At Facebook, Matthew Bell asks,
Given that science operations on methodological naturalism, i.e, ” a methodological principle within the context of scientific inquiry; i.e., all hypotheses and events are to be explained and tested by reference to natural causes and events” how is it not the case that science has already made up its mind about what kinds of things and events exist before it even begins its work?
The two biggest problems are first, that one would have no way of knowing within the system when it had failed. (If you don’t believe that, check out this completely ridiculous New York Times article on religion.)
Second, any explanation that supports methodological naturalism, no matter how ridiculous, must be preferred to any better non-naturalist one. Case in point: Any fatuous explanation of religion (again, see the link above) must be preferred to an explanation that proposes the possibility of an encounter with the divine—no matter what the state of the evidence.
“Evolutionary psychology” is an entire pseudodiscipline that testifies to this problem. A showcase for crackpots, especially on the subject of religion.
The only good thing about it is that the practitioners deserve themselves.