Requesting help from scientists/astronomers on the forum.

[Thumpalumpacus]

To him, astronomy as a scientific endeavor cannot proceed beyond the "hypothesis" phase, and thus cannot be described as a real science.

He's wrong about this. Astronomy can, does, and has made predictions which were borne out by observation. Simply because humans cannot manipulate the conditions of the experiment doesn't mean that we cannot observe the conditions found inside natural experiments.

For instance, Chandrasekhar found in Einstein's equations the hypothetical existence of black holes. Now, we cannot of course create black holes, but we could, and did, search them out. That is, we went beyond the "hypothesis" phase not in a laboratory, but by observing the natural laboratory with a keener eye.

There are other sciences which aren't amenable to direct experimentation (paleontology, geology) which are nonetheless amenable to solving hypotheses by observing natural experiments.

He's clearly cherry-picking Popper in service to his agenda.

Ask him how humans might confirm the God hypothesis.

[chimp3]

LIGO. Gravity waves detected!

[ohreally]

A couple of things I've read about recently have to do with parallax and the earth. Astronomers take pictures of stars as the earth goes around the sun and measure how much they move relative to the field of stars to help us know how far away certain stars are. It's where the distance of a parsec comes from, parallax of one arcsecond. Measuring light seems like a science thing to me.

Also related to that Galileo realized that you could use Jupiter's moons to tell time except it ended up being off sometimes. This of course happens because the distance between earth and Jupiter can vary and light does take time to get here. Measuring the speed of light seems like a science thing as well.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

There's a new NOVA dealing with the proposition, search for, and locations of black holes. Worth a look. PBS.org

[polymath257]

Here's another example.

After Newton proposed his law of gravity and laws of motion, it became possible to look at deviations from the orbits described by Kepler and to attribute these deviations to the gravitational influence of other planets. Well and good.

Well, the planet Uranus was discovered by mistake: Herschel was looking at the sky with his telescope and saw something that moved from night to night. It also showed a small disk. Eventually it was recognized to be a planet.

Now, the new Newtonian physics was immediately applied to this new planet. Things looked good for a while, then the observations and the predictions started going out of sync. There were at least a couple of options: 1) the Newtonian law of gravity didn't apply that far from the sun, or 2) there was another planet out there modifying the orbit of Uranus. Looking at the second possibility, it was possible to use the observations to *predict* where in the sky the new planet should be found. And guess what? When people looked, it was found! It is the planet Neptune.

Now, this is a perfect example of how science is done. Observations are collected. Differences with known conditions are discovered. A hypothesis is formulated. New observations are made, in this case verify hypothesis. This *is* the scientific method.

And, by the way, the whole thing would be impossible with a flat Earth.

[vulcanlogician]

Thanks for your help, everyone, but it seems the jerk just disappeared once it became apparent I had him cornered on the debate. I'll take that as a win. He had to have examined his own arguments and realized how easily they might be toppled.

[Fireball]

Thanks for your help, everyone, but it seems the jerk just disappeared once it became apparent I had him cornered on the debate. I'll take that as a win. He had to have examined his own arguments and realized how easily they might be toppled.

Keep up the good work!   I know I mentioned earlier that it's a waste of time in my mind, but someone has to do it. I did it for quite awhile, but generally don't get into it any more. Though I just did in the "Shithole" thread, and am already regretting it; not for what I said, but because of the extra-large heaping shovel of bullshit that is going to be laid in an effort to bury what I said.

[AFTT47]

Thanks for your help, everyone, but it seems the jerk just disappeared once it became apparent I had him cornered on the debate. I'll take that as a win.

I wouldn't do that.

This idiot got you to take your time to do research in order to answer him. You took him seriously enough to put forth this effort. That's a win for him.

The only way to score a win against idiots like this is to ignore them. Don't acknowledge them at all. If I call you "poopey face" and make derogatory comments about your family, are you really going to take me seriously? Your most devastating response would be to fail to acknowledge that I even exist.

That's the way to deal with irrational people. It's fine to engage theists in general because the theist vs. atheist argument is a valid discussion. But don't argue established facts with fools. Evolution is a done deal. A spherical earth is a done deal. Arguing with idiots who dispute this gives them validation they do not deserve.

[vulcanlogician]

Thanks for your help, everyone, but it seems the jerk just disappeared once it became apparent I had him cornered on the debate. I'll take that as a win.

I wouldn't do that.

This idiot got you to take your time to do research in order to answer him. You took him seriously enough to put forth this effort. That's a win for him.

No, that's a win for me. He didn't research anything, did he? He didn't learn anything new, did he? In the aftermath of this discourse, he looks like the loser to me.

[AFTT47]

I wouldn't do that.

This idiot got you to take your time to do research in order to answer him. You took him seriously enough to put forth this effort. That's a win for him.

No, that's a win for me. He didn't research anything, did he? He didn't learn anything new, did he? In the aftermath of this discourse, he looks like the loser to me.

Engaging a flat-earther in an argument is like playing chess with a stalk of celery and then bragging about winning. You're not going to impress anybody with your "win" and you're going to give the false impression that the stalk of celery had any business playing the game to begin with.