Unique Atheism

905

I've always been bothered by this one. Perhaps some of you atheists can help me out?

One often cited argument against religion is the idea that one's religion is right and all others are wrong. It is a feature to be seen in many faiths that theirs is the only right way of seeing the world. Atheists often point out how unlikely it is that a believer should be lucky enough to have been born in the right religion.

So far so good. But it could be argued that the same applies to science. It too claims to be the only true way of viewing the world and all other ways are false. Followers of science are incredibly lucky to be born in the right place at the right time; among the first people to discover the Truth.

How would ye respond?

p.s. I don't want a debate on how science differs from religion, there's plenty on that already. I want a debate on how science is received ouside the discipline itself.

andrewh5

The whole point about science is that it does not set out to prove anything - it does the opposite. A hypothesis is that something will not happen. If it does the theory is rethought. I see science as fluid whilst all religions are cast in stone and terrified of change. At least scientists don't believe in a bunch of fairy stories.

Zombrex

905 wrote: »

It too claims to be the only true way of viewing the world and all other ways are false.

Considering science doesn't make that claim (I don't even follow what you mean by "only true way") I imagine this thread lasting all of 5 minutes.

Dades

905 wrote: »

p.s. I don't want a debate on how science differs from religion, there's plenty on that already.

The only way to respond to a question like that is to explain how science is different from religion.

Zombrex

Dades wrote: »

The only way to respond to a question like that is to explain how science is different from religion.

Good point.

Unlike religion, science recognises that there is no "true" way to view the universe around us. That is the key difference, not that science offers an alternative true way to view the world.

Why do so many religious people think that science is about "truth" and telling people what to believe is true?

Is it because religion is about that, and they cannot see something other than in a religious frame work?

Perhaps they need the philosophy of science in Leaving Cert?

905

I am interested in the social role of science, in its everyday application and meaning to ordinary people. I'm not interested in what scientists make of science or what it makes of itself. Science is often presented in public as fact and this is equated with truth.

Zombrex

905 wrote: »

Science is often presented in public as fact and this is equated with truth.

Well I am certain against that as it seems to be result in an almost endless stream of mis-educated people coming on the the A&A forum ranting and raving about all the problems they perceive with science (particularly evolution).

So if the droppers in to this forum are anything to go by there needs to be some serious boosting in scientific education in this country.

905

Wicknight wrote: »

Well I am certain against that as it seems to be result in an almost endless stream of mis-educated people coming on the the A&A forum ranting and raving about all the problems they perceive with science (particularly evolution).

So if the droppers in to this forum are anything to go by there needs to be some serious boosting in scientific education in this country.

Further education will have as much influence on the social role of science as increased theology lessons would have on the the Church. At then end of the day there's still going to be a man in a white coat telling us how it is.

robindch

905 wrote: »

At then end of the day there's still going to be a man in a white coat telling us how it is.

Out of interest -- have you considered your role in this? That's the idea that it might be of some benefit to you to spend a bit of time trying to find out which one is the more accurate? Or do you really believe that everything that everybody says is equally accurate?

ie, who's better to listen to? The guy who knows something because he spent years with a test-tube and a magnifying glass, or the guy who knows something because he read it in a book?

Scofflaw

905 wrote: »

I've always been bothered by this one. Perhaps some of you atheists can help me out?

One often cited argument against religion is the idea that one's religion is right and all others are wrong. It is a feature to be seen in many faiths that theirs is the only right way of seeing the world. Atheists often point out how unlikely it is that a believer should be lucky enough to have been born in the right religion.

So far so good. But it could be argued that the same applies to science. It too claims to be the only true way of viewing the world and all other ways are false. Followers of science are incredibly lucky to be born in the right place at the right time; among the first people to discover the Truth.

How would ye respond?

Teflon.

Or, at greater length:

1. science does not claim to be the only way of viewing the world.

First, it does not know that it is, and nothing in science excludes other ways of looking at the world. Myth, for example, is also a way of looking at the world. Second, science does not claim to be able to answer questions like "why are we here". Finally, there is no body with the authority to make such a statement.

2. science does claim to be a useful and consistent way of looking at the world.

The proof of which is all around you. Amazingly, people do say "oh well, that's technology, which is why I often answer this question "washing machines", because technology is nothing more or less than the appliance of science. Teflon, however, is a somewhat better examples, developed as it was as a result of the space program.

3. science also claims to be a reproducible way of looking at the world.

A very small amount of education is sufficient to understand the scientific method - the vast bulk of science education is devoted to covering what science has already discovered. Approaching questions scientifically is open to anyone - no special grace or favour is required.

4. the claims made about science by journalists and pundits are irrelevant to science

It's very tempting to see science as simply the orthodoxy du jour, because of the way journalists and others outside science approach it as if it were. However, they approach it that way because by and large they have no scientific training, and are uninterested in the nuances and considerations of science - they want a nice simple answer that can be stated as being the truth. Post-modernists, of course, want to reinterpret it as well, as an orthodoxy that has no more special merit than the next belief system.

That has nothing whatsoever to do with science. If every media hack and academic sophist on the planet turned against it, you would still be able to build a washing machine, or determine a cure for cholera, scientifically. There may be another way to reliably determine the material answers to material questions, but we don't know of it. Science is the only tool we currently have for reliably and sensibly exploring the physical world.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Zillah

Scofflaw wrote: »

Science is the only tool we currently have for reliably and sensibly exploring the physical world.

A friend of mine once called me on using the term "the natural world", as it implied I was giving credence to the notion of anything existing outside of nature.

cordially,
Scofflaw

It just occured to me: Surely we should be the judge of that? Those receiving your posts should decide if they were cordial or not.

Charmingly,
Zillah

Scofflaw

Zillah wrote: »

A friend of mine once called me on using the term "the natural world", as it implied I was giving credence to the notion of anything existing outside of nature.

It's a bit of a delicate line, alright - it needs to convey the right sense without sounding exclusive.

Zillah wrote: »

It just occured to me: Surely we should be the judge of that? Those receiving your posts should decide if they were cordial or not.

Charmingly,
Zillah

Hmm. I suppose all I can do is state how I intend it, and it's up to you whether you find it cordial or not. After all, I don't put "cordially" if I don't mean it!

sincerely,
Scofflaw

JC 2K3

Religion is made up bullshít, science is a methodology used to discover more about the universe. What the hell is so hard to understand??

Scofflaw

JC 2K3 wrote: »

Religion is made up bullshít, science is a methodology used to discover more about the universe. What the hell is so hard to understand??

Science, apparently.

cordially,
Scofflaw

eoin5

I'm a scientist so I guess I'm out of this one

IRLConor

Scofflaw wrote: »

Teflon, however, is a somewhat better examples, developed as it was as a result of the space program.

Minor, unrelated nit: Teflon predates the space program(s). IIRC it was used in the Manhattan Project.

Zillah

IRLConor wrote: »

IIRC it was used in the Manhattan Project.

I can't imagine in what capacity.

I'm going to head to wikipedia, and if I don't edit this post in the next five minutes then you're a lying scumbag.

EDIT: Ok, call off the dogs, he's genuine:

An early advanced use was in the Manhattan Project as a material to coat valves and seals in the pipes holding highly reactive uranium hexafluoride in the vast uranium enrichment plant at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, when it was known as K416.

Zombrex

905 wrote: »

At then end of the day there's still going to be a man in a white coat telling us how it is.

Well that is my whole point, the man in the white coat doesn't "tell us how it is", he tells us what are current understanding of it is.

Big difference (huge huge difference).

The problem a lot of religious people is that they are so used to religion telling them how it is (with the claim of authority to know because God told them) and what they should believe is true that they can't tell the difference between these two types of statements.

That isn't necessarily all their fault, as I said I think there needs to be more education in this country about what science actually is, that it doesn't work like religion.

Scofflaw

IRLConor wrote: »

Minor, unrelated nit: Teflon predates the space program(s). IIRC it was used in the Manhattan Project.

Well, you can learn something new every day - and the less careful I am, the more likely that is...

Thanks for that - fortunately, it doesn't change the point!

cordially,
Scofflaw

905

Scofflaw wrote: »

Teflon.

Or, at greater length:

1. science does not claim to be the only way of viewing the world.

First, it does not know that it is, and nothing in science excludes other ways of looking at the world. Myth, for example, is also a way of looking at the world. Second, science does not claim to be able to answer questions like "why are we here". Finally, there is no body with the authority to make such a statement.

2. science does claim to be a useful and consistent way of looking at the world.

The proof of which is all around you. Amazingly, people do say "oh well, that's technology, which is why I often answer this question "washing machines", because technology is nothing more or less than the appliance of science. Teflon, however, is a somewhat better examples, developed as it was as a result of the space program.

3. science also claims to be a reproducible way of looking at the world.

A very small amount of education is sufficient to understand the scientific method - the vast bulk of science education is devoted to covering what science has already discovered. Approaching questions scientifically is open to anyone - no special grace or favour is required.

4. the claims made about science by journalists and pundits are irrelevant to science

It's very tempting to see science as simply the orthodoxy du jour, because of the way journalists and others outside science approach it as if it were. However, they approach it that way because by and large they have no scientific training, and are uninterested in the nuances and considerations of science - they want a nice simple answer that can be stated as being the truth. Post-modernists, of course, want to reinterpret it as well, as an orthodoxy that has no more special merit than the next belief system.

That has nothing whatsoever to do with science. If every media hack and academic sophist on the planet turned against it, you would still be able to build a washing machine, or determine a cure for cholera, scientifically. There may be another way to reliably determine the material answers to material questions, but we don't know of it. Science is the only tool we currently have for reliably and sensibly exploring the physical world.

cordially,
Scofflaw

I'm afraid I have to disagree with you. Science probably doesn't claim to be the only way to view the world. But I will repeat myself: it regards itself as the only true way of viewing the world. Myth and religion are all good and well but no scientist would take them seriously.

Science claims to be useful? I'm not disputing this, I'm a devoted fan of teflon myself. But when I say science I mean it in its social context. Science as a concept has only been around for four hundred odd years. Technology managed to develop well enough without it back then.

Whatever about its method, science takes years of training. How long does it take for a medical student to view the body in a scientific manner? Ir how often does the man in the street challenge Hawking about his bizarre theories? It remains, for most people, completely out of bounds.

Lastly, science exists in the social world. Ivory towers are very comfortable and very convenient but that's not good enough. How the puiblic views science is very important to science. I don't know about a cure for cholera, but AIDS research became a lot more urgent when it became widely known that it was a threat to heterosexuals too. Lots of medical research into behaviour as affliction, like drunkenness as disease and various personality disorders is being rubbishyed in our new world of personal responsibility and backlashes against the nanny-state.

cheerio
905

p.s. your post was cordial, don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Dades

905 wrote: »

Science as a concept has only been around for four hundred odd years. Technology managed to develop well enough without it back then.

Science as whose concept? Yours? It's clear that you are trying to flag science as a philosophical worldview, when it is only concerned with knowledge of the "natural" world - and applying that knowledge in technology.

If in doing so science happens to contradict what myth or religion has proposed, that is merely a by-product - as science has no agenda other than to learn.

Zombrex

905 wrote: »

But I will repeat myself: it regards itself as the only true way of viewing the world. Myth and religion are all good and well but no scientist would take them seriously.

You can repeat that all you like it doesn't make it any more true (har, see what I did there)

Any scientists worth his salt will instantly tell you that there is no "true" way to view the world in the first place, so science cannot claim to be the true way. Again this goes back to religious people confusing science with how their religion works.

905 wrote: »

Science as a concept has only been around for four hundred odd years. Technology managed to develop well enough without it back then.

Well that depends on who you define "science" ... the formal scientific method has only been around for a few hundred years, but it built upon thousands of years of systematic and disciplined study of the natural world.

905 wrote: »

It remains, for most people, completely out of bounds.

That is nonsense. Anyone can view the world in a scientific fashion, they simply have to educated themselves to what that is. And a trip to the library or the book store would sort them out sharply.

905 wrote: »

Lastly, science exists in the social world. Ivory towers are very comfortable and very convenient but that's not good enough. How the puiblic views science is very important to science. I don't know about a cure for cholera, but AIDS research became a lot more urgent when it became widely known that it was a threat to heterosexuals too. Lots of medical research into behaviour as affliction, like drunkenness as disease and various personality disorders is being rubbishyed in our new world of personal responsibility and backlashes against the nanny-state.

Ok ... what exactly are you complaining about?

pH

905 wrote: »

I'm afraid I have to disagree with you. Science probably doesn't claim to be the only way to view the world. But I will repeat myself: it regards itself as the only true way of viewing the world. Myth and religion are all good and well but no scientist would take them seriously.

Science is a set of processes for investigating the natural world. It makes no claims, and the opinions of those who use scientific methods (scientists!) are utterly irrelevant too.

Science claims to be useful? I'm not disputing this, I'm a devoted fan of teflon myself. But when I say science I mean it in its social context. Science as a concept has only been around for four hundred odd years. Technology managed to develop well enough without it back then.

I've no idea how science got a personality and a voice in your head (do you hear voices? Does science speak to you?)


About 400 years you say? Technology managed "well enough" without it, so science has made little difference?

Whatever about its method, science takes years of training. How long does it take for a medical student to view the body in a scientific manner? Ir how often does the man in the street challenge Hawking about his bizarre theories? It remains, for most people, completely out of bounds.

That's untrue, the principals of science are learned quite quickly by most children with a bunsen burner and a science exercise book in school. There is a reason that the same experiments are done again and again, actually performed daily by thousands of children because science is the opposite of your silly characterisations, everything is repeatable, everything is in the open, all methods are revealed, and the ability of anyone to be able to replicate any scientific claim is at the heart of science.

Lastly, science exists in the social world. Ivory towers are very comfortable and very convenient but that's not good enough. How the puiblic views science is very important to science. I don't know about a cure for cholera, but AIDS research became a lot more urgent when it became widely known that it was a threat to heterosexuals too. Lots of medical research into behaviour as affliction, like drunkenness as disease and various personality disorders is being rubbishyed in our new world of personal responsibility and backlashes against the nanny-state.

Of course science exists in our social world, and what is researched may well depend on what the body politic decides is urgent or even allowable. For example it would indeed be possible to produce very valid science by experimenting on children (by this I mean scientifically valid results), and science per se says nothing about whether this is good or bad. The fact that most of us would find such a process abhorrent and immoral, says nothing whatsoever about science, neither does what governments are prepared to invest in and want prioritised.

What does say something about science is that it's consistently the method that gets result. If we want a cure for aids we can put money into a scientific research program or we could perhaps pay a group of monks to meditate on the answer or perhaps give a grant to homoeopaths to see if that can shake up a cure. When anything else apart from science starts getting better real world results I'm sure that science will die away and be replaced by ir. Until then we're stuck with science.

905

Dades wrote: »

Science as whose concept? Yours? It's clear that you are trying to flag science as a philosophical worldview, when it is only concerned with knowledge of the "natural" world - and applying that knowledge in technology.

If in doing so science happens to contradict what myth or religion has proposed, that is merely a by-product - as science has no agenda other than to learn.

Dades, I mean science as a social concept. In the everyday world. I've said this a few times. An example of science in the social world here: http://www.defendscience.org/

(Don't tell Wicknight but they mention 'scientific truths', the beastly cads)

pH

905 wrote: »

(Don't tell Wicknight but they mention 'scientific truths', the beastly cads)

Sadly some like Wicknight have been beaten down by the philosophers so much they're not happy with words like truth any more. Which is sad because the philosophical meaning of the word 'true' (definition - nothing is, one sec let me think of a real clever way of proving that to you) is useless and the one that we all use to make statements about the everyday world the statement "alcohol makes you drunk" is the truth (for example) is equally valid in science - AIDS is caused by the HIV virus - that's a scientific truth whether you or Wicknight like it or not.

905

Difficult as it is to accept, scientists hold very strong views on what should be regarded as truth. Alternative medicine, for example, is not met with indifference and tolerance by the scientific community but is routinely condemned.

You seem to be suggesting that a trip to the library can make anyone a peer of Hawking. It wouldn't make them a peer of the lowliest physicist. Why do you think formal training exists for science?

My last point illusrates how science exists within society.

Dades

905 wrote: »

Dades, I mean science as a social concept. In the everyday world. I've said this a few times.

You may have said it a few times but the term is still just a catchphrase. Science is what it is. Your, or any member of the public's perception of it doesn't change this.

905 wrote: »

An example of science in the social world here: http://www.defendscience.org/

That's an example of scientists getting pissed about scientific funding being pulled because of other people's religious beliefs. I'm not sure what the problem is here. I'm quite sure they'd rather be in the lab instead of signing petitions.

905

pH wrote: »

Sadly some like Wicknight have been beaten down by the philosophers so much they're not happy with words like truth any more. Which is sad because the philosophical meaning of the word 'true' (definition - nothing is, one sec let me think of a real clever way of proving that to you) is useless and the one that we all use to make statements about the everyday world the statement "alcohol makes you drunk" is the truth (for example) is equally valid in science - AIDS is caused by the HIV virus - that's a scientific truth whether you or Wicknight like it or not.

And people believe those truths. In society statements made by scientists are regarded as truth in the everyday sense of the word.

And railroads were used by the Greeks, so revise your little graph.

robindch

905 wrote: »

Alternative medicine, for example, is not met with indifference and tolerance by the scientific community but is routinely condemned.

Yes, because the alternative medicine industry is packed with frauds. Are you saying that people shouldn't be warned about this?

From where I'm sitting, your views seem very confused and unfocussed indeed.

905

Dades wrote: »

You may have said it a few times but the term is still just a catchphrase. Science is what it is. Your, or any member of the public's perception of it doesn't change this.

That's an example of scientists getting pissed about scientific funding being pulled because of other people's religious beliefs. I'm not sure what the problem is here. I'm quite sure they'd rather be in the lab instead of signing petitions.

Science exists in the social sphere. This is a reality that ye seem to have a problem with. Laboratories exist in the real world; there is no escape. This is unfortunate for the principles of science but it is true nonetheless.

Even if they did live in an ivory tower on the moon, the scientific knowledge they sent us (assuming they would) would still be in the social sphere, and interpreted accordingly.

905

robindch wrote: »

Yes, because the alternative medicine industry is packed with frauds. Are you saying that people shouldn't be warned about this?

From where I'm sitting, your views seem very confused and unfocussed indeed.

I'm saying that scientists have views on what is true and what is false, something denied on this thread.