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Henry_Cowell
Joined: 27 May 2005
Posts: 3352
Location: Berkeley
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 Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 10:13 pm Post subject: |
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| Thel wrote: |
| But each step along the scientific process involves spirituality insofar as it demands a constant faith in the ability it has to perceive a thing, and even that the thing exists. |
I don't see this leap at all. One might just as well call it "trust in scientific explanations."
Injecting so-called spirituality into science is not warranted. There is a difference between faith in supernatural beliefs and trust in natural explanations that have not yet been disproven.
Supernatural beliefs can never be demonstrated, predicted, or otherwise explained scientifically. They therefore require faith. What science requires is not faith but trust in repeated demonstrations and natural explanations (and trust in the reported demonstrations of other scientists). |
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Thel
Joined: 24 Dec 2006
Posts: 52
Location: Kitchen table
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| Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 11:43 pm Post subject: |
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| Henry_Cowell wrote: |
| Thel wrote: |
| But each step along the scientific process involves spirituality insofar as it demands a constant faith in the ability it has to perceive a thing, and even that the thing exists. |
I don't see this leap at all. One might just as well call it "trust in scientific explanations."
Injecting so-called spirituality into science is not warranted. There is a difference between faith in supernatural beliefs and trust in natural explanations that have not yet been disproven.
Supernatural beliefs can never be demonstrated, predicted, or otherwise explained scientifically. They therefore require faith. What science requires is not faith but trust in repeated demonstrations and natural explanations (and trust in the reported demonstrations of other scientists). |
Hi, Henry
In trying to demonstrate the difference between supernatural beliefs and science, you use an instrinic reference to the latter to make the differentiation ("Supernatural beliefs can never be...explained scientifically"). I don't think this offers a comparative analysis demonstrating qualitative difference; rather, you're saying that X is not like Y because it is not Y-ish, which is tantamount to saying nothing about the differences between the two; it is, like previous statements on this thread ("religion is religion; science is science") saying that a thing is (or in this case, is not like) because it is (because it is not like).
If the definitive criterion distinguishing religion from science is a) predictability of phenomenon (science) in contradistinction to faith (religion), then I think a case can be made that both religion and science constitutively invoke the criterion of the other.
For instance, the cycles of the moon have been long observed. The ancients could predict those cycles; and attributed them to the will of the gods, or God, or [pick a mythology]. Thus they satisfied "a" from above. Let me restate the point in the form of a question: did the ancients prove that the gods were responsible for the cycles of the moon because they (the ancients) could predict those cycles? Similarly, what we call the discipline of physics is the name of a god, to whom we slavishly worship.
We can then segue into the understanding that science and faith are inseparable, the flip-side of the coin of my last sentence. A simple example: we believe that the sun will rise every morning; this is a belief, an article of faith. The fact that the sun has risen every morning since time immemorial does not necessarily mean that it will tomorrow. Previous repetition does not in and of itself ensure continuance. Likewise, if I wore a suit held an inexhaustible supply of oxygen, and imagining that no deadly creatures lived in the ocean, I still would allow myself to be lowered into that ocean past a certain depth because of the faith I have in science, whose scripture tells me that I will implode at some point. I know these points seem ridiculous, but it is precisely because we're such fervent and unquestioning believers that they do.
Yrs
Thel |
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Thel
Joined: 24 Dec 2006
Posts: 52
Location: Kitchen table
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| Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 12:05 am Post subject: |
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Hi again, Henry-Cowell
I wasn't sure if I clearly said what I wanted to. I think I can simplify. Take the quote below, yours:
"Supernatural beliefs can never be demonstrated, predicted, or otherwise explained scientifically."
If I rapidly drink a can of cola and burp, I believe that the Spirit of Burp was responsible.
If I rapidly drink a can of cola and burp, I believe that the carbonated gas in the drink required release.
"Carbonated gas requiring release"
"Spirit of Burp."
A difference without a distinction insofar as we are talking about significations. Science provides a linkage of significations whose intricacy impresses. But any mythological system does the same. I think what I mean is that in either case nothing is ever intrinsically explained. "Intrinsic" is a big word with me. I mean nothing in any system exists without reference to something else. Referentiality means that any claim to absolute truth or objectivity is, to my mind, forfeited.
Thel |
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Henry_Cowell
Joined: 27 May 2005
Posts: 3352
Location: Berkeley
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| Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 12:30 am Post subject: |
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| Thel wrote: |
| I wasn't sure if I clearly said what I wanted to. I think I can simplify. |
No, your explanations really do lack clarity. Even when you think you've "simplified" them, they are remarkably opaque.
Here's where we part company: The realms of scientific explanation and faith are entirely different. Simple, no?
Example:
| Thel wrote: |
| Science provides a linkage of significations whose intricacy impresses. |
Unless you're a poet, this is quite meaningless. If I read this sentence in a student paper, I'd mark in big red letters: WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? BIG WORDS DO NOT AUTOMATICALLY MEAN SOMETHING!!
But if you have a deeply spiritual faith in the meaning of your own words, I do admire you for that. |
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