vonroach wrote:
On Sat, 17 Jul 2004 18:38:37 +0100, "Jaxtraw"
wrote:

No. The claim that "Man Went To The Moon" is not a scientific claim; it's an
historical claim. Historians can only decide the validity of an historical
assertion; for instance "Edward VIII abdicated the British throne"

You have confused a `claim' with an historical fact. As a witness to
both events, there is absolutely no doubt as to the facts.

Herein lies the problem. There are different standard of proof for
historical and scientific facts, which was Jaxtraw's point. For a
scientific fact to be considered a fact it must be repeatable, this is
not possible with historical facts, which must be decided on the
weight of evidence at the time.

I very much doubt you were a first-hand witness to both events, unless
you happen to be a previously unknown royal and have your own radio
telescope. Certainly reading about something in a range of newspapers
and seeing and/or hearing about it in a range of other media is a good
indication of something having actually happened, but the fact remains
you are relying on second hand sources and cannot repeat the
experiment yourself.

A case in point: It has only recently become common knowledge that the
Cuban Missile Crisis was resolved my a mutual agreement to remove
missiles from locations close to the other party's country: The USSR
agreed to remove its missiles from Cuba in return for the USA removing
its missiles from Turkey. The USA's concession was kept pretty much
secret, which deeply coloured the historical view of that event till
recently.

Note that I don't doubt the moon landings took place, or that Edward
VIII abdicated, but I have more faith in the fact that Hooke's law
works because I have tested it under controlled conditions in a lab
(along with a number of other theories).


Tim
--
My last .sig was rubbish too.