The Difficulty of Scientific Conspiracies
. . . is illustrated here, in a nice post by Carl Zimmer. I’m extremely interested in the debate about these fossils, so I read what I can find, but I lack the scientific expertise to have a relevant comment on the science.
What I would like to point out is the way in which the controversy is conducted by the scientists. These are not people who take well to orthodoxies. They tear at each other’s theories with great vigor, and they keep on studying and researching to find out more. Contrary to claims of critics, if there is a scientific problem with any aspect of evolutionary theory, there will be plenty of scientists there to point out the difficulties and debate them.
When scientific errors have been debunked it has been by scientists using scientific methodology and not by detractors arguing on religious or philosophical grounds.
This is something very interesting to me, also. I can only watch and listen, but my ears always perk up when I hear this kind of topic being discussed.