Links With Your Coffee - Friday
Mad Kane has a limerick for Dirty Denny
Don Davis latest song parody Dubya Does The Bee Gees: 'Stayin' The Course'
Go say hi to Heather a friend of onegoodmove.
Republicans are popular
Fahrenheit 451 God wouldn't like it.
The book had a bunch of very bad language in it," Diana Verm said. "It shouldn't be in there because it's offending people. ... If they can't find a book that uses clean words, they shouldn't have a book at all."
Touch a light switch, catch a cold
Science vs. Scientism: Real or Imagined
There's a cheap debating trick which implies that if, say, science can't explain something, this must mean that some other discipline can. If scientists suspect that all aspects of the mind have a scientific explanation but they can't actually say what that explanation is yet, then of course it's open to you to doubt whether the explanation ever will be forthcoming. That's a perfectly reasonable doubt. But it's not legitimately open to you to substitute a word like soul, or spirit, as if that constituted an explanation. It is not an explanation, it's an evasion. It's just a name for that which we don't understand. The scientist may agree to use the word soul for that which we don't understand, but the scientist adds, "But we're working on it, and one day we hope we shall explain it." The dishonest trick is to use a word like soul or spirit as if it constituted an explanation.
Comments
Umm it appears that the link for Science vs Scientism is not the right one...
Posted by: bcortens
| October 6, 2006 3:51 AM | Reply to this comment
Oh my god, that Fahrenheit 451 story is like a bad joke of itself...
Posted by: Mithras
| October 6, 2006 7:36 AM | Reply to this comment
Here's the correct link for 'Science vs. Scientism: Real or Imagined.'
Good read. "It's just a name for that which we don't understand." is precisely it!
Posted by: BillB | October 6, 2006 8:02 AM | Reply to this comment
In the Science vs Scientism article, the author writes, "But because the scientist begins with the a priori certainty that he can reduce man to proportional magnitudes in the same way he does a rock or a light beam, he knows that his mathematical methodologies are certain and the prayers of man to the Divine are but figments and illusions. "
The key word here is a priori, which means prior to examination. In other words taken on faith. He knows the mathematical methodologies are certain because he assumes what is needed to bring the certainty.
It is a bit circular is it not? Scientists who want certainty can be certain because scientists assumes that everything can be reduced to mathematics so it can be certain. He even admits himself that he is assuming that certainty is possible. It looks like a leap of faith to me. You can't assume that certainty is possible just so you can have certainty.
A dog (that has 95% the same dna as humans) has no understanding of science, yet for all we know the world seems consistent to it. The brain is a product of the universe, just slightly more capable than that of a dog, a small part of the external whole. The assumption that the brain, a tiny part of the whole, can capture the essense of the whole in mathematical symbols is at least questionable (not certain) is it not? If it is questionable by a reasonable person, then by the author's own admission, his logic fails.
Posted by: Gerald | October 7, 2006 6:30 AM | Reply to this comment
Can't stop laughing at Fahrenheit 451 article. Too much irony.
Posted by: Maccewill | October 7, 2006 8:17 PM | Reply to this comment
If I ever get the Divine ground of Being shoot me.
Posted by: whyoung
| October 9, 2006 12:25 AM | Reply to this comment