scientific method and truth ...

by soft+gentle 66 Replies latest jw friends

  • bohm
    bohm

    SBF: You have yet to explain what "close to reality" really means. When is a statement close to reality and when is it identical with reality and how can you tell the difference?

    I can easily tell the difference, i can make an experiment, and i can talk about truth by examining the outcome of the experiment with eg. statistics. But that is quite immaterial to the discussion since it is you who said you could not see how one statement could be closer to reality than another, this is what you wrote:

    SBF: I don't see how you can say one scientific statement is closer to the truth or closer to reality than another

    So do you hold on to that statement? Is it as true to say there are dragons living in england as to say there are sheep? Is it as close to reality to say the moon is made of cheese as to say it is made of rocks? By implication, that is what you assert.

    It is advisable to believe one statement rather than another because of the consequences of doing so, not because of its supposed proximity to the world as it is in itself.

    but the REASON it is not advisable to eat human excrements is BECAUSE you tend to get ill if you do so: That is what the sentence said and that is why it is true, it accurately describe the world. Have you ever read Tarskis semantic theory of truth? Even while claiming to reject sentences can be truer than others, you are in fact accepting just that: It is a self-contradictory argument.

    Again, I think this is a clear example of trying to reject the obvious by making a fallicious argument so complicated it is hard to point out what exactly is wrong even though something is obviously wrong.

  • Fernando
    Fernando

    For a start I believe they both originate from God, and hence are antithetical to religion.

  • soft+gentle
    soft+gentle

    thanks everyone. I'm not going to reject anything anyone has said on this thread because in a strange way it all fits into my worldview.

    For example if we take the scientifc method as isolating everything that can belong to science and everything that can be included in it via testing the evidence and then bring in slimboyfats's argument that the facts and closeness to reality that science accumulates is part of a normative procedure then it is also easy to see how the treatment that he is about to undergo steps outside what is normative and indeed challenges what is natural and normative to find a cure for his condition.

  • soft+gentle
    soft+gentle

    slimboyfat - best of luck to you!

  • maksym
    maksym

    "Theology claims to offer ABSOLUTE truths,which do not exist."- quote from, king Solomon

    Is that an absolute truth?

  • soft+gentle
    soft+gentle

    TRUTH according to wiki has two components - facts and reality. The scientific method tries valiantly to put the two together imo. do you guys agree?

    edit: deadline approachith so over and out for the day

  • Twitch
    Twitch
    TRUTH according to wiki has two components - facts and reality. The scientific method tries valiantly to put the two together imo. do you guys agree?

    What reality exists without facts?

    Can facts exist and not be real?

  • jgnat
    jgnat

    Can facts exist and not be real?

    How about this example? Newtonian physics works just fine at the macro level. Take the human body with about 10 27 atoms. When these atoms are all glommed together, they behave in predictable, Newtonian ways. At least that what we are able to observe with the naked eye. I have substance. There is a firm line between "me" and "my world". When I swim, I push off with calculated force, and I move in the opposite direction. All Newtonian, all consistently predictable, all factual.

    But what if we observe a few atoms and their component parts at their level? All of a sudden, Newtonian physics fails completely. Now the movement can only be predicted as a probability. Quantum rules. It's a hard concept to get my head around, and nobody can see the movement directly, but using the Quantum rules, all behavior of electrons can be predicted. On average. This is also factual, and seems to fly in the face of Newtonian physics.

    If Newton's rules fail at the micro level, are they real?

  • King Solomon
    King Solomon

    "Theology claims to offer ABSOLUTE truths,which do not exist."- quote from, king Solomon

    Is that an absolute truth?

    No, because absolute truths don't exist....

    Go for it, find me an example. I'll wait.

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    Doubt everything, including this.

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