Merged Is Scientism Really Justified?

[Carrot Flower King]

The issue is the argument, not the age of the terminology. Popper’s definition is a different sense of “scientism.”

Then why introduce when an "argument" was made and compare it unfavourably with a newer "argument" if the age is not an issue?

And tell me why I should not be using Popper's definition, which has the advantage of describing something which happens in the real world as opposed to something which mostly exists in someone's mind only?

 

[Axxman300]

If it has been refuted, simply show where the refutation is.

Here you, Exhibit-A:

Viagra bucks global slowdown trend in China, sales soar 47%

Overall global sales of the Pfizer mainstay plunged 24%.

www.biopharmadive.com

Key statement:

Whereas before, Chinese men relied on traditional remedies, such as deer antler and caterpillar fungus to address ED, they are now more likely to embrace a pharmacologic option, such as Viagra, than ever before.

Folk Remedies - 0
Science - 1

For THOUSANDS of years the Chinese and others relied on folk remedies to get an erection. Then here comes Pfizer with Viagra, and 50 million Chinese men lined up to buy it. And they keep buying it, and the market keeps growing (pun intended) along with Pfizer's bank account.

Thousands of years of "Ancient Knowledge" tossed out the window by a side-effect from a high blood pressure medication. Sorry, dude, science wins.

 

[Axxman300]

Different experiments can test a theory, but they don't establish the foundational validity of the scientific method itself—that is the distinction I'm making.

You have yet to point to a different method. You just throw out philosophy as if it stands alone, and it does not. The scientific method predates science itself. Goes all the way back to ancient man walking though the remains of a forest fire, seeing the charred wood glowing red, picking up the glowing embers, burning his hand, and learning that red burned wood is hot, and it's a bad idea to touch it. Also discovered third-degree burns too. So man built upon that. "Hey, this rock is sharp, I just cut myself", evolved into stone blades. Stone blades evolved into spears with stone spearheads to make hunting large animals safer, and practical. Then we started launching spears, which evolved into arrows. We started cooking food, learning to preserve our food, agriculture so we didn't have to wander the earth, medicines from herbs because someone asked how this root did that crazy thing, biproduct - alcohol (!), and so on, and so forth.

The validity of the scientific method is found in the space probes orbiting multiple planets, the thousands of people who had their final cancer treatments, and are in remission today, and THE VERY DEVICE AND INTERNET YOU ARE USING RIGHT NOW are all validations of the scientific method.

Your argument fails.

 

[Resume]

I ran into this "scientism" horse ◊◊◊◊ on a paranormal board. It all boils down to "science won't validate my woo."

It's just boring.

 

[Axxman300]

I ran into this "scientism" horse ◊◊◊◊ on a paranormal board. It all boils down to "science won't validate my woo."

It's just boring.

That is exactly what this is. The old, "Science has limits to what it can know" canard. It shows a deep lack of knowledge about how science works, and what it actually knows, and how it continues to learn. True believers never continue to learn.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

Here you, Exhibit-A:

Viagra bucks global slowdown trend in China, sales soar 47%

Overall global sales of the Pfizer mainstay plunged 24%.

www.biopharmadive.com

Key statement:



Folk Remedies - 0
Science - 1

For THOUSANDS of years the Chinese and others relied on folk remedies to get an erection. Then here comes Pfizer with Viagra, and 50 million Chinese men lined up to buy it. And they keep buying it, and the market keeps growing (pun intended) along with Pfizer's bank account.

Thousands of years of "Ancient Knowledge" tossed out the window by a side-effect from a high blood pressure medication. Sorry, dude, science wins.

It just politics, they have a very powerful Rhinoceros lobby.

 

[Carrot Flower King]

You have yet to point to a different method. You just throw out philosophy as if it stands alone, and it does not. The scientific method predates science itself. Goes all the way back to ancient man walking though the remains of a forest fire, seeing the charred wood glowing red, picking up the glowing embers, burning his hand, and learning that red burned wood is hot, and it's a bad idea to touch it. Also discovered third-degree burns too. So man built upon that. "Hey, this rock is sharp, I just cut myself", evolved into stone blades. Stone blades evolved into spears with stone spearheads to make hunting large animals safer, and practical. Then we started launching spears, which evolved into arrows. We started cooking food, learning to preserve our food, agriculture so we didn't have to wander the earth, medicines from herbs because someone asked how this root did that crazy thing, biproduct - alcohol (!), and so on, and so forth.

The validity of the scientific method is found in the space probes orbiting multiple planets, the thousands of people who had their final cancer treatments, and are in remission today, and THE VERY DEVICE AND INTERNET YOU ARE USING RIGHT NOW are all validations of the scientific method.

Your argument fails.

Yeahbut, acknowledging that would mean ceasing the mental masturbation...

 

[W.D.Clinger]

Here you, Exhibit-A:

Viagra bucks global slowdown trend in China, sales soar 47%

Overall global sales of the Pfizer mainstay plunged 24%.

www.biopharmadive.com

Key statement:

Whereas before, Chinese men relied on traditional remedies, such as deer antler and caterpillar fungus to address ED, they are now more likely to embrace a pharmacologic option, such as Viagra, than ever before.

Folk Remedies - 0
Science - 1

For THOUSANDS of years the Chinese and others relied on folk remedies to get an erection. Then here comes Pfizer with Viagra, and 50 million Chinese men lined up to buy it. And they keep buying it, and the market keeps growing (pun intended) along with Pfizer's bank account.

Thousands of years of "Ancient Knowledge" tossed out the window by a side-effect from a high blood pressure medication. Sorry, dude, science wins.

Updating both Samuel Johnson and Saul of Tarsus, it's hard for @Gubiosak to kick against the pricks.

 

[arthwollipot]

That is exactly what this is. The old, "Science has limits to what it can know" canard. It shows a deep lack of knowledge about how science works, and what it actually knows, and how it continues to learn. True believers never continue to learn.

Not just that, it shows a lack of understanding about what science is actually for - what its purpose is.

The purpose of science is not to answer every philosophical and epistemological question. The purpose of science is to continually improve our models of reality.

 

[JayUtah]

That is exactly what this is.

I agree. I continually want to ask @Gubiosak to point on the doll to where science touched him. Science is reasonably good (and increasingly better) at answering the kinds of questions science can answer. That's not meant to be a tautology. And properly conducted as a virtuous cycle, it avoid logical circularity by being grounded to confirmatory observation. Knowledge obtained by the scientific method must result in a prediction whose truth can be observed. And a failure to make that connection results in refining the process until it works better. The notion that empiricism lacks some sort of magical grant of a priori validity is ultimately unimportant. As @Dave Rogers pointed out, if you propose to ask that question fairly, then you have to conclude we can know nothing, since all knowledge is similarly hobbled. Therefore it's just solipsism with an unconvincing coat of paint.

It turns out that questions like, "Does God exist?" (or ghosts or aliens or whatever paranormal claim is being made) are the kind science is good at answering. Attempts to place those propositions outside the grasp of empiricism commit the error of putting one foot in the boat while keeping one foot on the dock. Advocates want the real-world causations that paranormal or supernatural propositions entail, but they don't want them to be subject to the same standards of proof as other real-world causations. You can wave all the philosophy books you want, but it still comes down to straightforward special pleading.

 

[Axxman300]

It turns out that questions like, "Does God exist?" (or ghosts or aliens or whatever paranormal claim is being made) are the kind science is good at answering. Attempts to place those propositions outside the grasp of empiricism commit the error of putting one foot in the boat while keeping one foot on the dock. Advocates want the real-world causations that paranormal or supernatural propositions entail, but they don't want them to be subject to the same standards of proof as other real-world causations. You can wave all the philosophy books you want, but it still comes down to straightforward special pleading.

This is so true.

I am a much more productive ghost hunter because I embrace science. Instead of looking for ghosties, I look for explanations for why someone saw or heard something. Ghost hunting IS debunking. My "unexplained" file grows smaller every year because I keep my ear to the ground reading science journals, and following research centers like Lawrence Livermore Laboratories on social media. I've lost track of how many times I learn about some esoteric scientific phenomenon that suddenly fills in the blank for some odd occurrence. And I love when the science lines up perfectly with the setting and conditions. It is nice to put things to bed.

Thanks to science, I have a vast knowledge of weird - but - natural events which can make anyone freak out. Maybe that's the book I write.

 

[arthwollipot]

Thanks to science, I have a vast knowledge of weird - but - natural events which can make anyone freak out. Maybe that's the book I write.

I think you should.

 

[Axxman300]

Not just that, it shows a lack of understanding about what science is actually for - what its purpose is.

The purpose of science is not to answer every philosophical and epistemological question. The purpose of science is to continually improve our models of reality.

I always point out that Black Holes existed only on a chalkboard for decades, as an equation. The math added up, just that simple. From there we built new telescopes, and used that math to point them at locations in the sky until we finally photographed one. The truth is that science "knew" that something existed based on quantum mechanics, astrophysics, and high end math. Something that cannot be seen from earth with the naked eye, yet they knew it was a thing. And I'm sure there are other examples. Certainly Newton's work continues to pay off 400 years later.

So much of parapsychology is based on bad assumptions built upon other bad assumptions. They throw around words like, "Energy", and "Dimensions" without ever clearly defining either one. Energy can be detected, it radiates from somewhere, and certainly if it's concentrated in a location. The effects of different energies on the human body can also be recorded, and tracked. Most "paranormal researchers" don't know how to use the equipment they run around with, or understand what their various detectors are actually telling them. And the whole dimension thing drives me nuts because 99% of the paranormal crowd cannot define what a dimension is, let alone describe how something can transit between dimensions.

RFK Jr. is what happens when we lower standards of science. We can't allow that to continue on any level.

As a ghost hunter I try to respect someone's cultural background. Usually I decline to investigate their claims because I'm just going to make an enemy, and as long as they're not scamming strangers out of their money, or using their claims for self promotion I'm happy to let them have their creepy thing. But if someone is making money off gullible people I have to step in, as should we all. And if someone is claiming psychic healing? We need to put them in jail because they can kill people who need medical help.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

Unproven, and trivially refuted. The fact that the word exists may equally only indicate that some people dishonestly claim other people advocate for it.

Dave

An indication is only evidence, not proof. While it might be possible that all claims of scientism are false, it's far more likely that at least some of them are true. If it didn't exist there would be little point in creating the word.

In practice we find that some people do promote scientism, even if they don't call it that. Wikipedia says:-

Physicist and philosopher Mario Bunge used the term scientism with a favorable rather than pejorative sense in numerous books... In 2018, philosophers Maarten Boudry and Massimo Pigliucci co-edited a book titled Science Unlimited? The Challenges of Scientism in which a number of chapters by philosophers and scientists defended scientism.

Unfortunately the pejorative usage has taken over to the extent that people who agree with the principle often distance themselves from the word rather than owning it.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

Folk Remedies - 0
Science - 1

Thousands of years of "Ancient Knowledge" tossed out the window by a side-effect from a high blood pressure medication. Sorry, dude, science wins.

In this case Science 'wins' because it discovered something by accident. This was so for many folk remedies too. Generally it was a matter of trying some random thing and if it seemed to work keep it, perhaps with variations to see if it could be improved. That's not so different from the scientific method.

BTW those thousands of years of "ancient knowledge" weren't a failure - it helped redistribute wealth from those didn't need it to those who did, without any of the risks associated with using Viagra.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

This is so true.

I am a much more productive ghost hunter because I embrace science. Instead of looking for ghosties, I look for explanations for why someone saw or heard something. Ghost hunting IS debunking. My "unexplained" file grows smaller every year because I keep my ear to the ground reading science journals, and following research centers like Lawrence Livermore Laboratories on social media. I've lost track of how many times I learn about some esoteric scientific phenomenon that suddenly fills in the blank for some odd occurrence. And I love when the science lines up perfectly with the setting and conditions. It is nice to put things to bed.

Thanks to science, I have a vast knowledge of weird - but - natural events which can make anyone freak out. Maybe that's the book I write.

I'd read that book, I find the question of what makes us think we've seen a ghost absolutely fascinating. There was a TV show called something like 'Paranormal Home Investigations' where alongside the 'psychic' (as bad as you could imagine) and the 'psychical investigator' who pretty much just went through local records and news to list everyone who'd died within miles of the place and suggest that any or all of them could be haunting it, information clearly passed on to the 'psychic' often on screen, they had a qualified building inspector checking the house out.

The things he found ranged from the obvious, like overgrown trees and squirrels causing scratching sounds, less obvious ones like redundant heating ductwork that could allow voices from outside or next door to penetrate inner rooms and one particularly interesting one where the resident claimed and entity had tried to push her friend down the stairs. The stairs themselves were a spiral staircase that failed building codes on having no handrail and too small treads, it was also slightly too short so whoever installed it had sloped the last few inches of hallway to meet it. Finally, the wall and ceiling of the hallway at the top of the stairs were slightly out of true which had a slightly unbalancing effect as you walked toward the stairs, he described them as a 'death trap', no ghost needed.

Sadly I only saw one short season of it, I suspect the contrast between the woo and the actual investigation that upset the target audience of people that gasp at dust motes.

 

[Gubiosak]

I agree. I continually want to ask @Gubiosak to point on the doll to where science touched him. Science is reasonably good (and increasingly better) at answering the kinds of questions science can answer. That's not meant to be a tautology. And properly conducted as a virtuous cycle, it avoid logical circularity by being grounded to confirmatory observation. Knowledge obtained by the scientific method must result in a prediction whose truth can be observed. And a failure to make that connection results in refining the process until it works better. The notion that empiricism lacks some sort of magical grant of a priori validity is ultimately unimportant. As @Dave Rogers pointed out, if you propose to ask that question fairly, then you have to conclude we can know nothing, since all knowledge is similarly hobbled. Therefore it's just solipsism with an unconvincing coat of paint.

It turns out that questions like, "Does God exist?" (or ghosts or aliens or whatever paranormal claim is being made) are the kind science is good at answering. Attempts to place those propositions outside the grasp of empiricism commit the error of putting one foot in the boat while keeping one foot on the dock. Advocates want the real-world causations that paranormal or supernatural propositions entail, but they don't want them to be subject to the same standards of proof as other real-world causations. You can wave all the philosophy books you want, but it still comes down to straightforward special pleading.

I am not against science; I believe the scientific method is extremely important, but there are questions that may be beyond the current reach or scope of science.

 

[Mojo]

I am not against science; I believe the scientific method is extremely important, but there are questions that may be beyond the current reach or scope of science.

Such as?

 

[Pixel42]

I am not against science; I believe the scientific method is extremely important, but there are questions that may be beyond the current reach or scope of science.

And (following on from Mojo's question) what alternative way of obtaining knowledge are those questions within the current reach and scope of?

 

[Gubiosak]

Such as?

Do you defend the stronger claim that science is the only valid way of obtaining knowledge, or the more moderate claim that science is simply our best method for investigating the empirical world?