How Not to Formulate a Hypothesis - Red Sea

[ficino]

I just discovered this discussion of a paper. The author of the paper had sought to show from computer simulations of wind setdown that the parting of the Red Sea could have occurred as portrayed in Exodus.

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010 ... r-a-bible/

PZ Myers, writer of the blog, contends that the above-mentioned paper should not have been published. "It should have been rejected for asking an imaginary question and answering it with a fantasy scenario.

One summary catches the gist of the ‘research’.

'The study is intended to present a possible scenario of events that are said to have taken place more than 3,000 years ago, although experts are uncertain whether they actually occurred.'"

Myers makes the useful point that attempts to present scholarly defenses of miracle stories and the like in ancient texts can easily degenerate into pseudo-science at the outset because they require a series of elaborate, ad hoc prior premises. The question under investigation isn't a scientific problem that arises from observed data.

[The Crow]

I agree with Myers......

[ficino]

Hesitated over whether to post this in a new thread in the philosophy section... Anyway, here's a long but instructive review of a collection of essays on pseudoscience and the problems in demarcating it from what is taken to be genuine science:

http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/49425-philosoph ... n-problem/

I'll summarize it later, if I can manage. For now I'll just say that the review includes summaries of two papers on "Science and the Supernatural" and summaries of papers that "diagnose and respond to the stratagems pseudoscientists use to promote their views and/or evade relevant criticism."

[lecteur reader]

In the hebrew text "red sea" is the translation of "yam souf".
yam=sea and souf = ??
Most probably a variant of the hebrew word sof.
That is meaning "end".