Science is NOT faith-based!

[Dr. Trintignant]

The rule does indeed exist. You just don't like the limits of the predictions because of the quantum rules.

There really is no rule. There's also no rule that allows you to know the momentum and position of a particle exactly and at the same time, because the information simply doesn't exist.

And what do you mean I don't like the limits? I am perfectly fine with the idea that science does not assume there are rules for everything. It's not a limit of science, it's a limit of the universe--and because science is about getting the most accurate view of the universe as is possible, it would be rather silly to assume that rules always exist.

We can trace the origin of god beliefs back and we find the evidence supports they are the product of human imagination.

I see no way of interpreting your words other than that you think I am a theist of some kind. To be extra, extra clear: I am a strong advocate both of science and atheism. In addition, I think they are part of the same world-view. I think people that deny this are at the least deluding themselves. And I think that people who claim to be both theists and scientists may be right, but that they aren't practicing the two at the same time--can't be practicing the two simultaneously--for the reason that I cited: that the hidden assumption behind science is that there is no omnipotent god behind the scenes with the ability to muck with things.

- Dr. Trintignant

 

[arthwollipot]

...the hidden assumption behind science is that there is no omnipotent god behind the scenes with the ability to muck with things.

I disagree with this, but right at the moment my brain hurts and I am unable to adequately articulate why.

 

[Dr. Trintignant]

You can't pretend the articulation of those goals is irrelevant, as they will steer the way in which the car repair will happen.

I cannot agree. They do not steer it; they merely set the goal. The path from the current to final state requires no value judgments.

It is possible that there are subgoals which themselves come from value judgments ("I want my car repair to be done in an ecologically sound fashion"), but these are simply additional specifications, and themselves can be completed without additional judgments.

In fact, I deal with this every day in my job as a computer programmer. My values are often not the same as our customers. Sometimes, I am incapable of even understanding the motivation behind customer requests. But I am capable just the same of completing requests as long as they are articulated coherently.

Similarly you can't pretend that scientists' philosophical beliefs concerning the axioms of science are irrelevant, because it will steer the way in which they will do research, and what questions they think they ought to answer.

So, the order in which discoveries are made will depend on the values of the scientists. That's fine. But that doesn't change the ultimate truths.

Perhaps there is an intelligent alien civilization out there. If so, it likely shares almost no values with humans--how could it, being so alien? And yet, if they have any interest in the universe around them, they will largely make the same scientific discoveries as we have. Perhaps their focus will be different, but the knowledge sets will overlap and certainly not contradict (to the extent that they are not simply mistaken).

That's your value judgement. While it can be very useful to categorise and to think that some things belong in a category and others don't really belong there, it will inevitably lead to some "No True Scotsman" fallacies.

Whereas the converse leads to the conclusion that language is incapable of describing anything at all. Neither one is tenable. In the middle, we agree that words may be flexible, but that they do mean things, and that the sets of people that call themselves "mechanics" and "someone who prefers rusty cars over cars that move" generally don't overlap.

I think you would have a much greater survival advantage if I heard much better than I do; and there is nothing wrong with my ears.

You can't prove that. The physical limitations of ears dictate certain constraints like size, and therefore collection ability.

Your definition also makes the definition of "normal hearing" dependent on the state of the environment.

Of course it does! If we somehow lived in a medium that could not transmit sound, "normal" vs. "abnormal" hearing would be completely meaningless. I have no idea if my appendix is functioning normally or not; I know that it is not infected, but for all I know it is simply idle. It appears to have very little use in the current environment, and even if it were serving its original purpose, I could not legitimately say that it is behaving normally or not.

If you do not consider it medicine to consider how the patient will feel about the result, then you may have a very narrow view of medicine.

I like words to mean things. There are many other things that we can call this; counseling, say. And when my heart stops in the emergency room, I want the doctor to concentrate on fixing the machine that is my body instead of considering how I'll feel about the matter. But this is getting too far into semantics.

- Dr. Trintignant

 

[Earthborn]

Name one.

A few common axioms used by scientists are: "there is such a thing as the truth", "evidence can lead to the truth" or "two contradictory statements can't both be true at the same time."

Unfortunately, the evidence is, once a belief such as this is established, it is unlikely knowledge alone will alter the patterns which have already imprinted on one's brain.

Depends on how convincing your argument is, isn't it.

But you are mistaken to think that somehow removes these things from an evidence based world.

I don't think I said they exist outside the world, only that their truth or untruth cannot be established by scientific research. Mostly because they aren't truth statements.

Philosophically is just one way of describing moral and value judgments.

Philosophy includes all ways of describing moral and value judgements. Your argument is also a philosophical argument.

What you also apperently missed is that for my argumentation it is irrelevant how you describe value judgements, because my argument isn't about description, but judgement. Something scientists should try to stay away from if they want to do their work.

Some of the values are innate.

Which ones?

Take my dogs, for example, no one taught them that the dogs they meet their first year of life are in their pack and the dogs they encounter after they were about a year old are not in their pack, but that's exactly what their behavior shows occurred.

It seems like you are contradicting yourself. How do your dogs know the difference between dogs they met in their first year and other dogs if not for the learning period during their first year?

They do not originate by magic. They don't come from a soul. They are not mysterious.

Never claimed any of these things.

This is where your values originate.

The origin of my values is irrelevant to most of my argumentation in this thread, but since you want to discuss the origin of them anyway... Because they do not originate by magic, they don't come from a soul and they are not mysterious, they are not absolute and unchanging. They are in constant flux, never exactly the same for all people. It is exactly this property that morality doesn't fit in with science; scientists can study how people make moral decisions, but not judge how they should make them.

If someone says that something is (im)moral, that is not the sort of statement that science can adress. It is not a truth statement, it is a statement of opinion.

Mystery solved.

I have no idea which mystery you are talking about.

 

[Earthborn]

I cannot agree. They do not steer it; they merely set the goal.

That's the exact same thing.

My values are often not the same as our customers. Sometimes, I am incapable of even understanding the motivation behind customer requests. But I am capable just the same of completing requests as long as they are articulated coherently.

It still shows that you start with values, even if they are not all your own. And apperently you do use one of your own values: that the customer should get what he wants.

But that doesn't change the ultimate truths.

If there are any. That there ultimate truths is an axiom that many scientists believe in, but it is not something they have been able to prove so far.

Perhaps there is an intelligent alien civilization out there. If so, it likely shares almost no values with humans--how could it, being so alien? And yet, if they have any interest in the universe around them, they will largely make the same scientific discoveries as we have.

If they have an interest in the universe around them, then they share a value with humans who have an interest in the universe around them.

Whether they will largely make the same scientific discoveries as we have is interesting philosophical issue. It is not something we can be quite sure of. On the one hand, the axioms they believe necessary for science may be so vastly different that their research deals mostly with things we never even imagined while they can't imagine the things we deal with. On the other hand, axioms do change sometimes and it may be that they once dabbled with ideas that we have considered as well. As scientific knowledge expands the chance of that happening increases, but at what level of scientific progress it becomes inevitable I don't dare to guess.

In the middle, we agree that words may be flexible, but that they do mean things,

Well, people do attribute meaning to them anyway.

and that the sets of people that call themselves "mechanics" and "someone who prefers rusty cars over cars that move" generally don't overlap.

Only because people have chosen to draw sets in one way and not another. They do so quite subjectively, and doing it is a value judgement.

You can't prove that. The physical limitations of ears dictate certain constraints like size, and therefore collection ability.

It was your claim that "normal hearing" is "the state of hearing that gives the greatest survival advantage", so it is up to you to prove which level of hearing gives the greatest survival advantage. Otherwise your definition is useless.

Size is not much of a constraint to hearing. Plenty of animals have much smaller hearing organs than humans while still hearing much better (by some standards...)

It appears to have very little use in the current environment, and even if it were serving its original purpose, I could not legitimately say that it is behaving normally or not.

I think most doctors will say that it is behaving normally if it doesn't cause you any pain, whether or not it is serving its original purpose. Or even whether it even has a "purpose" because that sounds awfully teleological.

There are many other things that we can call this; counseling, say.

I don't think a doctor discussing with his/her patient what treatment is necessary for a physical ailment can be called "counselling". But it does involve considering the patient's values as well as the doctor's values and common societal values.

 

[Soapy Sam]

Science:- Commonsense observation. With notes.

 

[ponderingturtle]

You are missing the point. Or else you conceptualize this differently than I and we'll never reach an understanding.

Let me sort out some basics as I conceptualize this and maybe it will help.

The evidence based world does start with the assumption evidence is real. To steal from a couple other posts then:

Exactly that is a point of faith that was not mentioned in the BA blog. It only talked about their being immutable rules for the universe.

 

[Cuddles]

You are missing the point. Or else you conceptualize this differently than I and we'll never reach an understanding.

Let me sort out some basics as I conceptualize this and maybe it will help.

The evidence based world does start with the assumption evidence is real. To steal from a couple other posts then:

Cuddles: "Results. The fact that we have science and technology is proof that evidence is useful."

OnlyTellsTruths: "Science weeds out incorrect ideas that contradict reality (usually via various means of observation, though sometimes merely with deduction)"

SezMe: "...the assumption is that the universe behaves in a consistent, codifiable manner. Mankind has unraveled some of this consistency in a form that we call "rules" or mathematical statements. The universe does NOT obey these rules, it demonstrates their applicability."

In short, you start with the assumption evidence is real and then your observations confirm that using an evidence based belief system is successful further confirming your initial assumption that it is real.

You are trying to add a possible layer on to that, making the claim one would have no way of disproving something like a god layer or an alternate version of reality such as the Matrix. God beliefs, matrix possibilities and so on, none of those things are supported by the evidence.

What I am saying to you is, since none of those things are supported by the evidence, they also have no impact on the evidence. If they had an impact, we could test it. If they are untestable, they have no impact. If they have no impact, they are irrelevant.

Exactly. Ponderingturtle, you didn't ask if it was possible to prove that what we think it real actually is using evidence, you asked if we can prove that evidence is useful using evidence. Not the same thing at all. For the former, you can come up with all kinds of scenarios where the world is actually an illusion, so obviously we can't prove it. However, that says absoulely nothing about usefulness. Whether the universe is real or an illusion, evidence and the scientific method are still useful to help us understand how it works. Maybe we are really working out how the universe works, maybe we are just working out the rules to the computer program we live in. Either way, the results show that, from our point of view, evidence is useful.

 

[ponderingturtle]

The rule does indeed exist. You just don't like the limits of the predictions because of the quantum rules.

Um you seem to be arguing for the hidden variable hypothesis, and I thought that it has been disproven.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Exactly. Ponderingturtle, you didn't ask if it was possible to prove that what we think it real actually is using evidence, you asked if we can prove that evidence is useful using evidence. Not the same thing at all. For the former, you can come up with all kinds of scenarios where the world is actually an illusion, so obviously we can't prove it. However, that says absoulely nothing about usefulness.

But how do you define usefulness in a way that is removed from philosophical ideals?

It is a circular argument to say that science proves itself

Whether the universe is real or an illusion, evidence and the scientific method are still useful to help us understand how it works. Maybe we are really working out how the universe works, maybe we are just working out the rules to the computer program we live in. Either way, the results show that, from our point of view, evidence is useful.

That is still a philosophical position.

 

[Wowbagger]

Very good, simple article! I shall be shoving it in some people's faces, right now!!

 

[tkingdoll]

that the hidden assumption behind science is that there is no omnipotent god behind the scenes with the ability to muck with things.

I disagree. Firstly, 'science' doesn't assume anything, because science is just a system of acquiring knowledge. But if you mean 'scientists' assume that there's no god, then that's demonstrably nonsense. Firstly, there are plenty of religious scientists. Secondly, the existence of god is completely irrelevant to most scientific investigation, unless it's the investigation of a claim involving god. For example "this statue cried blood", "the earth is only 6000 years old" and so on. But you don't get your average scientist going "oh, I just discovered DNA, and I did so because I assumed that there is no omnipotent god".

It may have been relevant once upon a time, for example when one person said "you know what? 'Heaven' doesn't entirely satisfy my curiosity, I'm going to investigate that big blue expanse up there a little further".

 

[ponderingturtle]

I disagree. Firstly, 'science' doesn't assume anything, because science is just a system of acquiring knowledge.

So science works just as well if you assume reality is a fabrication by a capricious entity?

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Too many words, so I edited it down a little:

If you read any antiscience screeds, at some point or another most will claim that it can only be accepted by faith; This is completely how science works.

The scientific method makes one assumption, and one assumption only: we see objects going around the Sun.

From these observations we can apply mathematical equations Guess what? It works. It works so well This in turn strongly implies that the Universe is following pray.

All the knowledge we have accumulated over the millennia guessing here

Are there holes in this knowledge? Of course. Science doesn’t have all the answers.

Science is not simply a database of knowledge. Science is even subject to itself. (OK, bad example)

science and religion part ways. Science is based on faith. Science is based on a tapestry. faith is even reinforced when evidence is found

science can only be uttered by someone who is wholly ignorant of how reality works.

The next time someone tries to tell you that science is just as faith-based as religion, or that evolution is a religion wonder if its workings are a miracle

(I kid.. Very nice article..)

 

[tkingdoll]

So science works just as well if you assume reality is a fabrication by a capricious entity?

It makes no difference at all, unless you are investigating a miracle which purports to break physical laws. Why would it make a difference? If you want to measure the calorific content of a blueberry tart, does it matter to your experiment whether the tart was made by me, or occurred naturally?

 

[ponderingturtle]

It makes no difference at all, unless you are investigating a miracle which purports to break physical laws. Why would it make a difference? If you want to measure the calorific content of a blueberry tart, does it matter to your experiment whether the tart was made by me, or occurred naturally?

But it matters if I believe you are clouding my understanding of what a blueberry is, what a calorie is and that my measuring process is meaningful.

I readily agree that most of the attacks against faith in science are not meaningful because they identify faith in areas that faith is not part of in science.

I do not see how you are supposed to think science is a meaningful endeavor if you believe that the physical world is inherently corrupting and evil. In a gnostic world view science is not a rational endeavor.

 

[ArmillarySphere]

It would seem that in a gnostic world, life itself is not a rational endeavour...

The whole solipsism/Matrix/my-senses-are-lying/last-Thursdayism issue can be simply resolved by saying that if reality is an illusion, science will describe that illusion as well as it can. Whether the illusion is "real" or not is irrelevant, as long as it doesn't affect the evidence. In which case, the difference itself becomes evidence.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Um you seem to be arguing for the hidden variable hypothesis, and I thought that it has been disproven.

I am saying that regardless of knowing something for example, when a single nucleus is going to decay, we can predict the half like for example, of a bunch of them. And if we can either know location or speed of an electron (correct my physics ignorance if I have something wrong here) but not both at once, that's the 'rule'! Just because you can't predict something specific, doesn't mean the rules of physics in this or that case don't exist. And just because we don't know for example if there is more we could know about something like when the nucleus would decay or whether there is no more we can know and the decay is truly random, doesn't mean there is magic involved, gods involved, non-evidence things involved. If random is the rule, then random is the rule and guess what? They all behave that way.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

This article is relevant to the discussion here about moral philosophy and the things we supposedly use and/or need that fall outside the evidence based world. I found it for a different thread but it was relevant here as well.

Scientist Finds the Beginnings of Morality in Primate Behavior

Macaques and chimpanzees have a sense of social order and rules of expected behavior, mostly to do with the hierarchical natures of their societies, in which each member knows its own place. Young rhesus monkeys learn quickly how to behave, and occasionally get a finger or toe bitten off as punishment. Other primates also have a sense of reciprocity and fairness. They remember who did them favors and who did them wrong. Chimps are more likely to share food with those who have groomed them. Capuchin monkeys show their displeasure if given a smaller reward than a partner receives for performing the same task, like a piece of cucumber instead of a grape.

These four kinds of behavior — empathy, the ability to learn and follow social rules, reciprocity and peacemaking — are the basis of sociality.

Dr. de Waal sees human morality as having grown out of primate sociality, but with two extra levels of sophistication. People enforce their society’s moral codes much more rigorously with rewards, punishments and reputation building. They also apply a degree of judgment and reason, for which there are no parallels in animals. [*I assume they mean no parallel degree of reasoning and judgment.]

Religion can be seen as another special ingredient of human societies, though one that emerged thousands of years after morality, in Dr. de Waal’s view. There are clear precursors of morality in nonhuman primates, but no precursors of religion. So it seems reasonable to assume that as humans evolved away from chimps, morality emerged first, followed by religion. “I look at religions as recent additions,” he said. “Their function may have to do with social life, and enforcement of rules and giving a narrative to them, which is what religions really do.”

The idea we have some magical morality factor or that human values are magical is silly. We evolved. We are biological beings. We can see how other animals and non-human primates have behaviors similar to ours. To think morality is something originating in the soul or any place else is not what the evidence supports.

 

[JoeEllison]

It would seem that in a gnostic world, life itself is not a rational endeavour...

The whole solipsism/Matrix/my-senses-are-lying/last-Thursdayism issue can be simply resolved by saying that if reality is an illusion, science will describe that illusion as well as it can. Whether the illusion is "real" or not is irrelevant, as long as it doesn't affect the evidence. In which case, the difference itself becomes evidence.

Well, really, the only two options available are "assume that reality is what it appears to be" and shutting your effing mouth. That's IT! If your senses are lying to you, the way the woo fruitcakes claim, then they can make no further claims about reality without making themselves look like drooling idiots.