Re: MD Scientific beliefs and religious faith

From: ian glendinning (psybertron@gmail.com)
Date: Sun Apr 10 2005 - 06:52:04 BST

  • Next message: ian glendinning: "Re: MD Static and dynamic aspects of mysticism and religious experience"

    Sorry I menat Mark (MSH) not Matt.
    Ian

    On Apr 10, 2005 1:49 PM, ian glendinning <psybertron@gmail.com> wrote:
    > Matt, Sam,
    >
    > sam said:
    > 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 replied:
    > 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.
    >
    > If either of you actually believe either of those statements, then you
    > are sadly misguided by a gross caricature of reality.
    >
    > I am a professional engineer BSc(Eng) MIMechE, WWeldI, for over 30
    > years, and an MBA qualified experienced manager in industry, and I can
    > assure you few engineers (or scientists, or managers) have such a
    > narrow, blinkered, careless, thoughtless view of the world. You are
    > creating a disagreement where there is none and spreading the false
    > memes in the process.
    >
    > Get real. Give someone other than philosophers credit. At least Sam
    > started with "if" and is therefore not wrong in what he says in that
    > sentence.
    >
    > The "spacecraft landing" is only a "part" of the outcome - go read
    > Pirsig and his motorcycle maintenance analogies to understand good,
    > quality engineering (or good, quality anything). Go read my review of
    > Dawkins and the 10,000 rivets flying in close formation thanks to a
    > plane-load of social anthropologists. Why make such a colourful world
    > so black and white ? Repeat after me "There is no dichotomy".
    >
    > Ian
    >
    > On Apr 10, 2005 10:40 AM, Mark Steven Heyman
    > <markheyman@infoproconsulting.com> wrote:
    >

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