Let's make fun of Trump, bash him, etc. while we can!

[Eric the Green]

(08-26-2016, 02:52 PM)Mikebert Wrote: [quote Bob]
Throwing in another example, could Darwin's principle of evolution be considered a paradigm?

Quote:Of course it is.  It’s one of the fundamental paradigms for biology.  When evolutionary theory matured and developed a fruitful mathematical theory of evolution, biology matured.  And look at the progress since then!  Mature sciences have valid paradigms.  Science in which opposing plausible paradigms are still battling it out, like economics, are still immature.  This isn’t necessarily  because of clashing values. Science is  difficult.

Adopting a paradigm brings progress for a while; then's there's stagnation and anomalies and a new paradigm comes along. The battle resumes.

Just as the new quantum physics and relativity did not totally invalidate Newton's laws within certain parameters, the new biology of belief, of epigenetics, the gaia theory and so on will not totally invalidate neo-Darwinism; it will remain valid in certain respects and applications.

Quote:No it follows that a fundamentalist cannot become a competent biologist because his values conflict with the operating manual of biology.  He can still do chemistry, however.  I know some conservative Christian chemists who could be fundamentalists for all I know. I don’t look to them for religious guidance, just chemistry guidance.

I know of biologists who are successful whose spiritual views conflict with Darwin. Maybe they aren't fundamentalists, though.

Quote:The best way to resolve this is by experimentation.  We had the opportunity to try to experiment with this in 1920-21, 1929-33, 1970, 1980-82, 1987, 2000 and more recently in 2008-9.  The supply side paradigm yielded a good outcome in 1920-21, and with the Friedman modifications in 1980 and 1987.  It utterly failed in 1929-33.  Demand-side policy was employed successfully after 1933 and unsuccessfully in 1970.  In 2008 we sort of did both policies half-heartedly.  I will leave the interpretation of the results as successful or not to you.

I'm not aware of demand-side economic policies being employed in 1970. Maybe you mean 1965?