From: Mark Steven Heyman (markheyman@infoproconsulting.com)
Date: Sun Apr 10 2005 - 03:40:42 BST
Hi Sam
On 8 Apr 2005 at 19:28, Sam Norton wrote:
msh:
One position in the argument is that scientific assumptions are
faith-based and, therefore, no different than religious assumptions.
My position, expressed to Platt, to Adam, to Ham, and to the kitchen
sink, is that there is a world of difference between the two , that
scientific assumptions are made for pragmatic reasons, and that to
say they are "faith-based" is a nearly criminal misuse of the term.
sam:
Do you think _all_ scientific assumptions are made for pragmatic
reasons?
msh says:
No. Being human, some scientists might make and for a while cling
to assumptions for selfish reasons. However, the pressure for
results, clarity, and cross verification is so immense that bad
assumptions are always, eventually, brought to light. Besides, even
if some assumptions are made for selfish reasons, career advancement,
money from sponsors, fame and fortune, there is an element of
practicality, evidence and reason, that is missing from faith-based
assumptions.
sam:
If a scientist or engineer 'doesn't really care whether or not their
belief is correct' then they don't really care about the outcome.
msh:
No. The outcome is ALL they care about. They wanna land that
spacecraft, complete that circuit, build that bridge. What they
don't care about is the literal truth of their assumptions. In
fact, they care so little about the "truth" of the assumptions that,
if the assumptions get in the way of orbiting the satellite, they
will DROP the assumptions. This is pragmatism in action.
sam:
As you say, you're describing an ideal rather than a reality here.
But let's run with it for a bit.
msh says:
I'd say the pressures I mentioned above make my description more real
than ideal, in time.
sam:
Now, do religious people routinely drop their belief in God when
their prayers are not answered? Or when they are confronted with
even more powerful evidence against his existence? Of course not,
because the nature of their belief is fundamentally different to
that of a scientist.
sam:
I think you're assuming the strength of the arguments against God in
making those points. There are lots of cases where people have
indeed been 'persuaded' away from belief in God.
msh asks:
But would you classify these defections as routine? If so, wouldn't
the percentage of believers decline over time? What would you say it
is that starts most people along a particular religious path,
critical analysis of the various options followed by rational
selection? Or high pressure enculturation?
sam:
And just as many cases where scientists have persisted in belief
despite superior evidence to the contrary (for a non-contentious
example, look at how Wegener's theories about continental drift were
first received).
msh says:
Ah, continental drift, one of my favorite subjects, though I haven't
thought about it for many years. Wegener presented some decent
evidence for the movement of continents, the jigsaw puzzle look, the
continuity of rock formations and fossil records across matching
continents, but he claimed that the continents simply "plowed"
through the ocean floor, an idea that geophysicists showed to be
impossible, so there was considerable resistance to Wegener's theory,
and rightly so. It wasn't until the emergence of a viable mechanism,
the ideas of plate tectonics, that the notion of continental drift
picked up steam. Once the magnetometer evidence confirming ocean
floor spreading started rolling in (early 60's I think) geologists
relinquished the idea of the stationary continents and the theory of
continental drift was quickly accepted, relatively speaking.
Can you imagine a similar series of scientific events that would
cause people to stop believing in God?
sam:
So I don't think you've made the case that "the nature of their
belief is fundamentally different to that of a scientist" - not on
these grounds anyhow.
msh:
Well, let's see what you think after reading the above. And try to
resist <snipping> my questions, please.
<snip the bit about Newton>
msh:
See what I mean? I think that was an important bit.
sam:
<little snip>You seem to make the assumption that caring about the
truth in this sphere is a flaw.
msh:
If you're speaking of the religious sphere, I say caring about the
truth is essential. But it seems to me that, in the religious
sphere, faith, more often that not, impedes the search for truth.
Maybe it's supposed to.
sam:
Perhaps it's a question of narrow or broad understandings of truth. I
see scientific truth as a pretty poor thing at the end of the day.
Another Wittgenstein quote: "We feel that even when all possible
scientific questions have been answered the problems of life remain
completely untouched."
msh:
Yeah, Witt can be annoying, all right. In fact, science has solved
many of life's basic survival problems, could indeed solve them for
everyone, if power struggles between political and other privileged
elites did not prevent it. But anyone who expects science to solve
their personal emotional problems, to give them a sense of comfort
and well-being, an individual significance and purpose in life will,
as Witt suggests, be disappointed.
I'll respond to the Dawkins stuff in my next post.
Best,
Mark Steven Heyman (msh)
--
InfoPro Consulting - The Professional Information Processors
Custom Software Solutions for Windows, PDAs, and the Web Since 1983
Web Site: http://www.infoproconsulting.com
The legitimate object of government is to do for a community of
people what they need to have done, but cannot do at all or cannot do
so well for themselves, in their separate or individual capacities.
- Abraham Lincoln.
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sun Apr 10 2005 - 03:41:58 BST