(December 14, 2015 at 12:16 pm)SteveII Wrote: The very first sentence in the link I gave: Scientism is belief in the universal applicability of the scientific method and approach, and the view that empirical science constitutes the most "authoritative" worldview or the most valuable part of human learning - to the exclusion of other viewpoints. The rest of the paragraph goes on to say the same things to varying degrees.
Science is a tool, but it is demonstrably the best tool currently in our possession when it comes to the investigation of claims about objective reality. If you make a claim which impacts the world that we can detect, then science can test that claim, and the findings of the scientific method will be the best possible means of determining the truth of that claim, barring human error. It's not my problem that you'd really, really like to believe something, and yet science won't support it for you. It's not my problem that you're so committed to that belief anyway that you need to search for some exception to science's scope- which there are some, but none you could insert a god into- to slot that belief in, that you're content to find a patch of ignorance, call your specific way of resolving it some other way of knowing, and call it a day. But I won't be manipulated either. I'm not going to fall for made up distinctions and terms designed to make unflattering implications about people who recognize the extreme utility of a tool that has done more things for humanity, in a shorter span of time, than any other in our history, merely because doing so leads people to dare to disagree with you.
In short, you're going to need to do more than manufacture passive aggressive labels out of wholecloth to make your point.
Quote:No one has a problem with science and what it has discovered. The question is where does science stop?
"Someone please tell me, because that's where my god is, for sure."
You're just doing the same thing every other theist does, placing your god at the center of an ever-contracting sphere of human ignorance, deluded into thinking the ball will never shrink to nothing. "Science stops there, and my god is beyond that point!" you say, right up until the point, one day, using unforeseen advancements or new knowledge, perhaps science stops stopping there, and goes into the point you've so confidently said your god is in, and finds no god there. Then, you'll just push your god back further into the new, smaller zone of ignorance. You've reduced your god to something that flees at the sight of knowledge, constantly banished to the shadows of our ignorance, simply because you're unwilling to relinquish the conclusion that he totally exists, for realsies.
Quote: There is no way science can comment on what it means that it seems inextricable that life came from non-life or how incredibly complex the cell is.
And yet, if you were to make a claim as to what it does mean, that would be a claim about objective reality that we might be able to devise a test for. Unless, of course, the claim you make contains no referents to external reality, in which case one must ask the question: how do you distinguish that kind of claim from one that's just made up entirely?
Quote: Science cannot comment on the existence of God,
Sure it can, assuming that god interacts in some detectable way with the physical world. And if it doesn't, then how can you distinguish that god from a fantasy?
Quote: why the universe is fine-tuned,
It can and has, and by the way you're begging the question by asserting fine tuning without a means of determining that the conditions you see are a product of tuning toward a specific goal and not merely a specific set of random outcomes.
Quote:the existence of miracles,
Science can test individual miracle claims, and every time it has it has found a naturalistic explanation for them. Nice try, though.
Quote: It is not the source of all knowledge and certainly cannot be used to dismiss alternatives that may be true/probably/possible/not likely through other methods not conflicting with science.
Without a way of demonstrating those claims to be accurate, you have no means of distinguishing them from untrue claims. How would you even determine that a claim is probable without using tests that are, in some way, based on the scientific method? You're very quick to dismiss science and say it isn't the only way, but you're remarkably shy when it comes to proposing your alternative. Is it, perhaps, because that alternative is identical to just making things up?
"YOU take the hard look in the mirror. You are everything that is wrong with this world. The only thing important to you, is you." - ronedee
Want to see more of my writing? Check out my (safe for work!) site, Unprotected Sects!
Want to see more of my writing? Check out my (safe for work!) site, Unprotected Sects!