Talk:Fred Hoyle

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Contents

[edit] Athiest

I am Agnostic, which shouldn't be material to my point but often is in the eyes of others.

Regardless, If Fred Hoyle converted to Christianity and died as such, then he should be labeled as such under his picture in the short biography off on the right.

Staffa —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.107.0.108 (talk) 21:03, 18 February 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Picture

I must admit, Sir Fred looked pretty good in that picture — the one taken four days after his death.

Anyone know the deal with that? Wally 01:25, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Whoops, didn't notice that when I captioned it. I mistook the date of the article, written apparently as a eulogy, as the date of the picture. No indication when the picture was actually taken. TastyCakes 03:32, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removal of Dawkins’ Non-sequitur statement

Dawkins wrongly reduces Sir Fred Hoyle’s statement down to a misunderstanding of the simple process of evolution. To accuse Hoyle of failing to distinguish something that even a remedial science student would clearly understand is insulting to the highest degree to such a legendary scientist.

Dawkins attacked a straw man. Whether through ignorance or deception he repeatedly presents Hoyle as examining the origin of origins like eyes, not the origin of life itself. He made no reference to the meat of Hoyle’s argument found in Evolution from Space, and certainly never gave any meaningful counter-argument to Hoyle’s conclusion that the chance of spontaneous biogenesis as being 10-40,000.

The following quotes are the mass of Dawkins arguments against Hoyle from Climbing Mount Improbable and The Blind Watchmaker:

Climbing Mount Improbable (Page 75)
What Hoyle and Wickramasinghe miss is that Darwinism is not a theory of random chance. It is a theory of random mutation plus non-random cumulative natural selection. Why, I wonder, is it so hard for even sophisticated scientists to grasp this simple point?

Climbing Mount Improbable (Page 101)
Remember Sir Fred Hoyle’s debating point about junkyards and 747’s? He is reported to have said that the evolution, by natural selection, of a complicated structure such as protein molecule (or, by implication, an eye or a heart) is about as likely as a hurricane’s having the luck to put together a Boeing 747 when whirling through a junkyard. If he’d said ‘chance’ instead of ‘natural selection’ had have been right. Indeed, I regretted having to expose him as one of the many toilers under the profound misapprehension that natural selection is chance. Any theory that expects evolution to put together a new, complex machine like an eye or a haemoglobin molecule, in a single step from nothing, is asking too much of chance.

The Blind Watchmaker (Page 49)
It is amazing that you can still read calculations like my haemoglobin calculation, used as though they constituted arguments against Darwin’s theory. The people who do this, often expert in their own field, astronomy or whatever it may be, seem sincerely to believe that Darwinism explains living organization in terms of chance – ‘single-step selection’ – alone.

The Blind Watchmaker (Chap 9 Page 234)
Boeing 747 macromutations are the ones that really are ruled out by the complexity argument just given. They get their name from the astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle’s memorable misunderstanding of the theory of natural selection. He compared natural selection, in its alleged improbability, to a hurricane blowing through a junkyard and chancing to assemble a Boeing 747. ... Indeed, Hoyle’s fundamental error was that he, in effect, thought (without realizing it) that the theory of natural selection did depend upon macromutation. The idea of a single macromutation’s giving rise to a fully functioning eye with the properties listed above, where there was only bare skin before, is, indeed, just about as improbable as a hurricane assembling a Boeing 747.


What Dawkins fails to grasp is that Hoyle’s odds are referring to biogenesis which are certainly not subject to Natural Selection, Gene Flow, Genetic Flux, or Mutation as we know them. He does not propose any other means of bringing together all the complex nano-machines that are required for a simple cell to operate, let alone provide any evidence.

Regardless of one's personal beliefs, this post script of Dawkins ‘refutation’ is unfounded and is an insult to Hoyle’s memory. It is very bad taste to attach this slur as an epitaph to a great man which is not alive to defend himself.

Dewittm 04:09, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm reinstating the Dawkins quote, because it isn't a non-sequitur, and we don't exclude material simply on the grounds that it's critical of someone who's dead. It's very relevant to discuss how other biologists have reaced to Hoyle's claims, and your argument that Dawkins' argument is a straw-man is your original research unless you cite a reliable source criticizing Dawkins arguments, and then we'd just cite it; not remove Dawkins. -GTBacchus(talk) 05:15, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Clearly GTBacchus has not appreciated Dewittm's comment because of the emotive language used. This is an unfortunate occurance on many Wikipedia articles and talk pages. This exchange is an excellent example of how a NPOV must be maintained when making a comment. Although I have no references to provide, I state that Dewittm's observations on Dawkins' arguments are unoriginal. Similar work can be found in the transactions of relevant societies soon after The Blind Watchmaker was published. It is entirely accurate to state that Dawkins misrepresented Hoyle in his books.
A student of Dawkins books may also make the claim that Dawkins deliberately misrepresented Hoyle in order to make his own arguments appear more convincing. Such a claim is not so controversial if it is accepted that Dawkins' series of books on evolution are not scientific works but philosophical contributions which use anecdotory evidence from contemporary scientific publications. However, such speculation of Dawkins' motivation is secondary to the accuracy of Dawkins' representation of Hoyle's argument, which Dewittm has conclusively shown to be consistently poor.
In conclusion, it is both uncontroversial and NPOV to state that Dawkins' rebuttal of Hoyle's observations did not accurately address Hoyle's observations. I shall now edit the article to reflect this. --Lukestuts 15:38, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
IF it's both uncontroversial and NPOV, and not original research, then you'll find a source to back it up, somewhere among the "transactions of relevant societies." I don't care whether the language used on the talk page is emotive or not, I just care that we adhere to Wikipedia:Verifiability. It doesn't matter one whit how convincingly you argue here, just don't put unsourced allegations in the article, or they're apt to be removed. -GTBacchus(talk) 15:46, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
I left part of your edit there (is User:Lukestuts the same person as User:SirGalahad?), and I suspect it'll be salvagable with a source, but two sentences came out - one because I suspect it's false, so it really needs a citation, and the other because it draws conclusions in a manner inappropriate to an encyclopedia:
Natural selection can only help the evolution process if there are existing living organisms that can be subject to natural selection of the fittest. So from an abiogenesis point of view we can say Hoyle's analogy can be considered as correct.
Please feel free to improve the paragraph with some sourced material. -GTBacchus(talk) 15:59, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Some sources added. No connections between me & User:Lukestuts? (SirGalahad 16:43, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
I only asked because he said he was about to make the edit, and then you actually made it. -GTBacchus(talk) 17:04, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
GTBacchus requested that a source be given for my particular edit. It is a great embarrassment that subsequent searches have produced nothing but Creationist web pages and no peer reviewed articles, a result that prompts further comments about misrepresentation, albeit with a different purpose. A contributory factor for the failure to find a source was that the contents (rather than the abstracts) of many peer reviewed journals are not freely searchable on the Internet. The sources provided for the current edit cannot be described as peer reviewed. Therefore, it can only be reiterated that the quotation on page 101 of Climbing Mount Improbable is direct evidence for Dawkins' misrepresentation of Hoyle's observations on the synthesis of life. Although a similar criticism by a distingished third party cannot be provided, the purely derivative quality of my previous conclusion and the similarity of my edit makes such a source unnecessary.
Due to the use of the word allegation by GTBacchus in his earlier comment, it is appropriate to quote a definition of the word from the OED: An assertion without proof, a mere assertion. GTBacchus used this word to imply that my conclusion was an assertation. The above paragraph should establish that the word observation would have been more accurate because the proof is provided by a quote from Dawkins' book and the description of Hoyle's theory in the Wikipedia article itself. --Lukestuts 17:25, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
No. Even an original "observation" counts as original research. Read WP:NOR. If you can't find a published, reliable source that says that Dawkins misreprents Hoyle, then put it in. Otherwise, you're repeating your own analysis of Dawkins' argument, and that's just not how it works. -GTBacchus(talk) 20:20, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
actually I can say the Dawkins' misinterpretation was intentional because it was the only way he could escape the reality. i.e. somehow he had to falsify Hoyle otherwise he would falsify himself. I agree that many sources regarding this leads us to creationist sites because Hoyle is somehow banned from biological mainstream or misrepresented as Dawkins did. For anyone who has an understanding of Natural Selection and Abiogenesis -which both definitions are throughly avaivable in wikipedia- can see Dawkins' faulty misinterpretation of Hoyle's analogy. So I see no actual need to provide a source for this since it is self-explanatory. I propose to remove those cittings from my edit. (SirGalahad 17:55, 6 March 2006 (UTC))

I noticed that you reference Dawkins. If you take a look at his The Selfish Gene, you'll see that he talks a lot about how natural selection applies not only to living organisms but to any replicator at all (even a meme). This isn't just his opinion; it's widely supported and easily proven, as by software simulations. One of the consequences of this fact is that natural selection is available to play a role in the transition from simple replicators (or replicating systems) to a simple cell, instead of relying on blind luck. This undercuts Hoyle's 747 analogy entirely, and is why Dawkins sees that analogy as having attacked a straw man.

I'd also like to point out that, much like Behe, Denton is a Creationist chemist, not a biologist as such. This makes the line about "Still other biologists..." inaccurate. To keep it, we would need to find at least one actual biologist who agrees with this chemist. We could also avoid the problem by changing the line to speak of scientists instead of just biologists, but this runs into an even bigger problem. Namely, scientists have zero authority outside of their field of expertise. That's why Hoyle, however respected he might or might not be in astrophysics, is considered a laymen when he speaks about biology. Anyhow, for now, I've added a fact check template to this sentence, but I think we're going to have to wind up removing it eventually. What do you think? Alienus 17:47, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Natural Selection at replicator level is not proved. Can you provide us a scietific source to show us such a selective behaviour of nature in natural conditions of prebiotic earth to do the natural selection at replicator level? Also I'd like to seea link for your mentioned software simulations. Moreover there is millions of steps from a single replicator to form a living cell. Are those steps known or possible? ...and for the Dawkins he talks about manythings he can not prove. (SirGalahad 18:04, 6 March 2006 (UTC))

Look, none of this is genuinely controversial, and if you do a bit of research, you'll see this for yourself. I do recommend that you extend the scope of your research so that it's not limited to Creationist propaganda tracts. If you can come up with some legitimate support for your claims, feel free to bring it up here. Until then, there's nothing for me to respond to. Alienus 18:09, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice but it would be better not to show that stereotyped "darwinist" attitude of "Hey man! I know everything! but I'm sure you know nothing". Well I know enough about replicators and NS. I assure you it wouldn't take a bit of research but tons of it to fully realize the matter. Even the appearance of the first replicator by naturalistic methods is highly improbable. I also recommend you to leave the wonderful world of Mr. Dawkins for a while and see what real mathematics and probability have to say about abiogenesis and in general neo-darwinian theory of evolution. (SirGalahad 18:31, 6 March 2006 (UTC))

Yeah, when you spend years learning about a field of science, it's easy to sound dismissive when dealing with religiously-motivated claims.

As it happens, quite a bit of research has been done on abiogenesis, and it turns out that a simple replicator is indeed rather simple, hence not anywhere near as unlikely to form (in the absence of natural selection) as a cell might be. Moreover, the small probability must be multiplied against the huge number of opportunities for such a chemical to arise. Given this, in an environment rich in amino acids, the formation of a short, self-replicating peptide by purely chemical, non-selective means is not at all improbable. If anything, it's inevitable given time and a suitable planet.

Scientists see abiogenesis as an interesting puzzle that's hard to solve because the event occurred so long ago and take a long time to reproduce. Creationists see it as a polemic opportunity, because scientists can't just swirl some chemicals into a bottle and pull out a rabbit made from scratch. I think the latter view is far too biased to be allowed to dominate this article, although it would be acceptable to make reference to is so that the error may be better understood.

If you want to claim that some magical force prevents natural selection from applying to non-living replicators, you're free to do so. But if you want to make that claim here, you're going to need to back it up. Alienus 18:48, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I do not claim magical forces prevent Natural Selection. I'm saying there is none at all. I think it would be better to back up your claims that Natural Selaction can cooperate abiogenesis at molecular level. It is not the case that anyone who rejects abiogenesis theories is creationist. It's very likely that he can do some math and see what is probable and what is not. I don't go into details of the problems of abiogenesis that makes it impossible because here is not the right place to do this. Only I want to add that S/R peptides can be produced in lab but under certain conditions and very specialized and complex processes that can only be produced in a lab. However those peptides do not even last enough and are highly unstable. I think Dawkins interpretations for Hoyle are too biased so there is a need to balance it and show the counter-arguments as well. I even do not need to backup my claims as I stated somewhere above it is self-explanatory. Abiogenesis relies %99 on pure chance and it makes Hoyle's analogy accurate. But you can jump into and re-edit the article, as long as you can provide us a valid source that can explicitly show the power of natural selections in abiogenesis. (SirGalahad 19:57, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
It's absolutely not self-explanatory. No valid source explicitly showing the power of natural selections in abiogenesis is necessary in order to report that "Dawkins said 'X'". All we need is a source that indicates that Dawkins did, in fact, say 'X'. If you want to say that Dawkins was wrong about 'X', then we need a source saying "Dawkins was wrong about 'X'". If it's so self-explanatory, then you can find a source. -GTBacchus(talk) 20:34, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Natural selection has been demonstrated to apply to any replicator at all; this is not controversial. If for some reason you doubt this, you can download some software and confirm for yourself that it applies to such algorithms, artificial life, and and a variety of other non-living replicators. The reason I phrased my request in terms of magical forces is that natural selection has to apply to any replicator, unless something somehow stops it. It is a necessary consequence of the entity being a replicator in the first place. In other words, this is more an analytic claim than a synthetic one.

Self-replicating peptides aren't unstable, but they're delicious. In other words, they have a short lifespan in our modern biotic environment because it's teaming with organisms that would casually eat it up. That's why we don't expect abiogenesis to reoccur today; that boat has sailed. If we created a planet-wide abiotic environment and gave it some time, it's likely that life would be reinvented, so to speak.

Anyhow, the issue isn't Dawkins' interpretation, it's Hoyle's failure to understand that natural selection applies to any replicator, not just to living cells. Dawkins is entirely correct in recognizing that Hoyle's argument depends on abiogenesis being random. He's also correct in saying that this is not the case.

Hoyle's ignorance is understandable, as he was talking about things far outside of his field. Even in his own field, though, he did important work but had a bad track record on some really important stuff, such as BB vs. SS. For all his positives, the man was quite capable of totally messing up, and we have to recognize that. Alienus 20:21, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

there is no such thing as Natural Selection at replicator level. Would you mind to click and have look at the definition for the Natural Selection once again. I see you still hesistate to show me a single link for this universally accepted fact. If you are correct why just don't we produce a tank full of S/R peptides in a sterile tank and watch them evolve spontaneously? What you say is only a fiction and not even close to be proved by any empirical fact or research even among darwisnits. Your claims are what abiogenesis theorists assume, not empirical observations.(SirGalahad 20:56, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
None of that matters. Neither your, nor SirGalahad's understanding of natural selection has any bearing on this article. All that matters is that we don't include analysis, interpretation, or any observation that's remotely controversial without citing that someone published a book or paper saying so. -GTBacchus(talk) 20:34, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
GTBacchus it's not fair to remove my additions. It's not an original work. It is neither my particular understanding of Natural Selection and nor my understanding of Abiogenesis. If you can't prove Abiogenesis is based something other than pure chance then you can't disprove me and you shouldn't remove my additions. Hoyle was both correct and accurate. We should allow both conflicting arguments to reside in this article. (SirGalahad 20:56, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
What you fail to understand, SirGalahad, is that Wikipedia is not about either of us proving anything to the other one. It's about not making claims without proper back-up. I don't have to disprove your claims, and I don't even particularly care to. If what you say is so clearly true, then someone's published it. Even if you can't find it online, you still have to find it. The fact that it's not beyond question is amply demonstrated by the fact that Alienus and I are here questioning it. -GTBacchus(talk) 21:01, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Well, I backed it up with couple of links! wasn't them valid? according to whom? what is the criterion here? BTW I propose to remove the word infamously from the phrase or change it to famously because infamously represents a biased view.(SirGalahad 21:15, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
The links you backed it up with were http://www.us.net/life/rul_purp.htm and a link to trueorigins.org, neither of which are reliable sources. If you want to link to them and preface with "some creationist defenders of Hoyle have argued that" that would be consistent with your sourcing. JoshuaZ 21:26, 6 March 2006 (UTC)


After a quick perusal of the edit history and this talk page (having come here from the RfC page), I'm inclined to see Galahad's edits as they currently stand as OR. On the other hand, I have a vague memory of Hoyle himself making an argument very similar in response to Dawkins (although a quick google search doesn't seem to find it). Presumably if Galahad can find such a reference or a similar reference from a reputable source then it can go in. JoshuaZ 21:13, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Uhm, actually, I agree with that, which is why I haven't argued based on my understanding (much less called for a silly vote). Instead, I've repeatedly asked for citations to support what he wants to include. It's also why I haven't complained the inclusion of the Denton reference, no matter how silly I might think Denton's ideas are. However, I do want to make sure that we don't mischaracterize his scientific credentials.

Besides the focus on citations, I think it's important to try to share the basis for our conclusions. That's why, in addition, I'm attempting to explain why Dawkins said what he said, in the hopes that this will give Galahad greater insight into the issue at hand. While OR has no place in the article, an understanding of the extant research can be very helpful, particularly in deciding what to cite and how to summarize and link that information. Alienus 20:45, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Dawkins's criticisms of Hoyle may be using the straw man fallacy, but we should find a citation of a prominent adherent (as of intelligent design theory) who states this before we insert this viewpoint into the article (and also say something like "Defenders of Hoyle say..." rather than asserting the viewpoint as fact). Otherwise it is original research. --Wade A. Tisthammer 18:15, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Original research

The following I have removed from the section on "Rejection of chemical evolution":

Note that one could say that the chances of 92 protons and 143 neutrons coming together simultaneously in a stellar interior to form U235 is infinitesimal and therefore stellar nucleosynthesis of the heavy elements is highly improbable. Of course, this is demonstrably not the case, as Hoyle knew.

The following comments were attached to it: <!-- Is this just an argument that some Wikipedian came up with? It sure reads like original research to me... -GTBacchus --> <!-- This one is misinformation! not a valid comparison. stellar element forming and spontaneuos forming of dna chains are quite two different things, one is subject to known rules the other isn't known yet -SirGalahad -->

It's not remotely sourced, so it's out of the article. -GTBacchus(talk) 15:50, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

The argument you removed is quite likely sound, but you're right that it ought to be sourced. I'm going to look around a bit and see if perhaps the person who inserted it was paraphrasing a citable source. If not, not. Alienus 20:24, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

No luck, unless "bad" qualifies. The closest I came is a comparison between the probability Hoyle estimated and the number of protons in the universe, such as in this essay. I'm going to just let this drop, then. Alienus 20:46, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Can we find a place for this juicy little quote?

"A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question."

Fred Hoyle, “The Universe: Past and Present Reflections”, Annual Reviews of Astonomy and Astrophysics, 20 (1982), 16.

What do you think? Alienus 20:46, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I also like the quote. I have worked it into the article at the point where his work on the Triple-alpha process is discussed. The quote was in reference to that research. Jacob1207 19:10, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] RfC

I have filed an RfC for this article here, regarding the status of certain edits as original research or not. Let's see what the community says. -GTBacchus(talk) 21:06, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to Galahad

(comment copied from above)

Well, I backed it up with couple of links! weren't they valid? according to whom? what is the criterion here? BTW I propose to remove the word infamously from the phrase or change it to famously because infamously represents a biased view.(SirGalahad 21:15, 6 March 2006 (UTC))

I agree with dropping the weasel-word "infamously". As for your citations, they supported your interpretation of Dawkins' supposed mistake, but that just makes your original research more thorough. It's still, as far as we can tell here, SirGalahad and Lukestuts claiming that Dawkins' argument is flawed. Even if you explain why you think that, that's not enough. The source you need to find is one in which Hoyle, or some defender of Hoyle, responds to Dawkins' argument. -GTBacchus(talk) 21:27, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
I understand your point, I think I'll be able to find a more explicit source or quote another scientist such as Hubert Yockey . (SirGalahad 21:52, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
GT, I'm sorry, but I didn't notice this comment before I made a related change to the article. I agree that, on its own, "infamous" may well be POV, but I think it's fine if this popular view is properly attributed and cited. So after Galahad removed it, I went ahead and found such citation, adding it to the original text. Do you think that, in its current state, it's still POV? Alienus 21:44, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
I think the comment is still slightly too POVy especially because many creationists see it as a positive thing for Hoyle. JoshuaZ 21:47, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
well why not drop it at all?(SirGalahad 21:54, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
Hmm, that's a fair point. How about if it read that Hoyle's 747 argument is infamous among scientists? We could also refer to it as a popular argument, since it's used all the time by Creationists, which is what makes it infamous among scientists. Alienus 21:51, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
so we have two confilicting views here? Scientists and creationists? isn't it a POV also? Hoyle was a scientist himself. anyway lets remove the whole word. neither famous or infamous. agree?(SirGalahad 21:57, 6 March 2006 (UTC))
Either of these solutions would be fine with me. However, it isn't really infamous among scientists per se. Most abiogenetics researchers and ev bio researchers probably haven't even hear of Hoyle. Its infamous among the people who actually combat creationism, of which a substantial fraction are scientists. Therefore I slightly favor Galahad's proposal. JoshuaZ 21:58, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Although Galahad jumped the gun twice in deleting the word "infamously", I'm inclined to let this drop for now, although I wonder why he removed the word but left the reference that supports it. Instead, I'd like to shift focus to the sentence that reads "These analogies have been rejected by some biologists as a straw man argument." Is it really just some biologists or is it many or most? Perhaps we could say it's "generally rejected by biologists". I say this because, quite frankly, I can't think of a single biologist who takes Hoyle seriously. Dawkins speaks boldly, but speaks for the overwhelming majority. Alienus 22:05, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

POV in a reference can be tolerable but POV diretly in the main article is less likley to be acceptable. atleast reader has a chance to explore the reference and see talkorigins is an anti-creationist source. (SirGalahad 22:49, 6 March 2006 (UTC))

Uhm, I'm not sure that I understand your point. Are you saying that it's FALSE that Hoyle's ideas about evolution are "generally rejected" by biologists? Otherwise, are you suggesting that we should suppress this fact just because it reports on the POV of the scientific community? Please clarify. 23:04, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

The links you backed it up with were http://www.us.net/life/rul_purp.htm and a link to trueorigins.org, neither of which are reliable sources. If you want to link to them and preface with "some creationist defenders of Hoyle have argued that" that would be consistent with your sourcing. JoshuaZ 21:26, 6 March 2006 (UTC) (copying other replies to comment down here for clarity)
Agreed. We should not present the viewpoint as fact. --Wade A. Tisthammer 18:21, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dawkins misrepresentation claim

Dawkins is clearly right, Hoyle made a really stupid blunder. The reason is that Hoyle based his computation on a currently existing enzyme. No biologist claims that those enzymes were generated by abiogenesis or any sort of pure random chance, but they are assumed to have evolved. For that reason, and for some other reasons, Hoyle's computations are disingenious to the extreme. His understanding of biology was terribly bad, and Hoyle is the one building a strawman here, not Dawkins. All those creationists who claim that Hoyle was misrepresented are as incompetent as Hoyle was. --Hob Gadling 17:07, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Not only is what you say correct, it's not at all controversial among biologists. I see no reason to hide these simple facts by excluding them from the article. Alienus 17:22, 20 March 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Pseudoscience

Now I know a lot of Hoyle's ideas were out there, but should he really be in the pseudscience category? His main theory (the steady state universe) was widely supported for many years by scientists, and his proposal of nucleosynthesis is extremely important to our presently accepted theories. Newton believed in alchemy, I don't see pseudoscience stamped on his article although it would seem just as fitting. Countless other important scientists have believed what we now largely hold as wrong, based on "science" we would no longer accept.. TastyCakes 02:20, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

In his own field, Hoyle often turned out to be mistaken (steady state, denial of collapsars, etc.), but at least he was scientific. The problem came when he tried to branch out into areas of science that he was deeply ignorant and misinformed about. I'm talking about his claims about evolution, which were so far off the mark as to qualify more as pseudoscience than merely mistaken science. Consider his infamous "747" analogy, as well as panspermia. For these reasons, I believe that the category belongs and am provisionally restoring it. Alienus 02:50, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
I'm not saying his theories of evolution weren't far off the mark, but the other scientists in that category are people that believe in bigfoot, search for UFO's or promote bizzarre racial theories. Few if any have contributed to real science in any way. Hoyle stepped outside his own expertise and was wrong. But an important part of science is having people willing to question assumptions and theories the way he did. As for panspermia, yes it doesn't seem accurate now, but wackier theories with just as little scientific backing have proven correct. Since he didn't manipulate statistics or otherwise pervert science to come up with panspermia, it doesn't seem so much a pseudoscience as a theory that never collected evidence to support it. TastyCakes 04:16, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
Panspermia is arguably pseudoscience, Hoyle's abiogenesis calculations were pseudoscience pure and simple. JoshuaZ 04:40, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
And because he made a clumsy, unscientific rejection of evolution (like many religious types do every day), set in the backdrop of an important and largely respected career, he deserves to get put with the other nuts in pseudoscience? That seems totally perverse to me, but you guys do what you want, I'm sick of arguing this. TastyCakes 16:50, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Translation: I dislike the conclusion but cannot refute the argument. Alienus 16:25, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Translate it however you like. You people obviously dislike Hoyle for his opinions on Biology and you're going to let that decide where you draw the line of whether he belongs in that category or not. If there was an article on Hoyle's opinions on evolution, sure that belongs in pseudoscience. But to me, Hoyle was not defined by pseudoscience in the same way Newton wasn't. His "real work" in his real field overshadows his missteps. By putting Hoyle the person in pseudoscience you slight the contributions he made to real science - which to me far outweigh his biology ramblings. TastyCakes 18:12, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
The issue is not "slighting" him. Wikipedia does not whitewash. Among other issues, Hoyle is most well known in the general public for his diatribes regarding evolution. Why should they be discussed in the article and not have the category other than your feeling uncomfortable with that part of his life? JoshuaZ 20:15, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
I suppose evolution is held with a degree of religious fervour which is inappropriate for a scientific theory, so that the slightest heresy is intolerable. I see no similar condemnation of Einstein for refusing to accept quantum mechanics. For consistency, therefore, we should expect the entry on Einstein to be included in the pseudoscience category. Hoyle's work on the evolution of stars was far from pseudo-science. Gordon Vigurs 10:23, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
Come to think of it, according to the above criterion, Sir Isaac Newton should be included amongst the pseudo-scientists. He wrote more about astrology than he did about astronomy. So by the above criterion, the father of modern physics - is a pseudo-scientist! Gordon Vigurs 17:14, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
If a modern scientist advocated astrology, he would clearly be a pseudoscientist. Fred Hoyle had many of these, and was impervious to detailed refutations. E.g. Hoyle thought transitional forms were impossible, and deduced that Archaeoptryx was a fake. This was pure bogosity. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.198.98.214 (talk) 17:36, 15 February 2007 (UTC).
Your logic is flawed. Einstein did accept QM when QM was not as well verified as it was today. Furthermore, Einstein did not attempt to replace QM with some pseudoscientific idea. Your claims about Newton are more interesting- Newton engaged in a large amount of what today would be pseudoscience. However, 1) what constitutes pseudoscience is somewhat dependent on the era- astrology and alchemy we're not yet as discredited in Newton's time as they were today 2) Newton's ultimate influence was in physics not astrology. If he had significantly influenced astrology, it would be perfectly reasonable to categorize him under pseudoscience. JoshuaZ 17:37, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
It appears my facts are flawed, you appear to agree with the logic Gordon Vigurs 08:45, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Are you saying Hoyle had a significant influence on biology? Because it doesn't seem that way to me. TastyCakes 20:38, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course Fred Hoyle belongs in the pseudoscience, he believed in theories which were not founded on any scientific fact and promoted them even after they had been proven wrong. You cannot leave him out of the pseudoscience category just because you think he was a nice guy and made other contributions. If Fred Hoyle does not beong in the pseudoscience category, then there should be no pseudoscience category. 75.3.2.96 02:22, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

The category does not belong to that page and if you continue, you will be blocked for disruption. 68.5.224.107 02:24, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Would you like to explain why, 68.5.224.107, or are you just a little kid on your parents computer and not sure what you are talking about? 02:40, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

  • ok - that's it - Alison ☺ 02:50, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Readability

Could someone explain what "An atheist, Hoyle said" is supposed to mean? Was Hoyle an atheist who believed that life abiogenessis and evolution are wrong? Sorry, but English isn't my first language. 89.138.3.231 15:46, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

The full quote is "An atheist, Hoyle said that this suggestion of guiding hand led him to be "greatly shaken".
It refers to his calculations regarding carbon atoms, and means he was an atheist up until then and that his findings shook this view.--Threedots dead 15:13, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Fred Hoyle.jpg

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BetacommandBot (talk) 20:02, 13 February 2008 (UTC)