Does Science Presume Naturalism?

[Angrboda]

Yes, science proceeds on the basis of methodological naturalism, precisely because the focus of its study is the natural world. This is as it should be. The problem is when some people, like Mr. Crichton, confuse this with ontological naturalism, i.e. "the philosophical belief...". Ontological naturalism is not a scientific position.

Quite right, apologies.

Curious mind;

Would you not first have to hypothesise to derive the methodology, which would imply a philosophical beginning to all scientific enquiry?

If so;

Methodological naturalism is just applying a working theory to ontological naturalism, as to discern it's validity. I don't see how, if this is the case, ontological naturalism is any less scientific.

There's an interesting lecture that William James gave on a related subject. FallenToReason quoted it a while back, but I don't recall the title.

http://atheistforums.org/thread-17937-po...#pid420042

The work in question is "The Will To Believe" by William James, being a lecture he gave in 1896. The paragraph cited is in section two of this copy. The point of the lecture may be helpful as well, so that one knows the terrain in advance.

"The Will to Believe" is a lecture by William James, first published in 1896, which defends, in certain cases, the adoption of a belief without prior evidence of its truth. In particular, James is concerned in this lecture about defending the rationality of religious faith even lacking sufficient evidence of religious truth.

James' central argument in "The Will to Believe" hinges on the idea that access to the evidence for whether or not certain beliefs are true depends crucially upon first adopting those beliefs without evidence. As an example, James argues that it can be rational to have unsupported faith in one's own ability to accomplish tasks that require confidence. Importantly, James points out that this is the case even for pursuing scientific inquiry. James then argues that like belief in one's own ability to accomplish a difficult task, religious faith can also be rational even if one at the time lacks evidence for the truth of one's religious belief.