Passing experimental tests has nothing to do with being published in secular peer-reviewed journals.
Of course not. Any result must be reproducible, explained in relation to existing knowledge, and novel (i.e. new) to be published in peer-review journals.
Secular science operates under a foundational philosophy of naturalism...that existence consists ONLY of physical things.
This is simply untrue. Firstly, science is not secular. Nor is it religious. It is a completely separate phenomena which, to be blunt, doesn't give a damn if their is a god or not. Science can only measure things which have a physical existence in our universe, meaning that by its fundamental nature it cannot measure metaphysical things. There is no assumptions there - to date, no one's been able to build a "soul-o-meter" or a "godometer", and until someone finds a way to measure things like that empirically, science will not have anything to say on that matter, one way or the other.
Plainly speaking, you are as incorrect in assuming that science is trying to ignore god as an atheist is in assuming science disproves the existence of god. The reality is much simpler - science cares not, and only deals with physical phenomena which can be directly measured and quantified.
You were close to understanding the fundamental assumption that underlies all science, but you ended up missing the mark - science assumes that we live in a casual universe which operates on the basis of set, understandable rules. Whether or not god exists, and/or makes those rules, is not a topic science deals with.
Its clear you've learned most of your science in a church who treats all scientists as atheists trying to undo the word of god. I hate to break it to you, but most of us don't give a s__t about your faith and really don't care if our work supports your faith or not. Maybe try reading a little about scientists and our goals before you just to conclusions like the ones above. Our motivations, and religious beliefs, are probably quite a bit different from what you've been lead to believe.
However, they delve into the untestable/unfalsifiable when they (they refers to secular science) write about origins (abiogenesis) and the age of the universe and of the earth
Actually, these things are both testable, and falsifiable. Just to break down your examples:
Abiogenesis:
- Testable aspects:
- does the chemistry work
- can self-replication occur
- is self-replication sufficient for development of more complex forms
- can predicted pre-life forms be generated
- can life be generated de novo
- Predictions as to the characteristics of early life
- Falsifiable aspects:
- chemistry
- probability
- disproof of fundamental assumptions
Origin/age of universe
- Testable aspects:
- Age via different methods
- Look for expected products of big bang (CMB)
- Predicted vs. actual spectra of extremely old galaxies
- Distribution of mass
- Nature and interplay of the various physical laws which amke up our universe
- Falsifiable aspects:
- Age (i.e. if different methods predicted vastly different ages)
- Lack of predicted phenomena (no CME)
- Identification of unpredicted/"impossible" phenomena
Origin/age of earth:
- Testable aspects:
- Age via different methods
- Actual make up vs. makeup predicted by origin model
- Observation of equivelent systems forming (i.e. in orion nebula)
- Presence and characteristics of "leftovers"
- Falsifiable aspects:
- Disagreement between aging methods
- Large degree of difference between makeup of the earth and the "leftovers"
- Failure to observe planetary formation occurring elsewhere
all of these are conclusions that are interpreted under the philosophy of naturalism.
No. These thoeries are simply the best description of the existing data we've been able to come up with to-date. They meet all the criteria to be a scientific theory, are derived from logic, are both explanatory and predictive, and (to date) have no opposing evidence to show that they are wrong.
Of course it doesn't. But given that you've started with a false assumption it should be of no surprise that reality does not line up with your incorrect view of science.
Someone else doing the exact same science (observations and data collecting) could come up with a different conclusion when the evidence is interpreted under a different philosophy.
You know, we hear this claim a lot, and yet despite the evidence being available to the public alternate models are not being proposed. One has to wonder - if such alternate hypothesis are so easily derived from alternative "perspectives", then why do we not see people proposing alternate models.
The answer, of course, is simple. When you start with a philosophy (which, BTW, is the exact opposite of what science tried to do) you often end up having to do distinctly non-scientific things - like having to explain away inconvenient data. More often than not this results in "thoeries" (and I use that term very loosely here) like creationism/IDism which neither achieve the standards expected of a scientific theory, and are based more on the dismissal of evidence than on the explanation of evidence.
Keep in mind, all of those theories you so readily dismiss were proposed as ways to explain data we already had in hand. When you start with a philosophy you're doing the opposite - you've got your final conclusion in hand, and then try to fit the data to that.
That method, the method you prefer, is proven to not work, and has been rejected by science for over 2000 years.
So, when secular peer reviewed journals get wind of the philosophy under which your interpretations of evidence are being drawn, and that philosophy is not naturalism, then the journal submission is dismissed out of hand without regard to content.
Hardly. There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of scientific papers published by openly religious scientists. Likewise, most scientific papers try to challenge, or undermine, or even overturn previously held scientific beliefs. Even today, scientists who openly hold creationist beliefs continue to publish successfully in their fields - including the publication of papers which some interpret as disproof of certain scientific principals. One need look no farther then a creationist webpage to find citations to these articles.
At the end of the day, to be publishable in a scientific journal, a paper must meet some pretty basic criteria:
1) Be based on novel data (i.e. consist of new work), or
1b) Be a novel re-analysis of existing data
2) Meet, or exceed, accepted standards for data gathering and statistical analysis
3) Make no claims beyond those explicitly indicated by the results, and lastly
4) All conjecture and hypothesis should be consistent with published literature
If you can meet those criteria, then your work is publishable; no matter how much it goes against dogma.
Bryan
