[extropy-chat] against ID

[gts]

On Wed, 07 Dec 2005 22:32:56 -0500, spike <spike66 at comcast.net> wrote:

>> These anti-evolutionists are calling evolution-science/naturalism a form
>> of "religion," and suing teachers for using tax dollars to promote the
>> so-called "religion" of evolution.

> Ja, I anticipated that the fundies would eventually
> discover this line of reasoning.  This may actually
> be a bigger threat to US science education than is
> the whole ID business.

Absolutely, the idea that empiricism amounts to a type of religion is a  
huge threat to public science education wherever there is a separation of  
church and state. This debate is not only about evolution. It is about  
science itself.

I'm a little embarrassed to admit that some 15 years ago I defended  
metaphysical idealism against empiricism by criticising the empiricist  
idea of logical positivism.  Positivism, the doctrine that propositions  
are valid only if they can in principle be verified empirically, is easily  
refuted by pointing out that the positivist proposition cannot itself be  
verified empirically.

It is impossible to prove empirically that propositions are valid only if  
they can be proved empirically. Positivism thus fails its own test for  
meaning, and so must by the positivist's own standards be a meaningless  
proposition or a statement of religious belief.

At the time I did not question the validity of science or evolution, but  
arguments similar to my own are now surfacing in the public debate about  
evolution vs Intelligent Design. In Kansas, proponents of Intelligent  
Design have succeeded in redefining science itself.

Whereas science in Kansas once meant:

"seeking natural explanations for what we observe around us"

It now means:

"continuing investigation that uses observation, hypothesis testing,  
measurement, experimentation, logical argument and theory building to lead  
to more adequate explanations of natural phenomena."

The second definition seems on the surface to be quite reasonable, perhaps  
even an improvement on the first, but it lacks the requirement that  
science be about *natural explanations*. In Kansas, *any* explanation for  
natural phenomena now qualifies as science, including for example  
astrology as an explanation for human personality.

Fortunately for clear thinkers, the 'religion' of positivism is not really  
essential to science. I misled my interlocutors when I implied otherwise  
in my defense of idealism. Popper's philosophy is I think a superior  
philosophy of science, better than positivism, and one that does not rely  
on anything resembling religion.

Not coincidently, Popper's evolutionary epistemology is an extension of  
biological evolution into the world of science and ideas. Science is not  
about finding true beliefs about the world. It is about finding workable  
conjectures that solve problems.

-gtso