Are You a Creationist or an Evolutionist? (See Post For Details)

[Letum]

For every set of facts, there will always be a variety of explanations that fit.

Coming up with an explanation is easy, deciding which explanation is correct is not.

Both biology and religion offer explanations of the origin of species that fit the facts.
there are several tools that can help us decide the correct explanation.

1)
Firstly we should consider which explanation speculates the least about things
beyond the face value of the evidence and makes the fewest claims about the
existence of entities that are not in the evidence

2)
We should also candider how well the explanation coheres with other facts and
explanations that are uncontroversially believed to be true.

3)
A good explanation should allow the creation of testable hypothesis that can be
confirmed or disconfirmed. It should be possible to imagine some hypothetical, yet
somewhat credible, evidence that would disprove the explanation.

4)
Finally the explanation we chose should be comprehensive in leaving as few loose
ends as possible, generating fewer additional questions and leaving the least
unexplained.


Lets use the example of a man found hanging in a sealed room with one door locked
from the inside. The only objects in the room are the man, the rope and hook he has
hanged from and a stool on it's side just below his feet.
Based on these facts, the police come up with two explanations.

Explanation One:
The man entered the room and locked the door. He than stood
on the stool and put his head in the noose and kicked the chair away.

Explanation Two:
The man entered the room and was attacked by a daemon
who killed the man in a way that gave the body the physical appearance of a death
by hanging. The daemon then put the man in to the noose and placed the chair
under him to make it look like a suicide. Finlay the daemon locks the door and walks
away through a wall.

To decide which is the correct explanation we will use the 4 tools above.

Tool 1) Explanation One:
The explanation has no entities that are not shown in the facts.
Tool 1) Explanation Two:
The explanation posits the existence of the daemon entity, which is not shown in the facts.

Tool 2) Explanation One:
The explanation fits with our understanding of human nature and physics.
Tool 2) Explanation Two:
The explanation does not fit with understanding of how physics.

Tool 3) Explanation One:
The explanation could be disproved if the pathologist found that the man did not die
from hanging.
Tool 3) Explanation Two:
There is no hypothetical new evidence that could disprove this explanation as the
explanation can be adjusted to fit any new evidence imaginable.

Tool 4) Explanation One:
The explanation leaves the loose end of why the man killed himself.
Tool 4) Explanation Two:
The explanation leaves the loose ends of what exactly the daemon is, why it killed someone,
how it walks through walls, how it killed the man with no marks, where it came from, (etc. etc. etc.)