[MD] Dawkins a Materialist

[ian glendinning]

Hi Case, I agree with all your more subtle caveats, and the fact that
any choice of lesser evils between faith and science, science always
wins .... given ...

I guess my overly aggressive tone was really aimed at DMB who
repeatedly refuses to accept that science is "just" a belief system
too, and others in our audience who do not see as you do (and say DM
and I do) that "science" is no longer the simple causal objective
system it was 100 years ago. Some scientists seem to miss that
important subtlety too (partly because they are still fighting old
battles with blunt instruments), and the wider public and media
therefore misses it entirely. My "mission' is to rectify that, with
the help of MoQ. (ie I'm keen not to let the MoQ perspective freeze
intellect as just "GOF-Science" - my recurring agenda about what the
intellectual level really is.)

Subject to the limitations of language, naturally, I don't think I
have any significant argument with you ?

I'll take the pastrami if there's any going, ham is so last year, and
hold the mayo ....
Ian

On 1/1/07, Case <Case at ispots.com> wrote:
> [Ian]
> So we're agreeing Case. Dawkins is OK by us to use his "ham-handed"
> rhetoric to stir up debate where there is currently only passive
> complacency, sleepwalking us all to oblivion. Be our guest. But being
> ham-handed means his is a very blunt tool for us would-be philsophers
> to use constructively, where the debate is already raging thank you
> very much.
>
> [Case]
> Why in the world would Dawkins' ham-handedness trouble us would-be
> philosophers if all we disagree with is his tone?
>
> [Ian]
> Case, you said.
> Science is the foundational belief system of the modern world. It
> presents the modern standard for truth and the appraisal of truth.
>
> Can't argue with that.
> Firstly you confirm "Science is a belief system" (albeit a good one,
> nay even the best one.)
> Secondly, being the truth standard "of the modern world" means it is a
> matter of culturally accepted authority (except in strongholds of
> faith-based religion).
>
> [Case]
> Who has made the claim the science is anything other than a system of
> beliefs? But I am not saying that the "facts" of science constitute a
> standard of truth. I am saying that science is a method for evaluating
> claims of truth. It sets a standard for judging whether beliefs are true or
> false. Beliefs than can not be at present evaluated scientifically are ripe
> for speculation but that set of beliefs is far, far small than it once was
> and shrinking rapidly.
>
> [Ian]
> So my point .... science may be the "best" in that all its laws of the
> natural world are contingent and falsifiable. What scientists
> (particularly dogmatic ones like Dawkins) forget is that basic tenets
> of science like falsifiability, objectivity, reductionism, causation
> are nevertheless incomplete, contingent and much less certain than our
> enlightened arrogance suggests.
>
> Violent agreement I hope.
>
> [Case]
> Certainly your list of terms is subject to scrutiny and modification. All of
> them to one degree or another are understood differently today than they
> were 100 or even 10 years ago. The system of evaluation like the processes
> it evaluates is open to revision. In this sense it is self correcting. When
> the choice comes down to intellectual posers like Michael Behe propping up
> nonsense like intelligent design and Dawkins being ham-handed I say bring on
> some Swiss and rye.
>
> If I slap on a little Mayo would that be violent enough?
>
>
>
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