Why? Doesn’t that speak poorly of the powers of the scientific method?
From Jeff Tollefson, Lauren Morello& Sara Reardon at Nature:
Republican businessman and reality-television star Donald Trump will be the United States’ next president. Although science played only a bit part in this year’s dramatic, hard-fought campaign, many researchers expressed fear and disbelief as Trump defeated former secretary of state Hillary Clinton on 8 November.
“Trump will be the first anti-science president we have ever had,” says Michael Lubell, director of public affairs for the American Physical Society in Washington DC. “The consequences are going to be very, very severe.”
Trump has questioned the science underlying climate change — at one point suggesting that it was a Chinese hoax — and pledged to pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement.
Although he has offered few details on policies for biomedical research, Trump said last year that he has heard “terrible” things about the US National Institutes of Health; he has also derided NASA as a “logistics agency for low-Earth orbit activity“, and said he would expand the role of the commercial space industry in the US space programme. More.
Et cetera yada.
This is not a political blog so I (O’Leary for News) will do no more than suggest that if the “stunned” had spent less time preening and more time examining the problems of the American electorate as the electorate perceives them, they might have avoided the “fear and disbelief.”
One suspects they don’t have many friends down there and acting snooty won’t make them any more.
Point of possible interest: I have a news desk at a Canadian site where an ID sympathizer approached me last year and said, Trump is going to be president. Give me space and I will call every contest right for you. He did, including last night. Does that mean that ID would be more useful in making predictions about human behaviour? [No, no, human behaviour is all an accident!]
See also: Stephen Hawking disappointed by Brexit
Follow UD News at Twitter!
Trump is anti-science?
He may appear a little crazy and is definitely eccentric (which no doubt helped him win over boring and predictable Clinton), but he is not stupid. Let me assure you of that.
He may be the first president who will have no problem detecting nonsense science, since he, as a businessman, had to detect nonsense business opportunities fairly easily.
True science and true scientists have nothing to worry about, which puts Darwinists in the riding seat, again!
😉
From AAAS:
After the Election: What Now for Science Funding and Policy?
Dear Colleague,
What happens now?
Join Science/AAAS on November 14 for an online discussion of the election results and their impact on science funding and policy.
Register now for this informative webinar, moderated by AAAS CEO Rush Holt and featuring AAAS COO Celeste Rohlfing, former House Science and Technology Committee Chairman Bart Gordon and Natural Resources Defense Council Director of Government Affairs David Goldston, for an insightful discussion of the postelection landscape and what it means for science funding and policy.
as to:
“Trump will be the first anti-science president we have ever had,” says Michael Lubell, director of public affairs for the American Physical Society in Washington DC. “The consequences are going to be very, very severe.”,,,
Methinks the good professor is confusing his naturalistic philosophy with science. Contrary to what the good professor may sincerely believe, it would be hard to imagine a more anti-scientific worldview than his base naturalistic worldview has, in fact, turned out to be.
Let us be VERY clear to the fact that ALL of science, every discipline within science, is dependent on basic Theistic presuppositions about the rational intelligibility of the universe and the ability of our mind to comprehend that rational intelligibility.,,,
Moreover, if we cast aside those basic Theistic presuppositions about the rational intelligibility of the universe and the ability of our mind to comprehend that rational intelligibility, and try to use naturalism, i.e. methodological naturalism, as our basis for understanding the universe, and for practicing science, then everything within that atheistic/naturalistic worldview, (i.e. supposed evidence for Darwinian evolution, observations of reality, beliefs about reality, sense of self, free will, even reality itself), collapses into self refuting, unrestrained, flights of fantasy and imagination.
Methodological naturalism, the axiom of Materialism as it is applied to modern science, i.e. only materialistic/naturalistic answers are ever allowed, is the primary method of science taught in American universities. Yet, Materialism/Naturalism is not itself a finding of modern science but is merely a unproven philosophy that is a-priorily imposed onto science. A completely unproven philosophy which makes the dogmatic assertion that only blind material processes generated the universe and everything in it, including ourselves.
Materialism is thus in direct opposition to Theism which holds that God purposely created this universe and everything in it, including ourselves, i.e. holding that God created us in His image.
This dogmatic imposition of the philosophy of materialism, i.e. methodological naturalism, onto modern science is especially interesting since materialism had little to nothing to with the founding of modern science, but instead modern science was born out of the medieval Christian cultures of Europe by men who were by and large devoutly Christian in their beliefs. Specifically, they believed the universe to be rational and that they had minds capable of grasping that rationality.
Moreover science, or more particularly the scientific method, in reality, only cares to relentlessly pursue the truth and could care less if the answer turns out to be a materialistic one or not. Ironically, since truth itself is a transcendent entity which is not reducible to purely material/natural entity then Methodological Naturalism actually precludes ‘the truth’ from ever being reached by science!
Imposing materialistic answers onto the scientific method beforehand, methodological naturalism, is especially problematic in these questions of origins, since we are indeed questioning the materialistic philosophy itself. i.e. We are asking the scientific method to answer this very specific question, “Did God create the universe and us or did blind material processes create the universe and us?” When we realize that this is the actual question we are seeking an answer to within the scientific method, then of course it is readily apparent we cannot impose strict materialistic answers onto the scientific method prior to investigation.
When looking at the evidence from modern science in this light we find out many interesting things which scientists, who have been blinded by the philosophy of materialism, miss.
This is because the materialistic and Theistic philosophy make, and have made, several contradictory predictions about what type of science evidence we will find.
These contradictory predictions, and the evidence we have found by modern science, can be tested against one another to see if either materialism or Theism is true.
Here are a few comparisons:
As you can see when we remove the artificial imposition of the materialistic philosophy (methodological naturalism), from the scientific method, and look carefully at the predictions of both the materialistic philosophy and the Theistic philosophy, side by side, we find the scientific method is very good at pointing us in the direction of Theism as the true explanation. – In fact science is even very good at pointing us to Christianity as the solution to the much sought after ‘theory of everything’
That Christianity should provide an empirically backed solution to the much sought out “Theory of Everything”, i.e. a primary reason for why the universe exists, should not really be all that surprising since, number 1, modern science was born out of the Christian worldview, and, number 2, the belief that there should even be a unification between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, (i.e. a mathematical theory of everything), does not follow from the math, but is a belief that is born out of Theistic presuppositions (S. Fuller), and, number 3, Christianity ‘predicts’ that “in him all things were created”
An example of a different approach to gathering and analyzing data?
https://www.wired.com/2016/11/trump-polling-data/?mbid=nl_11916_p3&CNDID=44828754
J-Mac at 2: The Darwinists have the riding seat on a bucking bronco.
Dean from Ohio at 5: I (News) responded here: No need to apologize. You are obsolete.
Donald Trump vows to cancel Paris agreement and stop all payments to UN climate change fund
One of the reasons I voted for him.
Folks,
We must recall science is too often a code word for ideological, lab coat clad evolutionary materialism.
As Lewontin inadvertently exposed.
KF
PS: As in NYRB, Jan 1997:
PPS: Johnson’s reply:
Just for fun I did a little web-research on that title, looking for commentaries and reviews. What do scientific materialists have to say about it?
Non-statistical results show that 90% of the hits that come up in the first dozen of pages or so are from creationists/theists/IDists.
Of the very few references from those who would be friendly to Lewontin’s worldview, I found only one who superficially agreed with it (just an anti-religious attitude, not realizing the forceful ideology of Lewontin’s view), and the rest all basically saying “Lewontin is wrong”.
I’m not sure how to interpret that. It could be that most materialists want to co-exist with belief in God, and that Lewontin was just an extreme outlier who wanted to destroy all spiritual belief.
Or it could be that people don’t like seeing their worldview exposed so bluntly like that and they want to cover it up with a more tolerant attitude.
SA,
Lewontin is so eminent that he counts as an expert witness being blunt. So, it credibly is: not being too happy to have the cat let out of the bag (that should have had a piglet in it).
To see just how representative his point is, let us see what the US National Science Teachers Association [NSTA] have said in their official statement of 2000; which in effect ideologically redefines science in the exact context of education vs indoctrination — in a notorious July 2000 Board declaration:
The US National Academy of Science is simply subtler, but says much the same. Here, we may see this in a 2008 version of a long running pamphlet on teaching evolution:
Such are the ideologically driven indoctrination tactics being resorted to at the highest institutional levels directly relevant to popular, school level and lower division college education in origins science (where of course, much the same will be implicit in more advanced studies). Such bears out Lewontin’s point about a priori ideological imposition.
We need to do some sobering re-thinking i/l/o what Lewontin exposed.
KF
PS: Just for fun, let us rewrite the US NAS statement to better conform to the historic understanding of sciendce and its methods:
Notice, how different in force that becomes?
Have blind chance and/or mechanical necessity ever been seen to account for origin of life, or for the FSCO/I required for such?
For, the origin of body plans requiring 10 – 100+ million bases of fresh genetic information?
Or just for FSCO/I in any form?
(On trillions of cases FSCO/I reliably comes about by intelligently directed configuration, comments in this thread being trivial additional cases in point. The vera causa-plausible best so far explanation for OOL and OO Body plans, then — on the required FSCO/I — is, design. This does not then close off investigation, it invites reverse engineering and application, e.g. to molecular nanotech and to kinematic self replicator based rebooting of industrial civilisation, creation of an open source industrial “global village construction set” [Cf Marcin Jakubowski] and renewal of development thence solar system colonisation across the next 100 years. An accompanying technology to be researched and developed is manageable fusion. I suspect Bussard’s polywell technology is worth at least some further exploration. A successful Bussard drive could get us to the gas giant moons in 74 days. So much for the science stopper talking point, that is a considerable research programme with extensions to development transformation even if only partially successful. Given the energy sources and climate trend concerns context, I suggest a re-look at pebble bed modular fission reactor and molten salt thorium reactor technologies would be well worth exploring as ways forward on serious scale energy. I also like some of the approaches to digester based bio-fuels, cf Holtzapple. Algae oil may well be a significant source of oil deposits and algae fuel may be another potentially significant payoff. Butanol, today, is directly compatible with Otto cycle, 4-stroke engines, and FAME based biodiesel is a similar answer for trucks. Fuel cell technologies, esp. those capable of running on alcohols, are also worth a look for transformation of transportation and portable equipment generally. And much more.)
KF – good points.
There’s a lot that can be said here. As you pointed out, science is about finding the best explanations. Even if we took Lewontin’s view that science is the only begetter of truth, we’d have to assume then that there are no supernatural truths.
Beyond this, ID remains successful even within an entirely materialist paradigm. ID can point to a non-naturalist cause but all of the evidence that leads to that conclusion is captured within naturalism. It’s just saying that there are causes that go beyond what naturalism can produce.
Lewontin and others will deny that, with no evidence to support their position. How do they know that there are no supernatural causes?
So, I consider that ID does not have to change science as it is done today. ID can work successfully in an entirely materialist science. All of the data and observations that support ID come from material nature. The conclusion that there is a non-natural cause for design follows from the failure of naturalism to provide the best explanation.
Non-theistist (not anti-theists) should be open to this very thing. For any mystery in science where the answer is “we don’t know”, the possiblity of an intelligent designer should remain available. Cutting that off on an a priori basis is the anti-theist bias that we see in Lewontin and his followers.
News, I’m sorry for not making my last comment more sarcastic. I guess I’m gettin old…
Yes, Darwinists have had the riding seat on a bucking bronco for over 150 years… and nothing happened and THEY believe nothing will change, because they have been able to get away “with murder” for that long…
I only wonder how that was possible since until recently the dominating nations in science were religious…some still are…
If you were THE DESIGNER, who you and I believe exists, what do you think HE is going to do (should do) to the arrogant people who claim HE doesn’t exist?
I would suggest that every time that quote from Richard Lewontin’s is cited it should be considered against the entry on Naturalism in the online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
If it is unclear what is meant by “natural”, how is it any clearer to refer to the “supernatural”? For those that believe in the supernatural, perhaps they can give examples of that they mean by supernatural and why they classify them in that way?
Seversky, do you believe you have a mind and/or soul? If so, would you claim that your mind and/or soul is natural or supernatural? The common definition is that your mind and/or soul is a supernatural entity that is not reducible to material, i.e. ‘natural’, explanation. Indeed, as the plethora of Near Death Experiences testify, your mind and/or soul is a ‘supernatural’ entity that is capable of living beyond the death of your material, i.e. natural, body.
Moreover, since the mind and/or soul is a real entity that produces real effects on the material body, and since science can investigate anything that is real, then this ‘supernatural’ entity of the mind and/or soul is very much open to scientific investigation. Indeed, this ‘supernatural’ mind and/or soul finds abundant support in empirical science, especially with the recent advent of quantum biology (among many other lines of evidence).
notes:
What Penrose and Hameroff are referring to is the fact that in quantum mechanics it is quantum information that is primarily conserved, and not necessarily energy and matter that are primarily conserved, as energy and matter are primarily conserved in classical mechanics: (November 2016)
http://www.uncommondescent.com.....ent-620372
Sev, I actually agree on the vagueness of the term, naturalism. That’s a big part of why I normally use a descriptive term, one anchored to Lewontin’s own words, and further anchored all the way back to Plato in The Laws, Bk X. Namely, evolutionary materialism. From hydrogen to humans by blind chance and/or mechanical necessity. Where, “natural” can then be identified with Monod’s chance and necessity, and the ART-ificial can be contrasted. Especially intelligence acting by art to effect intended configurations. It is clear from US NAS and NSTA Board, not just Lewontin, that there is imposition of a priori ideological evolutionary materialism, which has exchanged philosophical robes for lab coats. As my adjusted version of the NAS shows, take the loading out and a very different balance obtains. KF
PS: The false dichotomy, natural vs supernatural then falls to the ground. The relevant issue — as Plato put on the table — is chance and necessity vs art.
PPS: As for definitionitis, start with defining life and natural and mind per precising definition, then we can go on to the implied contrasts. Plato talked in terms of accident and phusis, arguing that the latter runs into serious problems as used by his opponents even in his day. His core contrast is the intentional based on intelligent action by the self-moved — art — and that which comes by a causal chain from mechanical necessity and/or chance.
bornagain77 @ 18
I believe I have a conscious mind which is what I’m using now. It’s difficult to say about the “soul” because it seems to be a rather fuzzy concept. Different people seem to have different ideas about what it is. I don’t think the mind is supernatural in any meaningful sense even though we don’t have a materialist/physicalist account of it yet
To the extent that any phenomenon has an observable effect in the natural world it is a naturalistic phenomenon. It may be deeply mysterious to us at this time but that only makes it unexplained not inexplicable or supernatural.
kairosfocus @ 19
I have no problem with a natural vs artificial dichotomy but it doesn’t make things much easier. We know artifice or design exists in the Universe because we do it. The problem is showing that there is artifice or design for which we weren’t responsible. In other words, you need a reliable means of distinguishing between not just the natural and human artefacts but the natural and alien artefacts. You may develop a metric which can discriminate between the natural and human artifice but without alien artefacts to test it on you have no way of knowing if it is universally applicable.
So Seversky, did ‘you’, using your conscious mind, write your post or did the laws of physics write your post and inform the illusion of you of the event after the fact? If you believe the laws of physics, coupled with ‘chance’, can create information, could you please provide an example of information creation that does not include an ‘illusory person’ creating that information?
Sev,
We practice science, in this case observational science on the past.
First, as we know designers exist, e.g. us, beavers, etc, we can explore empirically testable reliable signs of design.
These abound.
We then use the vera causa principle of Newton, and examine traces of things we did not make and notice the same signs, e.g. codes, complex messages using codes, associated functionally specific machinery.
the living cell is designed.
We infer to design.
Note, not to designer, much less a designer beyond the cosmos. That canard is part of a strawman argument.
Next, we look at the cosmos itself and see another strong sign of design: fine tuning that sets the cosmos at a fine tuned operating point relevant to c chem aqueous medium terrestrial planet cell based life forms.
A reasonable target.
This too points to design.
But this time, the design is clearly beyond our cosmos.
The real question is, is the design of a simulation or an actual physical world.
I plunk for real physical world, on many grounds.
this is basics, the real issue is to reverse engineer and understand the use of info and configuration in the systems, then to apply in our own systems.
Indutrial civ 2.0 based on self replicationg open source machinery here we come.
Development transformation.
Solar system colonisation.
Next 100 years agenda.
Nope not a science stopper, far from it!
KF