Looking for Definitive Evidence

I was reading an article at LiveScience called the “Top 10 Missing Links” when I made the mistake of glancing down at the comments. I don’t usually do that because the ignorance often displayed drives me insane. In this particular case the person wanted to hear about definitive, unequivocal evidence that demonstrated evolution and I felt obligated to respond.

You're looking for definitive, unequivocal evidence? Forget it, because it doesn't exist. Unfortunately it's just not that simple. Not much in life is really. Generally what you have are little pieces of evidence gathered from here and there stapled together with a whole lot of interpretation and conjecture. That's just the way things work.

As new information is gathered it's put up against the existing hypotheses. If it confirms the existing hypotheses, they get stronger and more widely accepted. If it doesn't, then adjustments have to be made to include the new information. That's why science is called self correcting. It's supposed to alter the theory to accommodate the facts as understood rather than adjust or ignore the facts.

Does it always work perfectly? Of course not. Scientists are as human as anyone else and cherished hypotheses or explanations can sometimes die hard especially when reputations have been built on them. But overall, it does work this way. Science is always trying to move forward and widen our understanding of the world.

If you would like definitive, unequivocal evidence that science and the scientific method work, that I can give you. Just look all around you at the offspring of science which is technology. We have our current technology due to the empirical methods and self correcting nature of science.

Now let me ask you a question, is it very likely that science can be so right about the many things which are the foundation of technology yet be so wrong about evolution? I'd say that it's not bloody likely. The Theory of Evolution is a unifying theory that ties together many branches of science. There are many questions in evolution related to how, when and why, but there is no question about if.