Faith in science?

[Polymath257]

Yeah, start studying how you can't avoid subjectivity and learn to admit that. Your world view is in part subjective just like the rest of us.

Yes, of course. I have opinions just like everyone else. I have a goal of understanding, but to have a goal is to have a subjective opinion on something.

Sorry, but it seems like a triviality to me that is ultimately beside the point.

 

[Heyo]

No, we should be open to them guiding us as to what some of these questions mean and indeed if they mean anything at all. I find Pigliucci quite refreshingly incisive on the "hard problem" for instance. It gives me faith - yes, that word again - that my own instinct to dismiss it as not a valid question - may be reasonable, or at any rate shared by some people with brains.

We need a "shut up and measure" mentality to start working. Philosophers, at least in this question, are like @mikkel_the_dane, they try to prevent any progress. They are not goal oriented. I think those who think something can't be done, should get out of the way when people are actively doing what they think is impossible.

 

[exchemist]

Yeah, start studying how you can't avoid subjectivity and learn to admit that. Your world view is in part subjective just like the rest of us.

Mikkel I think you may be jumping to conclusions here. Anyone who has done any experimental science will be fully aware that every person's view is at least partly subjective. The reason science insists on reproducibility of observations is to try to eliminate, as far as possible, the subjective element from what it relies on. There is no reason to imagine that scientists think of themselves as occupying some godlike sphere of pure objectivity. If you are in any doubt, read the critiques of scientific papers. Personal beliefs, ambitions and antagonisms can all be present!

But the settled findings of science (which are a collective effort by humanity) are the closest things the human intellect has produced to objectivity about nature. The only other field, in my experience, that aspires to similar objectivity is the law.

 

[shunyadragon]

I'm sorry to have appalled you. What aspects or areas of a basic science education would help in your opinion?

You questioned science with nebulous undefined use of 'faith' in English does not apply to science. Other than the layman anecdotal use of 'faith.' like; 'I have faith that airplanes are safe,' faith applies to subjective belief outside science in terms of religion and philosophy.

Yes, there are many unanswered questions, but 'arguing from ignorance' claiming what science does not know is not productive, nor considers what the continually advancing science knows.

Basic understanding of science leads to the ability to understand what science does and does not know, and understanding the limits of science.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Yes, of course. I have opinions just like everyone else. I have a goal of understanding, but to have a goal is to have a subjective opinion on something.

Sorry, but it seems like a triviality to me that is ultimately beside the point.

Well, I am of a different subjective opinion.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

We need a "shut up and measure" mentality to start working. Philosophers, at least in this question, are like @mikkel_the_dane, they try to prevent any progress. They are not goal oriented. I think those who think something can't be done, should get out of the way when people are actively doing what they think is impossible.

How authoritarian of you. Who made you the master of humanity? You can take your authoritarian world view and start your own world.

 

[Yerda]

That's quite unfair. You make it seems as if we know virtually nothing at all. While many questions remain unanswered, lets not pretend as if we know nothing at all.

We know a lot of things. We know about brain chemistry, we know about neural networks,... we know quite some stuff from neurology etc.

So let's not pretend as if we are a bunch of drooling apes who don't even know what a brain is.

I talked about neurophysiology and neurotransmission and alluded to the importance of the ordering of the nervous system in my post. We know lots about the brain - I don't mean to imply otherwise. We don't have a theory of how the brain gives rise to experiences nor even a good guess as far as I can see.

Does it? It's not clear to me at all how you concluded that this gets us nowhere.
It seems to me that it gets us quite a long way already.

You just explained it. The "feels" is in the neurons firing away and activating pain receptors.

I don't think this explains it at all. What is it about neurons firing in patterns that implies feels?

No. You are excercising trust in a method of inquiry that has earned that trust with its immens and impressive track record of solving riddles that were once deemed unsolvable by many.

I am very confident in stating that IF one day we figure out consciousness, it will be figured out by a (or more) scientist(s) through science and not by some priest or monk or circus artist.

This is not "faith". This is trust based on an impressive track record of scientific success in doing exactly that: finding solutions to problems / answers to questions pertaining to nature.

Aye, I generally think along these lines myself. Science is an ever-growing box of tools and processes that we have adapted to fix so many problems and answer so many questions and on that basis I am confident that we'll get somewhere with this one. I do have a niggling feeling that this one is a bit special though.

Well, think of it like this. The pattern is *me smelling the coffee*. Whenever I smell coffee, that pattern (or one similar) occurs and whenever that pattern occurs, I smell coffee.

But is the pattern the smell of coffee?

I have to admit that I have never quite understood what the 'hard' part of the question of consciousness is. But, I also disagree with Chalmers about the coherency of p-zombies.

Saying something is physically identical to a conscious being but not conscious sounds like saying one system is physically identical to another but has a different temperature. It seems to me that both the temperature and the conscious state are determined by the physical situation, if known in detail.

But, I have to admit a similar difficulty understanding the meaning of the term 'qualia'. Does the quale of 'seeing red' also encompass the emotional response (in which case it is NOT indecomposable) or is it merely the sensation of the redness itself (in which case, what is the difference with sensory detection)?

I see this a lot. Some of us can't understand how some others can't see the problem and some others can't understand why we're having a problem to begin with. It might just be something to do with the ways we frame the world. That and words can be misleading slippery things.

Regarding that last paragraph, do you categorise seeing red as the same thing as sensing red?

What I mean is, I could train a machine to correctly identify red objects (in theory). Maybe it has a light detecting system and can just pick the object that reflects light in the right part of the spectrum. But it isn't 'seeing' red. There is no experience of redness or of anything else. Is this difference meaningful to you?

 

[Yerda]

You questioned science with nebulous undefined use of 'faith' in English does not apply to science. Other than the layman anecdotal use of 'faith.' like; 'I have faith that airplanes are safe,' faith applies to subjective belief outside science in terms of religion and philosophy.

Yes, there are many unanswered questions, but 'arguing from ignorance' claiming what science does not know is not productive, nor considers what the continually advancing science knows.

Basic understanding of science leads to the ability to understand what science does and does not know, and understanding the limits of science.

I'm not questioning science. I'm asking if my confidence that science can solve a problem without evidence is faith or something like it.

Maybe I don't understand faith.

 

[Heyo]

How authoritarian of you. Who made you the master of humanity? You can take your authoritarian world view and start your own world.

I might if I can figure out how to get out of this gravity well.
And I'm not so authoritarian to expect you to come along. Just don't stand in the way.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I might if I can figure out how to get out of this gravity well.
And I'm not so authoritarian to expect you to come along. Just don't stand in the way.

Likewise.

 

[Yerda]

Is the world purely physical?
No, because your understanding of this "no" has no physical properties. You can't hold or otherwise engage with it with your physical body. It has no physical scientific measurement standard and there is no scientific theory for it.

Further you can't see that the world is physical. That is a mental idea in your brain and only real, because you believe in it.

Maybe those things are physical properties. Or maybe the expression x is physical, y is not physical isn't really true but simply useful.

 

[Polymath257]

Regarding that last paragraph, do you categorise seeing red as the same thing as sensing red?

I see them as being very close. I guess it is possible to 'detect red' on a subconscious level that never gets into consciousness.

Or, for example, the redness can be detected by the retina, but never gets processed by the brain. There is a sense in which the redness is detected but not 'seen'.

What I mean is, I could train a machine to correctly identify red objects. Maybe it has a light detecting system and can just pick the object that reflects light in the right part of the spectrum. But it isn't 'seeing' red. There is no experience of redness or anything else. Is this difference meaningful to you?

Since the light detector doesn't have a complex analysis of the redness and its relation to other aspects of its existence, it is not conscious of the redness.

It is interesting that Chalmers said that thermostats might be considered to be conscious precisely because of detection like this. I think that is pushing the matter.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Maybe those things are physical properties. Or maybe the expression x is physical, y is not physical isn't really true but simply useful.

Yes. But useful comes in many versions.

 

[shunyadragon]

I'm not questioning science. I'm asking if my confidence that science can solve a problem without evidence is faith or something like it.

Maybe I don't understand faith.

The evidence of ou technology world demonstrates the confidence science by its nature solves problems.

I defined and clarified the use of 'faith' in previous posts. It does not apply to science.

 

[Altfish]

What is the best methodology for being a human?

Be born.

 

[Yerda]

The evidence of ou technology world demonstrates the confidence science by its nature solves problems.

I defined and clarified the use of 'faith' in previous posts. It does not apply to science.

"Science by its nature solves problems" doesn't entail "science will solve this one". So, again what I'm asking isn't whether science involves faith but whether the confidence that science will solve this particular problem without evidence is akin to faith.

You see the difference? I'm applying the idea of faith to me not to science.

 

[Yerda]

Be born.

Always a good opening move, imo.

 

[Altfish]

I

What I'm asking is, is my belief that science will eventually solve this problem a kind of faith?

I'm trying to acknowledge that I, an atheist (and also an avid follower of science if you can believe it), may have a belief without evidence.

I don't believe that expecting science to solve problems is based on a belief without evidence.
For example ...
Prior to COVID 19 coming along we didn't have a vaccine for it; but I was confident BASED ON PREVIOUS SUCCESSFUL VACCINES, not on faith, that science will come up with the goods.
And it did.

 

[WalterTrull]

What is "spiritual science" and how does it "answer a lot more questions"?

Give a practical example.

Well... That I perceive is scientific. What I perceive is not. I seem to have some control over what I perceive but not total control. Scientific analysis would suggest that I am not alone or perhaps more accurately, not the center or creator of perception.

 

[shunyadragon]

"Science by its nature solves problems" doesn't entail "science will solve this one".

This the fallacy of 'arguing from ignorance' I previously referred to. It does not work to be hypothetical as to what science can nor cannot know know nor in the future. This is the problem, particularly when you lack the education needed to understand the present knowledge of science, and the limits of science.

So, again what I'm asking isn't whether science involves faith but whether the confidence that science will solve this particular problem without evidence is akin to faith.

You see the difference? I'm applying the idea of faith to me not to science.

No, and 'faith' does not apply to the sciences involved with consciousness, nor any other science..