Is the Study of the Emergence and Development of Life on Earth a Non-Classical Field of Science?

1. Entity type Lemma
2. Original titleНекласическа научна област ли са изследванията, свързани с появата и развитието на живота на Земята?
3. Language term Bulgarian
4. lemma author Nachev, Ivaylo
5. lemma category Scientific theories and disciplines > Biology
6. Publication date 20-11-2018
7. lemma work Табаков, Мартин [Author]. Is the Study of the Emergence and Development of Life on Earth a Non-Classical Field of Science
8. lemma manifestations Философски Алтернативи
9. Keywords Evolution - pseudoscience - Intelligent Design
10. Citations
    1. Martin Tabakov (2018).“Некласическа научна област ли са изследванията, свързани с появата и развитието на живота на Земята”. Философски алтернативи 2018/1, 95-108.
11. Lemma body

    1. The article aims to add some views in the discussion between Intelligent Design (ID) and Evolutionary Theory (ET), following publications in the field in previous issues of the journal. It also touched upon the question to the nature of science and pseudo-science. Tabakov argued that the study of the emergence and development of life is a non-classical field of science, and thus for some questions science might not have found an explanation at the present stage yet. According to Tabakov, all questions in this field are also philosophical ones, being thus more complicated than the superficial assessment that ET is science and Intelligent Design is pseudo-science. In his opinion the sharp criticism of scientist thinkers of ID can also be explained by their perception that it is a treacherously veiled creationism. Yet, from a Hegelian viewpoint it may be considered that the ID is a positive development of creationist views. In the same time ET struggles with tough questions such as explanation of the beginning of bio-evolution and uses some vague concepts (theoretical constructs) such as “natural development”, “artificial” and “intervention”. A key question related with ET is whether it is possible to prove that a system is self-organizing and self-structuring by just using instruments that are internal to the system. In the more descent past religion had claimed monopoly on truth. Later in this position it was replaced by science. According to the author every monopoly is dangerous and holds the risk of misuses. Tabakov sees risk of misuses in the discussion between the ET and ID in cases when the arguments are presented only by proponents of one of the two groups. Science has its limitations and the history of science remembers many wrong or incomplete theories that have dominated during long periods.