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Fact, theory, test and evolution
Author(s) -
Fitzhugh Kirk
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
zoologica scripta
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.204
H-Index - 64
eISSN - 1463-6409
pISSN - 0300-3256
DOI - 10.1111/j.1463-6409.2007.00308.x
Subject(s) - citation , test (biology) , art history , history , library science , computer science , biology , ecology
In the article, ‘The Role of Climatic Change in the Evolution of Mammals’, in the Teaching Biology section of BioScience , Barnosky & Kraatz (2007) make two claims: evolution is a fact, and fossils are the test evidence of evolutionary hypotheses. In the beginning sentence, the authors state, ‘Despite all the arguments over semantics, evolution is a fact’ (Barnosky & Kraatz 2007: 523), but later claim, ‘Evolution is also a theory’ (Barnosky & Kraatz 2007: 524). This conflation of fact and theory is extended to hypotheses in relation to testing: ‘Over time, as predictions [ sic ] are repeatedly