What is this "scientific method" you all speak of?

[LogisticsBranch]

Indeed, I would have given the same answer. But then I decided that Hee Zen’s question was a troll question. After all, as an atheist with a ‘scientific’ worldview wouldn’t he exactly know what the scientific method entails? I suppose he does.

But it is obvious that some of his fellow atheists, despite their ‘scientific’ worldview, have no idea how the scientific method really works. In response to the claim that scientific evidence pointed towards an eternal universe, based on mathematical models, I posted the following reply:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=12503808&postcount=225

A scientist colleague of mine with whom I discussed this agrees with my statements.

The scientific method is a pattern of inquiry that forms a structure for advancing scientific understanding. The process: identify a problem, form a hypothesis, design and construct an experiment, collect data, analyze results, and form a conclusion. Scientists, using this approach, have answered questions ranging from the simplest to the most complex.

• Characterizations (observations, definitions, and measurements of the subject of inquiry)
• Hypotheses (theoretical, hypothetical explanations of observations and measurements of the subject)
• Predictions (reasoning including logical deductionfrom the hypothesis or theory)
• Experiments (tests of all of the above)

Al, your link takes me to a different topic and you said there, " String theory on the other hand has not yielded any experimental results that support it, not even with the recent Large Hadron Collider. Why do you think the scientists who formulated the Standard Model have received a Nobel Prize, but not even one of the famous string theorists, or Hawking for his models? The Nobel Prize is awarded for scientifically demonstrable results, not for speculations."

The last topic I was on with you, your response was bias thus non-scientific. I’ll try to pick-up a little more later on what you have said there. Honestly, I’m ticked off by your constant know it all attitute. Please stop it.

 

[tonyrey]

Then please post the link. Because I think you are playing fast and loose with the figures. This link will take you to a pdf which shows the total number of abortion in the UK (and the rate per head of population) has been falling for the last 10 years.

gov.uk/…/Abortion_Statistics__England_and_Wales_2013.pdf

Your choice of years is selected to suit your argument which is further weakened by the use of contraceptive pills that destroy fertilized eggs.

theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/jan/28/divorce-rates-marriage-ons

You have omitted one vital fact:

“But what it really shows is that for each year, an equivalent of half the number of people getting married get divorced.” ibid.

In addition to the fact that many people are not even bothering to get married… And over a million one-parent families? Are they also unrelated to the decline in religious belief?

The only one you have correct is the suicide rate, which has increased by less than 1 in 100,000 over the last 6 years.

In a population of 60,000,000! Another manipulation of the figures…

So do you believe that the decrease in abortions and divorces is linked somehow to a fall in spiritual beliefs?

Your question has no rational foundation.

 

[tonyrey]

*Which words are they and why did you select them? *

                             Your "Darwinism is a hopelessly inadequate explanation of both the  spiritual and physical beauty that are the basis of the teaching of  Christ" (sorry you need to delete more than 2 words to get to a haiku  17).

No rational response…

Please answer the questions before we proceed:

Are other cultures superior to Christianity (from a rational and moral point of view)?

Is Christianity a backward ideology?

Nope and nope.

Then why is exposure to other cultures significant?

Now please answer my question: Can you cite evidence for a global decline in religious belief?

I cannot and do not need to. There is no reason why the decline in religious belief and increased number of abortions be reflected occurred throughout the world nor is there any reason to think believers have a parochial mentality.

 

[Peter_Plato]

If you redefine words to mean whatever you want then yes, black can be white, but it destroys language as a means of communication.

Subjective = “influenced by or based on personal beliefs or feelings, rather than based on facts”

Objective = “not influenced by personal beliefs or feelings”

They are antonyms.

It seems to me that you have left out of your accounting that there are many meanings of “subjective.” The first one of which (below) pertains to what I have been saying. The third and possibly the fourth, to what you have. The dictionary (Merriam-Webster,) it seems, gives priority to mine by giving it prime of place (1b).

1: of, relating to, or constituting a subject: as
a obsolete : of, relating to, or characteristic of one that is a subject especially in lack of freedom of action or in submissiveness
b : being or relating to a grammatical subject; especially : nominative
2
: of or relating to the essential being of that which has substance, qualities, attributes, or relations
3
a : characteristic of or belonging to reality as perceived rather than as independent of mind : phenomenal — compare objective 1b
b : relating to or being experience or knowledge as conditioned by personal mental characteristics or states
4
a (1) : peculiar to a particular individual : personal (2) : modified or affected by personal views, experience, or background
b : arising from conditions within the brain or sense organs and not directly caused by external stimuli
c : arising out of or identified by means of one’s perception of one’s own states and processes — compare objective

When someone is making a truth claim such as "That painting is beautiful!’ what they are doing is making **the painting **the “subject” of their truth claim and saying something they believe to be true about the painting.

Subjects and objects are semantic aspects of language. In English, because it uses an SVO (subject verb object) language structure, the subject (who or what the speaker of the statement makes a claim about) typically opens the sentence. The object is the “receiver” of the action (the activity designated to the subject) because the object "receives” the action (verb) of the subject. "The cat [subject] ran [verb] to the tree [object].

When “is” is used as the copula, the object of the sentence is “about” the subject in the sense that a truth claim is being made about the subject per se. “The painting IS beautiful.” is such a claim. Notice that painting is both the subject of the sentence and an object in its own right. However, a sentence like “I like strawberries.” uses a subject (in the sense of definitions 3 or 4 as the grammatical subject of the sentence.

This is where you have become confused. You assume because a subject can be a subject semantically in a sentence, then all statements with subjects as subjects become subjective. Are you confused yet? You likely are because your response shows you haven’t thought enough on this subject.

To say, “That painting is beautiful!” is to make an objective claim ABOUT the subject (the painting) of the sentence that is, objectively speaking, the object of the claim.

To say, “I like that painting!” is to make a subjective claim (like) about a subject (I) that is coincidentally also the subject (in the sense of definitions 3 and 4) of the sentence.

Just because some people don’t know the meaning of words doesn’t mean we must all give up on language.

If beauty is objective then there would necessarily have to be a way that is independent of personal feelings to compare the beauty of one of Pink Floyd’s ditties against something else. All I did was to ask (several times) what that procedure is.

Instead you keep responding with arguments from obfuscation. By redefining “subjective” to give it a private meaning, you conflate it with “objective” such that war is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength, as the slogans on the Ministry of Truth read in Orwell’s 1984.

So, in summary you made a claim and until you substantiate it objectively, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” stands tall.

Clearly, from above, I am not using private meanings, but attempting to sort out the obfuscation by using the full range of meanings which you conveniently have ignored to make a trivial point about only one (or possibly two) of the meanings.

My point has been that both subjects and objects can be the subject of truth claims. Where an actual subject is the subject (I like…) the truth claim could be merely a statement of preference with the sole arbiter being the actual subject of the sentence in both senses.

However, when the truth claim is ABOUT any object (a tree, a painting, a food) the proposition is assumed to be an objective claim about the object. “This fish tastes salty!” is an objective claim subject to verification. "I like this salty tasting fish!” is a preference claim which can be verified by only one subject - the one making the claim.

“This painting is beautiful!” is NOT a preference claim, it is an objective claim made ABOUT the painting subject to analysis and judgement as to whether it is meaningfully true. You cannot wave it off by claiming it is MERELY a subjective claim. It doesn’t semantically purport to be subjective since it is being made ABOUT the painting, not ABOUT anyone’s feelings or preferences in the way “I like that painting!” is.

 

[Aloysium]

The discussion has reminded me that there is the science of linguistics, which studies language. I remember reading Noam Chomsky and finding his political writings kept my attention far more than what he had to say about language.

At any rate, it is amazing that we communicate - that we can formulate concepts, attaching symbols and words to them, and somehow what is going on in my head (or wherever it is occurring - sometimes it comes from the heart) is able to elicit similar phenomena in someone else.

 

[Peter_Plato]

The discussion has reminded me that there is the science of linguistics, which studies language. I remember reading Noam Chomsky and finding his political writings kept my attention far more than what he had to say about language.

At any rate, it is amazing that we communicate - that we can formulate concepts, attaching symbols and words to them, and somehow what is going on in my head (or wherever it is occurring - sometimes it comes from the heart) is able to elicit similar phenomena in someone else.

Minimally, to relate to another person, as person, we must acknowledge that they exist, as person, independently of our knowledge of them.

As Fr. Barron points out, this is essentially what faith involves.

youtu.be/m_4PSgFjtvI

In that sense, there can be nothing controlling or manipulative about our coming to know another person because they are not THAT kind of entity. They are not eligible for dissection as, say, a body, a rock or other “objective” things are.

That is not to deny that persons (subjects in their own right) cannot be known as objective beings. However that requires that we acknowledge and treat them (as persons) essentially different from the way we treat physical entities. That difference, however, does not amount to a concession that persons (as subjects) are any less real than objects which can be analyzed via the scientific method. Showing, yet again, that the scientific method is of value ONLY for specific purposes.

The question, then becomes how do we know (as in “provide an epistemology for”) that we truly “know” someone on a personal level? That would entail the scientific method is inadequate to that task just as it is for the tasks of determining how we would know anything is “good” or “beautiful” or “true.”

In other words, there MUST be some other epistemology for determining such qualities even though it hasn’t been well explicated by human philosophies.

On the other hand, perhaps some knowledge may be of the kind that is meant to be intimate and not accessible to third party analysis, without it being any less true because of that.

How do we know something is true about our “self” absent the scientific method? Otherwise Socrates’ injunction makes no sense.

 

[inocente]

No rational response…

Then why is exposure to other cultures significant?

I cannot and do not need to. There is no reason why the decline in religious belief and increased number of abortions be reflected occurred throughout the world nor is there any reason to think believers have a parochial mentality.

Your claim is off-topic, you’re not prepared to substantiate it, and you’ve misinterpreted my remarks, so you’ve given me no reason to continue. Go ahead and have the last word, I’ve said all I want to say on this thread.