Science is different than philosophy, religion or art because it is presumed an objective discipline, while the others are subjective. Further, science is founded on empirical data that support scientific conclusions, while philosophical, religious or artistic conclusions often require a “leap of faith.” Yet, many notable thinkers like Karl Popper and Paul Feyeraband argue that science is not objective, and that its methods are not superior to any other discipline in discovering the truth. As Popper relates, “The way in which knowledge progresses, and especially our scientific knowledge, is by unjustified (and unjustifiable) anticipations, by guesses, by tentative solutions to our problems, by conjectures. These conjectures are controlled by criticism; that is, by attempted refutations, which include severely critical tests. They may survive these tests; but they can never be positively justified: they can be established neither as certainly true nor even as probable (in the sense of the probability calculus)” (Popper vii).
Thus, the dilemma becomes, if science is prone to human error or ideology and not superior to any other source of discovering truth, how do we determine what is truth and from what discipline(s)? Nowhere can this dilemma be better expressed than if we look at the debating camps of thought regarding evolution. Evolutionary biologists believe in Darwin’s theories of natural selection, survival of the fittest and modification through genetic alteration. Life originated from simple organisms and evolved to its present day complexity, a complexity most illustrated in man because he alone of all animals has the ability to reason. Creationists, on the other hand, believe in a designer of the design theory, i.e., God created man and the earth and the Scriptures are the final authority on truth. The main argument of the creationists is that Darwin’s theories cannot be proven. Many argue that natur...