If science cant explain everything.. Scientific Materialism

[Tart]

I personally think we are all born with a wonder in our consciousness. Something that tells us that our reality might not be as what it seems, that there may be something mysterious and unexplained in our consciousness.. Something beyond our reasoning...

And we see this manifesting in peoples thoughts all the time... There are sooo many claims (even scientific claims) that go beyond our reasoning.. Like mind over matter, or infinite parallel universes, multiverses, aliens, ghosts, the afterlife, telekinesis, out of body experiences, past lives, the "matrix", mysticism, sorcery, magic, etc... We see people, who honestly wonder about the possibilities of many of these things, perhaps all of us have had these kinds of thoughts amusing the unexplained...

I mean even science, and scientist, and even atheist scientist have amused some of these possibilities, like the multiverse.. The multiverse (something that there is no evidence of) is a theory that came up in a rebuttal against God creating THIS universe... (Ill put a scientific video below that suggest "mind over matter" is a real thing)

But then when we come to the idea of God, all of these wonders turn away and people are certain that God cant exist, that miracle cant happen, that there is no after life, there is no soul, etc.... As soon as God gets into the picture, all these wonders that we are born with contemplating, are trashed as a means of mocking and discrediting anything out of the inexplicable, and everything boils down to cold hard science... This is Scientific Materialism.... This is why David Berlinski (atheist philosopher) says in his book "The Devils Delusion" that "scientific atheism is a frivolous exercise in intellectual contempt"... It is this notion that nothing inexplicable exist, that everything is explained, and anything beyond explanation (like God) is mocked...

Its a frivolous exercise in intellectual contempt...

To me, this seems like a complete indoctrination of atheism... And is there any proof that there is nothing beyond these cold hard explanations? No... But it is assumed....

So if you play around with any of these thoughts, how come you discredit God automatically? If something like "mind over matter" is true, how can you say the divine is false? (example: video below)...

(Personally i think Christianity explains in perfectly.. 2 Thessalonians 2:10-11)

[youtube][/youtube]

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to post 79 by bluethread]

One credits the universe to a deity and the other to matter and motion. That is the only difference.

But matter and motion can be verified to exist, matter can be seen, touched, combined in various ways to create new things (like airplanes capable of motion), etc. Deities cannot be seen or touched, and have never been shown to actually exist despite humans inventing literally tens of thousands of concepts for them.

When science encounters a phenomenon that it can't yet fully explain (eg. dark matter, consciousness, mechanism for the origin of life on earth, etc.), it has a process for gathering more information that might shed light on the subject. Experiments are concocted, new instrumentation built, measurements made and the results disseminated for other scientists to analyze and interpret, and these processes are repeated until the problem is eventually solved. This process continues for the short list of items I mentioned above, and incremental progress is made each year that advances knowledge.

Claims for the existence of various deities cannot be tested in the same way that matter and motion can, so there are really no boundaries on what may be claimed and no way to validate the claims. If there had been some convergence over the millennia toward a single concept of a deity due to a preponderance of the evidence then it would be easier to believe that such a thing might exist. But there hasn't ... all deities to date are simply proclaimed to exist, and their forms, capabilities, etc. are purely made up by whatever human or group of humans have the original ideas and were able to communicate them.

[bluethread]

[Replying to post 79 by bluethread]

One credits the universe to a deity and the other to matter and motion. That is the only difference.

But matter and motion can be verified to exist, matter can be seen, touched, combined in various ways to create new things (like airplanes capable of motion), etc. Deities cannot be seen or touched, and have never been shown to actually exist despite humans inventing literally tens of thousands of concepts for them.

However, matter and motion philosophy excludes all other possible factors. Everything that has been discovered has been or would have been excluded prior to their discovery.

When science encounters a phenomenon that it can't yet fully explain (eg. dark matter, consciousness, mechanism for the origin of life on earth, etc.), it has a process for gathering more information that might shed light on the subject. Experiments are concocted, new instrumentation built, measurements made and the results disseminated for other scientists to analyze and interpret, and these processes are repeated until the problem is eventually solved. This process continues for the short list of items I mentioned above, and incremental progress is made each year that advances knowledge.

However, matter and motion philosophy insists that those things are merely the result of matter and motion, even though that has not been confirmed.

Claims for the existence of various deities cannot be tested in the same way that matter and motion can, so there are really no boundaries on what may be claimed and no way to validate the claims. If there had been some convergence over the millennia toward a single concept of a deity due to a preponderance of the evidence then it would be easier to believe that such a thing might exist. But there hasn't ... all deities to date are simply proclaimed to exist, and their forms, capabilities, etc. are purely made up by whatever human or group of humans have the original ideas and were able to communicate them.

They can not be tested scientifically. However, they can be tested philosphically, using other means, i.e. reason, consistency and practicallity.

[DeMotts]

[Replying to post 82 by bluethread]

bluethread I think you're construing our position as "we know everything, we know how everything works already". It's more like, this is what we know so far, and we're not going to assume that other stuff is true simply because a super old book says so.

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to post 82 by bluethread]

However, matter and motion philosophy excludes all other possible factors. Everything that has been discovered has been or would have been excluded prior to their discovery.

I'm not sure how to interpret this comment. Are you saying that science excludes anything it doesn't already have an explanation for? That seems to be the exact opposite of what science actually does, which is to investigate with the goal of understanding things it does not already know.

However, matter and motion philosophy insists that those things are merely the result of matter and motion, even though that has not been confirmed.

It may not have been confirmed for the specific cases I mentioned, but that is the very reason for continued research. There are countless examples of similar problems to be solved that were in the same state of misunderstanding as, for example, dark energy but that were subsequently understood through the process of scientific investigation. In the late 19th and early 20th century it was thought that a protein of some sort must be the "transforming substance" for heredity. After years of research, Oswald Avery and his group proved that this substance was in fact DNA and published this result in 1944. 9 years later Watson and Crick worked out the molecular structure of DNA and it took many more years of experimentation and analysis to work out the transcription process and gain an understanding of the "genetic code" and how base pair sequencing on DNA related to the formation of proteins from amino acids specified by the codon sequences. And work continues on epigenetics, how genes are turned on and off, what "junk" DNA is, etc. It is a never-ending process of slowly driving towards better understanding of how things work, and this is true for many other examples where the unknown becomes known. And this includes consciousness and its origins and nature. The confirmations come along the way as certain problems are solved, and the solution to remaining ones becomes more clear as a result.

They can not be tested scientifically. However, they can be tested philosphically, using other means, i.e. reason, consistency and practicallity.

I have debates with some local people who have as their main argument something like "just look around you at the wonderfulness of nature and the complexity, etc., and tell me how that could happen without God" (these are Christians so "God" to them means only one thing). This is a reasonable response from someone who doesn't appreciate the scientific advances of the last 600 years or so which can now explain how life diversified from single-celled organisms to mammals, how our solar system formed and when, and the many other things humans have learned through scientific inquiry over that time that have closed so many gaps that previously needed the god explanation. I just don't see how deities can be accepted through analysis based on "reason, consistency and practicality", when we have the means to examine nature these days at levels which should show at least some evidence of them beyond simply claims by the faithful that they exist.

[DeMotts]

[Replying to post 84 by DrNoGods]

DrNoGods this isn't 100% applicable to what you posted but I always go to this quote from Feynman when someone tries to denigrate science as a means of taking the mystery and beauty out of the understanding of nature, as if having a better explanation somehow makes something less wondrous.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

Merriam-Webster
Definition of science
1 : the state of knowing : knowledge as distinguished from ignorance or misunderstanding
2 a : a department of systematized knowledge as an object of study the science of theology
b : something (such as a sport or technique) that may be studied or learned like systematized knowledge have it down to a science
3 a : knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method
b : such knowledge or such a system of knowledge concerned with the physical world and its phenomena : natural science
4 : a system or method reconciling practical ends with scientific laws cooking is both a science and an art
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/science

Science has nothing to do with philosophy. Science merely involves empirical observation. Science is all about the ongoing acquisition of knowledge, which not only requires the constant change and modification of current understandings, but presupposes the necessity of an ongoing change as our knowledge increases. Science strives for an increased understanding which necessitates modification of current explanations. The creation of the multi-billion dollar Large Hadron Collider in Europe is a testament to the desire of science to better understand and modify the current understanding of the exact workings of nuclear physics.

Religion on the other hand requires the acceptance, on faith, of rigid conclusions which are themselves founded on assumptions and baseless assertions. Attempts to significantly alter or modify accepted dogma could, at one time, be the cause of one meeting his end in most unpleasant ways.

Neither, as I stated, the strawman argument is your assumption that people are theists purely for emotional reasons and which you then attack as not fitting what you consider to be "cold hard facts". You have not established the former and, in the latter, are attributing too much to science. In doing so, you have created a false dichotomy between two disciplines that deal with different parts of the human experience.

Scinece can be used in colloquial fashion, as indicated in the first definition, to attribute everything that has been extrapolated from observation and experimentation to science. However, contrary to your contention, science does not merely involve empirical observation. The scientifc method involves initial hypothetical speculation, followed by experimentation and then observation, followed by repetition. Now, Scientific Empiricism goes beyond that to state that anything that can not be verifieed using that process is insignificant, at best. That is a philosophical assertion, not a factual one, that makes things like value, consciousness and morality insignificant to the Scientific Humanist. However, those things are anything but insignificant in the human experience.

Regarding theism, you are also misstating it. It does not necessarily have to be deductive. In can also be induced from observation and generalization, as scientific hypothesis is. The difference is that it speaks to different things such as value, consciousness and morality, which can not be derived through scientific experimentation. Therefore, it is more dependent upon archetypes and reason, which Scientific Materialism rejects.

Neither, as I stated, the strawman argument is your assumption that people are theists purely for emotional reasons and which you then attack as not fitting what you consider to be "cold hard facts". You have not established the former and, in the latter, are attributing too much to science. In doing so, you have created a false dichotomy between two disciplines that deal with different parts of the human experience.

Believers like to contend that their claims are rational and based on solid evidence. But when asked to provide this "evidence," believers often become strangely recalcitrant. Because if they do agree to provide the promised "evidence," the "evidence" they provide is invariably easily dispelled as erroneous or contrary to common observation and common experience. Claims which are contrary to common observation and common experience are commonly considered unsound or mistaken, FOR CAUSE. Unless of course, it can be physically demonstrated that common observation and common experience are misinterpretations of what is actually occurring.

But if you personally actually have "cold hard evidence" which serves to support your claims, then please enlighten us all with it. You will not comply of course, because you have no such "cold hard evidence," only insupportable claims. And we all know it.

Scinece can be used in colloquial fashion, as indicated in the first definition, to attribute everything that has been extrapolated from observation and experimentation to science. However, contrary to your contention, science does not merely involve empirical observation. The scientifc method involves initial hypothetical speculation, followed by experimentation and then observation, followed by repetition. Now, Scientific Empiricism goes beyond that to state that anything that can not be verifieed using that process is insignificant, at best. That is a philosophical assertion, not a factual one, that makes things like value, consciousness and morality insignificant to the Scientific Humanist. However, those things are anything but insignificant in the human experience.

Scientific discovery may well begin as "hypothetical speculation." Einstein's breakthroughs began as what he termed "thought experiments." But this is not the way things necessarily occur. The concept of black holes, for example, first began as nothing more than a result of the math that occurred when considering the implications of relativity. Even Einstein was dubious of the result. But in spite of a general reluctance to accept what the math was saying, black holes are now considered one of the most important insights into the nature of the physical universe ever discovered. Scientific discoveries often astonish scientists, because the results can often be very different from what was predicted.

Regarding theism, you are also misstating it. It does not necessarily have to be deductive. In can also be induced from obsrvation and generalization, as scientific hypothesis is. The difference is that it speaks to different things such as value, consciousness and morality, which can not be derived through scientific experimentation. Therefore, it is more dependent upon archetypes and reason, which Scientific Materialism rejects.

People have for millena looked at the universe and deduced that it must be the result of intelligent design. But that is not an accurate observation in exactly the same way that observing that the stars in the night sky go around the earth from east to west indicates that the Earth is the center of the universe. It is of course easy to understand how this "observation" could be popularly misinterpreted. But misinterpreted it was for centuries.

We humans have been developing more accurate ways for accurately observing and gathering evidence on how the universe operates. Currently, it is observed that the universe consistently appears to operate for natural reasons. The engine that drives all change is generally referred to as quantum mechanics. Understanding how quantum mechanics operates has been allowing us to develop working technology based on the consistent application of the observed workings of the natural universe. If our understanding of the workings of the natural universe are completely wrong, we are going to be very confused as to why any of our technology actually works.

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to post 85 by DeMotts]

DrNoGods this isn't 100% applicable to what you posted but I always go to this quote from Feynman when someone tries to denigrate science as a means of taking the mystery and beauty out of the understanding of nature, as if having a better explanation somehow makes something less wondrous.

I'll put this in my quiver for the next encounter with the local opponents. It seems to be a very common position of either anti-materialists or non-scientists that if science cannot yet explain something 100%, then that justifies discarding science entirely for that particular subject, and/or claiming that this lack of a complete explanation shows that the subject is "outside of the realm of science" and therefore science has no say in the matter and never will. Seems a very closed-minded view to hold.

[William]

[Replying to post 87 by DrNoGods]

I'll put this in my quiver for the next encounter with the local opponents. It seems to be a very common position of either anti-materialists or non-scientists that if science cannot yet explain something 100%, then that justifies discarding science entirely for that particular subject, and/or claiming that this lack of a complete explanation shows that the subject is "outside of the realm of science" and therefore science has no say in the matter and never will.

My particular view is that if science doesn't have the full evidence for any explanation, I remain skeptical and hold the agnostic position, which I think is remaining open-minded.

One must remember also, that science itself is a process. Scientific discoveries often astonish scientists, because the results can often be very different from what was predicted.

[bluethread]

[Replying to post 82 by bluethread]

bluethread I think you're construing our position as "we know everything, we know how everything works already". It's more like, this is what we know so far, and we're not going to assume that other stuff is true simply because a super old book says so.

No, I am contending that you are being disingenuous. I contend that you do a great many things because "a super old book says so". That said, I am not arguing for a particular "super old book", but for the value of mythology. Science can help answer the who, what, when and how questions. However, it can not answer the why question. That is a value question and the driving force behind all of the other questions. Science can not answer that question and yet is driven by it. "Super old books", along with not so old books and current books have examined that question philosophically. Our societies are based on what is written in all of those books.

[bluethread]

[Replying to post 82 by bluethread]

However, matter and motion philosophy excludes all other possible factors. Everything that has been discovered has been or would have been excluded prior to their discovery.

I'm not sure how to interpret this comment. Are you saying that science excludes anything it doesn't already have an explanation for? That seems to be the exact opposite of what science actually does, which is to investigate with the goal of understanding things it does not already know.

No, proper science includes all empirical factors that are relevant to a particular experiment. Scientific Materialism in it's purist form, excludes all things that can not be verified via the scientific method. Like all pure philosophies, it is not pure in practice. People include many things in their lives that are not verified via the scientific method, because they are not empirical and/or there is not time enough in the day to test everything scientifically.

However, matter and motion philosophy insists that those things are merely the result of matter and motion, even though that has not been confirmed.

It may not have been confirmed for the specific cases I mentioned, but that is the very reason for continued research. There are countless examples of similar problems to be solved that were in the same state of misunderstanding as, for example, dark energy but that were subsequently understood through the process of scientific investigation. In the late 19th and early 20th century it was thought that a protein of some sort must be the "transforming substance" for heredity. After years of research, Oswald Avery and his group proved that this substance was in fact DNA and published this result in 1944. 9 years later Watson and Crick worked out the molecular structure of DNA and it took many more years of experimentation and analysis to work out the transcription process and gain an understanding of the "genetic code" and how base pair sequencing on DNA related to the formation of proteins from amino acids specified by the codon sequences. And work continues on epigenetics, how genes are turned on and off, what "junk" DNA is, etc. It is a never-ending process of slowly driving towards better understanding of how things work, and this is true for many other examples where the unknown becomes known. And this includes consciousness and its origins and nature. The confirmations come along the way as certain problems are solved, and the solution to remaining ones becomes more clear as a result.

However, we still do not know, scientifically, why dark matter exists and why
DNA replicates. What you are explaining is a current time multiple regression with gaps. These are two problems common to all philosophies. However, Scientific Materialists consider themselves exempt, because "science".

They can not be tested scientifically. However, they can be tested philosphically, using other means, i.e. reason, consistency and practicallity.

I have debates with some local people who have as their main argument something like "just look around you at the wonderfulness of nature and the complexity, etc., and tell me how that could happen without God" (these are Christians so "God" to them means only one thing). This is a reasonable response from someone who doesn't appreciate the scientific advances of the last 600 years or so which can now explain how life diversified from single-celled organisms to mammals, how our solar system formed and when, and the many other things humans have learned through scientific inquiry over that time that have closed so many gaps that previously needed the god explanation. I just don't see how deities can be accepted through analysis based on "reason, consistency and practicality", when we have the means to examine nature these days at levels which should show at least some evidence of them beyond simply claims by the faithful that they exist.

Here we are again with the straw man. We are not talking about Christianity, or even theism. We are talking about Scientific Materialism. Inadequacies of other philosophies does not make Scientific Materialism adequate. The complaints you have made also apply to Scientific Materialism. A claim that 600 years of scientific discoveries verifies that all is matter and motion is no more valid. That is science of the gaps. One can also say that one can not see how all is matter and motion, when there is at least some evidence of order in the universe. In fact, a measure of order in the universe is an unstated presumption of Scientific Materialism. If there were no order in the universe, science would not work and science does not tell us why there is order in the universe.