Now, you may think MN is unnecessary, or even unsound, for the practice of science. (Another time, I hope to discuss the surprising fact that many atheist scientists and philosophers disagree strongly with MN, when MN is proclaimed as an unconditional rule.) The National Academy, however, is not listening to you, nor are federal courts, nor are organizations such as the American Federation of Teachers — all official bodies whose remit includes defining “science” for academic practice and public policy, in matters such as curricula, funding decisions, employment, and peer review.
All right: we’ve put a serious problem on the table for discussion. It looks very much like the dialogue between Evolver and Designer, despite their apparent engagement of the same scientific questions — e.g., how did life start? — is not a genuine dialogue at all.
Paul Nelson, “Trapped in the Naturalistic Parabola” at Evolution News and Science Today
Methodological naturalism is a lazy thinker’s dream because you could never know if it wasn’t true.
This is the first of four parts from Paul Nelson.
The trap isn’t really a trap after you understand that it is a trap. Discussion is useless. I’m not sure it ever worked, but certainly it can’t work in the modern environment of academia and web. The sole purpose of discussion is to pull you away from plain truth and into trivial fake arguments over DETAILS.
There are only two rational choices. Remain silent, or present the truth in a passively available way, where it waits for discovery.
Even better, present an invitation to perform real experiments. Reality can’t lie, and reality can’t play Alinsky games.
If you have a better way of doing science then let’s hear it because answering every question by speculating that it must have been the will of the Designer does not get you anywhere.
Seversky, imposition of methodological naturalism is deceptive, oppressive ideology and anti-science as it rejects a first duty of reason, to seek truth. KF
Re: Seversky: If you have a better way of doing science then let’s hear it because answering every question by speculating that it must have been the will of the Designer does not get you anywhere.
It gets you into heaven. 😉
I’d say a better way to do science is to not pigeonhole it into one ideology which you happen to favor and to allow others to also do science and have a fair voice in the matter instead of forcing a singular ideology down everybody’s throat and then mocking them for their view
So I guess a better way to do science would be for the scientist to be far more open minded and then let the work speak it self
The demand from atheists that science must be limited to giving us only natural and/or material explanations is to violate the spirit of science in the most fundamental way possible. It is to, prior to any experimentation and/or investigation, claim that you already know what the answer to the experimentation and/or investigation will be, i.e. for the atheist, the answer in science will always be a material and/or natural cause no matter how badly the experimentation and/or investigation contradicts their hypothesis and/or axiom of naturalistic materialism.
More specifically, to claim that only material and/or natural explanations are permissible in science is to make naturalism in general, and Darwinian evolution in particular, impervious to falsification by experimentation.
Moreover, it is not as if Darwinism has not already been falsified time and time again. It is that Darwinists themselves simply refuse, because of the prior adherence to methodological naturalism, to ever accept any falsification of their theory.
Here are a few experimental falsifications of Darwin’s theory that simply count for nothing in the Darwinian mindset
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Moreover, trying to force materialistic and/or naturalistic answers onto science, no matter what the evidence says to the contrary, forces science itself into catastrophic epistemological failure.
As I have pointed out several times before, although the Darwinist firmly believes he is on the terra firma of science, (in his appeal, even demand, for methodological naturalism), the fact of the matter is that Darwinists are adrift in an ocean of fantasy and imagination with no discernible anchor for reality to grab on to:
Thus, although the Darwinian Atheist firmly believes he is on the terra firma of science (in his appeal, even demand, for methodological naturalism), the fact of the matter is that, when examining the details of his materialistic/naturalistic worldview, it is found that Darwinists/Atheists are adrift in an ocean of fantasy and imagination with no discernible anchor for reality to grab on to.
It would be hard to fathom a worldview more antagonistic to modern science, indeed more antagonistic to reality itself, than Atheistic materialism and/or methodological naturalism have turned out to be.
Moreover, contrary to what many people have been falsely led to believe by Darwinian atheists, about Intelligent Design supposedly being a pseudo-science, the fact of the matter is that all of science, every nook and cranny of it, is based on the presupposition of intelligent design and is certainly not based on the presupposition of methodological naturalism.
From the essential Christian presuppositions that undergird the founding of modern science itself, (namely that the universe is rational and that the minds of men, being made in the ‘image of God’, can dare understand that rationality), to the intelligent design of the scientific instruments and experiments themselves, to the logical and mathematical analysis of experimental results themselves, from top to bottom, science itself is certainly not to be considered a ‘natural’ endeavor of man.
Not one scientific instrument would ever exist if men did not first intelligently design that scientific instrument. Not one test tube, microscope, telescope, spectroscope, or etc.. etc.., was ever found just laying around on a beach somewhere which was ‘naturally’ constructed by nature. Not one experimental result would ever be rationally analyzed since there would be no immaterial minds to rationally analyze the immaterial logic and immaterial mathematics that lay behind the intelligently designed experiments in the first place.
Again, all of science, every nook and cranny of it, is based on the presupposition of intelligent design and is certainly not based on the presupposition of methodological naturalism.
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