effective. However, I've felt awful after some vaccines, so in general, I think they are effective and moderately safe. I'd trust to get them, but I wouldn't be surprised if some of them were harmful.
The average temperature of the Earth is rising - Extremely confident.
Life on Earth including Human Beings evolved through a process of natural selection - Extremely confident.
Earth is 4.5 Billion years old - Somewhat confident
Universe began with a Big Bang 13.8 Billion years ago - Somewhat confident. In truth, there are other theories out there. Big Bang is the most widely known. There is also the Incredible Bulk, Time's Arrow, The Nows.
http://discovermagazine.com/2008/apr/25-3-theories-that-might-blow-up-the-big-bang

There are some ideas that date the Universe to being Trillions of years old. So, yeah... I am moderately confident about that.