… if you suggest we accept majority / popular opinion as truth, then it is a 'bandwagon' argument.
Outside of finding a new way of saying “an appeal to popular opinion”, I see nothing new in your response. It really is not to your credit to repeatedly use the straw-man trick of making it sound like we are asking a bunch of Joe-blow average off-the street guys for their opinion. Once again, let me repeat what I have (several times) been careful to say – that you go to those who have a
PROVEN TRACK RECORD IN BIOLOGY.
I honestly think that, given a scientific question that needs resolution, the best place to start is with those who are the experts in the field. There’s no guarantee that they are right, but at least start with whatever input they can offer. Since you don’t want to do that, who in the scientific community do you suggest going to as a starting point? If not the experts, then who in the scientific community do you want to go to? Do you prefer relying on the opinions of scientific newbies, or perhaps those who are ignorant of science, or even anti-science? Who?
And where did I ask that the opinion of the experts be accepted as truth? I only asked what you, 6days, would expect their answers to be on the question of whether man is a product of evolution. You seem tremendously resistant to giving a simple straightforward answer. What do you think the answer of the experts would be? Just can’t bring yourself to answer?
Since you typify relying on experts as being no more than “an appeal to popular opinion”, does that include the experts that you have forwarded in your arguments? For an example in biological science, several times you have mentioned Kondrashov and others on the subject of VSDMs. Can we dismiss their claims as just “public opinion?” Several times I have seen you get in theological arguments with other Christians over the meaning of “days” during creation week, and you responded with:
“James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University, former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford. "Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience.”
Is relying on those professors “of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university” just “an appeal to popular opinion?”
For example..... Imagine that the majority opinion amongst PhD scientists was that the Earth was flat; however there were several thousand PhD scientists who argued that the Earth was a sphere. you can accept that the world is flat because of majority opinion if you wish, but that does not make it truth.
Agreed. There are well-known cases where the majority of the experts were eventually found to be wrong. I know of “scientists” that support your ideas about human evolution, and some that oppose your view.
I accept God's opinion as ultimate truth and the science which supports it.
What on earth are you talking about – “ultimate truth and the science that supports it.” Science helps us increase our confidence in our understandings, but it is not in the business of “truth”, and most certainly nothing so esoteric as “ultimate truth”. I am left to conclude whatever this ephemeral “ultimate truth” is must be your personal belief in what “God’s opinion” is, and that is purely theology, not science.
Science is a methodology that tries to help us understand how the universe works – a methodology that is agreed upon and used by scientists of diverse religious, political, and social leanings. But in your case, you have abrogated any pretense of accepting evidence supporting scientific ideas that conflict with your specific theological beliefs. Did I get that right?
Many times I have seen you make the unqualified claim that science supports your view. So I turn the question back to you – What specific scientific evidence do you have that makes it “ridiculous to believe that fish can evolve into philosophers”?