Atheist VS Naturalist - the latter sounds more appealing to me...

[polymath257]

Uhm... Three does not neccesserily follow from two though, Bel.

Jus' sayin' is all.

Cheers,

Not at work.

If it excludes supernatural explanations, then no supernatural explanations will be found.

4) Doesn't follow from 3).

The point is that if we accept only methods which exclude the supernatural as determinant of truth, then we have pre-determined the kind of answer we will accept.

For some people, "that which can be demonstrated by science" = "that which is true." It works well in practice, but it begs the question.

Actually, science does NOT exclude supernatural explanations. What it excludes is explanations that cannot be tested.

In other words, it excludes any potential explanation if there can be no test, even in theory, that could show it to be wrong.

As an example, in physics, we might have a theory that predicts some measured quantity will have a value of 3.4 with an uncertainty of .2. If we then go and measure that quantity and it turns out to be 4.8, we have shown that theory to be wrong in this instance. Because of this, usually precision and testability are linked. But that isn't required.  For example, a theory might predict that a supernova should emit a certain amount of a certain type of radioactive nucleus. We can use spectroscopy to determine if that nucleus is present or not (although there might be a limit to how little we can detect). So that theory is testable: we can measure that quantity using spectroscopy and see if the theory works.

So, if you can come up with a testable supernatural explanation for *anything*, it could be a scientific hypothesis. We would then, of course, conduct the test to see if it holds up.

What that would mean is having some 'supernatural explantion' that makes a prediction that we can actually go out and do something to see whether that prediction is true or not AND if it is not, it brings the theory into question.

THIS is all science requires. Now, IN PRACTICE, nobody has been able to come up with such an explanation that is testable in this way. So, as yet, there have been no supernatural explanations that would be acceptable to science.

But, if an explanation is NOT testable in any way, why should we accept it as an explanation at all?

---

But.. it's doesn't 'Exclude' supernatural explanations Bel.

Really, it doesn't.

The scientific method works with things that can be studied through repeated empirical evidence. 

Therefore, things which never repeat and can't be shown through empirical evidence can't be subjects for science. 

Okay, lets try something.

Can you give a cognizant definition of what "Suprenatural 'Is'.

Not what the word 'Supernatural' means... But "What is (The) Supernatural" ?

Then, perhaps, we'll be closer to being on the same page?

Cheers.

Not at work. 

Everything has a nature. Its nature is what it is and does. Frogs have a frog nature. They are and do what frogs do. It is not in a frog's nature to sing "Là ci darem la mano." If a frog started to do this, it would be outside of -- "over" -- the frog's nature. That's what supernatural means. 

Garbage. if a frog started to do this, we would just say that some frogs are able to do it and investigate how and why.

But the deeper problem is that talking about things having a 'nature' smacks of Aristotelian philosophy, which really should be put to bed by now.