Can science REALLY explain Reality?

[Julia_Mae]

You’re asking how the object of love inspires the feelings of love?

No, I wasn’t. There is no empirical evidence that there is any such feeling. There are feelings people subjectively identify as love, but no way to quantify or identify those as the same. In fact, “love” inspires such actions as murder, suicide, stalking and commonly abuse.

You said:

Love is an inherently relational experience - the object of love, as such, inspires affection and the desire for the well-being of said object, to the extent that one’s actions are motivated to bring about the well-being of the object.

Your answer:

Well, I don’t actually know. There’s some evidence to suggest that human mothers are genetically and chemically programmed to bond with their infants

If we are going to deal with genetics and biological response than we are going to have to leave the exclusive realm of H. sap and be able to apply the principles to at least mammals. In fact, the evidence is much more suggestive that “mothering” (let’s define that as caring for an offspring in the way best suited to it’s healthy growth) is a learned behavior, much more than an instinctive one.

But we are not talking about all mammals here, we’re really talking about people, aren’t we? And because mothering is a behavior common to all mammals, let’s find a behavior uncommon to anyone but humans.

For what he perceived to be the good of his people, Ghandi starved himself. Have you ever gone a few days without food? It’s VERY painful. Denying your own need and comfort for the benefit of another is an action we can define as love. It’s really the only definition we can objectively apply.

You used the word “inspire.” I thought that was interesting. What inspirited Ghandi to suffer for his people? What biological imperative was at play?

 

[Julia_Mae]

If science is faith-based and subjective, how come it cures diseases when theologians can’t, how come it put a man on the Moon while philosophers could only stand and watch?

You don’t seem to have read the entire post you responded to, you might want to review. Or maybe you just didn’t understand the proposition?

How far is it from the earth to the sun? You don’t know. You can Google the answer, but then you know what someone else said. You choose to have faith that the answer is correct. (Or maybe you don’t, but your “knowledge” is faith-based.)

Perhaps next year, someone will say the earth is a different distance from the sun based ion new research. You will now find a different answer. But you might also find most of the scientific community accepts the new answer. Just as they accepted the old one. They have “faith” in it.

If you reread the post you replied to, take note of the probability element.

 

[Julia_Mae]

Agreed, but I’m not sure that’s possible, since any attempt to draw out a detailed explanation from a “supernaturalist” gets the closed response that the supernatural can’t be explained, and any attempt to find out how to test it draws the closed response that the supernatural can’t be tested.

Well, I’m a “supernaturalist” and I have said ITT that the supernatural will be explained and science is already investigating it.

What’s also true is that we know many things that we observe, investigate, describe and cannot give “detailed” explanations for because the system is too complex or has too many unknown dimensions. But we don’t say, for instance, that weather doesn’t exist or cannot be studied or explained.

 

[Gaber]

Nice post, I agree. Ultimately, the thing we can know is what we experience, IMO. And even then, we need to have that experience validated by another, to be sure it isn’t an hallucination. They don’t necessarily have to experience with us, but we seek to find those who have similar experience which we determine by the way they describe it. Science does this by replicating experiments and observations. We do it by talking to each other or reading each other’s accounts.

That is well said. What if we looked at this through the useful tool of the four quadrants proposed by Ken Wilber:* What we “know” through and as experience is yet subjective. It is in the quadrant of “I,” verified as common by submission to the quadrant of “we,” and that happens whether the experience is about an “it/they” of surfaces, or an interior delving into the “I” itself. So repeatability is a valid test of relative dynamics and when found verified is called “knowledge,” even if relative or incomplete. That is distinct from faith, which might have a pseudo verification in agreement but is not necessarily repeatable. Many people “know” the Bible as a collection of words and ideas, all highly interpretable according to viewpoint. There is no intrinsic commonaliity in those sets of words on the order of math equations which have commonality and repeatability, pointing to an underlying level of reality in expererince. However, the Bible at least points to, however usefully or not, to an attribution of a Source of “I” that science as a study of the commonality of surfaces does not. Unfortunately, the one way that might lead to, in our current culture of religiosity, to an commonly interpreted expereince of Source is diluted by being kept in the “it/they” quadrant without much serious work in the “I” quadrant.

The four quadrants

UPPER LEFT UPPER RIGHT
inner-individual outer-individual

LOWER LEFT LOWER RIGHT
inner-collective outer-collective

The UPPER LEFT quadrant covers the inner-individual aspects of human consciousness, as studied by developmental psychology, in both it’s coventional and contemplative forms.

The UPPER RIGHT quadrant covers the outer-individual aspects of human consciousness, as studied by neurology and cognitive science.

The LOWER LEFT quadrant covers the inner-collective aspects of human consciousness, as studied by the sciences of culture: cultural psychology and anthropology.

The LOWER RIGHT quadrant covers the outer-collective aspects of human consciousness, as studied by sociology.

Western culture tends to over-emphasize the Right Hand quadrants (brain science, sociology), and neglect the Left Hand quadrants (introspection, human culture). The integral model of consciousness redresses that imbalance by pointing out the importance of the Left Hand quadrants.

One way to make sense of the Four Quandrants model is to see the UPPER LEFT quadrant as primary, and the other three quandrants as the various ways individual human consciousness is conditioned, by the material brain, cultural influences and social structures.

A more radical view is to see the Four Quadrants as the four ways in which Universal Spirit is expressed simultaneously.

All of the quadrants mutually interact with eachother. A given stage of individual development (e.g. abstract mind) will be reflected in a stage of neurological development (e.g. the neocortex), a stage of cultural development (e.g. rationalisation) and a stage of societal development (e.g. industrialisation).

Each quadrant consists of nine levels/stages. Combining quadrants with levels gives the “all quadrants, all levels” approch of Integral Philosophy.

More details at kheper.net/topics/Wilber/Wilber_IV.html

 

[tonyrey]

Agreed, but I’m not sure that’s possible, since any attempt to draw out a detailed explanation from a “supernaturalist” gets the closed response that the supernatural can’t be explained, and any attempt to find out how to test it draws the closed response that the supernatural can’t be tested.

There are many detailed, testable explanations of **spiritual development **which correspond incomparably more closely to personal experience than the hypothesis that they are biological events. Science is hopelessly inadequate explanation of reality in all its fullness and richness because it doesn’t even recognise or allow for the existence of persons…

 

[In_Spiration]

If science is faith-based and subjective, how come it cures diseases when theologians can’t, how come it put a man on the Moon while philosophers could only stand and watch?

These questions are awfully misguided and quite irrelevant to my point. We must not share the same conceptual notions of faith, basis, or subjectivity. Plus, you’re confusing Science and Technology.

Name a philosopher/theologian in the last hundred years who had as much influence as, say (just for starters) penicillin, big bang theory, genetics or computers.

While this challenge only really manages to indicate your priorities and/or lack of perspective, I’ll answer anyway to highlight a profound point. The Church Fathers, Doctors, and saints have all had a more profound and beneficial influence on humanity than the best scientists. The only way you can prove me wrong, obviously, is if you first prove the legitimacy of your standard for judging this ridiculously-vague concept of “influence” you’ve introduced. (And if you try to rebut by claiming the burden of proof is on me instead of you, then I’ll kindly point out that you’re the one who kicked off the claims to knowledge about which theoretical aims are the most intellectually virtuous and objectively valuable. Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur: a gratuitous assertion is as good as its gratuitous denial. I’ve simply added a new, thus-far-also-gratuitous assertion that I could back with philosophy and theology if I had to.)

Science works, other disciplines not so much.

Correction: The SM is more pragmatically useful than, for example, the methods of sociological survey, post-Structuralist literary analysis, optimal Blackjack play, or Scriptural exegesis as a theoretical basis for technology, medicine, and other similar types of material progress toward commonly-pursued human comfort and survival.

On the other hand, most sane sociologists, post-Structuralists, Blackjack players, and Scriptural exegetes probably aren’t very fazed by the observation that their fields never got us to the Moon. Utility is strictly relative to various desires and ends, though, and not all desires and ends are equal. Frankly, you’ll probably have to establish at some point what the highest human desire is, as well as what fulfills it, what accomplishes the most important human purpose, etc. This will inevitably demand a robust account of human nature along with the rational justification for such an elaborate account. And I’m afraid you might have to depend on, or at least dabble significantly in, metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics if you’re to reach that with an intellectually-satisfying conclusion.

Granted that ultimately a mustard seed of faith is always needed but imho you’re not comparing apples with apples. You pointed out that scientists go to great lengths to calculate the error bars so as to minimize reliance on faith, but then ignored that this is very different from, say, the religious fundamentalist’s absolute certainty in their absolutely blind faith.

I am comparing apples with apples. The distinctions re: faith for various approaches, namely toward acquainting oneself with truth and its anticipated fruits, are differences in degree, not differences in kind. Sure, the SM can apparently be seen to employ much less emphasis and reliance on faith (in the reality of that which isn’t, and isn’t possibly) empirically-accessed when compared to, say, the Alchemy Methods. Still, most attempts at theoretical knowledge involve roughly the same abduction-deduction-induction feedback process as the SM, only open/directed to a different set/type of data. I mean, I suspect that the basic trial-error-correction route has been at work in more than just modern secular circles.

And a lot of the most innovative scientists were successful precisely because they had quirky habits of devoting themselves extraordinarily to hypotheses which they based on rather un-Scientific habits, often obsessively and arrogantly chasing “a hunch” or “intuition”, and then opting for wildly creative ways to try testing them. Just read this article from Cracked.com for a humorous sample of the excesses such minds can be prone to embark upon. [Warning: the site can be vulgar, and there’s at least one less-than-whomesome picture on the linked article.]

Major innovation in natural science is frequently accelerated by a sort of unscientific amount of faith in the hidden truth of one’s favorite preliminary, yet-established ideas on the part of the thinker who eventually ends up revolutionizing the field (that is, frequently after the mockery from his peers has faded and a delay of many years has passed since publication). One might argue that genuine faith, categorically beyond mere dexterous mental entertainment, amid an absence of verification, is in fact advantageous or required in order to reach the highest, most desired truths. They characteristically possess a firm handle on the potential gain alongside an arguably admirable ability to ignore various reminders of the downside to risked error. They’re the men who are most likely to mentally take on the heaviest risks in order to achieve the greatest theoretical rewards, ideally out of noble curiosity and a pure thirst for knowledge of the truth of the world. I find that interest.

What if these geniuses weren’t always practicing unenlightened faith, though? It’s possible that they were just able to draw a lot more out of acknowledged available data than the other scientists, who could’ve been too mentally myopic to see profound relations past a certain logical distance. Just because a chain of rational justification may be too long, nuanced, or unconventional for some to follow, is no proof of falsity.

 

[tonyrey]

It’s certainly true that I take what is called a compatibilist view of free will - that is, I don’t absolutely deny that we have the ability to govern our actions to some extent, despite being part of a deterministic universe. I think the actual extent to which we have such an ability - an ability that involves the capacity to comprehend the probable consequences of our actions (and this comprehension being amongst the determiners of our behaviour) - tends towards being evidence against a supernatural aspect to the self, or the kind of free will that consists in being the conscious originators of our thoughts and actions, as opposed to our consciousness being simply one component of the deterministic process.

Comprehension alone does not enable us to govern our actions. We could conceivably be impotent spectators of events. Therefore your explanation doesn’t constitute evidence against the supernatural but simply highlights the incompatibility of self-control and determinism.

In any case, it remains an open question, although I must admit to being thoroughly intrigued by the possibility of an ultimate explanation of how it is that we feel ourselves to be (and might well actually be) responsible agents, despite being enmeshed in the causal web of the universe.

I think you’re overoptimistic because that predicament is comparable to that of flies enmeshed in a spider’s web with no possible means of escape. You can’t blame them for their lack of freedom!

 

[inocente]

You don’t seem to have read the entire post you responded to, you might want to review. Or maybe you just didn’t understand the proposition?

No, I read and understood, and accept that some faith is needed in any enterprise, although in science it is tiny compared with, say, astrology. I’m making a different point, which is that it is unscientific to bias the evidence by critiquing the scientific method while not critiquing the methods used in philosophy and theology. Many (at least on CAF) criticize science because they don’t understand that provisional results, falsification rather than proof, along with some healthy doubt and uncertainty are strengths, not weaknesses.

How far is it from the earth to the sun? You don’t know. You can Google the answer, but then you know what someone else said. You choose to have faith that the answer is correct. (Or maybe you don’t, but your “knowledge” is faith-based.)

Accepting a Google answer on faith isn’t science to me. If I want a scientific answer, I’ll look at what observations were made and how the distance was derived, then make up my own mind.

Baptists believe that each person is competent to form her own conscience and beliefs, and science lets me do that, in fact science insists that I do that. On the other hand there are many religionists who require me to unquestioningly accept their morality, beliefs and version of reality or burn in their hell for all eternity. I mean,

Perhaps next year, someone will say the earth is a different distance from the sun based ion new research. You will now find a different answer. But you might also find most of the scientific community accepts the new answer. Just as they accepted the old one. They have “faith” in it.

Yes, but they will know the guy that produced the results. Personally, I’d still glance at the paper.

 

[inocente]

Well, I’m a “supernaturalist” and I have said ITT that the supernatural will be explained and science is already investigating it.

I wandered why you were talking about Invitation To Tender, then worked out you meant In This Thread.

Please say what you mean by supernatural - I suspect (and am hoping) you have a very different take to any other “supernaturalist” on CAF. If I had a cent for every time I’ve got no answer to asking how an interface to a supernatural human mind complies with conservation of energy I’d be a rich man.

What’s also true is that we know many things that we observe, investigate, describe and cannot give “detailed” explanations for because the system is too complex or has too many unknown dimensions. But we don’t say, for instance, that weather doesn’t exist or cannot be studied or explained.

True, but we can all see the weather, whereas angels and demons seem very camera-shy. Given that every man and his dog has a camera on their mobile phone these days, if angels and demons were real I’d expect to see lots of them uploaded to Facebook or whatever. Seriously, I suggest that with so many interconnected cameras and no images, the odds on lots of proposed supernatural phenomena are reduced to a gnat’s whisker from zilch.

 

[inocente]

There are many detailed, testable explanations of **spiritual development **which correspond incomparably more closely to personal experience than the hypothesis that they are biological events. Science is hopelessly inadequate explanation of reality in all its fullness and richness because it doesn’t even recognise or allow for the existence of persons…

I’d have thought trying to explain spiritual development by biological events would be like trying to explain a golden eagle in terms of protons, neutrons and electrons alone. Can you name any scientist who doesn’t recognize or allow for the existence of persons, whatcha mean my man?

 

[inocente]

While this challenge only really manages to indicate your priorities and/or lack of perspective, I’ll answer anyway to highlight a profound point. The Church Fathers, Doctors, and saints have all had a more profound and beneficial influence on humanity than the best scientists. The only way you can prove me wrong, obviously, is if you first prove the legitimacy of your standard for judging this ridiculously-vague concept of “influence” you’ve introduced. (And if you try to rebut by claiming the burden of proof is on me instead of you, then I’ll kindly point out that you’re the one who kicked off the claims to knowledge about which theoretical aims are the most intellectually virtuous and objectively valuable. Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur: a gratuitous assertion is as good as its gratuitous denial. I’ve simply added a new, thus-far-also-gratuitous assertion that I could back with philosophy and theology if I had to.)

Perhaps if I’d said “modern science”. Theologians may have done an absolutely terrific job in the past, but post-Enlightenment science has easily outshone them. As expanded below, I’m just taking an Everyman position.

Correction: The SM is more pragmatically useful than, for example, the methods of sociological survey, post-Structuralist literary analysis, optimal Blackjack play, or Scriptural exegesis as a theoretical basis for technology, medicine, and other similar types of material progress toward commonly-pursued human comfort and survival.

Go on, call me a materialist, I can take it.

On the other hand, most sane sociologists, post-Structuralists, Blackjack players, and Scriptural exegetes probably aren’t very fazed by the observation that their fields never got us to the Moon. Utility is strictly relative to various desires and ends, though, and not all desires and ends are equal. Frankly, you’ll probably have to establish at some point what the highest human desire is, as well as what fulfills it, what accomplishes the most important human purpose, etc. This will inevitably demand a robust account of human nature along with the rational justification for such an elaborate account. And I’m afraid you might have to depend on, or at least dabble significantly in, metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics if you’re to reach that with an intellectually-satisfying conclusion.

We’re going in the same direction but on different tracks, and my point is thankfully somewhat simpler. The OP makes the claim that “It is PHILOSOPHY (and Religion) that explain Reality, not science”.

Assuming that the claim isn’t simply elitist (although perhaps some posters take it as such), then for it to have any meaning “PHILOSOPHY (and Religion)” must have some effect on the seven billion of us who aren’t professional philosophers. But no single “PHILOSOPHY (and Religion)” has ever had such a universal influence on all people across the globe.

On the other hand all sane people everywhere can accept that the Earth is a sphere and the Sun burns hydrogen and so on - the influence of scientific explanations crosses cultures and cliques, it is universal.

So I’d assert that for most of us in modern multicultural societies science plays an essential (not exclusive) role in explaining our reality, and that.the OP claim is false unless one takes it as the lesser claim that different philosophies and religions give various competing explanations of their own realities.

*I am comparing apples with apples. The distinctions re: faith for various approaches, namely toward acquainting oneself with truth and its anticipated fruits, are differences in degree, not differences in kind. Sure, the SM can apparently be seen to employ much less emphasis and reliance on faith (in the reality of that which isn’t, and isn’t possibly) empirically-accessed when compared to, say, the Alchemy Methods. Still, most attempts at theoretical knowledge involve roughly the same abduction-deduction-induction feedback process as the SM, only open/directed to a different set/type of data. I mean, I suspect that the basic trial-error-correction route has been at work in more than just modern secular circles. *

I’d point to the wealth of differing philosophical theories on any given topic, while science gets embarrassed when it has more than one. It would be great if other disciplines had a tool as powerful as the SM.

And a lot of the most innovative scientists were successful precisely because they had quirky habits of devoting themselves extraordinarily to hypotheses which they based on rather un-Scientific habits, often obsessively and arrogantly chasing “a hunch” or “intuition”, and then opting for wildly creative ways to try testing them. Just read this article from Cracked.com for a humorous sample of the excesses such minds can be prone to embark upon. [Warning: the site can be vulgar, and there’s at least one less-than-whomesome picture on the linked article.]

Yes, but science is self correcting, it throws bad ideas away, not necessarily true of other systems.

Sorry, would have written more on some points but my reality is three dogs wanting their walk.

 

[inocente]

Major innovation in natural science is frequently accelerated by a sort of unscientific amount of faith in the hidden truth of one’s favorite preliminary, yet-established ideas on the part of the thinker who eventually ends up revolutionizing the field (that is, frequently after the mockery from his peers has faded and a delay of many years has passed since publication). One might argue that genuine faith, categorically beyond mere dexterous mental entertainment, amid an absence of verification, is in fact advantageous or required in order to reach the highest, most desired truths. They characteristically possess a firm handle on the potential gain alongside an arguably admirable ability to ignore various reminders of the downside to risked error. They’re the men who are most likely to mentally take on the heaviest risks in order to achieve the greatest theoretical rewards, ideally out of noble curiosity and a pure thirst for knowledge of the truth of the world. I find that interest.

What if these geniuses weren’t always practicing unenlightened faith, though? It’s possible that they were just able to draw a lot more out of acknowledged available data than the other scientists, who could’ve been too mentally myopic to see profound relations past a certain logical distance. Just because a chain of rational justification may be too long, nuanced, or unconventional for some to follow, is no proof of falsity.

You make good point, but at the end of the day the scientist knows the final arbiter must always be observation, his theory must fit the evidence. This is perhaps my main point, that science should be a major (not exclusive) component in our understanding of reality because it is the only system that actually makes regular reality checks.

 

[tonyrey]

I’d have thought trying to explain spiritual development by biological events would be like trying to explain a golden eagle in terms of protons, neutrons and electrons alone. Can you name any scientist who doesn’t recognize or allow for the existence of persons, whatcha mean my man?

No scientists allow for persons in their scientific investigations. They are concerned with natural objects like bodies - not intangible souls or minds.

 

[tgrath]

I’m sorry, but I do not think so.

Science’s domain concerns explaining the world of nature and its phenomena.

It is PHILOSOPHY (and Religion) that explain Reality, not science.

Anybody who thinks Science=Reality is under the spell of Scientism, and that is faith-based.

And true science is NOT faith-based in any way. It concerns studying and explaining (defined) natural phenomena. NOT reality.

Got this explanation from a response in another forum. Parapharsed this somewhat and added “religion” to it. Made by a scientist, as a matter fact.

Thought it wa a cool response to a question asked there.

Anybody agree/disagree with it?

I saw a lecture recently by Richard Hawking in which he states that physics has now explained how matter can materialize out of nothing. Way over my head.

 

[BobCatholic]

Au contraire. Love in all its forms is emotion,

Nope. Only infatuation is. That’s the “luv” and “ga-ga” feelings one feels for someone.

The other types of love are not emotions.

Love of family is reasonable and rational - you need your family to survive.

Love of friends is reasonable and rational - strength in numbers, and a pack mentality to survive.

Unselfish love - agape - supernatural, super-rational.

None of these types of love are emotional - though emotions do come with with them both positive and negative.

However, you seem to be saying that a steak dinner is a vegetable because it comes with a salad that has vegetables in it. Love is not an emotion just because there are emotions that come with it.

and as such it has subjective aspects which are not open to natural science, and objective aspects which are. For instance, science can investigate whether compassion has societal survival benefits and so on. It can’t explain what the subjective feeling of compassion feels like, but then nothing else can either.

Actually subjective things can be measured by natural science. Fear raises blood pressure and skin temperature changes. That doesn’t mean all blood pressure risings and skin temperature changes are fear, but those are signs.

However, not all things can be measured by natural science. I used love as one of them, as this is outside of the jurisdiction of natural science.

I’m suggesting that the human experience of reality cannot help but be a mix of the objective and subjective, since ultimately we can only look at the world through the eyes of our own species, and probably only through our own culture. A girl in a nomadic tribe in the Maghreb experiences a very different reality to you or me, and her reality is just as valid.

Yes, there is subjective and objective elements. But there are many objective things - like love, which are not subjective. You can tell who loves their family by observation versus who wants nothing to do with their family. You can tell who loves his friends versus wanting to be a loner. You can tell someone who is selfish, self-centered, egotistical and a taker vs someone who is giving, self-sacrificial, self-denying and helpful. It is not subjective, there are objective criteria to measure agape.

I’d say they give complementary explanations rather than rule any out.

I agree, philosophy and theology have a band and make great music together.

 

[Cristiano]

**No scientists allow for persons in their scientific investigations. **They are concerned with natural objects like bodies - not intangible souls or minds.

That is what I explained to my thesis adviser when I told him to stop touching my instruments while I was acquiring data. I did not want to be concerned about the state of his soul when I killed him for messing up my experiment.

 

[Julia_Mae]

Accepting a Google answer on faith isn’t science to me. If I want a scientific answer, I’ll look at what observations were made and how the distance was derived, then make up my own mind.

Well, you can Google the scientific papers and formulas also. The bolded part is the operative phrase. You make up your own mind.

You know enough about how astrology works to believe the chance of that being useful are vanishingly small. So it isn’t that you need more or less faith, it’s that you credit one kind of thing with more credibility.

When one guy says he say a mammal that laid eggs, no one believed him and probably shouldn’t have. But when a ship full of sailors said they saw a furry creature with webbed feet and a duckbill that laid eggs, they should have been given more credibility.

Science told them they were wrong and it was impossible.

How many people need to witness and describe something before they are given credibility?

Baptists believe that each person is competent to form her own conscience and beliefs, and science lets me do that, in fact science insists that I do that.

Science doesn’t exist as anything that “lets” or “insists” you do anything. Some scientists, like say Dawkins, think a rather large portion of the population cannot be trusted to make up it’s own mind about and must be told what to believe.

As someone who spent a large portion of her professional lifetime working in science, I guarantee you the resistance to anyone who dares to “think for themselves” is very great. In fact, the only way anything new is ever discovered in science is for someone to commit scientific heresy and push past scientific “knowledge.”

On the other hand there are many religionists who require me to unquestioningly accept their morality, beliefs and version of reality or burn in their hell for all eternity. I mean,

Which is unrelated to the topic: *can science explain reality? *

 

[Julia_Mae]

Please say what you mean by supernatural - I suspect (and am hoping) you have a very different take to any other “supernaturalist” on CAF. If I had a cent for every time I’ve got no answer to asking how an interface to a supernatural human mind complies with conservation of energy I’d be a rich man.

What is your theory about that connection that would violate the 1st Law of Thermodynamics? What makes you think either Newtonian or Eisensteinian physics applies to the supernatural state? Do you know the prevailing theories in science concerning how many dimensions the universe comprises?

True, but we can all see the weather, whereas angels and demons seem very camera-shy. Given that every man and his dog has a camera on their mobile phone these days, if angels and demons were real I’d expect to see lots of them uploaded to Facebook or whatever.

For someone who identifies themselves as a Christian, you speak very much like an atheist. There’s film, pictures and so forth, but why would you give that any credibility? You see, the non-scientific and prejudiced mind first moves to “explain away” whatever doesn’t fit in their comfortable version of reality. What photo or film would satisfy you?

Millions of people saw the apparition of a woman atop a Coptic Orthodox church over a span of three years, people of various faiths and a rather large number of atheists. No one, including the journalists swarming over the area trying to figure out the presumed “hoax,” ever could explain it. Thousands of feet of film were shot, probably millions of pictures taken.

But my question is: what makes you believe an angel a demon, a vision or other supernatural apparition should be photographable?

What do you believe in that you cannot see? Do you believe there is such a thing as “dark mater” that does not interact with Time/Space in any discernible way but somehow is purportedly responsible for the speeding up of universal expansion, in direct contradiction to what science insisted was true for generations, which is that the universe was slowing down? They had math to prove it. Math dependent on the Laws of Thermodynamics.

But when finally able through new technology to measure the rate of collapse, they found expansion, speeded up, instead. Which violates the laws of thermodynamics so…so… well… there MUST be “dark matter.”

Right?

Like to explain in detail how that’s possible?

And explain to me how you, a Christian, don’t believe in angels.

 

[OrdinaryMelkite]

But the Scientific Method is faith-based. It relies primarily on dubitable abductive logic, inference to the best sufficient explanation. And of course that’s only the “best” in a somewhat subjective manner – that is, the best at time t, and given a particular amount of (limited) experience. Here’s a better account:

The Scientific Method is fundamentally a method for gradually reducing, not eliminating, the uncertainty of whatever promising hypotheses we’ve come to believe in after having deemed them sufficiently explicative of new raw data that initially wasn’t covered by one’s prior set of theoretical convictions. It is probability-based, and thus there’s room, however slight, for error.

Therefore any time one chooses to accept a conclusion from the Scientific Method, he’s making the choice to proceed in the face of a specific risk for error. He’s effectively gambling with what he finds to be his best odds in a game that’s undetermined (as far as he knows), with faith in a probability that he personally considers high enough to justify that leap from suspension of belief to adoption of belief. Or in other words, belief results once one thinks the probable good of the belief (the “juice”) is worth the possible evil of the risk (the “squeeze”).

I’m still here, BTW, folks…still looking through and answering certain posts.

I’ll answer yours.

Good points, overall. And what you are saying a I basically agree with.

When I talk about “faith-based,” I reaqlly mean in the sense of “Taking that information as definite proof and making almost a religion out of it. Which is what Scientism does, whether its adherents like Dawkins care to admit that or not.”

That’s what I meant.

 

[OrdinaryMelkite]

You don’t seem to have read the entire post you responded to, you might want to review. Or maybe you just didn’t understand the proposition?

How far is it from the earth to the sun? You don’t know. You can Google the answer, but then you know what someone else said. You choose to have faith that the answer is correct. (Or maybe you don’t, but your “knowledge” is faith-based.)

Perhaps next year, someone will say the earth is a different distance from the sun based ion new research. You will now find a different answer. But you might also find most of the scientific community accepts the new answer. Just as they accepted the old one. They have “faith” in it.

If you reread the post you replied to, take note of the probability element.