And yet it seems many people of your camp have unlimited faith, not only in the scientific method, but in unlimited "human progress." I can't tell you how many times I have been told over the years that, "yes, it is true science doesn't have all the answers re: X problem [fill in the blank] YET; but it will at some future time."
If this isn't an example of "faith," then I don't know what it is. It is faith in an unshakeable epistemically prior conviction that the regnant scientific "methodological naturalism" approach can answer all questions — if not today, then eventually, i.e., at some future time.
That strikes me as pretty credulous. Not to mention I consider it unreasonable to reduce the world to the size of one's own presuppositions. This sort of exercise is to commit Whitehead's Fallacy of Misplaced Concreteness.
FWIW albionin. Thank you for writing.
I do too. I don't think God put us here to sink back into the primeval muck. We're here to follow him to the heavens and make the stellar debris field bloom.
We've got awesome work to do.
:)
Me: It is not a lack of imagination but a lack of credulity and an inability to abandon reason and accept things on faith.
Betty boop: And yet it seems many people of your camp have unlimited faith, not only in the scientific method, but in unlimited “human progress.” I can’t tell you how many times I have been told over the years that, “yes, it is true science doesn’t have all the answers re: X problem [fill in the blank] YET; but it will at some future time.”
Me: Well you couldn’t say that anyone in my camp, Objectivism, has faith. If they did they wouldn’t be in my camp. Human beings are limited by our nature just as all things are. We can only achieve that which is in our power to achieve. We are not omniscient. It is true that science can’t answer every question right now. No one can look into the future and say what knowledge science will uncover, but we can say that if we are to have any answers to these questions then science is the only way we will get them. There is no other tool at our disposal. I can’t tell you how many times over the years I have been told that if science can’t answer some question then that means it must be a supernatural being controlling everything. Not too long ago you could have said since science can’t explain why the sun rises in the east and sets in the west then it must be caused by a supernatural being. Of course many people still believe that but science has a pretty good handle on what is going on with the sunrise. I’ll tell you what I never get from your camp: a rational argument for the existence of God.
Betty Boop: If this isn’t an example of “faith,” then I don’t know what it is. It is faith in an unshakeable (sic) epistemically prior conviction that the regnant scientific “methodological naturalism” approach can answer all questions — if not today, then eventually, i.e., at some future time.
Yes, you don’t know what faith is, or rather your definition is too broad and makes no distinction between how knowledge is gained. The bible defines faith as “the substance of that which is hoped for” and “the evidence of that which is not seen”. The substance of that which is hoped for is a wish. The second definition means that belief is evidence. That is pure subjectivism. That is consistent with the teaching of the bible of a subjective reality. Science rests on a completely opposite metaphysics and epistemology, namely an objective reality and reason and logic as the means to gaining knowledge. To lump faith and reason together is to destroy the concept of reason. So don’t equate belief based on reason and logic with religious faith. I do believe that science and methodological naturalism can answer any proper question about existence. the question of who created the universe is improper and wrong on principle because it contradicts the three fundamental axioms of philosophy: Existence, Identity and Consciousness.
Instead of attacking reason and logic why don’t you just provide a rational argument for God. That is all you have to do. Just one.