“… a scientific consensus is, by definition, an evidence-based consensus.A convergence of the weight of existing evidence is a prerequisite which distinguishes a knowledge-based scientific consensus from mere agreement.
This is critical, because the scientific enterprise is essentially a meritocracy.
As a result, it doesn’t matter if a few contrarians on the fringe disagree with the conclusions unless they can marshal up evidential justification of comparable weight or explain the existing data better.
The weight of the evidence is paramount.
In a nutshell, a consensus in science refers to a convergence of many independent lines of high quality evidence all leading the majority of active scientists in a given field to arrive at the same conclusion and/or complimentary conclusions. …”
Well it’s more like they wouldn’t accept that most basic fact. That science is based on observation and that we have faith that our observations are true and that things can be known.
"science at the most base level is based on faith.”
Would you care to clarify "it's most base level"?
And how do you mean “faith.” - faith in principles or faith in a dogma - can you explain? (I’m assuming you appreciate the difference)
Seems to me science is a set of rules to help people to honestly learn about our physical planet as constructively as possible.
Items of faith would be:
“I” can trust my senses, if “I” tested my instruments enough "I’ can trust my instruments, although “I” must constantly double check and cross check.
Faith in Constructive debates, that is where each side honestly represents not only their own position and evidence - but also their opponent’s position and evidence.
It requires faith in a human’s rational abilities,
It requires a faith in the concept that: We Need Each Other, To Keep Ourselves Honest.
I imagine I’m missing some other fundamentals, if anyone cares to add some, please do.
So Xain, I’m curious, what do you really think about “science” and the community of humans who have dedicated their lives to being professional scientists and experts?
Xain: ... science is based on observation and that we have faith that our observations are true and that things can be known.
I didn't understand your first line, but this one's good. Though it's worth pointing out "faith that our observations are true" is incumbent upon those observations constantly being tested, checked, double checked, adjusted as data dictates and such. It's not the blind faith that an observation I made today is gold forever.
Well what I mean is that I have faith that I can know things and things can be known (though based on who you ask there are no things cough Deepak).
I also have faith that my senses are no being deceived. For if they were then could I call my scientific knowledge true knowledge if it’s based on the deception of my senses.
I would like to place my faith in science really, since it actually bothers to show how it got there. Other spiritual people just use personal experience and then weave a story that makes sense of it all. Like how meditation can make one feel like they are one with all but all it is is the changing of the brain (which mystics of the past wouldn’t have known). Of course they could argue that meditation changes the brain to see the truth but that seems like moving the goal posts, and the same argument can be made about other brain states.
But faith in our senses is fundamental to science. Without it we wouldn’t get anywhere, literally.
Problem with your fact is that isn’t, in the way you seem to be suggesting. You seem to be trying to conflate religious faith, which is “belief in things unseen” and belief in science, which is evidence based. The two are not the same.
We can have faith that our senses are operating but we can never know that how we interpret the information is correct. People who thought the sun revolved around the earth had faith in their senses, too. And they were completely wrong. There have been countless scientific experiments that show that people misinterpret what they think their senses are telling them all the time. People hear voices and see things that aren’t there. They feel their skin crawling with no evidence of anything touching their skin, and they smell odors that no one else can detect.
Xian argues just like his name implies, a Christian. His arguments are exactly the arguments used in books like “The Case for Christianity” or “The Reason for God”. He shows no interest in any actual logic or the simplest thought experiments. If you stop responding to one of his repetitive threads, he will start a new one, possibly even making some admission about not really believing his earlier assertions anymore.
The quote you provided is nicely concise. Whenever I try to say that consensus comes from the evidence, I always feel like something is missing. The sentence about the contrarians adds that extra punch.
I had a long drive this weekend and listened to a few hours of Tony Campolo talking to his son Bart Campolo about belief. Tony is a famous Christian evangelist and sociology professor, Bart worked with his ministry for years, but now calls himself a humanist. Tony is no slouch, he knows his Kierkegaard from his Nietzsche, he has helped to lead evangelicals to working for just causes, but when it came to understanding how morality comes from biology which is based on scientific evidence, he could not see outside of his worldview. He continually went back to saying it was decision to say love comes from God or natural evolutionary processes, and those two different views were equally valid.
There were a few moments where they managed to agree on something like, there is mystery and wonder, but it got frustrating at times. The fact that they are father and son and have a lot of respect kept it from being Hitchens vs whatever evangelical type debate, but the arguments don’t change much no matter who it is.
Problem with your fact is that isn’t, in the way you seem to be suggesting. You seem to be trying to conflate religious faith, which is “belief in things unseen” and belief in science, which is evidence based. The two are not the same.
Not at all, but faith that your senses are telling you the truth is easier to get on board with than the cosmic nonsense religion does.
It’s more like science uses faith as a start and builds off it while religion bases it’s all on it. Science can comfortably admit it doesn’t know with spirituality and religion NEEDS answers and will fill in what it wants.
What I was trying to say is that if you drill all the way down there are some ideas or concepts that you just have to take on faith, like the external reality (not arguing for solipsism).
Ah.Ok. We’re back in the world of the unfalsifiable claim. Yes, 'I ‘trust’ my senses. I’m a materialist.
I said a few posts ago that for me, metaphysical discussions are OK to a point. This discussion reached that point some time ago. From MY perspective it has disintegrated into tedious mental masturbation.
Metaphysics seems to me completely unrelated to daily life
That is so funny coming from you, Xian. What I enjoy about your posts is they lead me to new ways to express the obvious flaws in your arguments. I'll agree that metaphysics doesn't make you fun at parties, at least not your average kind of party. But dismissing metaphysics as irrelevant is like dismissing knowledge of how your car works because you can drive it without knowing what's under the hood. If someone had not thought about combustion and converting vertical motion to circular, you wouldn't have a car. So, today's lesson is, the "Appeal to stone" fallacy.
It’s a little different from knowing how my car works under the hood.
Knowing the fundamental nature of reality is pretty irrelevant to whether I get school loans or how to ask a guy out. To pull from the wiki page asking “what is there” and “what is it like” is pretty moot to me. It might have given me tons of grief in the past, but to be honest it seems more like a waste of time to me. I’d rather just live than think about stuff like that.
I mean the fact that metaphysics has characters like Parmenides should tell you how useful it is.
I know, but it feels better to just say it. Parmedines seems like a nutter, I know the wiki says that Plato respected him but I would have to reserve judgment on his sanity in that matter.