Metaphysics & The End Of Science

[MindOverMatter]

I believe that quantum events marks the end of physical explanation in regards to the origin of our universe. Hence a theory of everything is unachievable without philosophy. But will this lead to people having more respect for Metaphysics? Perhaps you disagree with my initial statement about cosmological science. What do you think?

 

[Touchstone]

I believe that quantum events marks the end of physical explanation in regards to the origin of our universe. Hence a theory of everything is unachievable without philosophy. But will this lead to people having more respect for Metaphysics? Perhaps you disagree with my initial statement about cosmological science. What do you think?

A “theory” in the scientific sense, is an equivocation outside of science. A “philosophical theory” is an informal concept, maybe something we would call a “conjecture”, maybe even a “proof” as a syllogism. But a “theory” in the scientific sense makes demands that cannot be met by philosophy, or metaphysical musings. For one thing, it has to make testable predictions. It has to be falsifiable, at least in principle, for another.

It was always thus, though, and one cannot understand the scientific method without understanding its severe limitations. Science is not equipped to address ultimate questions, or metaphysics. It’s just the search for natural explanations for natural phenomena. As it turns out, that leaves plenty of interesting work to be done in science.

Which means that a “theory of everything” is severely limited in what it can achieve, epistemologically. There is no objective “feedback loop” for metaphysics, which means it cannot possibly get the epistemic “respect” that science has. Science has nature itself as a feedback loop, an objective means to test and detect errors, and validate positive performance. There is no such “calibrator” for metaphysics, so we are lost, left to muse about dangling conjectures.

The more we know about science, the more starkly clear it becomes how little we know, and how little we can know in terms of metaphysics. Our metaphysical questions will never go away, but the prospects for improved epistemology in metaphysics are dim. If the esteem for metaphysics is going to grow, it will mean that our demand for performative knowledge has waned.

-Touchstone

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Touchstone

It was always thus, though, and one cannot understand the scientific method without understanding its severe limitations. Science is not equipped to address ultimate questions, or metaphysics. It’s just the search for natural explanations for natural phenomena. As it turns out, that leaves plenty of interesting work to be done in science.

It’s certainly true that the scientific method, so far as finding natural laws is concerned, is limited to natural phenomenon. But intelligent design* is* a natural phenomenon. We can prove that things are intelligently designed. We design things every day so we ought to know something that is intelligently designed when we see it.

If no explanation for evolution can be found in certain bacteria, it is still possible to see elements of intelligent design in molecular life as Michael Behe and others have pointed out (see Michael Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box. The root question is whether that design should be called natural or supernatural. That becomes a philosophical question which has to become a profound puzzle for atheists and an easy implication for theists. One would have to go one way or the other, unless one chooses to compromise at the level of deism, which apparently many have, including Spinoza, Voltaire, Darwin (though he called himself a theist) and Einstein, none of whom could abide Christianity or atheism.

 

[Deum_quaerens]

Touchstone

It was always thus, though, and one cannot understand the scientific method without understanding its severe limitations. Science is not equipped to address ultimate questions, or metaphysics. It’s just the search for natural explanations for natural phenomena. As it turns out, that leaves plenty of interesting work to be done in science.

It’s certainly true that the scientific method, so far as finding natural laws is concerned, is limited to natural phenomenon. But intelligent design* is* a natural phenomenon. We can prove that things are intelligently designed. We design these things every day so we ought to know something that is intelligently designed when we see it.

If no explanation for evolution can be found in certain bacteria, it is still possible to see elements of intelligent design in molecular life as Michael Behe and others have pointed out (see Michael Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box. The root question is whether that design should be called natural or supernatural. That becomes a philosophical question which has to become a profound puzzle for atheists and an easy implication for theists. One would have to go one way or the other, unless one chooses to compromise at the level of deism, which apparently many have, including Spinoza, Voltaire, Darwin and Einstein, none of whom could abide Christianity or atheism.

The problem of intelligent design is that it appeals to a supernatural explanation, which is outside of the scope of science.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

*The problem of intelligent design is that it appeals to a supernatural explanation, which is outside of the scope of science. *

Can we say the intelligent designs scientists themselves make when they invent something (like a nuclear reactor) are outside the scope of science?

Intelligent design is intelligent design. Why do we have to give it a supernatural explanation if we are atheists and don’t want to? All we have to do is concede that it seems more logical that molecular life is intelligently designed, rather than evolved.

 

[Detales]

Here is the province of science: “systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation.” It does not claim to be complete, or final, or to explain the origin of the Univers as we understand it.

Here is the province of metaphysics: “the branch of philosophy that treats of first principles, includes ontology and cosmology, and is intimately connected with epistemology.” It comes from a phrase meaning “beyond what is physical.”

Certainly, since “science” comes from a word meaning “to know,” it would seem to include “meatphysics,” and, indeed, Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science, said that our experience was a matter of “Science or suffering.” And metaphysics certainly can have bearing on science, as many scientific advances were arrived at by not reason, but intuition that came after reasoning was exhausted.

In either case, they both refere to organized knowledge. Scientific knowledge has physical referents, but is yet incapable of certain explanations, and due to its yet very finite scope, can be informed to some extent by metaphyiscs. Nevertheless, it is very useful in describing how physically observable things work, as demonstrated by repeatability. Metaphysics provides guidelines to considerations of how we can percieve and explain the world, even as to its causation.

Both are aspects of our experience, and we willnot find, I think, that we can dispense with either. They are merely labels to certain kinds of activities and ways of thinking. They are, neither one of the, encompassing of our entire experience, but of ways of organizing our perceptions.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Detales

Scientific knowledge has physical referents, but is yet incapable of certain explanations, and due to its yet very finite scope, can be informed to some extent by metaphyiscs. Nevertheless, it is very useful in describing how physically observable things work, as demonstrated by repeatability.

This remark is interesting because it raises the question of scientific knowledge based upon repeatable observations. I suppose one could say that the Big Bang is verified by the repeatable observation of an expanding universe. A law of nature emerges, even though its first motion is lost in mystery. There is* no *observation that the expanding universe is now reversing, or ever could, reverse its outward motion. A Big Crunch is therefore in the province of scientific possibility, but not necessity. Science textbooks are not averse to mentioning the possibility of a Big Crunch, even though proof is lacking that one will occur.

By the same token, we observe intelligent design in human behavior, and so we can see intelligent design repeat itself and verify its existence from one intelligently designed project to another. But when we look at life on the molecular level, we have no proof of evolution at all. There simply is no law of random adaptability that works. On the contrary, the greater likelihood is that bacteria were originally created in one act (as the universe was created in one act) and that the dependence of each part of the bacteria on the other is very likely not a random event; just as you would not expect a mousetrap to evolve itself into existence all at once with its various parts ready to perform their teleological function and do the opposite of bacteria: kill rather than replicate.

So why aren’t there high school or college textbooks willing to concede the possibility that life originally came into being by intelligent design, rather than evolution?

Well, I guess we all know the answer to that question. Fear. The same fear Einstein felt, and overcame, by inventing the cosmological constant so that he would not have to confront the Judeo-Christian teaching of a created, rather than an eternal universe.

And as Einstein later admitted … “the biggest blunder of my career.”

 

[Deum_quaerens]

How can intelligent design be science, when it appeals to an entity that is neither quantitatively measurable, nor qualitatively testable? Supposing that random evolution cannot account for irreducibly complex systems, surely thence to conclude that they are the product of intelligent design is a metaphysical argument, akin to the Kalām cosmological argument? This acknowledgment of the proper bounds of science would in no way jeapardise the veracity of the argument in question.

 

[buffalo]

The problem of intelligent design is that it appeals to a supernatural explanation, which is outside of the scope of science.

Science is so limited and it is due for a maturing of a sort. It is not the arbiter of truth. Perhaps a redefinition is due.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Deum

How can intelligent design be science, when it appeals to an entity that is neither quantitatively measurable, nor qualitatively testable? Supposing that random evolution cannot account for irreducibly complex systems, surely thence to conclude that they are the product of intelligent design is a metaphysical argument, akin to the Kalām cosmological argument?

Your assumption is that we have to upper case intelligent design and literally translate it as God. I don’t think science has to do that. All science needs to do, after verifying that no other hypothesis makes sense, is to allow* the possibility* that molecular life appears to have intelligent design at its base. Let other make what they will of that.

There is a precedent for this in a comment by Einstein.

“I’m not an atheist, and I don’t think I can call myself a pantheist. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the language in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn’t know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God. We see the universe marvelously arranged and obeying certain laws but only dimly understand these laws. Our limited minds grasp the mysterious force that moves the constellations.” Albert Einstein in Max Jammer’s Einstein and Religion.

And again from Einstein:

“I have never found a better expression than “religious” for this trust in the rational nature of reality and of its peculiar accessibility to the human mind. Where this trust is lacking science degenerates into an uninspired procedure. Let the devil care if the priests make capital out of this. There is no remedy for that.”

“My religiosity consists of a humble admiration of the infinitely superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble minds. That deeply emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.”

Apparently Einstein found the idea of intelligent design perfectly consistent with the findings of modern scientists. So have many other scientists from Copernicus to Einstein. It is only the atheists who go ballistic when you mention the idea of intelligent design.

 

[Touchstone]

Deum

How can intelligent design be science, when it appeals to an entity that is neither quantitatively measurable, nor qualitatively testable? Supposing that random evolution cannot account for irreducibly complex systems, surely thence to conclude that they are the product of intelligent design is a metaphysical argument, akin to the Kalām cosmological argument?

Your assumption is that we have to upper case intelligent design and literally translate it as God. I don’t think science has to do that. All science needs to do, after verifying that no other hypothesis makes sense, is to allow* the possibility* that molecular life appears to have intelligent design at its base. Let other make what they will of that.

There is a precedent for this in a comment by Einstein.

“I’m not an atheist, and I don’t think I can call myself a pantheist. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the language in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn’t know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God. We see the universe marvelously arranged and obeying certain laws but only dimly understand these laws. Our limited minds grasp the mysterious force that moves the constellations.” Albert Einstein in Max Jammer’s Einstein and Religion.

And again from Einstein:

“I have never found a better expression than “religious” for this trust in the rational nature of reality and of its peculiar accessibility to the human mind. Where this trust is lacking science degenerates into an uninspired procedure. Let the devil care if the priests make capital out of this. There is no remedy for that.”

“My religiosity consists of a humble admiration of the infinitely superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble minds. That deeply emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.”

Apparently Einstein found the idea of intelligent design perfectly consistent with the findings of modern scientists. So have many other scientists from Copernicus to Einstein. It is only the atheists who go ballistic when you mention the idea of intelligent design.

People who understand and support science will just have to keep setting the record straight on this.

**Intelligent Design ideas as theology are not a problem for science, even when it comes from top scientists, even such a one as Einstein. Because it’s theological in its formulation and propostional content.

What is a problem is when people try to confuse theology with science. That’s profoundly destructive to science – theology is poison to science as science, and it doesn’t matter who is proposing it, even (especially!) Einstein.

**So, have at it. It’s just theology, and indeed many scientists have had those intuitions ans beliefs as theological positions. But please don’t try to ruin science by injecting theology into it. This is the loathesome goal/effect of the Intelligent Design movement, all to ofter. So long as you can keep science natural (and that can include addressing questions about God, so long as they are natural questions with natural answers), and free from getting its epistemology corrupted by ideas about the supernatural, everything works out fine.

-TS

 

[Charlemagne_II]

So long as you can keep science natural (and that can include addressing questions about God, so long as they are natural questions with natural answers), and free from getting its epistemology corrupted by ideas about the supernatural, everything works out fine.

Gotcha!

So long as we keep science atheistic, “everything works out fine”?

Funny, I thought it was a Catholic priest (George LeMaitre) who had to correct Einstein’s math in order to find the Big Bang. In that instance, it was belief in God that* helped *to make a scientific discovery since LeMaitre had no bias against Genesis’ creation of the universe that Einstein *did *have, and of course he had to exploit his anti-Genesis bias by assuming the universe was eternal and by introducing a phony cosmological constant to make sure it remained so.

 

[MindOverMatter]

What is a problem is when people try to confuse theology with science. That’s profoundly destructive to science – theology is poison to science as science, and it doesn’t matter who is proposing it, even (especially!) Einstein.

It is true that the scientific method becomes meaningless when we make theology a physical science; it causes damage to theology also. However there is nothing stopping them from being two complementary world views, so long as they respect each others mode of knowledge.

It’s just theology, and indeed many scientists have had those intuitions ans beliefs as theological positions.

It is true that many scientist have found the laws of physics and the meaningful nature of the life around them inspiring; so much so, they feel compelled to invoke a creator. But, however valid such a inference may be, its important to note that this is a metaphysical inference; not a scientific one.

But please don’t try to ruin science by injecting theology into it.

Please don’t ruin science by injecting the naturalist world view into it. Then a lot more people would respect science.

This is the loathesome goal

Naturalism is a loathsome goal.

(and that can include addressing questions about God, so long as they are natural questions with natural answers)

To ask questions about God is to do philosophy. Its not Science; and its important that people realize that, on both sides of the divide.

 

[Touchstone]

So long as you can keep science natural (and that can include addressing questions about God, so long as they are natural questions with natural answers), and free from getting its epistemology corrupted by ideas about the supernatural, everything works out fine.

Gotcha!

So long as we keep science atheistic, “everything works out fine”?

I think “agnostic” is the right term. Science has no opinion one way or another about the merits of any supernatural ideas. Under its own epistemology, “supernatural” isn’t even a coherent concept. So long as science doesn’t pretend what is incoherent is coherent, no problem, it can continue to provide natural explanations for natural phenomena.

Funny, I thought it was a Catholic priest (George LeMaitre) who had to correct Einstein’s math in order to find the Big Bang. In that instance, it was belief in God that* helped *to make a scientific discovery since LeMaitre had no bias against Genesis’ creation of the universe that Einstein *did *have, and of course he had to exploit his anti-Genesis bias by assuming the universe was eternal and by introducing a phony cosmological constant to make sure it remained so.

The universe may be eternal. If the Big Bang is the “cycle point” in a infinite cycle of expansions and collapses for or universe, then the “beginningness” of our Big Bang is just an empirical barrier, giving rise to our illusions.

Bet then again, maybe it’s not. Maybe this universe is just a brute fact, uncaused.

But then again, maybe neither of those is the case, and maybe some god or some kind of “mind” created this universe…

As for the basis for intuition about possible explanations for phenomena, all ideas are welcome so long as they can be rendered into natural explanations. James Watson supposedly got the inspiration for the double helix as the structure of DNA as the result of his using psychedelic drugs. Whatever. You’re reason for inspiration can anything at all, it just has to be bear up under analysis and testing. It doesn’t matter if God told you, or if you are flying high on acid, at the end of the day, your ideas have to perform in empirical fashion. So science takes all comers for ideas. Get your inspiration anywhere you like, just know that it has to perform as science, if you want it to be advanced as science.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

It is true that the scientific method becomes meaningless when we make theology a physical science; it causes damage to theology also. However there is nothing stopping them from being two complementary world views, so long as they respect each others mode of knowledge.

Right. Ken Miller is a prominent, brilliant biologist, and a practicing Catholic, an “Intelligent Design” believer of the respectable kind (as opposed to say, Dembski). He doesn’t seek to corrupt the scientific method with his theology, or vice versa, but instead has synthesized them in a way that respects the epistemology of both.

I don’t agree with Miller’s overall views, but he’s an example of how those “modes of knowledge” can be integrated.

It is true that many scientist have found the laws of physics and the meaningful nature of the life around them inspiring; so much so, they feel compelled to invoke a creator. But, however valid such a inference may be, its important to note that this is a metaphysical inference; not a scientific one.

Right. Can we be spared the “Einstein said…” quotes of Einstein engaging in his right to have whatever metaphysical intuitions he want, but having nothing to do with science *per se. *Those are really transparent “appeal to authority” fallacies (and I know you didn’t post the quote above. Einstein is as “right” about metaphysics as my dog.

Please don’t ruin science by injecting the naturalist world view into it. Then a lot more people would respect science.

In science, we’re not embracing a “world view”. It’s a method, a tool. And naturalism is a requirement for the tool, but only in a methodological sense. I mentioned Kenneth Miller above. He’s no “naturalist” by worldview, but when he is doing science, he’s as unflinchingly naturalist as any atheist. When you do math, you follow the rules of the symbolic calculus. When you do science, you become a “naturalist” in a provisional sense. It’s not your worldview; Naturalism is just a required principle for using the tools of science to build natural knowledge.

Naturalism is a loathsome goal.

We might as well say calculus is a disgusting worldview! yech!

To ask questions about God is to do philosophy. Its not Science; and its important that people realize that, on both sides of the divide.

Science is philosophy. It’s just rigorous philosophy, accountable to the real world. That makes a pretty clear demarcation, but you are right, it’s good to make sure they don’t get confused.

-TS

 

[TheAtheist]

I think “agnostic” is the right term. Science has no opinion one way or another about the merits of any supernatural ideas. Under its own epistemology, “supernatural” isn’t even a coherent concept. So long as science doesn’t pretend what is incoherent is coherent, no problem, it can continue to provide natural explanations for natural phenomena.

And technically we should leave it at that.

Unfortunately as human beings, people have often attempted to “cash in” on the cache of science.

It has been misused to “justify” philosophical positions (such as atheism or intelligent design), Communism -billed supposedly as the “Science of History,” Racial theories, etc.

Precisely because it is viewed by the average person as giving concrete answers.

 

[MindOverMatter]

We might as well say calculus is a disgusting worldview! yech!

Naturalism as a philosophy and naturalism as a methodology, are to different things. Naturalism is a belief that the world is purely physical in nature.
Methodological naturalism, is to look strictly for natural explanations. Scientists are not suppose to, on scientific grounds, assume that their are only natural explanations or that only natural explanations are possible; but only that, as far as they are practicing empiricism, they must look for natural explanations for measurable phenomenon.
When scientists start saying that science supports naturalism, they are no-longer doing science, but rather they are expressing their metaphysical beliefs. Scientists have beliefs like everybody else.

Science is philosophy.

Science is a branch of philosophy. True. However; it has a very specific agenda and a specific method of knowing, which does not allow for realities that cannot be measured, verified or falsified empirically. Hence; intelligent design is a metaphysical philosophy as well as naturalism.

 

[RobbyS]

*The problem of intelligent design is that it appeals to a supernatural explanation, which is outside of the scope of science. *

Can we say the intelligent designs scientists themselves make when they invent something (like a nuclear reactor) are outside the scope of science?

Intelligent design is intelligent design. Why do we have to give it a supernatural explanation if we are atheists and don’t want to? All we have to do is concede that it seems more logical that molecular life is intelligently designed, rather than evolved.

Good point. It is often be remarked how amazing it is that our thoughts so consistently anticipate outcomes. I am not just talking about scientific conclusions, I am talking about “intuitions.” or insights that allow the simplest person to make wise choices and to invent things that improve their lot.

 

[RobbyS]

And technically we should leave it at that.

Unfortunately as human beings, people have often attempted to “cash in” on the cache of science.

It has been misused to “justify” philosophical positions (such as atheism or intelligent design), Communism -billed supposedly as the “Science of History,” Racial theories, etc.

Precisely because it is viewed by the average person as giving concrete answers.

Part of the problem is that people forget that science is something that people have learned.

 

[MindOverMatter]

Good point. It is often be remarked how amazing it is that our thoughts so consistently anticipate outcomes. I am not just talking about scientific conclusions, I am talking about “intuitions.” or insights that allow the simplest person to make wise choices and to invent things that improve their lot.

What does this prove? Or rather, what is the implication of what you’re saying?