Why I Think That Science Kinda Sucks

[Student of X]

Every assumption that we make on fundamentally based on the assumption that the world we perceive and exist inside of is real. If we start from the basis that reality isn't real, we can't really do, achieve or even observe anything of any merit whatsoever.

We can make a science-conducive fundamental assumption under material monism or under mental monism. As long as it's all one "stuff", we can make some progress.

Like trying to build a house-of-cards on two tables won't work. You need to pick a table and then focus on building and on not bumping the table.

I want to bump the table of material monism.

As for "technological toys", I wouldn't exactly call modern medicine, transport, agriculture and information processing "technological toys".

They are toys once you a) realize that the nature of reality is consciousness not this "crude matter", and b) begin to expand your own consciousness so that you can begin to grok its true potential. Until then, you are caught in the Matrix so to speak. So you can't see the toys for what they are.

And until we have any reason whatsoever to conclude that the physical world is not the "real world" such an assumption is not only baseless but entirely meaningless, aimless and stupid, as explained above.

There will always be people who have plenty of good reasons to conclude that the physical world is not the "real world", or at least that it is not the complete picture.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

We can make a science-conducive fundamental assumption under material monism or under mental monism. As long as it's all one "stuff", we can make some progress.

Like trying to build a house-of-cards on two tables won't work. You need to pick a table and then focus on building and on not bumping the table.

I agree. And this is why science has made advances and philosophy has not. Science is the table on which all the cards are being stacked. Leave science to do that, and leave philosophy and myticism to do whatever the hell they want. Science does not need mysticism and fantasy to progress, so just leave them out of it.

They are toys once you a) realize that the nature of reality is consciousness

Prove it.

and b) begin to expand your own consciousness so that you can begin to grok its true potential. Until then, you are caught in the Matrix so to speak.

Yawn. Could you say something that means something?

There will always be people who have plenty of good reasons to conclude that the physical world is not the "real world", or at least that it is not the complete picture.

And those reasons are...?

 

[Student of X]

Science is the table on which all the cards are being stacked.

No it isn't. Philosophy is the table on which the house-of-cards you call science is stacked. The particular table modern Western scientists have chosen is a philosophy called material monism. There are other philosophy tables one might choose to build sciences on.

 

[E. Nato Difficile]

I want to bump the table of material monism.

It always comes back to the table-knocking.

-Nato

 

[tumbleweed41]

Yes, science is supposed to be the study of the "material world". People figure that if the material world wasn't "real", then science wouldn't be able to give us all these neat technological toys.

Pfft.

So what would you say if it turns out that there is an "immaterial world" that science also works on, without explicitly telling you, thus allowing you to believe and maybe even encouraging you to believe that the "material world" is the only "real world"? Would you be concerned?

How do you suppose science would empirically test the "immaterial world"?

 

[ImmortalFlame]

No it isn't. Philosophy is the table on which the house-of-cards you call science is stacked. The particular table modern Western scientists have chosen is a philosophy called material monism. There are other philosophy tables one might choose to build sciences on.

I think you're confused. Science could be said to have originated from philosophy, but science itself is a methodology of investigation, not a philosophy. And it is the most successful methodlogy we have ever developed. Nothing has even come close to achieving what science has achieved in the last hundred years alone.

 

[Student of X]

How do you suppose science would empirically test the "immaterial world"?

Maybe by pretending that it can be reduced to the "material world", and by moving goal-posts and remaining willfully ignorant of philosophy and excommunicating scientific heretics and using double-standards and so forth?

Embracing The Immaterial Universe

[...]

"In contrast to conventional reductionism, the new noetic science is based upon holism, the belief that an understanding of nature and the human experience requires that we transcend the parts to see the whole. Materialism and reductionism engender the idea that humans are disconnected from, and above, nature. The noetic vision emphasizes that life is derived from an integration and coordination of both the physical and the immaterial parts of the universe. The resolution of our global crisis requires the integration of reductionist and holistic perspectives. This revisioning of conventional science is seeding creative minorities who will rescue us from extinction."

 

[Student of X]

I think you're confused.

 

[tumbleweed41]

Maybe by pretending that it can be reduced to the "material world", and by moving goal-posts and remaining willfully ignorant of philosophy and excommunicating scientific heretics and using double-standards and so forth?

Embracing The Immaterial Universe

So, you want science to give up on empiricism and embrace subjective speculation?

 

[Student of X]

So, you want science to give up on empiricism and embrace subjective speculation?

No I want a middle way.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Well, fair enough.

No I want a middle way.

Why would you want a middle way when one way is demonstrably far more successful than the other way?

 

[Sleeppy]

You got very little love in this thread SoX.. But not surprising to either of us, I'm sure. The video you posted, 'Science Delusion' is a really good watch. I've been saying this for a while now. These people just manipulate until it fits their little theories. Then when it appears right, most of the time, it's science. We are humans. To say our consciousness is aware of all reality is a lie.

 

[E. Nato Difficile]

To say our consciousness is aware of all reality is a lie.

And who has ever said that?

-Nato

 

[tumbleweed41]

No I want a middle way.

And what is the middle of objective empiricism and subjective speculation?

 

[ImmortalFlame]

And what is the middle of objective empiricism and subjective speculation?

Objective speculation? Subjective empiricism?

I would love for someone to try and explain those as concepts.

 

[McBell]

Objective speculation? Subjective empiricism?

I would love for someone to try and explain those as concepts.

Seems you have break rule 6 in order to "understand" it....

Also sounds like some one has been breaking rule 6 far to long to have a meaningful conversation on science....

 

[Valjean]

OK, now I think I see what's going on. The mystic Student and materialistic Flame are discussing different realities and different methodologies and talking past each other.

Student, I think, comes from a perspective of hierarchical 'layers' of different realities, with only the lowest, material, 3-D reality directly perceptible to our senses. Reality, thus, is a sort of dream, an emergent property of consciousness itself, different in different levels of consciousness. He advocates exploring these realities not by careful measurements and testing of the material world but by by expansion of consciousness, perhaps even to merge with this ultimate Reality.

Flame, this is all well and good -- for a mystic -- but it cannot be communicated. It's personal, ineffible and has no empirical backing that can be understood by your average Joe. You're trying to put revelation into a 'reasonable' dialectic; trying to jam a square peg into a round hole.

Student is operating completely within a single, materialistic level of reality, as is the methodology -- science -- he's defending. The He has reason and logic on his side. His Weltansicht is communicable, consistent, and his argument pretty much unassailable. On the other hand, he's not going to grok Brahman directly. The best science can do is describe it with numbers.

Am I beginning to see where your heads are at?

 

[Student of X]

And what is the middle of objective empiricism and subjective speculation?

I think that science could get a clue to the middle way by disseminating parapsychological findings, instead of ignoring them and leaving the debunking to the tender mercies of pseudo-skeptical activists.

Change the Rules!

Abstract

Although consciousness-correlated physical phenomena are widely and credibly documented, their appearance and behavior display substantial departures from conventional scientific criteria. Under even the most rigorous protocols, they are only irregularly replicable, and they appear to be insensitive to most basic physical coordinates, including distance and time. Rather, their strongest correlations are with various subjective parameters, such as intention, emotional resonance, uncertainty, attitude, and meaning, and information processing at an unconscious level appears to be involved.

If science, by its most basic definition, is to pursue understanding and utilization of these extraordinary processes, it will need to expand its current paradigm to acknowledge and codify a proactive role for the mind in the establishment of physical events, and to accommodate the spectrum of empirically indicated subjective correlates. The challenges of quantitative measurement and theoretical conceptualization within such a ‘‘Science of the Subjective’’ are formidable, but its potential intellectual and cultural benefits could be immense, not least of all in improving the reach, the utility, the attitude, and the image of science itself.

[...]

 

[Willamena]

You know. Material monism, reductionism, physicalism, etc.

Those aren't the premises of science, although they may be assumed by scientists. The philosophical branch of science grew out of epistemology, so its premises are idealism, realism and empiricism. That's the "science" that has unlimited potential.

 

[tumbleweed41]

I think that science could get a clue to the middle way by disseminating parapsychological findings, instead of ignoring them and leaving the debunking to the tender mercies of pseudo-skeptical activists.

Change the Rules!

Abstract

Although consciousness-correlated physical phenomena are widely and credibly documented, their appearance and behavior display substantial departures from conventional scientific criteria. Under even the most rigorous protocols, they are only irregularly replicable, and they appear to be insensitive to most basic physical coordinates, including distance and time. Rather, their strongest correlations are with various subjective parameters, such as intention, emotional resonance, uncertainty, attitude, and meaning, and information processing at an unconscious level appears to be involved.

If science, by its most basic definition, is to pursue understanding and utilization of these extraordinary processes, it will need to expand its current paradigm to acknowledge and codify a proactive role for the mind in the establishment of physical events, and to accommodate the spectrum of empirically indicated subjective correlates. The challenges of quantitative measurement and theoretical conceptualization within such a ‘‘Science of the Subjective’’ are formidable, but its potential intellectual and cultural benefits could be immense, not least of all in improving the reach, the utility, the attitude, and the image of science itself.

[...]

Again, what is proposed is an abandonment of objective empiricism for a "Science of the Subjective" to validate processes that cannot be empirically tested.

Simply put, abandoning the naturalistic process of science by allowing untestable and unverifiable supernatural speculation.

This is no "Middle Way".