Scientific evidence is always – always – interpreted. What happens when it’s only interpreted according to previously accepted dictums? A rigamarole of self-supporting science that really isn’t suspended from anything at all.
Remember geo-centrism? It accurately (although complicatedly) described the observed phenomena. Same with helio-centrism, although it accomplished the same functions more elegantly. The point is, identical observations were available to both theories.
When people seized upon evolution, it was rooted not in the scientific rigor of the theory, but the fact that it offered intellectual credibility to the secular mind: finally, a theory that didn’t need God. Ever since then, there has been a self-fulfilling system of
1. predetermined bias against any cosmology compatible with a deity, followed by
2. Only interpreting available evidence in terms of this secular cosmology, which becomes
3. a system where only one theory has “evidence,” due to an unwillingness to examine the evidence in any other way, rooted in #1.
So there are indeed “shreds of evidence” for theories besides evolution: the exact same shreds that exist for evolution. Evidence is observation: when you conflate evidence and the interpretation of evidence, you’ve already gone a good way towards making your science unfalsifiable, which I’ve been told is a bad thing. The evidence is there: all that’s lacking is a willingness to examine the old observations in a new light.
Now, I’m not saying this is unfair. Far from it. Everyone has their biases, and everyone has fundamental axioms which they will inevitably interpret the world by. The sticky part is when scientists claim neutrality as their demesne. No, they are human like the rest of us: and until they realize that their actions, including interpretation of evidence, spring from preconceived ideologies, their science will be fatally close-minded.
The biggest mistake a scientist can make is taking his own worldview for granted – and that includes evolution.
sprattscribbler 