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( I DO so hope I will not regret this ... )

Likewise on my end.

All of my previous interactions in this thread revolved around discussions / criticisms of the misapplication of logical process thinking and / or the essential ‘ignorance’ of certain participants who persist in misrepresenting the means or methodology of the so-called ‘scientific method’.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but I didn't parse the thread looking for your comments and disputations as separate threads; I'll take your word for it. In the meantime, "persist"ing in misrepresenting may be due to a number of factors, whether ignorance, using strawmen, legitimate criticisms which you do not want to recognize, or over reliance on the vernacular or on "journalistic" sources for science.

N.B. Throughout, I firmly resisted engagement in the underlying metaphysical or theological points at issue as I do not deem myself appropriately informed about such material to be competent to make a ‘useful’ contribution.

A rare trait: most people with an intellectual bent love to sharpen their claws on such topics, regardless of their level of skill or knowledge.

In particular, the conflation of ‘truth’ and ‘proof’ as interchangeable expressions or products of the application of the so-called ‘scientific method’ was a constantly recurring source of non-communication. I was also completely frustrated by folks who couldn’t apprehend the distance between a ‘conjecture’ and a ‘theory’ and how this difference profoundly affects the applicability of the Method to process the object at issue.

I'll have to re-read the thread to be sure. And it's too late at night for me to do that now.

But...begging your pardon since I don't remember seeing you on these threads, or indeed on FR at all. In the past there has been a relatively large contigent of scientist and/or scientific hangers on, who engaged in what C.S. Lewis used to describe as "swashbuckling" : pedantic attention to detail coupled with a purely social, rhetorical overemphasis on the significance of those details, and attributing all disagreements with themselves to the fundamental ignorance of their disputants: such ignorance alleged by the swashbucklers to be willful and perverse.

Many of the "attacks on science" are by those who are tired of being "swashbuckled" at, and are an attempt to reduce the level of condescension by those who stake out the materialistic position.

*This* is interesting; the more so that I cannot tell from the context whether you are frustrated at scientists for overstating their case, or attacking non-scientists for "quote mining" among experimental results and overstating the philosophical implications of their favorite cherry-picked results.

I was also completely frustrated by folks who couldn’t apprehend the distance between a ‘conjecture’ and a ‘theory’ and how this difference profoundly affects the applicability of the Method to process the object at issue.

You're going to get that a lot if you deal with non-specialists: and the popular press doesn't help much either.

I argued, in various ways, that a well-constructed ‘theory’ MAY be demonstrated to ‘fail’ but CANNOT be deemed either ‘true’ or ‘false’. This argument, as I expected, fell on stone-deaf ears. Since these folks sought only the most resplendent ‘truth’ and rejected anything which aspired to only some less lofty goal of utility, these arguments were just an exercise in utter futility.

That depends: e.g. quantum mechanics supersedes classical mechanics, but for macroscopic systems, the predictions will reduce to the classical limit: hence classical mechanics has utility even though it is not (in the sense you seem to mean) "true". On the other hand, a geocentric solar system can predict the motions of many of the planets to a high degree of accuracy; but it is "messy" and leaves out certain relativistic predictions. By Occam's razor it is held to be "false" and you would have your work cut out for you trying to persuade anyone that it is "true".

I specifically argued that the so-called ‘multi-verse THEORY’ ( actually a ‘conjecture’ ) presents a scenario where the object under discussion is so completely beyond our powers of observation and ability to interact that it is IDENTICAL to a non-existent object. As no aspect of an alternative / parallel ‘universe’ co-residing with our own within some construct of ‘multi-verses’ is accessible to us, it may as well not exist at all as a proposed object of measurement, observation, prediction or falsification — you know, the rudiments of the so-called ‘Scientific Method’ for proposing and disposing of a well-founded Theory.

Agreed; I made essentially the same point, for the same reasons, in different language.

I concluded that any energy or attention devoted to the pursuit of such a ‘theory’ was pointless in fact and demonstrated a fundamental lack of appreciation for the method or its application. Disguising this clap-trap with the forms of scientific thought or method and demanding that the offended method somehow produce ‘truth’ about the meaning of the ‘Multi-verse CONJECTURE’ didn’t make it ‘scientific’ at all.

I disagree with the first point, and agree with the second. The reason is, that it might happen that there ARE mathematical models concerning multiverses and the like which *would* yield testable predictions; but that the mathematical groundwork has not yet been laid to allow these models to be formed; *perhaps* the current work will lead to the development of such formalisms. (No guarantee, and a low-payoff bet...so I'd be happier throwing grant money at things with higher direct return on investment.)

I was challenged, in various ways, to step up and admit the uselessness of any thought or process which, in concept or application, was unable to reveal ‘TRUTH’. Well, I could only respond that that was not the OBJECT or goal of science nor the justification for any well-founded ‘theory’.

I was presented with various forms of ‘magical thinking’ cosmetically disguised as syllogisms and required to ACCEPT these strawmen if I could not REFUTE them. When I declined to play these games, I was regretfully informed that I was afflicted with various defects, deficits or deficiencies in intellectual, moral or spiritual development. ( E.g., “You are suffering from a truncated metaphysic.” — sound at all familiar ? )

Back up a step there.

The purpose of science is knowledge leading to predictability leading to control. It is therefore held that any theory must be true (or at least congruent to truth) to be useful. For example, ideal gas theory is wrong, but encapsulates many actual properties of gases, so it is useful, even if not entirely true; but a refinement which claims that compression of a gas lowers its temperaure *is* false as it leads to the opposite of what really happens.

But there is another kind of truth -- and that is not just "are we able to accurately predict within some limits, the behaviour of the system under consideration" -- but rather the philosophical underpinnings, or an accurate depiction of ALL of "life, the universe, and everything". And it is there, I think, that some of your detractors were harping on you.

Secondly, I find it odd that you used the term 'magical thinking' *and* put it in scare quotes. It is true that one assumes methodological naturalism as a precondition of performing experiments: the underlying supposition which allows experiments is that of "uniformity of causes in a closed system". And if one assumes there are elves, pixies, sprites, angels, devils, and God running around unconstrained, it makes it rather difficult to know when to attribute an anomalous result to a systematic error in the measurement, a faulty control in the experiment, a flaw in the model, or supernatural interference.

You then quoted me as follows:

In this local instance, you present the following ‘argument’ — “The point is that many people seem to conflate “not logically valid” with “necessarily untrue”.

“Thus only things which derive from logical conclusions validly derived from agreed-upon axioms, or things derived experiementally, are held (by some) to be true.

“Which is actually sloppy thinking: there are other things which may be true, but by neglecting “falsifiability” one rejects them — think of the O.J. trial and “not guilty” vs. “not proven”, or of the null hypothesis.

“It is not that the null hypothesis necessarily gives a “true” model or account of things, but that it avoids giving philosophical false positives. This is not an absolute good, but it is useful if (as is the goal of applied science) one wishes to enable and to effectuate control of phenomenon.”

Upon which you commented:

This resembles the ‘form’ of logical argument but, to me, the substance slips away rather like mercury on a porous surface. I can’t quite contain it within a construct I understand well enough to analyze it.

It wasn't meant to be logical argument; but rather the introduction of certain concepts which are correctives to mistaken assumptions made by many skeptics and materialists -- for there have been indications in your postings that you are in sympathy with this sort of thinking. In other words, it was a description of certain elements of a new construct which appeared to be foreign to you -- as you said in commenting on it, "I can't quite contain it within a construct I understand well enough to analyze it."

F’rinstance, the outcome of the O.J. trial was a blatant exercise of ‘Jury Nullification’ — this was NOT the confusion of ‘Not Guilty’ and ‘Not Proven’. If you don’t apprehend this clearly, you may be excused for offering this fallacious argument but it doesn’t help your cause or advance your argument at all.

I don't care what the jury did in the O.J. trial: but it is instructive that O.J. was found guilty in a civil proceeding with a lower standard of evidence but innocent in a criminal trial: but the findings of the jury in either case are not proof (neither in an experimental nor a mathematical sense) of his guilt. As you pointed out earlier, "In particular, the conflation of ‘truth’ and ‘proof’ as interchangeable expressions or products of the application of the so-called ‘scientific method’ was a constantly recurring source of non-communication. " Mentioning O.J. was my version of referring to this, in a way which would not be controversial on this thread. The application to the discussion at hand, and its relation to the null hypothesis, is as follows.

The justice system starts out with the assumption that the accused is guilty unless 'proven' (see above) beyond a reasonable doubt. The null hypothesis starts out with the assumption that there is no relationship between two sets of measurements, or that (say) a putative treatment has no effect. In layman's terms, we assume that there is no "there" there.

In the court system, this is used to assure (though not guarantee) that innocent people are falsely convicted as seldom as possible; in science, it is a good way to minimize spurious claims of significant results, and indirectly, aiding in Occam's razor -- for if there is no effect observed, there is no mechanism, and no cause which need be invoked to account for it.

All well and good.

But the price -- well seen in the law, somewhat neglected in the scientific realm -- is that while these approaches minimize Type I ("false positive") errors, they provide no symmetrical or complementary assurance against the presence of Type I ("false negative") errors (failing to aver or assert the presence of a factor which is there, but doesn't have a clear enough signal-to-noise ratio so to speak, or where there is reasonable doubt).

And it is there that the rub comes in, when combined with methodological naturalism: if you *assume* there is no supernatural, and your tests and models are therefore predicated on the absence of the supernatural, you might happen to miss anything supernatural which is out there.

But it gets a little more subtle than that, simply because the supernatural is asserted to be sentient and/or personal, and therefore capable of acting independently of experimental controls -- so that a negative test for the supernatural in one experiment need not be sufficient to exclude it. ("How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?" becomes "How can you tell for sure that they even showed up to be counted?")

The rejoinder I have most often seen at this point is either "Occam's razor" or "chronological snobbery" (i.e., savages used to believe in gods to explain things but now we know better, God of the gaps, etc.) But I don't consider God or Angels or Devils as part of a "model" used to account for unknown phenomena (Maxwell's Demon notwithstanding), and hence not subject to Occam's razor in the first place. I consider God as rather a non sequitur as far as the models of physical science but rather as a revelation given by authority (Moses coming down from Mount Sinai with the 10 Commandments, don't covet your neighbor's ass, and ceremonial and civil laws as opposed to physical and chemical law).

Cheers!