Why do some people think that Science is the only source of knowledge?

[PetrusRomanus]

And the reason for that is very simple… science has an incredibly good “track record”.

People make all sorts of bad starts, bad hypotheses, incorrect explanations - but since nothing is sacred, and everything is up for criticism, and because the scientists are also fallible people with all sorts of “despicable” attitudes - like jealousy and envy - they will try to poke holes into their colleague’s pet theory, and eventually, someone will come up with a theory, which will withstand the relentless attacks, will prove to be good enough to keep - at least temporarily, until someone comes up with something better.

The good reason for the optimism is precisely that good track record. What you call “cop out” is actually an intellectually honest admission of the current ignorance and the expression of a well deserved optimism.

What can you bring up in your “defense”? I keep asking about the epistemological method to find out if the propositions of religion are true of false, and all I get is evasion and silence. There is no reason to trust the claims of religion, precisely because there is no objective epistemological method to separate the “wheat” from the “chaff”. How can you “prove” that there are demons, who cause physical illnesses? Or guardian angels, who are supposed to protect people?

Well if someone discovered a material epistimologic method for identifying the spiritual that would be guaranteed to produce results and have them repeated Im sure we’d see the evidence. However, we are dealing with spiritual beings, which have their own intellect and will, they are not static objects that will behave the same everytime and give the same results. I personally believe we have methods, like fasting, sincere prayer, selflessness, for interaction with the spiritual realm. Have you tried them?

Secondly, just because we may lack method for physically unveiling that which is spiritual right now, does not negate the existence of a spiritual realm. Think of cave men… they at that point lacked espistomologic scientific methods for unveiling the truth about the material world, but that never meant the material world was never real, it just meant they didnt have the methods to unveil the many truths about the material world.

 

[tonyrey]

Without philosophy science has no rational foundation.

No one cares, the scientific method is validated by its results not by dudes in ivory towers.
You could close the philosophy department of every university, and science would still cure diseases and put men on the Moon just the same.1. Does science provide a basis for your belief in Christianity?

1. Did Jesus make any scientific statements?
2. Did Jesus make any philosophical statements?
3. Is curing diseases and putting men on the Moon more important than anything else?
4. Do you base your moral and personal decisions solely on scientific facts?
5. Does science give a complete explanation of why you exist?
6. Will science eventually explain why **everything **exists? If not why not?
7. Does the teaching of Jesus give us a type of knowledge?
8. Does the teaching of Jesus give us scientific knowledge?
9. Does the teaching of Jesus give us spiritual knowledge?

Without philosophy science has no rational foundation. Results do not explain the principles on which science is based. Therefore science is not the only form of knowledge.

Still no response.

Please answer, which school of philosophy do you think gives science a rational foundation.

The rational foundation is not provided by a **school **but a **branch **of philosophy which is entitled metascience or the philosophy of science.

In your opinion what is philosophy?

Do you believe all human activity is in principle neuroscientifically explicable?

Yes.Then you cannot consistently believe in free will - without which moral responsibility cannot exist, qualia - which are essentially subjective, insight and intuition - which transcend neural impulses, inspiration and discernment - which have a spiritual source, or consciousness - which is the main stumbling block to the attempt to reduce men, women and animals to biological machines (a hypothesis alien to theism, Christianity and other religions).

 

[Tyrion]

Well if someone discovered a material epistimologic method for identifying the spiritual that would be guaranteed to produce results and have them repeated Im sure we’d see the evidence. However, we are dealing with spiritual beings, which have their own intellect and will, they are not static objects that will behave the same everytime and give the same results. I personally believe we have methods, like fasting, sincere prayer, selflessness, for interaction with the spiritual realm. Have you tried them?

Secondly, just because we may lack method for physically unveiling that which is spiritual right now, does not negate the existence of a spiritual realm. Think of cave men… they at that point lacked espistomologic scientific methods for unveiling the truth about the material world, but that never meant the material world was never real, it just meant they didnt have the methods to unveil the many truths about the material world.

I am not talking about a “material” epistemological method. Any epistemological method will do, which gives consistent results. The cave-men did discover a whole lot about the physical realm. We discovered even more. There is a LOT still left to be discovered. But what we discovered is consistent.

It looks like that people are confused about the role of epistemology. Suppose for a second that someone discovers a brand new way to separate true propositions from false ones. The method would be tossing a “magical” coin in the air, and when it shows “heads”, the proposition is true, and when it shows “tails”, the proposition is false, and this method gives consistently valid results, time after time, thousands and millions and billions of times. We might not be able to find out how this “magical” coin can separate the true propositions from the false ones… but we could rely on it as a valid epistemological method.

Naturally we don’t have such a “magical coin”. But the method of “observe, hypothesize, predict and verify” does exactly the same thing. It WORKS, consistently, every time.

You propose “prayer, fasting, selflessness”, etc… as an epistemological method. Fine. I am not asking how these are supposed to work. Is there any guarantee that they will yield consistent results? Can they separate true propositions from the false ones? Of course you already uttered a most convenient “caveat”: the spiritual “beings” will not act consistently. So you already admitted that your method cannot be relied upon. What good is it then? How do you know if in “this specific instance” your “method” gave a reliable result or not? An example would be: “praying for a loved one, who is sick”. If the loved one gets better, you say: “God listened to our prayer”. If she does not get better, you say : “God, for his inscrutable reasons, did not grant our prayer, but we are sure that it is the best solution”.

In other words, if it’s heads, you win, it it’s tails, I lose… very, very convenient.

 

[polytropos]

Development of the atom bomb was ordered by President Roosevelt, a Dutch Reformed non-scientist, to protect the US from a first strike by Hitler, a non-scientist birth-Catholic who made Nazism his religion. The bomb’s use was ordered by President Truman, a non-scientist Southern Baptist, to end the war and save lives.

Which is to say that blame games don’t get us anywhere.

Philosophers have helped define warfare (such as Machiavelli and von Clausewitz), along with alternatives to war (such as Gandhi), but of course are useless when it comes to defending us in wartime, you can’t stop a bullet with a rebuttal no matter how well aimed.

Philosophers are masters at one of the causes of conflict - disagreeing with each other.

For which reasons your positive examples - curing diseases and putting man on the moon - are not science - or at least the positive benefits that have come from their implementation are not. Science is about methodological inquiry.

That medical science should be applied practically is not a scientific stance but a philosophical one. It’s a basic philosophical stance, certainly, so it’s understandable that you’ve conflated it with science proper.

Our putting man on the moon was a product of nationalism and the cold war.

 

[Semangelof]

You propose “prayer, fasting, selflessness”, etc… as an epistemological method. Fine. I am not asking how these are supposed to work. Is there any guarantee that they will yield consistent results? Can they separate true propositions from the false ones? Of course you already uttered a most convenient “caveat”: the spiritual “beings” will not act consistently. So you already admitted that your method cannot be relied upon. What good is it then?

Science can predict and know natural things because natural things are bound by laws. However unlike a rock a human can move, choose to do this or that from a certain cause. That “cause” can only sometimes predict the action the living being will take. Not only that we cannot always know the cause. The cause is sometimes hidden from observation, even to the living being. Therefore we have created psychology to provide a reasonably accurate guide line for prediction.

Theology is to God as psychology is to man. If we want to try to predict the cause or the action of God then we use theology… because even more so than man, the mind of God is out of reach. A theology either shows God to be acceptably reliable within it’s scope or that school of theology is rejected as inaccurate.

Gods ethereal nature is not a convenient caveat to stumble science. Just as the human mind is only ruggedly approachable by science even more so the mind of God is further resistant to approach. We cannot start accusing people of having conveniently elusive minds because it upsets our purposes. Likewise we cannot accuse God of being conveniently elusive.

 

[mek42]

I think some people are confusing science with engineering. Scientists seek understanding of the (natural) world. Engineers (clinical physicians are a kind of engineer here if not a technician) seek to use that understanding to make “better” things than existed prior to developing that understanding. These better things as a collective are called technology.

We can go further, but I think this is enough. Scientists do not invent things, they study things. Engineers invent things. Sometimes the same individual acts as both.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Somehow philosophers imagined they could explain the most complicated thing in the known universe just by thinking really hard, so it’s not surprising they’ve never got anywhere.

Scientists don’t do any thinking, then? How do you think science moves forward? Isn’t it by speculating logically from scientific data as premises to valid conclusions from those premises? Logic forms the basis for the best and most fruitful advances. Perhaps the advances of science would be much greater if more scientists were proficient with logic and the validity of arguments.

They’re still arguing about what they mean by consciousness.

And you have the answer to what consciousness is and how it arises? I guess it is my turn to

 

[Peter_Plato]

I am not talking about a “material” epistemological method. Any epistemological method will do, which gives consistent results. The cave-men did discover a whole lot about the physical realm. We discovered even more. There is a LOT still left to be discovered. But what we discovered is consistent.

It looks like that people are confused about the role of epistemology. Suppose for a second that someone discovers a brand new way to separate true propositions from false ones. The method would be tossing a “magical” coin in the air, and when it shows “heads”, the proposition is true, and when it shows “tails”, the proposition is false, and this method gives consistently valid results, time after time, thousands and millions and billions of times. We might not be able to find out how this “magical” coin can separate the true propositions from the false ones… but we could rely on it as a valid epistemological method.

Naturally we don’t have such a “magical coin”. But the method of “observe, hypothesize, predict and verify” does exactly the same thing. It WORKS, consistently, every time.

You propose “prayer, fasting, selflessness”, etc… as an epistemological method. Fine. I am not asking how these are supposed to work. Is there any guarantee that they will yield consistent results? Can they separate true propositions from the false ones? Of course you already uttered a most convenient “caveat”: the spiritual “beings” will not act consistently. So you already admitted that your method cannot be relied upon. What good is it then? How do you know if in “this specific instance” your “method” gave a reliable result or not? An example would be: “praying for a loved one, who is sick”. If the loved one gets better, you say: “God listened to our prayer”. If she does not get better, you say : “God, for his inscrutable reasons, did not grant our prayer, but we are sure that it is the best solution”.

In other words, if it’s heads, you win, it it’s tails, I lose… very, very convenient.

It may be very inconvenient to propose to you that training a cat does not follow the same method as training a pet rock, but, unfortunately for you there is a difference. A rock follows all the rules of physics so training a rock to roll over or fall down conveniently has a simple and effective “method” attached to it. On the other hand, training a cat does not follow that same method. A different method is called for. Pushing a cat to get it to roll (which works with 100% efficiency where a rock is concerned) will likely get you scratched. You might complain that, therefore the methodology for training a cat is useless because it isn’t as consistently effective as rolling a rock, but that is completely owing to the subject of training or inquiry.

Why should anyone feel a compulsion to commit to an assumption that all methodologies ought to be easy and consistent?

I cannot dissect a human person using the same methodology as dissecting a human body and I have no reason to assume it should be. Why assume a methodology for understanding physical causation should apply when attempting to discover or understand persons, whether of the human or divine kind? Is there an epistemological method for confirming that the “you” someone else (your spouse for example) believes they have come to know is the real “you,” after all? You could be a very adept liar or actor and completely have everyone around you deceived. Disregarding intentional deception, there is still no way for another person to know you as you know yourself.

Even regarding self-knowledge, can you provide an effective epistemological method for knowing oneself that gives consistently valid results? I am not clear that such a quandary proves that, therefore, the subject of the inconsistent and ineffective methodology is purely fictional.

 

[VeritasLuxMea]

So was anyone able to provide and explain an epistemology other than science yet?
tony rey:

Science is not the only form of knowledge because it does not explain qualia, insight, intuition, inspiration, discernment, consciousness or free will.

What does again?

 

[Tyrion]

Science can predict and know natural things because natural things are bound by laws.

I am not talking about science, which deals with the “physical reality”. According to some people, there is a non-physical “reality” out there. They present all sorts of propositions about that non-physical “reality”. The question is: “is there an epistemological method to decide if those propositions are true or not?”. Al Moritz said that there is one. I asked about it, and he declined to answer (at least so far). No one has ever come up with such a method. This has nothing to do with faith, revelation, authority, theology, and whatnot. Epistemology is an objective, repeatable method to evaluate propositions. Something that does not rely on the a-priori acceptance of those propositions.

Maybe not ALL the propositions will be decided with such a method, after all science cannot answer ALL the questions about the physical reality - at least, not yet. But science keeps on answering more and more questions, and there is no theoretical limit to it. There is no logical boundary, which would say: “this question will never be answered, not in a million years”.

But what can you offer as an objective, repeatable method to decide such questions, as:

• There are demons, which cause physical illnesses.
• There are guardian angels, who protect us.
• The bread and the wine in the eucharist literally turn into meat and blood, while there is no physical change takes place. (a clear physical nonsense)
• Everyone is assigned an “immortal” soul exactly at the moment of conception.
• God is both “one” and “three”. (a clear logical contradiction)
• Etc…The metaphysical propositions are endless, and there is no method offered which would help the non-believer to find out which one is true and which one is false. You (in general) could always come back with an intellectually honest admission, by declaring: “there is no way to decide these propositions, except based upon faith”. That would be perfectly fine.

 

[Mount_Carmel]

‘Why do some people think that Science is the only source of knowledge?’

• Hmmn, perhaps it is because they have made un-scientific assumptions and conclusions about the nature and reality of the physical and temporal and problems faced by the likes of ‘infinite/eternal regressions’ and perceptions of the space/time continuum.

Some seek ‘intellectual solice’ in Chaos Theory as being the ‘true’ explanation of how physical matter can exist within the infinite and eternal - others say nothing can be infinite or eternal, that such states are paradoxical and un-scientific - hmmn, here they have laid for themselves an intellectual trap, because TRUTH cannot support paradoxes but incomplete knowledge can.

Many ‘New Atheists’ view the Law of Cause(s) and Effect(s) AND ‘infinite’ regression as problematic, since this path logically must end with something that ‘always was’, therefore ‘always is’ and ‘always will be’ {echoes of learning my catechism] - something that is greater and encompasses the merely physical and temporal - something that physical and temporally entrenched ‘science and knowledge’ is ill equipped to deal with a therefore cannot/must not exist - hmmn, very scientific and logical and rational - NOT!

 

[Kevin12]

I am not talking about a “material” epistemological method. Any epistemological method will do, which gives consistent results. The cave-men did discover a whole lot about the physical realm. We discovered even more. There is a LOT still left to be discovered. But what we discovered is consistent.

It looks like that people are confused about the role of epistemology. Suppose for a second that someone discovers a brand new way to separate true propositions from false ones. The method would be tossing a “magical” coin in the air, and when it shows “heads”, the proposition is true, and when it shows “tails”, the proposition is false, and this method gives consistently valid results, time after time, thousands and millions and billions of times. We might not be able to find out how this “magical” coin can separate the true propositions from the false ones… but we could rely on it as a valid epistemological method.

Naturally we don’t have such a “magical coin”. But the method of “observe, hypothesize, predict and verify” does exactly the same thing. It WORKS, consistently, every time.

You propose “prayer, fasting, selflessness”, etc… as an epistemological method. Fine. I am not asking how these are supposed to work. Is there any guarantee that they will yield consistent results? Can they separate true propositions from the false ones? Of course you already uttered a most convenient “caveat”: the spiritual “beings” will not act consistently. So you already admitted that your method cannot be relied upon. What good is it then? How do you know if in “this specific instance” your “method” gave a reliable result or not? An example would be: “praying for a loved one, who is sick”. If the loved one gets better, you say: “God listened to our prayer”. If she does not get better, you say : “God, for his inscrutable reasons, did not grant our prayer, but we are sure that it is the best solution”.

In other words, if it’s heads, you win, it it’s tails, I lose… very, very convenient.

…Breaking my own rule of giving this up, there are plenty of questions about reality towards which the past reliability of empirical science means little or nothing. I will not link to his blog or Wikipedia page because quite frankly I hate the man (though obviously I know I shouldn’t because Christ told us to love our enemies), but even Jerry Coyne has commented on the extent to which evolutionary psychology, for example, has produced a great deal of just-so stories that can’t really be proven. And if you really wanted to find out about some of those questions, like whether the capacity for language is genetic or learned, you would have to do something pretty unethical.

I like science just fine, and indeed I have to often defend it from people on this forum who think the idea that the Earth revolves around the sun is some kind of Masonic conspiracy. But it doesn’t really answer with enough certainly many of the questions I am interested in. I like philosophy a lot more, since it’s foundational.

As for prayer, fasting, selflessness etc as an epistemology - whether or not those things are “effective” in the way you want to discuss, all epistemologies, as Wittgenstein pointed out, are just backscratchers for the itch of uncertainty that all the Large Hadron Colliders in the world could never get rid of for good.

 

[Kevin12]

Maybe not ALL the propositions will be decided with such a method, after all science cannot answer ALL the questions about the physical reality - at least, not yet. **But science keeps on answering more and more questions, and there is no theoretical limit to it. There is no logical boundary, which would say: “this question will never be answered, not in a million years”.
**

Oh wow. I thought you said you weren’t a logical positivist? Wittgenstein’s Tractatus should disabuse you of the notion that science has no end-point.

As to all the other things, some things obviously have to be taken on faith, but transsubstantiation and the trinity have at least more logical coherence than you suggest. Have you really read, for example, Augustine’s “On the Trinity” or any of the other foundational documents of the Father’s on that issue and found it wanting, or are you just criticizing the bald statement. I don’t believe in the Buddhist concept of Nirvana, but I realize that, in spite of its apparently logical contradictions (i.e. that a state that can only be compared to non-existence is blissful, that the compassion that made the Buddha turn back from Nirvana to teach the Noble Truths to others isn’t a form of attachment itself), it is logically coherent.

 

[Mount_Carmel]

Tyrion - All science and all knowledge must have an ‘end point’, that end point lies in the completeness of knowledge - the question is, just where does the ‘completeness of knowledge’ lie - and the reality and realisation that fallible and intellectually and perceptually challenged [physical] humanity cannot possibly be its source or wellspring, just [perhaps] one of ‘It’s’ outcomes.

 

[Semangelof]

I am not talking about science, which deals with the “physical reality”. According to some people, there is a non-physical “reality” out there. They present all sorts of propositions about that non-physical “reality”. The question is: “is there an epistemological method to decide if those propositions are true or not?”.

Epistemology is a branch of philosophy and yes there are quite a few epistemological methods that show our origin from the existence of a God. The arguments show that the existence of God is an immediately rational one, and it is more reasonable to accept it than deny it. They are shown to be true or false by the same general tools of epistemology we use everyday. The arguments are already logically sound and self evident, so It would be up to you to prove them false using logical and rational methods.

There are 5 of these arguments that can be found here.
I have watched this author uphold those arguments for 16hours. I have seen the best of the best debate him, some of them even conceded their own time(hutchins). Dawkins won’t even debate him despite an ongoing petition to get him to do so. They have rebuttals, but none that show themselves to be a more rational example than what is given. Even more disturbing I have yet to see them give a counter premise in those debates. A few are hinted at but immediately refuted and then afterwards left undefended.

If you find yourself having a rebuttal to any one of those arguments then you can submit one to Dr Craig. He regularly debates people in a public forum, and he even debates a person a week on his website. Just submit your rebuttal and he will publicly accept or refute it.

 

[inocente]

For which reasons your positive examples - curing diseases and putting man on the moon - are not science - or at least the positive benefits that have come from their implementation are not. Science is about methodological inquiry.

That medical science should be applied practically is not a scientific stance but a philosophical one. It’s a basic philosophical stance, certainly, so it’s understandable that you’ve conflated it with science proper.

Our putting man on the moon was a product of nationalism and the cold war.

You could plead that everything under the sun can be called philosophy, but the plain fact is that no trained philosopher was ever necessary to rid the world of smallpox or to put a man on the moon, while neither would have been remotely possible without trained scientists.

We can all name loads of scientific discoveries in the last hundred years that have had a major impact on humanity. Can you name any breakthrough at all by philosophers in the same period which has had the same impact as just one of them?

 

[inocente]

Somehow philosophers imagined they could explain the most complicated thing in the known universe just by thinking really hard, so it’s not surprising they’ve never got anywhere.
Peter Plato;10830935:

Scientists don’t do any thinking, then? How do you think science moves forward? Isn’t it by speculating logically from scientific data as premises to valid conclusions from those premises? Logic forms the basis for the best and most fruitful advances. Perhaps the advances of science would be much greater if more scientists were proficient with logic and the validity of arguments.

In your hurry you didn’t notice the highlighted word.

So what I meant was that philosophers imagined they could explain the most complicated thing in the known universe JUST PURELY by thinking really hard AND BY DOING NOTHING ELSE.

This is a major problem for philosophers, while scientists can test hypotheses and make progress by breaking the problem into manageable pieces.

They’re still arguing about what they mean by consciousness.
Peter Plato;10830935:

And you have the answer to what consciousness is and how it arises? I guess it is my turn to

In your hurry you didn’t stop to notice that it’s hardly surprising philosophers can’t explain consciousness when 250 years after Kant they don’t even agree on the definition of the word.

Peter, any chance that on this thread you’ll read what’s written rather than jumping straight in and forcing me to repeat everything?

 

[inocente]

No one cares, the scientific method is validated by its results not by dudes in ivory towers.

You could close the philosophy department of every university, and science would still cure diseases and put men on the Moon just the same.

1. Does science provide a basis for your belief in Christianity?

1. Did Jesus make any scientific statements?
2. Did Jesus make any philosophical statements?
3. Is curing diseases and putting men on the Moon more important than anything else?
4. Do you base your moral and personal decisions solely on scientific facts?
5. Does science give a complete explanation of why you exist?
6. Will science eventually explain why **everything **

exists? If not why not?

1. Does the teaching of Jesus give us a type of knowledge?
2. Does the teaching of Jesus give us scientific knowledge?
3. Does the teaching of Jesus give us spiritual knowledge?

Sorry but I can’t face getting into another round of long multi-quote posts, so leaving out the questions that have nothing to do with my post, i.e. with validation of the scientific method, my answers are: 4. Far more important than any school of philosophy, yes. 5. More so than any philosophical system such as utilitarianism. 6. Better than any philosophical argument. 7. More so than any philosophical argument.

Still no response.

My response is still there in post #66, just like it was yesterday and the day before.

*The rational foundation is not provided by a **school ***but a **branch **of philosophy which is entitled metascience or the philosophy of science.

Please can you name some philosophers in this branch who have provided rational foundations for science?

If they disagree which rationale provides the foundation of science, is there an objective means to choose, or do we flip a coin?

And why should we care what they say? “Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds” - attrib.Richard Feynman.

In your opinion what is philosophy?

I’d say professional philosophy (as opposed to café) is the skeptical, critical, systematic use of rational argument, which suffers from it’s emphasis on logic alone.

Then you cannot consistently believe in free will - without which moral responsibility cannot exist, qualia - which are essentially subjective, insight and intuition - which transcend neural impulses, inspiration and discernment - which have a spiritual source, or consciousness - which is the main stumbling block to the attempt to reduce men, women and animals to biological machines (a hypothesis alien to theism, Christianity and other religions).

This seems confused between the philosophical (terms such as free will and qualia) and a specific theology (consciousness as spirit).

Do you think Catholic scientists trying to cure diseases are attempting to turn us into “biological machines”, or is it just non-Catholic scientists, or just those interested in knowledge for it’s own sake, or who? Do you think theism, Christianity and other religions require us to remain in ignorance about our biology?

 

[mek42]

If God can be proven, there is no longer an act of faith. Would not, then, any such proof be a heresy?

 

[polytropos]

You could plead that everything under the sun can be called philosophy, but the plain fact is that no trained philosopher was ever necessary to rid the world of smallpox or to put a man on the moon, while neither would have been remotely possible without trained scientists.

The point is that you will accept the positive applications of science but not the negative applications. Whether they are good or bad is not a scientific matter. Science is just a method of inquiry. The fact that it has produced many good results (ignoring the bad) does not make it the only valuable type of knowledge.

We can all name loads of scientific discoveries in the last hundred years that have had a major impact on humanity. Can you name any breakthrough at all by philosophers in the same period which has had the same impact as just one of them?

I’m not arguing that philosophy in the past 100 years has been good or applicable - and I would hesitate to call much of it a “breakthrough.” But the philosophies of communism, Naziism, and liberalism have shaped the world pretty substantially in the last 100 years. If I weren’t restricted to the last 100 years I could mention any modern philosopher. Let’s say, for example, John Locke and Adam Smith.

Which is not to say that these philosophies had positive impacts on the world, but they did have impacts on the world which were not scientific in the modern sense. If anything their failures accentuate the need for good philosophy, which science cannot substitute, because methodological science is not the only way that anyone thinks.

So what? Science’s success and philosophy’s recent failures imply that philosophy should be abandoned?