http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor#Science_and_the_scientific_method

"In science, Occam's Razor is used as a heuristic (rule of thumb) to guide scientists in the development of theoretical models rather than as an arbiter between published models.[8][9] In physics, parsimony was an important heuristic in the formulation of special relativity by Albert Einstein,[36][37] the development and application of the principle of least action by Pierre Louis Maupertuis and Leonhard Euler,[38] and the development of quantum mechanics by Max Planck, Werner Heisenberg and Louis de Broglie.[9][39] In chemistry, Occam's Razor is often an important heuristic when developing a model of a reaction mechanism.[40][41]"

You are pointing the finger and saying I am ignorant yet you dismiss Occams razor in ignorance of its application to the scientific method. According to the principle of parsimony I do have an argument but it appears you can't be bothered to consider what I am saying. This is an intellectual laziness which seems to typify our culture today. It is an apathetic reasoning process that sees everything through the lens of stereotypes and generalities. If I am wrong about that I will happily admit it, and you still have ample opportunity to establish otherwise.

For a science teacher he's pretty terrible at the scientific method. This is an attention grab, not an experiment.

It always slightly amazes me that the fact that little maxim works both ways is lost on most people. Sorcerers (well the good ones anyway) invented the scientific method, it can be just as appropriate to regard science as very advanced sorcery as you have done here. (modern science most certainly doesn't have a monopoly on "deductive truth" at any rate)

Then again I guess a lot of people get hung up on the superstitious nonsense most people associate with sorcery/magik these days.

Their loss!

I do have some anger issues-The crux of that issue perhaps possibly, my perception that I might be living in an era of mass-hypnotism of the planet's inhabitants through technologies envisioned originally to afford power now hi-jacked (and historically so) by charlatans posing as world leaders?

Another obvious turd lodged in my craw? How about a social-evolutionary path akin to Bradbury's "Fahrenheit" or Orwell's "84" turning an entire continent of what formerly consisted of self-determined, practical, and classically educated hard-working sorts into a cast of extras from "Idiocracy?"

Yeah, it pisses me off that so many people are distracted by what they are being told about some illusory process in which the common citizen might take part to imagine some bright future for mankind falling somewhere between the golden rule and the code of Hammurabi. The planet is being hi-jacked by a new breed of criminals frighteningly similar to the most egregious of old-For everything there is a season my friend, Solomon's wisdom in Ecclesiastes 3 it just as pertinent today as it will be for humans for the next 10,000 years-"a time to kill and heal, a time to break down, and a time to build up."

I'd like to imagine the new-construction-upon-the-ashes to include projects both organic and nano-technological in nature with the transformation of our specie's bodies, minds, souls and spirits as a prime objective.

You are living in these wonderful and frightening times, consider this incarnation your most favorable having been born when, where, how, why, and what you are-You are an amazing collection of cellular consciousness manifest in the wonder of flesh.
It's pretty fucking cool actually, and these are the ideas upon which I try to meditate upon every waking hour.

Oh yeah, and I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore, Hail Satan, Hail Eris, Jesus Saves.


(BTW, to answer your inquiry as to the "knowledge" that administrations keep in the dirty-little-secrets folder? Do you really have to ask about need-to-know information that would end the lives of yourself and everyone you know, because that's what the United States can do for you alla-Hoover, alla-Bush, alla-New World Order Über Alles.
What you think you know you don't, and you can't form an opinion or come to a conclusion on a subject for which you have incomplete data with which to arrive at those opinions or conclusions. Simple deductive reasoning or even a pragmatic model of the scientific method should make this screamingly clear to anyone who distrusts the anemically hostile Babylonian system .

Always trips me out. The scientific method-man in me recalls now it's about one in every twenty-five cats???

He means GOD, the maker of science. Or the scientific method. One of those -- or both, but in a hippy, anti-anti-transhumanist "ehhhh it's all in my head right why i needs ta explain it I LOVE IPHONES and I'm over it and death makes nihilism plausibly romantic."

That.

I truly admire Richard Dawkins, but the question is philosophical, and the way he answered that question is nothing to look up to.

Most religious people believe in a "higher power" for pragmatic reasons as well, it's emotionally comforting for them, and gives them a sense of purpose. If pragmatism was enough, religion could justify its faith in god the same way.

For example, one of the twelve steps for recovering addicts is "recognizing a higher power". Whether or not that's factually true, the belief is therapeutically useful.

I think a better answer should go along the lines of establishing what "justify" means, then explaining that the alternative, NOT believing in the scientific method, allows knowledge to be arbitrary, or impossible.

At least that's how a philosopher of science would start to answer that question, but I guess "It works, bitches" makes for a better sound bite.

If only our feeble experiments in psychology actually got us much closer to an answer. Unfortunately, psychology is a bit of a quasi-science where the scientific method doesn't apply (but yet it should - they just conveniently forget about it all too often).

@criticalthud
Yeah, I've been accused of that, but I blame that on the "arguing on the internet" aspect of things, rather than my actual mindset. For instance, as much as I talk up Medical Science, I still don't trust doctors, and in the last 10 years, have only visited to A) get a Physical Examination required by a job, B) get a prescription for a PT, C) Get innoculated for one of the bird/swine flu, as I had been sick for a week after spending a weekend at a "Gamer Convention" (PAX), where there were many confirmed cases.

But, while I don't trust doctors, I actively campaign against "Alternative Medicine", as I've seen many people hurt by it. I've seen one person poison themselves after getting food poisoning, because "like cures like", and I've had one friend commit suicide after they were convinced that the anti-psychotic medicine they were taking wasn't "natural", and quit it.

Whenever I think of alternative medicine practitioners and their criticism of Proper Medicine, I have one quote that sticks in my head, courtesy of The Big Lebowski:
"You're not wrong, Walter. You're just an asshole"

Sure, Medical Science can be improved. But you can't improve it by removing the science. You improve it by removing the politics. Remove the kickbacks from big pharma. Remove the groveling and begging for research funds. Remove the Actual Politics of Insurance and Medicare and Medicaid and VA Benefits. Remove the Actual Politics of the 'War on Drugs".

Those are the problems in our current medical community. But rather than attempting to solve the actual problems that we all agree on, most naturopaths are just treating the symptoms... working on the edges of society, and contributing to the distrust of the individual doctors, rather than the overhaul of the entire system.

And there are certainly many types of naturopaths. Of those that I've met (my wife spent three years in a "Traditional Western Herbalism" school, so I've met quite a few), most have problems differentiating between an idea and a fact. An unsettling amount believed that herbalism is effective because the ancient aliens that brought us to earth also brought us a dramatic and intelligent plant-system which was created to diagnose and treat all of our illnesses.

They believe that through meditation, they are able to connect to this awareness, and this awareness is what will tell them what to give their patients.


It's not the individuals I have a problem with, it's their poor education that I have a problem with. Some NPs can overcome the disadvantage of their environment that de-values scientific method and fact-gathering. Many MDs can overcome the disadvantage of years of de-valuing their own intuition.

But acknowledging the similarities between the two ignores the actual harm that is caused by alternative medicine. Alternative medicine shares the same risks as Proper Medicine, with the same chances of mis-treatment.... but it removes any chance of surgery or active treatment to cure issues. It removes the huge base of shared understanding, and replaces it with a very small base of folklore that has been accumulated through "give the patient this plant, if they don't die, it must have cured them".

You're right, Messenger..in a pragmatic sense it is a good assumption to make. However, the conclusion that the scientific method is justified doesn't follow from that assumption, and that is the point of this video.

When you say "we don't know, but maybe we will someday" it reminds me of this quote:

"For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountain of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries."

Robert Jastrow

The straw man argument is that you claim/imply that someone claims that the laws of nature will always be the same, and so forth, then you say that that's not a possible claim to make. But nobody claims any such thing.

I didn't claim or imply anyone did..I was pointing out that Dawkins failed to justify the scientific method because he did not overcome the problem of induction. I then further elucidated the argument by pointing out what the problem of induction is, and why pragmatism could not be justified in light of it.

If the underlying intent behind the question is: "

Listen carefully to what the man is asking and the responses; they're speaking in philosophical terms. The questioner is asking about justification, and Dawkins understood exactly what he meant when he framed the question as "what justifies the faith that science will give us the truth?" This is exactly the intent behind the question. It's a philosophical question, and Dawkins gave an inductive argument as an answer.."it works", but the inductive argument has its own issues which I have already pointed out.

Science has worked incredibly well so far within its domain, so I'm curious why you think there's any reason to even raise the possibility it won't continue to work in the future.

I believe that science will continue to work until the end of time, because there is a God who upholds His lawfully ordered Universe. This isn't really about whether science will work in the future; it's more about the nature and basis for truth claims. Empiricists claim, for instance, that knowledge only comes from sense experience. Empiricism is of course the cornerstone of the scientific method. Because most atheists trust in science to explain the world to them, they are empiricists by default and they think empirical evidence is the measure of everything that is true and real.

In a round about way, this is getting at the core reason for the question. It's cutting to the heart of a major problem that people have, which is that they are only skeptical to a point. They fail to see the assumptions inherent in their own worldview, or that they even have a worldview.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_view

Everyone makes certain assumptions about reality, consciously or unconsciously, in order to function in it. This is something we have discussed before. You think it is unreasonable that you should ever have to justify something like your existence. I happen to agree with you here; it's completely pointless to argue about whether you exist or not. I don't think you should be skeptical of your own existence, and therefore it is justifiable to make that leap. This is an assumption you must make, and there are many more..such as the world is real. That, for instance, the Universe didn't pop into existence 5 seconds ago and all of our memories are false. You must assume that your history is real, and that the people you are meeting are not actors like in the Truman show. All of this sorts out to form the foundations, or basic beliefs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_belief) of your worldview. A world view is like a pair of glasses you put on to interpret reality. My worldview is Christian, for instance..I interpret everything through the revelation of God. Most atheists are naturalists and so their worldview is naturalistic atheism. They interpret everything in natural terms, but this is also informed by their lack of belief in a God. A belief in God or a lack thereof is the cipher which will determine everything you believe about the nature of reality. It is the one truth that informs all other truths.

But here is where things go wrong, and why the question is necessary. People assume things about the nature of reality, and about logic, morality, and science which they cannot justify, and then they falsify truth claims on those topics with reasoning based on those assumptions. For instance, people will say that something isn't real unless there is empirical evidence for it, but this is based on the unjustified assumption that empirical testing is the only method for determining the truth. They will justify this claim like Dawkins justified the scientific method "science works therefore empirical testing". But pointing to the results to justify the assumption is logically fallacious reasoning. I could get out of debt rather quickly by murdering all of my creditors, but if I promoted this to you as a sound debt management plan, would you agree that being debt free justified the assumption inherent in the premise, that murder is acceptable? If you wouldn't, then you can see why no one should agree with the idea that because we sent a man to the moon, the scientific method has been justified. Results don't justify anything; the methodology used to get the results must itself be justified by a higher reasoning process. The idea empirical testing is the only way to obtain truth itself must be empirically tested; and how do you empirically test that idea? This is where the inductive argument completely fails.

Unfortunately for most people their skepticism has already turned off long ago and they are blind to the leaps of logic they make in their own reasoning process. They are only skeptical of what challenges the core assumptions of their worldview, not the assumptions themselves, and they evaluate all truth claims through these assumptions. It would be like if I wore glasses that saw only two colors and you wore glasses that saw three. Everything you told me about seeing three colors I would evaluate in terms of seeing two. I would be utterly blind to the third color because of my assumption that only two were possible. No matter how articulate your argument was, unless you could get me to take off those glasses (put down the assumption that only 2 colors were possible) I would never see it.

So this is the essence of the question..why should we trust science for the truth and not something else? To answer that we must challenge the assumptions that make science possible and see if they are coherent with reality.

I'm not sure what straw man you're seeing in my argument..could you point it out to me?

The question the man asked was how do you justify the scientific method..or, as dawkins said at :38 "how do justify your faith that science will give you the truth"

Here is the essential question: why is there uniformity in nature? Or, why are the laws of nature constant? This is the fundamental assumption that is made in every scientific test, which is that the laws of nature will continue to be constant in the future. Without that assumption science would not be possible.

Dawkins response to his question is pragmatism; it's justified because it works. Well, that doesn't provide any basis for justification. It works now, but why should it work in the future?

What you've appealed to in your reply is probability. You're saying it's more probable that the laws will remain constant because of the vast record we have of unchanging constancy. The problem is that it's still begging the question..what is the reason that probability will tell us what the future will be like? The best you could say is that it always has in the past, but you couldn't tell me why it should continue to do so in the future.

science is self correcting... its not a logical fallacy to say "it works", because producing results is what science is concerned with... and testing hypotheses, which is NEVER ENDING...

If two models agree with observation, neither one can be considered more real than the other. A person can use whichever model is more convenient in the situation under consideration."

All of science assumes there is such a thing as uniformity in nature. If tomorrow the laws of physics stopped working science couldn't self-correct that..it would become useless. The question was, what justifies the scientific method..and pragmatism doesn't justify it. You have to be able to answer why it will continue to work without using a logical fallacy to justify it.

you will run into limits with a faith based system which the scientific method will accelerate by due to use of logic and model-dependent realism.

In the case of Christianity, there aren't any limits. It was because of the Christian assumption that there is a Lawgiver who created an orderly Universe based on laws which helped birth the scientific method in the first place. Now science still operates with the assumption of an orderly Universe based on laws, but it denies the Lawgiver that created them without explaining why they should exist in the first place.

simple, no??? what do i win?? eternal torment in this form by having to exist with ignorant animals who deny their true existence?? Cool... somedays i wish i hadnt bit that apple, but it is done... and i take some comfort knowing that reincarnation is literally true for the physical world, but this planet is getting a little crowded ill never see the end or the start all i am is a middle... when can i sleep eternal...

Are you of the Hindu faith? Why do you believe in reincarnation?

You're making a straw man argument.

The "evidence" that the future will be like the past is the past itself. It's not proof. The seasons changing every year for all of recorded history doesn't prove that they will continue to do so, but any person planning a ski trip would be wise to make it in the winter. There is no presupposition whatsoever that nothing will change in the future, just an expectation based on the past that it probably won't, as with the seasons.

If any model has consistently made accurate predictions about the future, it is reasonable to assume that it will continue doing so. This is not an absolute statement that science is right, but rather an absolute statement that the scientific method has proven useful for explaining nature to such an astonishing degree that you're wiser to question whether the summer will come than whether the scientific method will continue to prove itself correct.

science is self correcting... its not a logical fallacy to say "it works", because producing results is what science is concerned with... and testing hypotheses, which is NEVER ENDING... something inherently without end and self referencing surely is confusing, but the scientific method builds on observation... so what? Well, maybe this will put it in terms one can understand:

"Adopt a view -- model-dependent realism -- the idea that a physical theory or world picture is a model (generally of a mathematical nature) and a set of rules that connect the elements of the model to observations. According to model-dependent realism, it is pointless to ask whether a model is real, only whether it agrees with observation. If two models agree with observation, neither one can be considered more real than the other. A person can use whichever model is more convenient in the situation under consideration."


you will run into limits with a faith based system which the scientific method will accelerate by due to use of logic and model-dependent realism.

simple, no??? what do i win?? eternal torment in this form by having to exist with ignorant animals who deny their true existence?? Cool... somedays i wish i hadnt bit that apple, but it is done... and i take some comfort knowing that reincarnation is literally true for the physical world, but this planet is getting a little crowded ill never see the end or the start all i am is a middle... when can i sleep eternal...