Name one scientific theory that has been *proven*.?

There are none that have been proven, so I can't give you an example.

One of the basic misconceptions about science is that it 'explains how the world works'. It doesn't. One analogy I've heard is the 'doll's head' ... you've seen those dolls that close their eyes when you lay them flat? Well imagine there was no way of looking at the mechanism by which that works. You could suggest that inside the doll's head is an accelerometer which is attached to a microprocessor. The microprocessor determines the angle the doll is rotated, and small electric motors rotate the eyes by that angle. Someone else suggests that, actually, the doll's eyes are just weighted spheres or parts of spheres that are free to rotate.

Both of these 'theories' explain the observation that the eyes seem to close when the doll is rotated. The job of science is to determine which one does a better job of matching observations. For example, you might be able to differentiate between the theories by conducting an experiment in the weightless environment of earth orbit which would make 'weighted spheres' useless. This could tell you that yes, the weighted sphere idea is correct since there was a change in the experimental result when a zero g environment was used. Ah, but what if the accelerometer was actually a mercury tilt switch instead ... it also wouldn't work in zero g so maybe the motor idea is still correct ... and so on ...

The point is that the universe is like the doll's head. We can't open it up and look inside it. All we can do is poke and prod at it, form theories about how it might work, then try to come up with an experiment where the results predicted by each theory would differ. This then tells us which of the theories is better at modelling our observations.

The reason we use the term 'model' is because all scientific theories are 'models' of reality, rather than actual reality. They are entirely independent of how the universe *actually* works, because that's something we can never know. The reason we can never know is, since we can never conduct an infinite number of experiments, we can never be sure that any theory accurately models every possible experimental situation. Hence, you can never prove a scientific theory. All you can do is increase the number of observations that are consistent with that theory by conducting more experiments, which increases confidence in the theory, or make observations that are inconsistent with the theory, in which case you need to tweak it or abandon it altogether.

Disproved Scientific Theories

Unlike mathematics, there are no proofs in science. In fact, we should remember that even in math, every proof is based on certain UNPROVABLE suppositions that we all agree sound reasonable. The question regarding AGW is whether there is sufficient evidence that it is reasonable to act. This is more a question of public policy than it is of science. When people in here demand proof, it's typically used a ruse to keep society in a state of inaction. They typically don't define what "proof" would be, or even understand what might be considered reasonable proof.

I have to disagree with gcnp58, I don't think there is any sort of progression to something being a "law". I think the things that are called laws are you generalizations from empirical evidence--without necessarily the synthesis of any supporting theory. Look at something like the Titius-Bode Law, I don't think there any particular ascendance to it being called a "law", and I don't think there is even very good theory to back it up.

The laws of thermodynamics arose from experimental evidence, and in some sense there there is no theoretical proof for them--but when we run experiments we see that they hold. However to keep the laws intact we often need to redefine what we mean by them. Hawking showed that we need to identify a quantity related to a black hole's surface as the "entropy" of a black hole, but surely that is nothing that was ever conceived by Kelvin and Clausius. To keep the first law intact, we need to use Einstein's famous equation relating energy and mass, or else that law is out the window.

Speaking of Einstein and gravitation, we have Newton's original synthesis based on orbital measurements of the "Law of Universal Gravitation", but it has now been supplanted (or at least extended) through Einstein's THEORY of General Relativity, so here, definitely, theory trumps law.

Climate change is a complexe topic, it is uncompareable with scientific theories..

Like a dude above just said.

Earth is round. This is just one statement. Earth can be round or not.

If you consider climate change you need to think about the properties of the greenhouse gases, you have to compare them to what is already there, you have to think how much of them actually makes an effect on our atmosphere. You can't give a proof to that, just because you can't keep on track of where those gases will go after they get emissed. Maybe if you consider one factory then you will be able to. But globally? Not a chance. Same goes with heat ammount on earth. Some is beeing stored, and you have no clue when and where it will be released causing overall heat on the earth to increase and therefore you can't estimate the significance of human actions. And it is also not like that that everything we have emissed goes into atmosphere, it can be absorbed by plants and animals, or even materials. And finally by how the gases work, they can influence the heat ammount positively, but also negatively it depends on how light statisticly bounces off by what conditions. And that alone cannot be proven anyhow, because a statistical proof is not a real proof.

No theory in science is ever proven. What they likely mean is sufficient evidence to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt. In much the same way, there is always that discussion that evolution is proven, when it, in fact, is not. Of course with evolution you have the theory of evolution and evolution itself. Evolution just means change, which is why a few scientists have taken to calling evolution a fact and distinguishing it from the theory of evolution. Unfortunately, this has led to a rise of non-scientists calling the theory a fact, but I digress.

In much the same way there is an inherent problem of what you mean by AGW and what I mean. The idea that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and will raise the temps of the world, is beyond dispute in my opinion. It has sufficient evidence to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt. Of course, one may still note that many warmers here call me a denier, so evidently this definition is not sufficient.

You are not asking me to believe that CO2 will cause some warming. You are asking me to believe that it will cause catastrophic problems. I can't imagine that you think we should be spending trillions on minor or moderate problems. For this, you do not have scientific tests. You do not have irrefutable evidence. You have models. You have models of which 95% are currently overestimating the global temperature.

Now if the only people you were arguing against were the people that had little scientific knowledge and claimed CO2 is not a GHG, you would certianly have sufficiently made your point. You are not. Indeed, if you were not asking for large societal changes, I would not think that you held much of a burden of proof.

You, however, are asking for large societal changes based solely off of nothing more than models that are currently overestimating. This does not meet your burden of proof. Indeed, it is quite obvious looking at those who preach AGW, that in order to truly accept this, you either have to have a lack of knowledge on the subject or predisposed to the view based upon political leanings.

None – and, moreover, there is no such thing as something being “closer” to being proven than something else. The concept does not exist in science – period.

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Raisin Caine –

>> Evolution just means change<<

No, it does not. The scientific theory of biological evolution refers to descent through inherited modification.

>> which is why a few scientists have taken to calling evolution a fact and distinguishing it from the theory of evolution. Unfortunately, this has led to a rise of non-scientists calling the theory a fact, but I digress.<<

Evolution is both empirical fact and scientific theory. It is a fact that was known before the theory. Nineteenth century scientists were well aware of the fact that species evolve over time because they saw it in the fossil record (i.e., they saw evolution as fact). The theory of evolution provided a mechanism that explained how the process worked.

Scientists also casually refer to evolution as a ‘fact’ in the same way they refer to the “fact” that the earth revolves around the sun – as the scientific evidence supporting both theories is so overwhelming that only the truly insane and stupid could question their reality.

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Smith –

Equations only work as proof in logic (aka pure math). They do not constitute proof of anything in the real world.

Most scientific laws are elegantly simple equations. Newton’s Law of Gravity can be solved using only addition and multiplication. However, Newton’s law, like all other scientific laws, is a description of some observed physical relationship (in Newton’s gravity law it is the mass product multiplied by the inverse radial distance^2). It does not prove the existence of anything – including “gravity.”

Scientific theories explain things. They can include scientific laws as in the way Einstein’s Theory of Relativity includes a Theory of Gravity that, in turn, includes Newton’s Law of Gravity.

In general, when it is accepted that a theory has been proven, it becomes a "law." The laws of thermodynamics, for instance, started out as theories. Heisenberg's uncertainty theory, likely, will become a law.

As an aside though, a lot of climate change theory is based on really fundamental stuff, like the laws of thermodynamics and Maxwell's laws. Which is why some would argue that for the planet not to be warming due to anthropogenic CO2, something is fundamentally wrong at a very basic level with how we think the universe works. Because we are pretty certain that the laws of thermodynamics are right (that is why they are "laws"), there really should be no debate in a scientific sense that the theory of global warming is essentially correct.

This sounds like a bit of a strawman to me. These people you "see" certainly deserve to be corrected although the number of them is questionable (i.e. are there enough to ask this question?).

Of course we know that in science, a theory can only be conclusively falsified but never conclusively proven (i.e. that would take forever).

I believe the 2nd law of thermodynamics is the strongest scientific theory there is and is unlikely to be falsified. It could be considered the closest one to being "proven".

Human climate change (which I consider to be climate sensitivity to increased CO2 emissions plus land use change) is not even close.

The speed of sound and light are solid equations.The list is to long to list here.Magnetic fields,gravity,evoporation,reclamation,boiling point,the chemical make up of everything from water to meteorites.Is this question really neccassary.The electricity that runs your computer was made possible by the electrical scientist Telsla.What hasn't been proven is the question.The things you use in you daily life are a scientific miracle.The brains in your cell phone is greater than that used to send men to the moon.The abilities of networks to send their TV progams that are reasembled by your flat screen.You get in your car and depend on the internal combustion,a proven scientific event that accures when you mix oxegen and gasoline with a supplied spark your engine will begin to rotate engaging your entire drive train,all resulting in a tranferrence of enery that turns your tires.These are all science.35 years ago they proved that acid rain was killing wildlife in Canada and resolved the problem through pollution control.

Proof is not a concept of science.

A law is not a theory that has been proven. A law is an equation. Law =/= proven