[ExI] Atheism again

[Ben Zaiboc]

On 22/04/2020 01:12, bill w wrote:
> *How would you react if someone challenged your belief in science? 
> With patience, I hope, a shake of the head, perhaps a tendency to 
> preach the values of science*

I don't have a belief in science to be challenged. Any challenge to the 
scientific method (which currently seems to me to be the best way of 
understanding the world) would be evaluated in the same way as anything 
else, and if it turned out to be a valid challenge, showing there was a 
better method, I'd adopt the better method.

It's possible that the scientific method as we know it now, is 
improvable. I'd welcome any improvement.

A  challenge such as "but WHY do you think the scientific method is the 
best way of understanding the world?" is easy to answer: Because it's 
the only system that has been shown consistently to work. So it makes 
sense to use it. It has been demonstrated, again and again, that 
sandbags are better than prayers when it comes to flood defence, for 
example.

I think that's the key thing. I don't 'believe' in science, i use it.

So I'd rephrase the question to "How would you react if someone 
challenged the superiority of the scientific method over belief?"

Sometimes I'm patient, sometimes not, but I'd just point to some of the 
innumerable instances where science worked and belief did not.

My own attitude to these things is simply 'go with what works'. If 
prayer reliably restored amputated limbs, and I lost a limb, do you 
think I'd refuse to pray?

-- 
Ben Zaiboc

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