Occams Hatchet and Is Materialism "Special"

[Arkilogue]

I bet you think that means something.

Well, the usual suspects are all here, at least.  

It means we are capable of making our dreams or nightmares come true.

[Whateverist]

I subscribe to methodological naturalism (or materialism I suppose). I find no need to assume the testable world is all there is. But for all practical purposes, anything untestable can be ignored. You don't have any choice, in fact.

Well that pretty much rules out the arts and humanities.

I don't see why you'd assume that a methodological naturalist must be uninformed by literature, history or philosophy.  I believe he would only employ that method when pursuing answers to empirical questions.  Anything at all might might influence the empirical questions which become of interest.  Where allegorical meaning is concerned the method would simply not apply.

[The Grand Nudger]

More pedantically, the method still applies regardless of whether people agree with the metrics.  I can say (of joyce and literature).  "I define x y and z as the mtrics for "best" or "allegorical meaning"".  I can then test, the very real and very material body of his work..to see if it satisfies.

Now, someone can come along and say "I don;t think that those are the right metrics", but the method is hardly at fault there. Trying to figure out -why- a given person assigns x y and z as a metric in the first place, equally amenable to the method (and constantly done - it's a profitable industry). The truth of the matter, and I;m sure someone™ could dispute this as well, is that some people think of art as immaterial. They bring it up because this is so obvious to them that they do not feel the need to elaborate or place qualifiers. Thus, materialism means art is out the window. Those people, like usual, are uninformed and uncritical. It's a rationalization meant to buttress their beliefs, not an appraisal of art or materialism.

[Whateverist]

Yeah, but that would be pretty uninteresting as well as pedantic.  The world of ideas is bigger than science and there is no need to inject it where it isn't the best tool.  It would be a shame if one over-applied it to the degree that it actually narrowed one's perspective.  Over-reliance on science, at its worst, becomes a kind of appeal to authority .. which so cuts against the grain of what it is intended to be.


From a google search without actually opening a link.

conservapedia:  Methodological naturalism is a strategy for studying the world, ..

rationalwiki:  Methodological naturalism is the label for the required assumption of philosophical naturalism when working with the scientific method.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yeah, but that would be pretty uninteresting as well as pedantic.  The world of ideas is bigger than science and there is no need to inject it where it isn't the best tool.  It would be a shame if one over-applied it to the degree that it actually narrowed one's perspective.  Over-reliance on science, at its worst, becomes a kind of appeal to authority .. which so cuts against the grain of what it is intended to be.


From a google search without actually opening a link.

conservapedia:  Methodological naturalism is a strategy for studying the world, ..

rationalwiki:  Methodological naturalism is the label for the required assumption of philosophical naturalism when working with the scientific method.

IDK, scientific assessments of why pop music is so popular could be pretty interesting.   The world of ideas is big, but "bigger than science" is an empty phrase.  What does it mean to be bigger?  That science hasn't answered some question, or that it can't?  Would you know which is which?  Are you sure that the question is properly formed?

Science isn't about authorities, it's an appeal to evidence and testable, repeatable demonstrations.  An "over reliance" on it...again, an empty phrase, would be an over relaiance on what it is, not what people wish (or do not wish) for it to be (such as an appeal to authority). Just as the problems of materialism are what they are, not what people import upon them as straw effigies.

In any case, art can be -and has been- studied scientifically, it;s not immune. So if there are questions out there which science cant (not hasn't, can't) answer, or questions for which science is not an appropriate tool...it isn't one of them. It falls -well- within the remit of the method and the pursuit. It's demonstrable. Testable. Repeatable. Material. The current status of advertising is nothing other than the scientific pursuit of commercially successful art. It seems to be producing results.

[The Grand Nudger]

-as an addendum to the above.  When an artist studies art theory or art history, formally or informally, what are they doing other than engaging in science as it applies to art?  I do, btw, understand the sentiments of separation, I really do.  I don't concern myself much about science when I appreciate a painting...but I do realize that some people do, that it can be and has been done.  That the pursuit is valuable and informative, even if not to me or my immediate appreciation of the medium....though some behaviorist out there will tell you that this, too, is an empty statement.  It is important to me, I just don't know why or how.

There's more than just "me like painting, me no like painting" going on, and in this context it's hard to see why science would be an improper or unreliable tool...even for that thing we put on the pedestal called "art". Just google "why do we like pop music" for a demonstration. You'll be buried in links to research papers very much into the science, of art.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Well that pretty much rules out the arts and humanities.

....lol.....why?  Art and humanity exist, and are both material......If you want to know whether or not the mona lisa exists, or whether or not james joyce wrote the greatest novel ever written - it's fairly simple to devise a test.  This is the kind of claim that leaves me wondering what the opponents of materialism think materialism is.  It suggests, to me, that their objections are likely to be a long list of non-sequiturious arguments from consequence and ignorance.

"We don't know this, we can't explain that...this other thing I like -i think- would be affected!"
So what, so what....and so what?

Maybe because proponents of materialism are vague and slippery about what is and isn't included in their theories. All they do is just repeat that everything is material, material, material, then try to sneak intentionality in through the back door by redefining it down.

[The Grand Nudger]

Sure they do, that couldn't possibly be yet more straw, could it?

Do you know how tiring it gets,. watching the lot of you air out your grievances with some other x and then -pretend- that you're even discussing materialism.....? I keep thinking that someday, we'll hear what your bone with materialism actually is, rather than all of that other x, but that day never comes, now does it?

[Neo-Scholastic]

Then maybe your could help me out. In your version of materialism what is a song made of?

[The Grand Nudger]

Would a discussion of musical theory or the nature of sound somehow elucidate the materialist position for you?  No, you're just wasting our time.  Get to the moneyshot.  
"Songs are immaterial"

hur dur.  You couldn't really believe that every materialist who's ever lived, in all the world... didn't notice music, didn't notice sound or noise.  Didn't notice that their existence makes their materialist worldview untenable....didn't -have- explanations for either sound or music.  Couldn't even discuss either subject without ambiguity. That there was no functioning mechanical and physical explanation for the noises people and instruments make and how we arrange them together........ That you, Chad W. Ooters, here at AF...with the brilliant objection to materialism, of music....have finally put the nail in that coffin.  

Could you?