(December 26, 2019 at 1:49 am)John 6IX Breezy Wrote:(December 26, 2019 at 1:31 am)Paleophyte Wrote: Phylogenetic trees are trivially easy to test and falsify. It's a remedial exercise in any second year evolution course and asking Google for "How to Test Phylogenetic Trees" will net you an unsurprising number of second year students trying to get you to do their homework.
I can't know what tests you have in mind. But perhaps such a Google search can lead to a few errors on the subject. Methods such as parsimony, bootstrapping, and so on, are used to decide among competing phylogenies for a particular taxa. For example, by helping you find the scenario with the fewest number of events, thereby increasing its likelihood. These methods cannot, however, confirm that a given phylogeny is correct.
No one knows the true pattern of branching for cats (leopards, lions, tigers) for example. The best that can be done is to identify the most plausible scenario.
That's true for any scientific theory. That's precisely what makes it falsifiable. All you're doing is whittering on about how science doesn't have Absolute Truth.
