How many of those who argue against science actually know anything about science?

[Secret Chief]

I've not answered the poll because the grade thing is not used over here, which uses "key stages." But basically...the great majority of children are required to stay in education until at least 16 and to follow the "National Curriculum." This includes science:

National curriculum in England: science programmes of study

 

[cladking]

Science is all about reasoned and rational scepticism. I think the OP is addressing irrational scepticism of science.

That is a perfectly reasonable statement but anytime someone makes a perfectly reasonable argument against established "theory" they are ignored and lambasted.

Obviously science is "skepticism" but few adherents seem to understand this concept and "skeptic" has come to mean anyone with knee jerk reaction to things that sound like they might be "unscientific". There is little reason left on any subject is "science" because it has become dogma more than any religion.

 

[Subduction Zone]

That is a perfectly reasonable statement but anytime someone makes a perfectly reasonable argument against established "theory" they are ignored and lambasted.

Obviously science is "skepticism" but few adherents seem to understand this concept and "skeptic" has come to mean anyone with knee jerk reaction to things that sound like they might be "unscientific". There is little reason left on any subject is "science" because it has become dogma more than any religion.

That is not the case. People only tend to be lambasted after they make poor arguments and refuse to acknowledge corrections. Worse yet many of these pseudoscientists pretend to be skeptics when they are only science deniers.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

Science is all about reasoned and rational scepticism. I think the OP is addressing irrational scepticism of science.

Religion, from my experience, does not seem to embrace scepticism and continual reevaluation. It does not employ these self-correcting mechanisms in the pursuit of understanding the how and why of the cosmos.

Imo that might have more to do with your location to have those experiences.
Again, young earth creationism, literal flood, anti-evolution is a minority belief within Christianity, let alone religion at large. But because they're loud and there's more here in the US it's all we see.
But it's worth pointing out that the demographic of highest educated people isn't atheists, it's Hindu. There are a lot of introspective and extrospective religious beliefs out there.

 

[lostwanderingsoul]

How many religious folk know about 'religion'?
What they often know about is THEIR religion, although there have been pretty interesting studies about the commonality of heretical beliefs amongst RCC members, for example.

Science and religion are both processes rather than facts, so how you're using the word 'true' here confuses me too.

I really like your line that both religion and science are processes rather than facts. But I guarantto that if you ask a scientist he will say evolution is a FACT and the big bang is a FACT. Maybe if science was a little more willing to say that they have ideas and theories about waht may have happened they would be better accepted by religious people.

 

[lostwanderingsoul]

True science.

God stone origin is first ended sealed. The one O mass as god. The God. One. Stone planet of Multi bodies.

God never created you says religious science. No man is God. God is sealed planet.

Science says evolution on earth places the ape kra he once said ark...kra baboon family is observed before self human.

Human in science is a human first observing.

Said I am one whole body past two pre formed ape lifes.

A human making all observations.

Stated so God in DNA genesis had added onto the ape ark form as kra to knowingly own my human self.

Meaning a lot more cells and bio chemistry.

Notice the human owned the DNA already. To observe. To compare.

It was medical observed stated human science biology. No different from what a human medical biologist says today.

The DNA condition already exists and both bodies separated. Seen. Notified. Stated. Science.

Nothing to argue about as science is human observation.

However the scientist claims separation was by radiation. Claiming I know God.

Yet that is a conversion into destruction by reaction. As radiation owns no form.

Are we less than an ape?

No says science observation.

If a human says by natural observation science that you have to accept. Science observed we live only because we are one whole body greater than an ape.

Science biological. Reason we live as a human. Is because we are a human. Common logic.

Then it was said no man is God as you cannot theory on behalf of God and then claim machine reaction.

Yet you did.

Science is a living human making natural observation as the status science by being a human in their present life form human observing..

Totally ignored by humans.

Nobody understands a word of this.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I really like your line that both religion and science are processes rather than facts. But I guarantto that if you ask a scientist he will say evolution is a FACT and the big bang is a FACT. Maybe if science was a little more willing to say that they have ideas and theories about waht may have happened they would be better accepted by religious people.

Is gravity a fact?

 

[Subduction Zone]

Nobody understands a word of this.

On very very rare occasions he can make sense.

 

[cladking]

That is not the case. People only tend to be lambasted after they make poor arguments and refuse to acknowledge corrections. Worse yet many of these pseudoscientists pretend to be skeptics when they are only science deniers.

No. Believers in science can't even see the argument. No matter what subject believers can only see what what they believe.

This even applies to the majority of scientists. There is very little training in metaphysics any longer and colleges don't like people who think for themselves so they strongly discourage it even the sciences which are supposed to be naturally skeptical. Real scientists are often superb metaphysicians and this includes people like Einstein and Feynman but some scientists now days are little more than technicians because the schools have been failing for more than a century now.

Much of what passes as "science" is nothing but inductive reasoning and statistics. Even cosmology is largely just mathematical and involves little experiment. Of course cutting edge physics is always going to be hard to devise and perform experiment but people are taking things as gospel that has no real underpinning in real science. For instance models show a point exploding into a universe but when real science shows an acceleration it causes no concern!!! Real science suggests an outside agent to the universe since something must have sucked it into existence. No problem we just double down and find an infinite number of universes.

Meanwhile we ignore vast swathes of evidence, logic, and math in order to protect long established theory.

I imagine something quite similar might have happened to lead to the "tower of babel" and with so few people who understand science and complex systems we are already on the exact same path. Don't expect science to save us unless you are very patient because the vast majority already know everything and when anomalies appear some fields will just sweep them under the rug. Our best hope might be machine intelligence but the people working on this have no clue because they believe inductive reasoning is intelligence and they have no working definition of consciousness. How do make an artificial consciousness if you don't know how you yourself think? Even if you succeed you'll just have something as "stupid" and ignorant as yourself that writes poetry.

We need to consider the nature of science and humanity before we're going to get past the "unified field theory".

 

[cladking]

On very very rare occasions he can make sense.

I'm sure he makes sense all the time but you can't prove it by me. Of course if I understood better it just might be an open book.

It can be hard to establish communication.

 

[Subduction Zone]

No. Believers in science can't even see the argument. No matter what subject believers can only see what what they believe.

This even applies to the majority of scientists. There is very little training in metaphysics any longer and colleges don't like people who think for themselves so they strongly discourage it even the sciences which are supposed to be naturally skeptical. Real scientists are often superb metaphysicians and this includes people like Einstein and Feynman but some scientists now days are little more than technicians because the schools have been failing for more than a century now.

Much of what passes as "science" is nothing but inductive reasoning and statistics. Even cosmology is largely just mathematical and involves little experiment. Of course cutting edge physics is always going to be hard to devise and perform experiment but people are taking things as gospel that has no real underpinning in real science. For instance models show a point exploding into a universe but when real science shows an acceleration it causes no concern!!! Real science suggests an outside agent to the universe since something must have sucked it into existence. No problem we just double down and find an infinite number of universes.

Meanwhile we ignore vast swathes of evidence, logic, and math in order to protect long established theory.

I imagine something quite similar might have happened to lead to the "tower of babel" and with so few people who understand science and complex systems we are already on the exact same path. Don't expect science to save us unless you are very patient because the vast majority already know everything and when anomalies appear some fields will just sweep them under the rug. Our best hope might be machine intelligence but the people working on this have no clue because they believe inductive reasoning is intelligence and they have no working definition of consciousness. How do make an artificial consciousness if you don't know how you yourself think? Even if you succeed you'll just have something as "stupid" and ignorant as yourself that writes poetry.

We need to consider the nature of science and humanity before we're going to get past the "unified field theory".

And this is an example of what I was talking about.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

This question directly hit me, because of my lack of belief or interest in science.
I agree i do know very little about science, and the reason is "I have no interest in knowing"'

The only answers i am after in this life is the spiritual answer truth the religion/spiritual practice. Personally nothing else matter at this point.
But as i say, If others want to study science and know all about it, that is not a problem for me.

I find the notion of a "lack of belief or interest in science" quite fascinating. How many things are there, do you think, that you could NOT even contemplate doing today with science? How about reading this message, or sharing your own messages, for example? Phoning the doctor when you need to -- or even having access to a doctor who could do anything to help you anyway?

If we can't critique science then it's not science anymore.

You can't critique anything that you know nothing about. You can disrespect it, mistrust it, hate it, believe it or not believe. But critique involves pointing out what is right and wrong about it, and if you don't undestand it, you are in no position to do that.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

Can you prove that?

Since there is not just one science, but several, if I start taking tests, I'm sure I'd get different scores depending on the subject. I would likely do well in biology, medium in chemistry, and pretty bad in math and physics, which I love but my brain isn't oriented towards numbers and school didn't help.

Nope, can't prove it. That's why I said I'm "voting" for it.

But I will say this: I think it extremely unlikely that the types on RF who thunder endlessly about how stupid evolution is to think a goat could give birth to a cow could pass even the most elementary test on the subject of ToE itself.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I find the notion of a "lack of belief or interest in science" quite fascinating. How many things are there, do you think, that you could NOT even contemplate doing today with science? How about reading this message, or sharing your own messages, for example? Phoning the doctor when you need to -- or even having access to a doctor who could do anything to help you anyway?

You can't critique anything that you know nothing about. You can disrespect it, mistrust it, hate it, believe it or not believe. But critique involves pointing out what is right and wrong about it, and if you don't undestand it, you are in no position to do that.

Creationists can't seem to learn from their mistakes. Many years ago I argued against AGW. I learned from my mistakes. Proper critique involves learning.

 

[Spirit of Light]

I find the notion of a "lack of belief or interest in science" quite fascinating. How many things are there, do you think, that you could NOT even contemplate doing today with science? How about reading this message, or sharing your own messages, for example? Phoning the doctor when you need to -- or even having access to a doctor who could do anything to help you anyway?

You can't critique anything that you know nothing about. You can disrespect it, mistrust it, hate it, believe it or not believe. But critique involves pointing out what is right and wrong about it, and if you don't undestand it, you are in no position to do that.

I have no interest in knowing how techincally science works, but yes i use phone and laptop

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

I think we get a distorted view about this.

Most creationists won't have advanced degrees in the sciences simply because most people in general don't have advanced degrees in the sciences. We tend to make a big deal out of acceptance of creationism or evolution by, say, university professors, but university professors make up a miniscule proportion of the population. Big differences there don't necessarily translate into big differences overall at a population level.

It's generally a mistake, IMO, to assume that creationists are stupid or uneducated. Compartmentalization is a thing. The differences tend to be more about values than academic knowledge.

Then let me ask a different question: on how many topics in which you are unlearned are you willing to make absolute "true" or "false" statements? Do you think making pronouncements on subjects you know little about is generally an intelligent thing to do?

Or is the occasional "I don't know" often both a little more intelligent, and a lot more honest?

 

[cladking]

And this is an example of what I was talking about.

And believers in science can't understand the concept that 100% certainty about anything at all is a superstition. Everything you know is a superstition because you can't even examine your "knowledge" in terms of axioms and definitions.

We live in a reality where it's impossible to even step into the same river twice but you know everything!

 

[Subduction Zone]

And believers in science can't understand the concept that 100% certainty about anything at all is a superstition. Everything you know is a superstition because you can't even examine your "knowledge" in terms of axioms and definitions.

We live in a reality where it's impossible to even step into the same river twice but you know everything!

Where did I even imply that I know everything?

By the way, you can step in the same river twice. The water is different, the river is still there.

 

[cladking]

Where did I even imply that I know everything?

By the way, you can step in the same river twice. The water is different, the river is still there.

Every single time you open your mouth you are implying you know everything. You started with this;

"That is not the case. People only tend to be lambasted after they make poor arguments and refuse to acknowledge corrections."

You "correct" people for having a different opinion than you do. Then you can't see their arguments because you can't even entertain premises that are different than your own. Even where someone does make a misstatement of fact you need to determine that the definitions are the same before you can "correct" him. Most believers are like the quisling media chewing on a new bone anytime they detect heresy. God help anyone for saying the wrong thing any more since you can destroy products, companies and entire countries with impunity so long as you commit no heresy. You can be promoted if you can talk a good game and you rise in the Peer pecking orders for toeing the line of orthodoxy. Thinking for yourself and having good results are obsolete and undesirable in a world that doesn't even remember what "metaphysics" means.

The inmates run the asylum since even the craziest things haven't caused total destruction yet. And when it comes you can blame it on blasphemers and heretics.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Then let me ask a different question: on how many topics in which you are unlearned are you willing to make absolute "true" or "false" statements? Do you think making pronouncements on subjects you know little about is generally an intelligent thing to do?

Or is the occasional "I don't know" often both a little more intelligent, and a lot more honest?

Do you think that a literal interpretation of the Bible is something that for a devout Christian is a topic on which they are unlearned?