this post was submitted on 29 Mar 2024
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Science is the belief that what we observe with our five senses is reality. That's the belief system. It's based on a universal experience.
Remove that, and anything goes. Any religion has equal weight. With the exception that, for some reason, religious people believe the religion of their parents.
They often try to mold philosophy into their religion (what it means to be good) using some semblance of logic, but then inevitably tells you what happens in the afterlife.
Eh, science is more of a process than a belief system. You can use science to support or deny certain belief systems.
"I believe humans are fundamentally good"
Okay let's use psychology and philosophy to determine if that's true.
"I believe the earth is flat"
Okay let's use geology, astronomy, and physics to determine if that is true.
Also there are plenty of things that are part of reality which we can't observe with our "five senses", it's why we need to measure the effects and see the recordings instead.
We use 5 senses to measure and see the recording. The "process" of science is based completely around our observations (including measurement). Any evidence is defined a information gathered using our senses.
We reason and conclude based on those observations. Any fact or law is an observation using the senses.
But we have to first assume/believe that our observations are real and that we aren't plugged into a computer being used as batteries (Matrix trilogy is philosophy 101). Religion abandons that belief or supplements it with supernatural
Agh presump logic. Belief is not required prior to methodology, belief in the effectiveness of methodology stems from results.
When things evolved to swim they didn't have apriori knowledge that swimming would benefit them. You knew how to eat long before you even learned that eating got rid of stomach pains well before you took a nutrition class.
This whole idea that you need a metaphysics before you have a physics which you need before you have engineering which you have before any technical skill is a reversal of cause and effect. Put another way we didn't start with reasonable is rational, develop the big 3 of logic, spend decades developing set theory just so we could add, so we could develop the tensor equation for kinematics, which in turn led to Newton's laws, which branches into material science, and spend a century testing until the wheel came out.
I don't have to defeat Kant to know how to fry an egg.
That's not the point. The point is whether or not the fried egg is real. You eat because you're hungry because you choose to believe the sensation is real. Your senses.
So yes, senses existed before science, but science said "hey let's use these senses to reason"
Incorrect. The vast majority of life are single celled organisms and arguing that they have any sorta belief at all is very hard to do. Especially since they function perfectly fine without it. They find food, they eat it. No room for belief. To claim that humans don't work (action comes prior to belief) that way is just begging for me to ask at what point in evolution the sequence of events got reversed.
The fried egg is real. You should have vastly more confidence in the material world vs your thoughts about it. Which is more likely to be true?
A. Sticking your hand in fire will hurt you.
B. There is no largest prime number.
Everything went wrong with the early Greeks. They figured out your senses can be wrong sometimes. So instead of acknowledging this and moving on they demanded that it had to be right all of the time or wrong all of the time. No surprise this black and white thinking led them down to useless skepticism. It is so bizarre it is like noticing your speedometer isn't perfectly calibrated so the best idea is to go as fast as you feel like.
Stop reading Kant you are wasting your time.
You're making assumptions about what I'm saying.
We only find out our senses were wrong when we gather more information. More data. More observations. Stuff you acquire using your senses. You can't measure without senses. You can't question nature without observing it. Observe means father information. The only way to gather information is using senses.
That's the BASE. Yes, we then have to question and experiment and question more. But we can only do that with new information. The only new information we get is through senses.
A fact is only verifiable with observation. Observation, by definition, is information gathered using senses.
Again, I fully believe our experience is real. But science begins at the assumption that our senses are real.
I didn't know fuck all about Kant. This is just simple, basics of scientific inquiry.
This is my point of contention. Assuming our senses --> science is not supported historically. What I say is results of science --> science --> assuming our senses. Because something works we choose to explain how it works, we don't start with the assumption that it works and get it do so.
Kant basically argued that we can't be justified in our empirical knowledge because even if our senses were always correct we have hidden assumptions about the world that clouds them. For example that things happen in sequences, cause before effect. That space between things is real instead of all the same thing churning. And thus having defeated both reason and observation he declared God to be the basis of all human knowledge. It really is just Plato but in German and somehow more confusing.
Make an observation of a something, then explain it, right? Observe it working. Observe using senses. That was step one?
Think of a mathematical proof. List the givens. So when you explain your results, you start with "given that senses are real and not a simulation..." I agree that questioning senses came later, but it doesn't change that we always assumed they were real.
I see the frustration with those philosophers. I assure you I'm not trying to discourage or discount science.
Fine let's think of math. Did you learn to add and subtract in first grade via proofs or by counting? This is not only true as an individual this is true as a species. Someone noticed a pattern and only later did someone else write a proof. And then in the late 19th to early 20th century when set theory became a thing, when there was an attempt to justify all of math via itself endlessly problems popped up. Pretty much all math, according to some, depends on consistency of arithmetic which we don't know is true in the formal sense. Maybe one day someone will break that and get 2 = 3 and it won't matter. Because addition will still work.
I think I understand you're saying senses existed before science. Science and philosophy helped us to get to a place where we can say "are senses real?"
Like "wow we were using our senses the entire time! That's how we observe! But how do we know senses are real? Oh we can't"
Starting with a given is required, otherwise, as others here have said, anything goes.
The difference is that religion starts with a given that is absolute. If conclusions are incorrect, the understanding must be questioned because the given is absolute.
Science, on the other hand, regularly questions the given. If conclusions are incorrect (e.g. Mercury in retrograde dilemma) then the given is questioned until we have a better understanding. For science, there is no final solution because the posibility that we were wrong and will understand better the more we observe is science.
I'm not sure if you meant to reply to me or the other guy...
I'm the one who said that
But all of our understanding is through our senses. All measurements taken, all tests, all new "data" is gathered using our senses. The assumption of science is that our senses are real.
Yes, and if you keep going on that speculation, you arrive at two options.
Keep assuming our senses are real until there is a reason not to.
Assume our senses are not real and attempt to discover what reality is.
Either way, science doesn't care because it's not about being right, it's about figuring out what is. Put another way: Change theories to suit facts instead of facts to suit theories.
What speculation? I haven't speculated at all.
I have no reason to believe senses are fake. Science is the study of our observations. That's what it is. Ergo, we assume our observations are real. I'm not arguing at all that they don't exist. But science starts with the "understanding" that our senses are reality.
You're arguing with yourself.
Hope it's fun for you.
Shit, are you me?
No, this is Patrick?
You keep asserting this and I am not seeing you provide evidence for this. How did you look into the minds of anyone doing an experiment in history to see this?
You literally cannot make an observation without the senses. You can't DO an experiment without using your senses.
I'm really confused by the misunderstanding. I do assume the senses are real. I teach science. I'm not trying to disprove it.
Any steps or methodology includes facts and observations. Which you acquire through senses.
Right but that doesn't mean that you have a prior assumption. Your students aren't starting from philosophical first principles they are learning the methods of science long long before they will ever learn the philosophy that is used to justify it. And as a scientist/teacher you know historically this is exactly what happened. We observed and then we derived, not the other way around.
The problem with all the presup arguments is they can't accept that with very very few exceptions actions proceed thoughts. They depend an underlying basis for the universe and epistemology then not finding one they declare god and fuck off. And it goes all the way back to Plato.
I feel like you're going beyond anything I've said.
I had to look up this presup you keep saying. I think you're just defending science or something because you feel threatened by what I'm saying. Maybe you hated me using the word "assumption". I'm not a skeptic. I'm not trying to convince anyone that religions have the same weight as science or anything. I'm an atheist. Science is my living.
Science begins with an assumption that the senses are real. That's it.
Caveman and fire analogy? Yes, started with an observation using senses. Then the questions came. And seeking understanding of the observations. That's all well and good; great even. Science is the study of our natural world and that is only perceived through our senses. Even when our senses seem to be wrong, like water bending light. It was through further observation that we get new, better information. Cool that senses are used for other things as well. Even before science, and even by other living things.
As long as there exists some possibility that we're all in a computer simulation, our senses are an assumed reality. I'll repeat though, that doesn't make anything more or less likely, it just is what it is.