Perspective and Belief

[The Grand Nudger]

So you would say that perception gives way to science which has the ability to negate our perception? While affirming that belief and science cannot be made equivalent or used synonymously.

In other words, science is a method which has no need to directly affect the way in which we interact with the world, unlike a belief. Perception precedes science, and it is science which explains our perception. Is that a correct summation of what you stated? If not, please feel free to correct me. I'm just trying to simplify what you said overall in regards to the question.

Perception sometimes gives way to science. Sometimes it doesn't, and sometimes any given experiment has no bearing on human perception in and of itself since the subject being investigated is beyond the usual range of human perception. In addition to this the average Joe has no idea what science is actually doing, and terrible misconceptions about the conclusions it reaches. Largely because a lot of science has no direct effect on the average Joe. Sometimes science negates our perception, sometimes it doesn't. People still believe in phrenology and alchemy, as a couple of examples. There are those who perceive a world filled to the brim with magic and magical things, in spite of the overwhelmingly negative conclusions science has reached on the subject.

It's not as though science and belief are mutually exclusive by way of their conclusions or how we leverage them. One can reach the same conclusions from either platform (at least in theory). The times when science and belief cannot be reconciled with each other are those moments in which an article of faith contradicts available evidence. You could hold beliefs that are roughly in accordance with scientific inquiry (though that would probably be very difficult, at some point your beliefs would cease to be beliefs and they would simply be science). However, no amount of belief will ever become science without leaving the realm of belief and going through the scientific method, which does not rely on belief at all. The difference is in the method. The methods are so wholly incompatible that it is impossible to equate the two. That's why we call one subject "science", and the other "belief".

Whether or not science needs to directly affect the way we interact with the world is a personal value judgement. It's also reversing the order of objects in the question. We're the ones with needs, yay or nay. As an aside, belief needn't affect our interaction with the world either. What you're describing here are choices. People choose to let science affect the way they interact with the world, people choose to let beliefs affect the way they interact with the world. The opposite for both cases is also true. Some choose to draw from both, some choose to draw from neither (GG solipsism). Arguing that people don't need science is a tough sell. Arguing that people don't need belief is a great deal easier. Either way, as I've said, personal value judgement. One is free to go whichever way they want. Trouble only arises when these two areas come into conflict with one another. One has the weight of demonstrable evidence behind it and the other does not.

Perception and belief both precede science, yes. We had a perception of the world around us (many times based upon belief, or vice versa) long before we started down the road of scientific inquiry. You may be attempting to simplify a subject which is not simple, and losing some key bits of the situation in the process.

By the by, scientists and science do fall prey to bias. Confirmation, selection, anthropic (the last one being extremely difficult to avoid), others as well. That's why we have peer review, and that's why it's important that we understand bias and how it can express itself in any given observation, experiment, or conclusion.