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Index to Creationist Claims,  edited by Mark Isaak,    Copyright © 2004
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Claim CA310:

Scientists find what they expect to find.

Response:

  1. Scientific results are tested. This has two very important consequences: First, the scientists know that their results will be subject to challenge, so they work harder to make sure the evidence really does support their results. Second, published ideas that the evidence does not support will get rejected, especially in times or places with different cultural biases.

  2. Scientists more than most people are trained to be objective. Although expectations can affect their conclusions, they would not affect them to a large degree. Most certainly, they would not blind all biologists and geologists to all the evidence, as would be necessary if creationism were true.

  3. At the start of the nineteenth century, scientists expected to find evidence for creation and a global flood. Instead, they found evidence for evolution, which is why evolution was the accepted theory by the end of the century.

  4. Creationists find what they want to find. Since their entire world view is threatened by finding disconfirming evidence, they are very highly motivated not to see it. Scientists, on the other hand, usually welcome disconfirming evidence when it comes along.

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created 2000-11-18