| Author | Message | ||
     Sami |
Tpehak, in a sense you could say that time is an illusion, but only insofar as you might say that a shadow is an illusion. Time is the 'shadow' of change, it exists only by virtue of change. Time is what we use to measure change. The past is change that once occurred, the present is change that is occurring, the future is change that is yet to occur. | ||
| Aesquire |
https://9gag.com/gag/aroPZ56 | ||
| Blake |
Right, designing an airplane using scientific principles... Meaning it all gets fully TESTED, no matter what the "science" professionals might have shown through engineering using scientific principles. Paraphrasing. "If you destroyed a holy book, in a thousand years it wouldn't be replicated." Says the arrogant ignorant man and his presupposition, which could very well be wrong. I for one say he's wrong. "If you destroy science books, in a thousand years they would be replicated." Same answer. A thousand years? Uh, it took thousands last time. But it's fun to weave fiction in support of your world view. (Message edited by blake on April 21, 2020) | ||
| Sami |
"If you destroyed a holy book, in a thousand years it wouldn't be replicated." Doesn't this speak to the value of holy books, though? Let's put it this way, if you destroyed the pyramids, in a thousand years it wouldn't be replicated. Are we going to say that therefore the pyramids are any less of an achievement because it wouldn't be replicated in a thousand years? On the contrary, because the pyramids cannot be duplicated in a thousand years, they are one of the greatest achievements of the ancient world and counted amongst the world's wonders. Or to use another example, if you destroyed a rose, in a thousand years it wouldn't be replicated. Every rose is unique, every flower is unique, science cannot duplicate a single rose nor its complex fragrance. The best rose fragrant-wise is the Damask rose. Poems have been written on it, paintings have been inspired by it, perfumes have been made from it, yet its scent cannot be replicated (mainly because it contains over 200 aromatic compounds). Here's the Damask rose, the queen of roses when it comes to fragrance:  According to Dawkins' reasoning, if you can't replicate it, it's bunk. Quite the opposite, if you can't replicate it, it's that much more valuable. We value things that are unique, things that cannot be replicated. That's part of what gives them value. Not everything can be replicated, nor does it need to be replicated to be valuable. Can Dawkins himself be replicated? I want to duplicate Dawkins. What? It's not possible? How dare you! | ||
| Aesquire |
You would clone Dawkins! But it wouldn't be the same person. You are your experiences and your genetics. Not just one or the other. See also the greatest movie ever about a science experiment on that subject. Trading Places. | ||
| H0gwash |
Roses and pyramids and books are biology and culture, they are unique and beautiful but not hard science. Science is about universality and transparency. | ||
| Aesquire |
I'm reminded of a Pyramid documentary where they made this huge deal about certain dimensions being divisible by Pi, and how this proved the scientific superiority of the ancient Egyptians. Which is true, but... At the end they asked the visibly frustrated archaeologist they'd been interrupting every time he tried to be rational about alien visitors, etc. How this super advanced mathematics could have been so far ahead of it's time? ( centuries before Pythagoras ) His comment, "they could have just used a wheel to measure..." Pretty much made the entire hype fest a joke. when I built a yard maze I also got the "how could you make this acre plus sized geometric design?" question. My buddy and I had spent an evening doing the basic math and plans, but the actual work on the ground used the technology available to the guys building the Great Pyramids and crop circles in England. Rope and a stick. ( I admit to some experience in experimental archaeology. Big fan of Thor Heyerdahl. ) | ||
| Aesquire |
I also draw a fuzzy line between science and engineering. One feeds The other. Theory vs. Practice. The Wright brothers were engineers. But they also did hard experimental science. The first wind tunnel and surprisingly advanced design work on propellers. If you look at contemporary design, it's lifted from boat props. The Wright Flyer's propeller would not look dated, and function fine on an aircraft of similar speeds and power. ( darn slow and not much ) I know. I've flown them. | ||
| H0gwash |
The hard sciences and the arts are on opposite sides of the spectrum. Being at either extreme is a lonely place. Great to spend some time in isolation there, but most people are happiest somewhere between those two poles. | ||
| Court |
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| Blake |
Hogs: >>> Science is about universality and transparency. Can you name five philosophical assumptions without which science would be futile? Science is about... Observation, experiment, theory, repeat. Science may be performed in complete isolation and never shared with anyone. Someday maybe I'll be allowed to share some details about some very interesting experiments. | ||
| Sami |
Patrick: ''You would clone Dawkins! '' On second thought, I wouldn't. Having one Dawkins is more than the world can handle. Maybe in a thousand years we'd replicate him, would be funny if Dawkins 2.0 became a theist. | ||
| Sami |
Gerard: ''The hard sciences and the arts are on opposite sides of the spectrum.'' It wasn't used to be that way. Many people back in the day were polymaths, they did science as well as arts. They were trained in the liberal arts (trivium and quadrivium). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_arts_educati on There is indeed a fuzzy line between science and engineering, as Patrick mentioned. Without engineering, science becomes a futile pursuit. What is the use of science if it is not put to practice? Engineering is a science as well as an art. Historically, many engineers have been artists and vice versa. Science should serve engineering, theory should serve practice. | ||
| Aesquire |
I'm still disagreeing that "scientists" are anti-god. Loudmouth atheist evangelist types are, yes. The neo-fascist education system in the U.S. ( and the UK seems equally crazy ) creates a self censored response from folk who have faith and science. You won't get grants, jobs, or finish your degree if you buck the system. It's not like you've got a real hope of bringing to the light a department head that insists that 2+2=4 is racist. That declaring that mathematically correct answers, attendance, and responsibility are racist because you can't expect those lesser races to accomplish them, is massively racist itself, is ignored as heresy. ( and pointing it out can get you expelled ) The only religion allowed is one that promises to end the civilization that created the colleges originally. | ||
| Court |
I’m not so sure they are “anti-God” . . . . But they are not “counting on” God, Allah or any divine being to either motivate or validate their work. Like construction workers, they can be religious, independent of their vocation. | ||
| Court |
By the way. . . . I am entertained by the comments on the academic community. I’ve become the real outlier at an Ivy League school. . . By not appending my faculty e-mail address with an “Acceptable pronouns” section. I’m still celebrating the arrival of the gender free restrooms. I was getting so tired of going up to the 5th floor to pee. I confess . . . . I thought about peeing on a tree out front and asserting “I indentify as a Yellow Lab”. (Message edited by Court on April 24, 2020) | ||
| Blake |
>>> ...they are not “counting on” God, Allah or any divine being to either motivate or validate their work. Whether knowingly or not, they ALL rely upon the supreme being for the validity and usefulness of their work.  See the question I posed to Gerard/Hogs just above. The assumptions that the scientific method requires, all point to the omniscient eternal supreme being. But now we're talking philosophy. (Message edited by blake on April 24, 2020) | ||
| Aesquire |
I told a lesbian friend I identified as an attack helicopter. She was offended! It's a t-shirt mocking the gender chaos. I explained I was a hang glider pilot and really did love flying below tree top level down valleys watching the deer run before me. She was partly unwound. Didn't have the heart to tell her a guy I worked with, when I told him that, said, "we shoot dogs for that." . | ||
| H0gwash |
IMHO the whole point of religion is that it cannot be proved, which IMHO puts it in the arts side of the spectrum. | ||
| Sami |
Science cannot prove its own assumptions, which puts science in the arts side of the spectrum. Scientific Proof Is A Myth https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2017/11/22/scientific-proof-is-a-myth/ (Message edited by Sami on April 24, 2020) | ||
| H0gwash |
The inability of the hard sciences to predict and quantify all phenomena does not invalidate all the phenomena that the hard sciences can accurately predict and quantify. There is a lot of value to those numbers. Theories like the "Big Bang" are widely considered as 'valid' by scientists in the absence of better explanations, but scientists are always open to transparently peer review alternate views that can explain a wider array of phenomena more than current theories can. | ||
| Chauly |
So, Sami: Which air fryer did you buy? | ||
| Sami |
Gerard, No one claims that science should predict and quantify all phenomena, but the fact remains that there is a reproducibility crisis and the peer review is corrupt. Here is a reference from the original OP: A Massive Hoax Exposes Social Justice in Academia (Full Interview) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97FuO-hEhQo Academics expose corruption in Grievance Studies https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVk9a5Jcd1k Charles, haha, ''8 Of The Best Air Fryers For 2020''. I like fat and greasy food, so no air fryers for me in 2020. | ||
| Aesquire |
Corruption and fads in education are not the same as saying physics is fake. Anthropology and Social science are like psychiatry or economics. Not so much science as a selection of cults. There's some reproducibility in experimental work, to be sure. "Repressed Memories" for example. Using the developed techniques, anyone can create a mental illness in another, a false memory. It becomes a severe illness when you do it again and the victim has 2 mutually contradictory memories. Then you'd better get them "professional help", and chose the cult wisely. And I'm well aware that the political has dominated even the hard sciences with blackmail and threats. How much does a Neutrino weigh? But you don't reject the existence of God because there are translation errors in a dead King's vanity project Bible, do you? And those who accuse others of Satanic influence because they bothered to read a different translation and can recognize words they researched in attic Greek are not MY guide to spiritual discipline. You can make your own choices, including refusing other's. My respect for that particular choice may not please you. But I also know my wings didn't fall off. I wore a parachute anyway, and didn't consider it a waste. Newton was incomplete, not universally wrong. Btw, Calculus was invented during a plague isolation experiment just like today's antisocial distancing. How bored do you have to be to invent calculus?  | ||
| Sami |
Newton would've been given ADHD meds if he were alive today. How many geniuses have we lost in recent times by putting them on meds? Is physics fake? Certainly much of theoretical physics is fake. Do you know how many dark matter can dance on the head of a pin? Quantum Mechanics is also riddled with fake physics. Multiple worlds, string theory, quarks, there is no end in sight to fake theories in physics. All in the name of ''science'', so don't you dare question any of it! Much of physics is fake, there is no question about it. Here is an example of that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_constan t_problem In cosmology, the cosmological constant problem or vacuum catastrophe is the disagreement between the observed values of vacuum energy density (the small value of the cosmological constant) and theoretical large value of zero-point energy suggested by quantum field theory. Depending on the Planck energy cutoff and other factors, the discrepancy is as high as 120 orders of magnitude,[1] a state of affairs described by physicists as "the largest discrepancy between theory and experiment in all of science" [1] and "the worst theoretical prediction in the history of physics." [2] | ||
| Blake |
Gerard, What are the foundational principles, all taken purely on faith, upon which all of science depends? There are at least five, probably more. | ||
| H0gwash |
This sounds like a rhetorical question, but I'll play. Google says "integrity of knowledge, collegiality, honesty, objectivity, and openness." | ||
| Sami |
Patrick, this is an interesting read on the state of affairs of modern science. Science is indeed political and anti-God. Billions and Billions of Demons RICHARD LEWONTIN https://www.drjbloom.com/Public%20files/Lewontin_R eview.htm Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. The eminent Kant scholar Lewis Beck used to say that anyone who could believe in God could believe in anything. To appeal to an omnipotent deity is to allow that at any moment the regularities of nature may be ruptured, that miracles may happen. | ||
| Sami |
Court: ''I’m not so sure they are “anti-God” . . . . But they are not “counting on” God, Allah or any divine being to either motivate or validate their work. Like construction workers, they can be religious, independent of their vocation.'' True independence from God is not possible, unless one takes a hardcore anti-God stance, which would be metaphysically shaky to begin with. Now, if you cook your meal you are not ''counting on God'' either, but that doesn't mean that God is irrelevant. Science and engineering are not that dissimilar to cooking, that is, one's motivation may not necessarily be to glorify God or to have God validate it. That being said, without God, no work of any kind would be possible, be it cooking, science or engineering. Comparing God with the air we breathe, we go about our daily lives with no second thought about breathing. Does this mean that breathing is irrelevant to our lives? Well, hold your breath and find out. God is similar to breathing, we don't give Him much of a second thought, but without Him we wouldn't be having any thoughts, let alone scientific thoughts. There's an old joke that has become a favourite of mine, which makes the point of how much we depend on God for everything we do in life: God was sitting in heaven one day when a scientist said to Him, “God, we don’t need you anymore. Science has finally figured out a way to create life out of nothing – in other words, we can now do what you did in the beginning.” “Oh, is that so? Explain…” replies God. “Well,” says the scientist, “we can take dirt and form it into the likeness of you and breathe life into it, thus creating man.” “Well, that’s very interesting… show Me.” So the scientist bends down to the earth and starts to mold the soil into the shape of a man. “No, no, no…” interrupts God, “Get your own dirt.” | ||
| Blake |
Gerard: >>> This sounds like a rhetorical question, but I'll play. Google says "integrity of knowledge, collegiality, honesty, objectivity, and openness." It's not rhetorical in the least. The google results touch on the answers some. Collegiality doesn't seem necessary to science, though it is advantageous. Five foundational assumed principles vital to the scientific method. Absent any, science would be folly. Would science be possible if the laws of logic were not constant and universal? In doing science we assume they are, but we have no way of scientifically proving that the laws of logic indeed are constant and universal. That they are is just a scientifically unprovable assumption. Would science be possible if human powers of observation were not reliable? To do science we assume that they are, but we cannot prove it, for if our powers of observation were not reliable, we may not know it. That our powers of observation are reliable is just a scientifically unprovable assumption. Would science be possible if human reasoning was invalid? To do science, we assume that our reasoning is valid, but if our reasoning wasn't valid, we may not ever know it. That our reasoning is valid is a scientifically unprovable assumption. Would science be feasible if there was no objective truth, no objective facts? Doing science assumes that some things really are objectively true, no matter who might think otherwise. That objective truth exists is a scientifically unprovable assumption. Would science be possible without the reality of the past, if what we call the past was just an idea that we have in our minds? Doing science assume the reality of the past, that events do transpire with real tensed relationships. The entire principle of induction would be at stake. That the past is real and not just a figment of our imagination is a scientifically unprovable assumption. That's a lot of faith we must have in order to do science, don't you think? (Message edited by blake on April 29, 2020) |
