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| - Yes, I evolved in a parallel universe. Some quantum coffee? |
There is a creationist meme which goes something like this: "Evolutionary biology must be true, because physicists get excellent results". This is obviously based on the common idea that while physics is a form of "hard" science which discovers absolute laws of nature, biology is a fuzzy "soft" science only a few steps removed from such woo such as psychology, literary criticism, or what have you.
But what if it´s the other way around entirely? About 20 years ago, I chatted with a quantum physicist who apparently wasn´t in superposition. Let´s call him Elgar. He said that cosmologists and quantum physicists are actually jealous of biologists. The theory of evolution is about 100% proven by the confluence of evidences from many different branches of science. It´s also directly empirically observable. Quantum physics on the other hand...
According to Elgar, there were four different models of quantum physics back in the days. One was the notorious Copenhagen interpretation, another was David Bohm´s model. I don´t remember the third one. The fourth one was Elgar´s own model. The math of all four worked just as good, and there was no way of telling which one was right! I assume all four were compatible with whatever counts as "observation" in this field. In other words, QM is in the same position as astronomy during the Early Modern Period, when both heliocentrism and geoheliocentrism were equally compatible with all (then known) observations.
Elgar also pointed out, perhaps a bit tongue in cheek, that in a certain sense evolutionary theory is more certain than heliocentrism. After all, nobody has stood on the surface of the sun observing the Earth circle around it...
So that creationist meme should be turned on its head. The caption should read: "I refuse to believe in evolutionary biology since quantum physics suck". Which sounds a tad bit irrational.
