You will enjoy this one. :)

I did! I do wish there was a way of presenting it so that it sounded like less of a rant, though :)

The mathematico-deductive and empirical-inductive points were interesting, although a little awkward. I'm not sure how to phrase it better... modern cosmology is an exercise in the fine art of curve-fitting. It is certainly not devoid of empirical touch points - we would not have gotten to this high number of parameters otherwise - but what is perhaps more the point is that although sets of parameters can be falsified, there seems to be no empirical feedback which can falsify the form of the mathematical model... at least, nothing short of measureable parallax in a high-z object, and even then.

I would surmise a correlation, though, between where someone is on the pure theoretician to pure observer axis and whether the Big Bang is acceptable, with the lowest point somewhere before hitting pure observer. I base this solely on the likes of Halton Arp, Grote Reber and a few of the other folks I have run across who clock significant scope time. How much easier, I surmise, is it to presume an orderly universe that will bend to theory when one gets their vision of the universe third-hand.

I really liked the Burbridge quote:

G. Burbridge said:

“Let me start on a somewhat pessimistic note. We all know that new ideas and revolutions in science in general come from the younger generation, who look critically at the contemporary schemes, and having absorbed the new evidence, overthrow the old views.

This, in general, is the way that science advances. However, in modern astronomy and cosmology, at present, this is emphatically not the case.

Over the last decade or more, the vast majority of the younger astronomers have been conformists in the extreme, passionately believing what their leaders have told them, particularly in cosmology.

In the modern era the reasons for this are even stronger than they were in the past. To obtain an academic position, to obtain tenure, to be successful in obtaining research funds, and to obtain observing time on major telescopes, it is necessary to conform.” (G. R. Burbidge 1997)

(I wish I had the proceedings to see what else Burbridge had to say in there)

The young blood is in no position at all to turn the older generation on its ear. That's true... and sad.