Kansas Citizens for Science has a troll who brought up a post of mine, and a reader asked for a clarification…so I made two short comments in reply. That prompted a comment here from someone named “Dave”.
Mr. Myers, at Kansas Citizens for Science we are fighting a tough battle to have the present school board replaced.
When you, and Robert Madison who invited you over (and who is an outspoken atheist) link your atheism to science, going beyond anything science can provide, you are playing in to the hands of our opponents.
The primaries here are coming up, and having atheists swarming our site will not, AT PRESENT, be helpful.
Your choice.
Shorter “Dave”: “Shut up, atheists.”
I guess Kansas is in an even more benighted state than I thought. This is a board for activists who want to promote good science teaching, and it’s infested with the likes of Salvador Cordova…yet the contributors they (if “Dave” is actually representative, and I am assured he is not) want to exclude are those who don’t buy into their religion.
He’s wrong.
Having atheists, who are sympathetic to their cause and perfectly willing to offer their expertise, contribute (uh, “swarming” is absurd hyperbole, I think everyone can see) to their site would be helpful, and I know there are freethinkers already working with them. Perhaps “Dave” would like to shoo them away, too? I think that more outspoken atheists are precisely what Kansas needs: rather than hiding them away or demonizing them or asking them to leave, they should be standing up and showing their neighbors that godless people are also decent human beings who may also like Kansas and want what’s best for the state and their children.
I’m afraid that a state that tolerates only good Baptist biologists is just as much a sinkhole of stupidity as one that tolerates only good Baptist anti-biologists. Oh, and I think a statewide organization dedicated to a goal of interest to all citizens that only included the godless would also be a damned dumb thing, too.
I think that more outspoken atheists are precisely what Kansas needs: rather than hiding them away or demonizing them or asking them to leave, they should be standing up and showing their neighbors that godless people are also decent human beings who may also like Kansas and want what’s best for the state and their children.
Sure. But according to many, anyone who uses the term “idiot” and dares to call a creationist peddler a “liar” is a shrill asshole. And atheists are probably most likely to do that because, well, they cherish the right to speak their mind and exercise that right at will.
At least they haven’t “banned” you yet, PZ.
Speaking of which, I saw ultralibertarian and anti-communist Tim Sandefur’s sourpuss in living color on the front page of one of the Califorornia lawyer rags. Tim has to deal with otherwise sympathetic morons of another stripe — anti-gay bigots.
Yet another Panda’s Thumb contributor making waves …
Of course the opposition would never go beyond what science can provide. Idiot.
Just to show how much the other side is committed to not going beyond what science can provide, I just want to make sure no one missed the recent thread on the Templeton prize.
Hey, sign me up!
The primaries here are coming up, and having atheists swarming our site will not, AT PRESENT, be helpful.
The more I read that post from “Dave” the more hilarious it is.
Swarming atheists? I suppose “Dave” imagines our “swarming” action to resemble Brownian motion. After all, we atheists “admit” that we lack free will because ultimately all our actions are merely the products of chance chemical events …
It never ceases to amaze me that many of the same liberals that have a righteous fit (correctly) over the military’s absurd don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy are so anxious to impose the same policy for atheists.
PZ, when you give talks on evolution and creationism to the public, do you make a point of making your views on religion clear?
Yes, I do. I state loud and clear that I am an atheist and personally find religious explanations wanting. I also say that science isn’t a matter of beliefs one way or the other, and that all I can do in the talk is state the evidence and the logic behind biologist’s explanations.
I certainly don’t state that “science proves atheism”, or anything similar. I have had questions about it, and at best I might say that I find scientific explanations sufficiently powerful that I find religion irrelevant…but that there are scientists who can comfortably accommodate their faith and science.
Dave is not a regular poster at KCFS, and doesn’t speak for the group in an official capacity. He also doesn’t speak for the general group.
This is a cheap trick that some creationist is using to try to divide the science camp.
Don’t fall for it.
“……but that there are scientists who can comfortably accommodate their faith and science.”
…comfortably for them, but not for you!
OK, let’s take a look at the facts. There are people of ALL faiths (including no faith) encouraging good, responsible science in public schools. On the other side, the only proponents of shitty science are a mostly homogenous group of fundamentalist Christians, the differences among which are mostly with respect to just how wacko they are. It would take idiocy of monumental magnitude – or equal parts idiocy and propaganda – to conclude that proponents of good science have a religious agenda, simply from the mere fact that there are all kinds of faiths supporting the teaching of good science.
Just from this single observation, the agenda on each side is obvious: science in the classroom – ignoring religion completely, and religious indoctrination in the classroom – ignoring science completely. The question, then, is of course:
Which of these really belongs in SCIENCE class?
Naturally, we all know the answer here…
Of course. And if I were pushed by someone in the audience, I’d tell them that I thought those scientists were wrong.
So far, though, my experience has been that those kinds of metaphysical questions aren’t a big deal for my audiences, and they’re much more interested in the biological explanations. People usually come up afterwards and tell me that no one had bothered to lay out the biological story for them before, and I think that’s where the interest lies.
What makes science precious to some is that it revealed the plots of religious leaders, not of religion. Religion, on the other hand, is precious to them (although they may notr practice it)because of Christmas dinners, oops, I mean family gatherings and other local culture expressions.
There are some people who really don’t care about how/if religion fits to science or vice versa but use both as tools to better understanding of the “world”.Separately. They don’t convert everything to a political debate. I think politics is what causes the clash here, not science or religiosity.
The pejorative use of the word “atheist,” as well as the final two words of the trollbait you received are verbal techniques identifying one particularly heinous and unethical troll who has been infecting the Kansas discussion boards and blogs for some time now. This troll has been repeatedly banned from those sites, and now has decided to turn to you in the hope that it may achieve the desired “wedge strategy” in reverse.
In Kansas, there has been a strong working alliance between pro-science people of all philosophical orientations, and there is neither any reason to discuss philosophical positions without solid empirical basis, nor any desire to exclude any voice from the discussion based on philosophical considerations.
On the other hand, anti-science forces have repeatedly attempted to paint the discussion in terms of metaphysical loyalties. In large measure, they have failed to “wedge” philosophical theists away from their non-theist counterparts; it is manifestly obvious that any anti-science victory will eventually lead to more repressive measures directed against those whom they regard as non-conformists.
So, in order to achieve the “wedge,” this particular troll disguised itself as a pro-science-but-anti-atheist partisan, hoping to create a rift with a false smear. Don’t fall for it.
agnostic: A person who believes that the human mind cannot
know whether there is a god or an ultimate cause, or anything beyond material phenomena.
atheist: A person who believes that there is no god.
Dr. PZ said above “Yes, I do. I state loud and clear that I am an atheist…”
Hey, Dr. Myers, looks like you may be promoted to
an agnostic, aye? If you/we have no way of proving
nor disproving “God”, then the correct label would
not be atheist, correct? No one can really be an atheist
only an agnostic. By the way, I don’t like labels of
any kind, I bet you don’t either.
Is my understanding wrong here? I’m no expert,so
holler back and let me know.
Thanks
Well said, Kynos. Whover the Davetroll may be, he’s extremely stupid to think that anyone would accept his blather as the voice of Kansas Citizens for Science.
To view the *real* positions of KCFS, please visit http://www.kcfs.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi.
“No one can really be an atheist only an agnostic.” That’s like saying, “No one can really disbelieve in unicorns, since we cannot prove that they don’t exist.” Well, I don’t believe in unicorns, and I don’t have to first prove that they don’t exist. They have to prove that they do.
Fred:
In the understanding of most atheists, agnosticism is a subset of atheism, not an alternative. (It is also a subset of theism). Atheists don’t believe in gods. Agnostics, more specifically, don’t believe because they don’t know (or, in the original strong form: claim that we CANNOT know).
I won’t presume to speak for PZ, but I am a “strong” atheist, believing there are no gods. “Weak atheism (also called negative atheism) is the lack of belief in the existence of God or gods, without a commitment to the necessary non-existence of God or gods. Weak atheism contrasts with strong atheism, which is the belief that God or gods do not exist, and theism, which asserts that there is at least one god. The weak atheist generally gives a broad definition of atheism as a lack or absence of evidence justifying a belief in God or gods, which defines atheism as a range of positions that entail non-belief, disbelief, doubt, or denial of theism. A narrower definition of atheism as denial of the existence of God or gods as epistemically impossible (synonymous with strong atheism) is also in common use.” -wiki
Fred Gray wrote:
Most knowledge and belief is a matter of the weight of the evidence, not proof–proof is for matters of logic and mathematics. If you don’t believe in God because you think the weight of the evidence is against the idea, you’re an atheist. If you don’t believe that it’s possible to measure the weight of the evidence or that it’s evenly balanced, then you’re an agnostic.
What’s the difference between a “label” and any word that refers to something? I don’t think we can live without labels, but we just have to be careful not to confuse the map with the territory.
Actually, to get more specific, the logic works like this. In doxastic logic, let B = believe and K = know. Both B and K are assertions about one’s own self-evident mental state, belief simply meaning that your mental state is that you hold claim X is true, while with K, your mental state also contains a list of reasons or justifications which affirm it’s truth.
The broad definition of atheists, then is this:
~BG = not believe God
The definition you have of atheists, however is this:
B~G = believe not God
Then of course are the theists: BG.
Note that ~BG and B~G are NOT logically equivalent. More importantly, note that ~BG is actually a statement entirely about one’s mental state (i.e. that it lacks God beliefs), whereas B~G is a belief statement about the external world. That’s why when we say that the burden of proof is on the person making a claim, the ~BG atheist is not technically making a claim. The B~G atheist is.
Now, as for agnosticism, it’s more complicated. Here’s some of the issues:
~KG = don’t know if there is a God = agnosticism
K~G = know that there is not a God = gnostic atheism
KG = gnostic theism
Now, note the compatibility. ~KG is compatible with both ~BG AND B~G AND BG!
So hopefuly you can see the basic issue more clearly: claiming to be agnostic does not resolve the question of whether or not you are a god believer. And while we have two equally viable definitions of atheism, if we choose the strong definition (B~G) then we have left a perfectly reasonable position (~BG) without a common name, despite the fact that it is perfectly consistent with the common usage of atheism (i.e. if you ask me if I believe in God, I will say no and you will probably call me an atheist based on that response. However, what I said no to was BG, which is not the same thing as alleging B~G)
The primaries here are coming up, and having atheists swarming our site will not, AT PRESENT, be helpful.
I like this. How weaselly can one get? Yes, we’re going to play to religious biases AT PRESENT, but hey, maybe later we’ll start to allow that science and religion are at best uneasy bedfellows. I thought we were out to tell the truth, not one convenient part-truth after another.
I guess some people think we need a big tent of the kind that the dishonest ID side has. Screw it. Science is the big tent, and whatever the philosophical status of theists within it, there is no question that theists are completely allowed, respected, and admired for their actual scientific work.
This is the only message that is worth getting across, that anybody, from theist to atheist, may be capable of understanding the case for science, including evolution. And we don’t object to good theistic or to good atheistic scientists, only to pseudoscientists. Telling atheists to shut up merely obscures the fact that science and evolution belong to all reasonable people, while the IDiot side is largely sectarian, with a few hopelessly unscientific “agnostics” like Berlinski and DaveScot thrown in for bad measure.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com
Telling atheists to shut up merely obscures the fact that science and evolution belong to all reasonable people, while the IDiot side is largely sectarian, with a few hopelessly unscientific “agnostics” like Berlinski and DaveScot thrown in for bad measure.
You forgot Charlie Wagner.
>guffaw<
Hey, everybody, lighten up on the KCFS folks; they’re not telling P.Z. to shut up.
The “Dave” who sent the message P.Z. quotes does not represent KCFS, his views are not representative of KCFS, and he’s apparently either a loose cannon or actually a troll for the other side. (Some of us can probably figure out which tiresome troll…)
The actual KCFS folks have said nice and welcoming things to P.Z. on their site, and disavowed that person, so let that go. KCFS is cool.
plunge:
Interesting analysis. K~G is logically impossible (proving a negative), and I along with many other people believe KG is inconsistent with present evidence, therefore, ~KG is logically required. (Also, of course, ~K~G: I can’t be sure that there is not a god.)
Where it gets complicated is that (I think) PZ is assuming that all good scientists abide by the rules
Ax: Kx -> Bx
Ay: ~Ky -> ~By
(in other words, they believe what the evidence shows them, but don’t believe anything without justification).
This leads directly to ~BG, thus PZ’s claim that theism is inconsistent with good science. Interestingly, it also leads directly to ~B~G: good scientists shouldn’t be sure that there is no god, since they can’t prove that there isn’t. (And in fact, I am an agnostic atheist for exactly this reason: ~KG, ~K~G, ~BG, ~B~G in this notation.)
However, this is all using strict two-valued logic: applying Bayesian inference gives quite different results. You can’t prove a negative with absolute certainty but you can often establish it to any finite degree of certainty you want. Bayesian inference not only allows us to stop falsely dealing in absolutes, but also be precise about *how sure* we are of something.
You can be pretty darn sure (but not absolutely sure) that certain types of god don’t exist, because if they did, they would be doing something visible, like preventing the Holocaust, or flinging thunderbolts at people who utter their names in vain. Each unprevented misery or unpunished blasphemy is further evidence reducing the probability of a god that would have acted if it had existed (benevolent or strict respectively).
It’s not “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”. It’s “You catch more flies with honey than vinegar”.
Under the British model (or rather some exam boards), YEC does belong in science class. As does Flat Earth Theory. In both cases you are taught what people used to believe, why they used to believe it, why we no longer believe it and what the best theories currently are.
Religion, on the other hand, is precious to them (although they may notr practice it)because of Christmas dinners, oops, I mean family gatherings and other local culture expressions.
There are some people who really don’t care about how/if religion fits to science or vice versa but use both as tools to better understanding of the “world”.
I agree with your sentiment, but I’d note that you’ve given two orthogonal purposes for religion here – as a means to social ends and as a way of understanding the world. I’d agree that the former is both harmless and often actively beneficial, but the latter can lead to people mentally lopping off any bits of science that don’t fit into their (religious) image of the world.
“Interesting analysis. K~G is logically impossible (proving a negative)”
First of all, please never again suggest that proving a negative is impossible. If you think so, prove it! (How’s that for irony!) What you are thinking of is that it is _in practice_ impossible to prove _universal_ existential negatives _inferentially_. But that leaves out all sorts of other ways to K~G, the foremost being deductive proofs. While I’m not personally impressed with most of the common deductive disproofs for the various major theological concepts of God, I certainly wouldn’t want to go so far as to say that the deduction of the non-existence of something is impossible!
“Where it gets complicated is that (I think) PZ is assuming that all good scientists abide by the rules
Ax: Kx -> Bx
Ay: ~Ky -> ~By
(in other words, they believe what the evidence shows them, but don’t believe anything without justification).”
Yep, that’s the definition of empiricism. Its effectiveness can even be well demonstrated… albiet empirically. :)
“However, this is all using strict two-valued logic: applying Bayesian inference gives quite different results.”
That’s the beauty of doxastic logic. Belief, at least, IS binary. Either you affirm a belief, or you don’t. You’re entirely right, though, that knowledge doesn’t necessarily break down like that, especially empirical knowledge, which NEVER breaks down like that.
“You can’t prove a negative with absolute certainty”
I thought it was impossible outright?! :)
“You can be pretty darn sure (but not absolutely sure) that certain types of god don’t exist, because if they did, they would be doing something visible, like preventing the Holocaust, or flinging thunderbolts at people who utter their names in vain. Each unprevented misery or unpunished blasphemy is further evidence reducing the probability of a god that would have acted if it had existed (benevolent or strict respectively).”
Personally, I think it wise to leave empiricism out of philosophy/theology, in part to avoid corrupting empiricism. It doesn’t really make much sense to apply measures of certainty (which are linked with the idea of data and testing) to philosophical abstracts, which are often so airy and vague that evidence for can become evidence against or irrelevant with the turn of a phase.
Good news for Kansans
That’s some heavy firepower.
Intelligent Design Society of Kansas
There was some discussion of this a while back. Basically, to break down the prositions, you can be:
Agnostic-agnostic
Agnostic-atheist
Atheist-atheist
An agnostic-agnostic is someone that a) hasn’t seen any evidence of any gods and b) therefor doesn’t know if there is such a thing.
An agnostic-atheist would be someone that a) sees no evidence that any god ever described by anyone exists and b) is 100% atheist per any and all human defined gods. Such a person also probably places the odds any place from extremely low to 1/infinity for such a thing existing at all, since you would have to a) have evidence and b) be able to describe it in some non-arbitrary and purely invented way, first.
An atheist-atheist is the extreme of the former, a) seeing no evidence to suggest any gods exists and b) considers the odds of such a thing to be redundant, completely unecessary and probably “worse” than 1/infinity.
In other words, the terms are applicable to both “what” and “how” you get there. Most are probably in category 2, they are agnostic about if there is areal reason for there to be anything, if there is evidence and what that could possibly be, little if any chance for such a thing *and* they are atheist about any and all gods the human race has so far ever come up with.
Logic alone is sufficient to demonstrate that no entities fitting the traditional concept of ‘God’ exist.
Whether beings like Star Trek’s Q can exist in an entirely different matter, but at most we can say that there is no known evidence clearly indicating their existence.
from Fred Gray
I see says the blind man
You lie says the deaf man. Many thanks to:
Kristine, plunge, wildlifer, Jim Lippard, Glen,
Chris, Kagehi, Caledonian, and PZ’s blog!
There are atheist who don’t believe in god.
There are atheist who do believe their is no god.
There are agnostics who do not know.
Their are theist who do believe in one god.
To tell the truth, I had no idea there was a
regular and weak athiest. I have never put much
thought on the subject of whether a person has
a religion or a person who does not have a religion,
because what difference does that make if you are
talking about science or science fiction or biology?
Thanks all,
Did you notice that a church in Kansas is inviting scientists to lecture on evolution? It’s in the Kansas Citizens for Science update.
Corkscrew, I put the word ‘world’ in brackets, I don’t mean it as creatures and planets and Universe only. I wanted to include history, human laws, society, imagination etc without excluding sciences.
I meant “why we are as we are and why we live as we live” (or something like that, I haven’t had coffee yet :) )
“Personally, I think it wise to leave empiricism out of philosophy/theology”
But in this case (and especially on this blog :-) it’s a mistake. I think your analysis is interesting, but since you leave out knowledge from science rather irrelevant to what we can think.
I think Kagehi is closer to the definitions of weak/strong agnostic/atheist someone presented here a while ago. (But there were 4 categories then.)
Caledonian,
I don’t think logic alone gives the strongest or perhaps even a correct theory.
Some people prefer to choose ontological materialism (the conclusion that the natural world is all there is) because they argue that natural phenomena seems to be behind all observations, and thus they close off the remainder. This theory cant be falsified, since all observations must be redefined as “natural”. That is not a satisfactory scientific theory.
I believe we can make a good theory. We cant make theories about supernatural phenomena in the absence of observations that helps us define them. We know however that natural phenomena obeys energy and probability conservation laws. Lets call the remainder nonnatural phenomena. The nonnaturals will include all possible supernatural phenomena.
By testing a massive amount of different systems (for example chemical and gravitational ones) one can confirm or falsify “beyond reasonable suspicion” whether nonnaturals can be observed as breaking conservation laws. If they arent, the best theory will be that they dont exist.
I cant see why “methodological naturalism” cant eventually show “ontological materialism” as a correct theory by observations?! Until then, I will not shut up. :-)
Most people regard me as an atheist – but …
I prefer to regard myself as a militant agnostoc – why should this be so?
Because, as an agnostioc, I can demand of the religious believers that they produce evidence (naturalistic evidence, of course) for their absurd claims.
In the continued absence of evidence, Occam’s Razor suggests that a continued non-belief in any sort of “god” is the safer bet.
So: In the absence of evidence, I don’t think there is any detectable god, and will act accordingly.
Right, religious believers, show me cause to change my mind ….
I and others have written (in too gory detail to get into here) how materialism gets supported by contemporary science. It is on the same playing field as other general hypotheses, though, which sort of stand or fall as a unit. By now they are so mutually reinforcing it is dififuclt to imagine what would shake even the slightest bit of it up. Of course, this is all anathema to the religious both traditional and new age.
As for strong atheism, Michael Scriven’s argument IMO still stands. (See his Primary Philosophy, linked to on my website somewhere if someone wants to see more.) Basically it runs an incompatibility argument on benevolence and potency. (Note: one doesn’t need to assume omnipotency and omnibenevolence to run the argument, amazingly.) This rules out “internal to the universe gods”, and of course my post from yesterday asking about why one would think that the universe has an origin refutes other gods.
Scriven’s argument is discussed a little at http://www.positiveatheism.org/writ/smithdef.htm . It seems to be a good application of the problems to make a case (a real theory) on supernaturalism. It includes Ockhams razor in a natural manner. And I think I see why the observation of the unnecessity of an origin is needed to close the argument. However, as for Caledonian’s argument, I don’t see clearly falsifiability and avoidance of a somewhat tautological definition of natural.
IMHO, something like what I sketched above is stronger, since it would let us positively state that nonnatural mechanisms doesn’t exist, and prove it in a definite falsifiably manner. Ockhams razor would be naturally implemented here too, in the choice of the best theory.
The existence of alternate more or less wellfounded theories (which in some cases would need more observations :-) that implies the same thing is invigorating, though.
This is almost completely wrong.
Ontological materialism is not a conclusion. It is a definition. Because science is always open to revision of its understanding of nature, the content of that category is provisional and uncertain. ‘Nature’ is defined as everything that we can observe and that affects the things we observe. Nothing supernatural exists by definition.
The only way the category of ‘supernatural’ could be useful would be if we had some way of defining precisely what fit in the category of ‘natural’, and that requires a static and unchanging understanding of the natural world. Any observations that conflicted with that understanding would then be pushed into the supernatural.
Science constantly uncovers phenomena that weren’t a part of its earlier understanding. Its strength is that it can incorporate those phenomena into new theories and discard the old. This is not “falsifiable”. Hypotheses within the scientific method need to be falsifiable. The scientific method itself does not need to be and cannot be — what would we use to falsify it?
Tell me, Mr. Larsson: are X-rays supernatural? What about neutrinos? Nuclear fusion? None of those things fit within the scientific understanding of the world before they were discovered. Should they have been shunted off into the category of magic, or should we have altered our conception of the natural order to include them?
You fail to grasp the logic, then.
The traditional concept of ‘God’ includes a number of properties. Some of these properties are mutually incompatible — in fact, a few are inherently impossible, as they’re logically paradoxical. Therefore, we can safely say that no entity matching that traditional concept exists.
Perhaps the demands of philosophy don’t quite match your skill set, Mr. Larsson. I think you’d be happier with the Sophist model of rational discourse.
“This is almost completely wrong.”
I don’t think it’s so easy as you say, since in that case where would be no philosophical discussion here. As Keith says, “I and others have written (in too gory detail to get into here) how materialism gets supported by contemporary science.”
“Ontological materialism is not a conclusion. It is a definition.”
This is completely wrong. It’s an assumption. It “refers to the metaphysical assumption that the natural world (including the universe) is all that exists.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naturalism_%28philosophy%29
“‘Nature’ is defined as everything that we can observe and that affects the things we observe.”
That’s the tautological part, which also makes ontological naturalism unfalsifiable. Everything observed, including eventual “supernaturals”, are really redefined as ‘natural’. It’s an inherent property of methodological naturalism, or the method of science.
“Nothing supernatural exists by definition.” This is equivalent to the Closed World Assumption, “the presumption that what is not currently known to be true is false.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_world_assumption. This is the assumption of ontological naturalism.
“In contrast, methodological naturalism is the more limited view that the supernatural can’t be used in scientific methods.”
Methodological naturalism doesn’t contain ontological naturalism, it’s an added assumption.
If you look at this as a scientific type of theory, it makes it very weak since the last assumption, which the theory really hangs on, can’t be falsified when combined with the first definition. This is not so strong.
Some would say (have said to me, in fact) that this is not a scientific theory at all, but a philosophical idea. I tend to agree, since it’s based on a combination of one method (working, but tautological) and one metaphysical assumption (unfalsifiable).
“The only way the category of ‘supernatural’ could be useful would be if we had some way of defining precisely what fit in the category of ‘natural'”
If you look at what I wrote, you can see that this is exactly what we can do. Except that we can’t make any assumption on “supernaturals”. They will however be closed off anyway, by observation. I am merely saing that this is a stronger and probably scientific theory.
An added benefit would be that ‘ontological naturalism’ would be pushed into methodological naturalism by observation.
“Hypotheses within the scientific method need to be falsifiable. The scientific method itself does not need to be and cannot be”
Here you are saying exactly what I say; your hypotheses about a closed world need to be satisfiable. The scientific method, methodological naturalism, is (a) method(s) that has been observed to work very well.
“Should they have been shunted off into the category of magic, or should we have altered our conception of the natural order to include them?”
I don’t see where you are going with this. The idea I describe wouldn’t treat new observations any different than today. It is based on very wellknown and general properties on natural phenomena. It needs it own series of observations to support a specific theory. The above observations have nothing to do with them.
“”Caledonian, I don’t think logic alone gives the strongest or perhaps even a correct theory.”
You fail to grasp the logic, then.”
Scientific theories has always trumped philosophical theories. Since they include observations and crosschecking, they reveal many ‘logical’ theories as faith theories.
However, in this case the logic tells us the same as the proposed theory. I was discussing the status of it as a scientific theory. As I said above, some doesn’t see ontological naturalism as a correct scientific theory. “Hypotheses within the scientific method need to be falsifiable”, remember? I could however have been clearer on this point.
“Therefore, we can safely say that no entity matching that traditional concept exists.”
The aim of my proposal is to shoot down all supernatural claims, not only obviously impossible claims.
“Perhaps the demands of philosophy don’t quite match your skill set, Mr. Larsson. I think you’d be happier with the Sophist model of rational discourse.”
If you don’t understand or like the message, kill the messenger by ad hominems, is that it? I prefer science, since this is the direction I come from, and I believe it’s stronger than philosophy whenever they overlap. Here we are looking at such an overlap. But philosophy seems fun and essential in other areas.
“The essential claim of sophistry is that the actual logical validity of an argument is irrelevant (if not non-existent); it is only the ruling of the audience which ultimately determines whether a conclusion is considered “true” or not.”
Obviously from what I have written, if you claim I would like sophism, you are wrong.
“your hypotheses about a closed world need to be satisfiable” – your hypotheses about a closed world need to be falsifiable.
“they reveal many ‘logical’ theories as faith theories” – they reveal many ‘logical’ theories as false faith theories.
There are no possible grounds for separating phenomena into natural and supernatural categories. The universe is a closed system by definition — if you insist upon using a different word for the totality of everything in existence, fine, but then *that* will be a closed system by definition.
Of *course* ontological materialism is unfalsifiable! It’s a definition!
That is precisely what we can *never* do. Science always remains open to new phenomena and new observations, which it cannot do if it constructs arbitrary definitions of what can be found in reality.
You say you don’t like sophistry? Then why don’t you use anything but it?
Caledonian,
You should read my commentary on how to observe natural phenomena more carefully. I didn’t put any limitations or “arbitrary definitions” on these, but used already theorised and amply confirmed general properties, the conservation of energy and probability.
I have pointed you to resources that says exactly the opposite of what you say. By philosophers, both methodological and ontological materialism is considered to be (methodological respectively metaphysical) assumptions, not definitions. Ontological naturalism isn’t accepted by all. Lastly, sophistry is appealing to an audience, while I (and you) try to argue something on its merits.
You persist in denying this conflict between you and the general discourse, so continuing this argument here is neither fun nor productive.
Is anybody else here old enough to remember the “Lavender Menace”?
How about all those right-wing screeds about how racial integration was a Communist plot, because Communists supported it? Ditto labor unions. And how the unions and integrationists worked mightily — onced their positions had been established as “reasonable” — to shut their Communist workhorses up?
And just to distribute the blame a little, the commies vs. the anarchists in the Spanish Civil War.
Those are limitations, and they *are* arbitrary. The conservation of energy is already violated in modern physics — and before Einstein, it was amply confirmed. Should scientists have considered the existence of our sun to be supernatural, then? Of course not.
Your attempts to argue are inane, and your denials of basic definitions are perplexing. I suggest you stick to less rigorous fields than philosophy in the future.
Caledonian,
It seems to me that Torbjorn is using the pretty-much standard definition of “ontological naturalism,” and you’re not.
As I understand it, in normal philosophical parlance, ontological naturalism does contain the extra assumption (beyond methodological naturalism) that the supernatural does not exist—and that that’s not simply a matter of defining it away.
Your definition of “ontological naturalism” is different from Torbjorn’s and most other people’s, including mine, specifically with regard to “naturalism” and whether the concept of “supernatural” is even valid.
I share your general sense that “supernatural” is a bogus category, in a certain sense. It’s hard to define, and most attempts are inconsistent, factually false, or otherwise lame. But that doesn’t, in itself, mean that there’s no interesting or important distinction between the natural and the supernatural. There could be, in principle, even if no current definition is quite right, and even if every current definition is substantially wrong.
You can’t simply define the “supernatural” away by generalizing “natural” in the way that you do—or if you do, you can’t expect other people to accept that definition as “the” definition without a very good argument. It misses exactly the point that Torbjorn wants to make, which is that we can be generous enough to accept the term “supernatural” as a possible “natural kind term” and show, empirically, that it actually has no referent on any reasonable interpretation.
(If I understand him correctly, Torbjorn would rather show that the supernatural does not exist, empirically, in the way that we normally “prove negatives” in science. We show that all the apparent observations of the hypothesized entity are actually better explained by something else—in this case, by mechanisms that are clearly, prototypically “natural.”)
To resolve this issue, you’d have to at least make your case better. In particular, I think you’d have to show that whether something is natural or supernatural is a matter of actual definitions, with necessary and sufficient conditions, rather than being “natural kinds.” There are some subtleties in the philosophy of language that turn out to be central to making sense of these distinctions.
The usual way that words work is that they refer to actual things in the world, and definitions are secondary. A “definition” can be very incomplete, and somewhat wrong, and still refer to an actual thing; the actuality of the observed thing is primary, and we “fix the definitions” as we go along. We do not normally stick to strict definitions and say that if reality doesn’t fit them, the named thing doesn’t exist.
For example, in the 20th century, the concept of “electron” underwent several radical revisions, especially if you include the revisions of the concept of a “particle.” If we stuck to definitions we’d have had to say to say that “electrons do not exist,” rather than revising the definition. (Similarly for atoms. Atoms were originally supposed to be indivisible; that’s was part of the point of calling them “atoms.” It turns out that they’re just sorta indivisible for some purposes, like basic chemistry, and that’s “close enough” that we say “atoms are real, we were just wrong that they are atomic.”)
In general, we use definitions as rough descriptions to pick out actual things in the world, and not much more. Only when we actually understand those things can we come up with a “correct” definition, based on what they actually turn out to be.
(We have to be “generous” in interpreting definitions, or rather humble about the accuracy of “definitions” in the face of the real things we’re learning about.)
To use your own example, suppose it turned out that Q from Star Trek TNG existed. Is he a “supernatural” being, or not? Depending on how the facts about Q turned out, I think it could go either way. If he’s just a powerful alien who takes advantage of certain unknown physical laws that don’t seem “supernatural” once we know them, then he’s a natural phenomenon. He’s just a powerful, smart alien.
But suppose that the laws he uses turned out to be very weird in certain peculiar ways, which make them very unlike the natural laws we’re used to, and which resemble “magic” in certain basic ways—e.g., deep connections between mind and matter that are not reducible in any of the usual senses we use for materialistic explanations. And suppose that it turns out that these weird magic-like laws also explain many phenomena previously described as “supernatural.”
In other words, we find out, empirically, that there “was something to” this traditional labeling of things as “supernatural,” after all, even if it’s not quite what people thought.
One way to slice this is to say that once you know those laws, they’re just natural laws no matter how magic-like they turn out to be.
Another is to salvage the terms “magical” and “supernatural’—in the same way we salvaged the terms “atom” and “electron.” Of course, these “supernatural” phenomena would be “natural” in your sense, but they’d also make sense of the natural/supernatural distinction, and allow us to salvage the term “supernatural.” We’d find a cluster of phenomena that had been referred to as “supernatural,” and which turn out to be real and interestingly different from prototypical “natural” phenomena—and “similar enough” to the preconceived idea of the “supernatural” that we’d say that the supernatural does exist, after all, as atoms and electrons do despite many mis-definitions.
I personally don’t think that the supernatural does exist; I even think that the supernatural can’t exist, but for much subtler reasons than you give.
Please, unless you can address these issues carefully and respectfully, please stop ridiculing Torbjorn for failing to accept your apparently “defining the problem away.” He’s not being sophistical, and you’re not bringing to bear the kind of philosophical expertise you’d need to resolve an argument about what’s a good definition.
The objection you’re making is akin to saying that evolution is just a theory. A substantial difference exists between the normal, everyday usage of ‘theory’ and its use as scientific terminology.
As far as science is concerned, the natural world includes everything that exists. If new phenomena are shown to exist, they’re added to our understanding of the natural world — and if that requires revising our understanding of how that world works, so be it.
Earlier, less sophisticated systems of thought did define what was part of the natural world, whether explicitly or implicitly. All cloven-hoofed creatures chew a cud in the natural order of things, for example, so pigs (which do not) are obviously an unnatural intrusion into that order. And so on.
Q is not a supernatural being by definition. The rules that describe his behavior do not have to be similar to our understanding of the universe’s rules. He is necessarily part of the natural world, although a part that we did not encounter previously.
This is not an argument about “good definitions”. I am using the definition accepted in rational debate, and neither you nor Larsson are. The term ‘supernatural’ is not a mere label — the word has meaning when broken into smaller, constituent parts, rather in the same way that ‘triangle’ is a word made up of meaningful components. There is no such thing as a four-sided triangle. It is not possible for us to encounter evidence of a four-sided triangle. No empirical examination of the universe will ever demonstrate this statement to be wrong. If it’s not three-sided, it’s not a triangle. There is no way to salvage the concept of a four-sided triangle. Period. If something exists, it is not ‘supernatural’ but natural. Period.
From the Wikipedia entry on “Supernatural”.
This is basic logic, applied to rudimentary concepts. If you can’t handle that, you shouldn’t be attempting philosophy. (You also shouldn’t be permitted to live outside of controlled circumstances with real people, but that’s another thread.)
Cal,
Sorry, you’re still begging the basic question, and I couldn’t care less whether somebody who wrote a wikipedia entry agrees with you.
It is not true that “any concept of supernaturality requires that supernatural phenomena are not accessible by the scientific method”—or if it is, it’s because it hinges a whole lot on what you mean by “accessible” and “scientific method.”
The simple fact is that the central examples of (purportedly) supernatural phenomena are things that (supposedly) affect natural things and are thus observable. Any “definition” of the “supernatural” that excludes the prototypical examples is just a bad definition.
That is not what “supernatural” has ever really meant, outside of bad philosophical arguments.
(You might want to read Pascal Boyer’s book Religion Explained, in which he talks about what “supernatural” really does mean. It’s not what you think, and it’s not something most people can articulate.)
All of the early definitions of “water,” “gold,” “atom,” “electron,” “mammal,” and “species” would exclude many, most or even all actual instances of those categories. That doesn’t mean that those things don’t exist—they all do. It means the supposed “definitions” were wrong.
None of these things actually fits the early, pre-theoretical definitions, so by your logic none of them exist. That indicates something wrong with your “basic philosophy” and “simple logic.” You need to study more and better philosophy.
You put way too much stock in simplistic definitions, and end up making sophistical, question-begging arguments.
If we’re going to address “the supernatural” scientifically, we can’t stick to simplistic definitions of “supernatural”; we have to give “supernatural” the same kind of definitional leeway that we do other “natural kind” terms.
“Natural” is a cluster concept, i.e., it has several relevant senses. The relevant sense of “natural” when contrasting “natural” and “supernatural” is clearly not the sense you’ve picked. You are simply mistaken to think that that’s the definition of “natural,” or that it’s the relevant sense of “natural.”
For as long as people have been trying to distinguish between “natural” and “supernatural,” they’ve clearly been using a very different and narrower sense of “natural” than you are using, when making that distinction. You are misreading them. In contrasting the “natural” and the “supernatural,” it is generally assumed that supernatural things can have observable effects on natural things.
You’re creating a false dichotomy between “natural” (in your sense) and “supernatural” (in theirs)—and propounding a fallacy of four terms based on your simplistic and erroneous “definitions.”
Over and over again.
It’s pretty ballsy of you to do that, and constantly condescend about other people’s allegedly philosophical incompetence, sophistry, etc.
And thus they qualify as ‘natural’ under the scientific definition. We’ve been over this before. Sticking your fingers in your ears and humming isn’t going to accomplish anything meaningful.
Or perhaps they’re bad examples?
You mean, all of the actual instances of the current definitions of those categories. The categories themselves have changed even when the word remained the same.
There’s the question-begging, again. Science does not address the supernatural. It dismisses it. It can address things that are foolishly asserted to be supernatural, but it excludes the conceptual category.
Yes, let’s go ask the witchhunters what the definition of ‘supernatural’ is. While we’re at it, let’s see how many people were capable of actually using natural-language symbolic logic at the time.
I’m not misreading anyone. People have commonly utilized self-contradictory, false, and nonsensical terms. Even in the best of cases, general usage frequently does not match technical usage. I will not deny the primacy of the theory of evolution, or the theory of gravitation (Newtonian or Einsteinian), or the theory of quantum mechanics, simply because hoi polloi don’t understand what ‘theory’ means.
More to the point, you are failing to grasp the basic nature of the scientific method. Science does not and cannot define the content of the category ‘nature’. There are no a priori grounds to distinguish between one kind of observed phenomena and another. Is bringing people back from the dead supernatural? By older definition of ‘life’ and ‘death’, anyone with a little training in CPR has a good chance of managing it.
You, and the people like you, are to the philosophy of science what IDists are to evolutionary biology and Holocaust deniers are to history.
Oooh, fighting words! I’m so impressed. Holocaust deniers? Why not just call me a Nazi and be done with it?
My turn: You’re just a wanking lightweight who doesn’t know how to listen, or ask a civil question.
No, I take that back. You’re an asshole, too.
Are we done now?
The truth doesn’t hurt unless it’s supposed to, Paul W. I’ve listened to enough of your prattle already. When you’ve decided to stop existing at the same intellectual level of IDists, drop me a line.
Before I lose all ability to locate this post, I shall address the example of atoms so clumsily brought up by Paul W.
The key point is that the community of scientists made both a definition and an assumption. They defined the stuff they were working with as having the name ‘atoms’, and they assumed some things about their properties – specifically, that they were indivisible, which is part of what the original Greek meaning of the word ‘atom’ implies.
Assumptions are dangerous things. The things called atoms turned out not to be indivisible. Scientists did not then deny the reality of the things they had been studying — they simply reformed their conception of what properties those things had.
Names can be given freely. Assumptions about what is and is not true cannot be made freely. Scientists study the observations available to us, and they call the totality of those available observations ‘nature’. It is necessarily the case that nothing outside of this category exists, but scientists (or anyone else) are not free to assume what is actually included in this category.
Caledonian,
Can you turn down the invective a few notches, or at least hold off until after we’re communicating better? You’ve already said that my “prattle” is “on the level of the IDists” and “akin to saying that evolution is just a theory,” compared me to holocaust deniers, etc.
If you showed you understood my argument first, your condemnation would be much more convincing and humiliating. In lieu of that, it’s just incredibly tedious.
Your last posting finally acknowledges that you understand one point I was making. That’s progress. We might be able to get further, where you could understand my argument and either agree with it or disagree with it in a clearer way.
I guess I’m just an oaf. Thanks for deigning to address my clumsy example.
Right. Definitions often embody assumptions which are false. That is not necessarily fatal to a theory, because such “definitions” aren’t generally definitions in the classical sense of having strict necessary and/or sufficient conditions for set membership. Instead, they are rough descriptions of something guessed to be actual, and can be amended in light of new information about the real phenomena.
(Actually they’re two things together—a rough description and some extra precision which may be wrong. Part of the point of being precise is so that you can be wrong, and fix the definition when you notice it doesn’t quite fit reality.)
Exactly. One thing it shows is that a definition can be shown to be contrary to fact, without the actual thing it (incorrectly) describes being unreal, and without other claims about the real thing in question necessarily being false.
(For example, the fact that we were wrong about atoms being atomic didn’t much affect the truth of statements about atoms of elements combining to make molecules of compounds.)
This terribly complicates logical arguments about real phenomena. Given a logical definition of some purported thing, and a resulting contradiction, it’s not obvious that the actual thing in question can’t actually exist—it can’t exist exactly as it was logically defined, but maybe it really does exist, and the “definition” was partly wrong.
That is why, for real phenomena, you can’t generally soundly nail somebody for a contradiction that arises from a particular logical definition that is purported to describe a real phenomenon. If your argument hinges on a peripheral aspect of the definition, they can change the definition to “fix their theory.” You win the battle, but not the war.
They are allowed to do that. Scientists do quite frequently, and that doesn’t mean that they don’t understand basic philosophy and logical argument. It means that they know their definitions are provisional, and secondary to the actual things that they roughly describe.
Unfortunately, this has to apply to purportedly real phenomena that we don’t believe are real, as well, or we risk begging the question in a funny way.
The phenomenon may or may not exist, but deriving a contradiction from a particular definition does not necessarily show that it doesn’t.
So, to be fair to supernaturalists and win the argument fair and square, about “the supernatural,” we have to give them the same kind of definitional leeway we give scientists like ourselves, about things like atoms or species. A theory may be logically inconsistent in some details, or contradict demonstrable facts in some minor ways, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s basically wrong—it only shows that it’s at least somewhat wrong, somewhere.
The real question is whether it’s fixable because it’s roughly correct in describing something real.
(This sounds wrong to many people who’ve absorbed some simplistic philosophy of science that makes it sound like a single disconfirming instance disproves a theory. In a certain sense it can, sometimes, but in practice, it generally can’t. A theory is generally a complex interrelated set of assumptions and hypotheses, and theory confirmation is much, much more complicated than people often make it sound. Scientists generally try mightily to “debug” theories in the face of failed predictions, rather than simply discarding them.)
Right.
On one hand, it’s question-begging to define the supernatural into existence by asserting that there is real stuff beyond the reach of science.
On the other hand, it’s also question-begging to define the “supernatural” out of existence by simply asserting that a particular definition captures the essential idea of the supernatural, and showing that such a thing can’t exist, based on another definition.
For that strategy to work, you have to first show that the purported definition of the supernatural really does capture the basic idea of the supernatural, and not a peripheral detail of a provisional theory, which they’re allowed to “fix”—in the same way we’re allowed to fix our theories of atoms, species, etc.
I do not think that the central idea of the supernatural is that it has no observable effects and is thus the complement of the “natural” (in your very broad sense).
In fact, if one is defined in terms of the other, by complementation, I think it goes mostly the other way—the “natural” is defined in terms of the “supernatural.” It’s all just stuff, and the “natural” stuff is everything but the “supernatural” stuff.
The basic intuition is that there’s one set of principles that govern (most aspects of) most stuff, and another set of principles that governs some special stuff. (Or special aspects of some more-or-less normal stuff.)
I think that fundamental intution is both historically and logically prior to the rather artificial boundary people often assert between the natural and the supernatural, to keep supernatural claims “off limits” to encroaching science.
Here’s an analogy. Consider “natural” in the sense of “not artificial.” “Artifical” things are constructed intentionally by intelligent beings, prototypically humans. Natural things, in this sense, are everything else.
Of course, you can and should say that in a larger sense, it’s all part of Nature—humans evolved naturally, and it’s natural that they make things, so in the big picture everything’s “Natural.”
But so what? It doesn’t change the fact that within Nature in that broad sense, there are natural things like rocks and clouds, and artifical things like cars and Nutra-Sweet(TM). It’s still a meaningful distinction about real things.
When it comes to the “supernatural” I think we have to give the supernaturalists the same kind of benefit of the doubt, even if we don’t really believe them. (And I don’t.)
There could, in principle, be some tenable distinction between the natural and the supernatural, as there is between the natural and the artificial, even if it’s all part of Nature—i.e., everything we could know about or sensibly speculate about.
I don’t think that there really is, and I think it can even be proven beyond reasonable doubt. But doing so isn’t easy—if it was easy in the way you seem to say it is, we could also prove that there’s nothing artificial because everything is ultimately Natural.
Doing it right involves the kind of debunking of particular definitions you’re doing, plus an actual attack on the core theory—we have to show that the idea of the “supernatural” is incoherent or factually incorrect in a way that the idea of the “artificial” is not.
To do that, we have to first get a handle on what “supernatural” really means, beyond “not natural,” or show that it doesn’t mean anything beyond that. We can’t just assume it doesn’t.
Christ, you’re an idiot.
I’ll make you a deal, Paul W.: I’ll turn down the invective a few notches if you turn down the stupid a few dozen notches. Assuming of course this is some kind of pointless joke and you’re actually capable of intelligent thought, all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.
My arguments are perfectly clear. It’s your understanding that’s muddled.
Fool. Names are arbitrary, but once given they cannot be arbitrarily changed, particularly not in the middle of an argument. If we throw out the definition, we have no means to say that “maybe ‘it’ really does exist”, because we have no way of determining what we mean by ‘it’.
At no time have you demonstrated a willingness to think, or even the capacity to do so. You do not understand natural-language logic, nor do you understand the natures of the fallacies you accuse others of utilizing. In short, you’re a waste of protein.
I’ll take that as a no.
Gosh, Caledonian. I guess you’re unfamiliar with the word “maybe.”
Of course, if we were trying to prove something does exist, that would be a bad argument. But you’re trying to prove something doesn’t exist, without having a generally-agreed definition of that thing. Being unable to determine what `it’ means is a problem for your argument, too. If they’re not claiming to have exactly the right definition, and disagree with yours, your argument fails, too.
You’re trying to prove a negative.
Ever heard the expression “you can’t prove a negative?” That’s what you’re trying to do.
You’re trying to prove that a poorly-defined thing is not actual.
That puts the burden on you to define it properly. That’s the hard part, and you seem to think it’s trivial. You’re wrong.
You also seem to be unfamiliar with “reductio ad absurdam,” or unable to recognize the relevant instances. (Hint: you’re pretty funny.)
As I’ve repeatedly shown, the kind of argument you’re making cannot be valid in general. If it were, we could trivially prove that atoms and species don’t exist, and that nothing is artificial.
You haven’t really addressed that, or shown that you understood it. If it’s not okay for supernaturalists to change definitions and evade disproof of the existence of the entities they describe why is it okay for scientists to do so, in many instances?
If these things were as easy as you make them out to be, science would be easy. It isn’t.
No, Cal, I think it’s pretty clear what’s going on here. You’re a crank.
You have repeatedly crowed, in various threads, about having proven that the supernatural doesn’t exist. “We’ve been through that,” you say to me, as though it were settled. And you proceed to call me names.
You miss the significance of the fact that when you claim to have proven this thing, people generally ignore you. Like a classic crank, you seem to take silence as assent.
It’s not. If you actually had such a proof, we’d be very interested.
But most people here know that you can’t simply disprove the existence of such a thing. They understand the idea behind the dictum, “you can’t prove a negative.” (Even if that statement is simplistic to the point of falsity, taken literally.)
And when, like Torbjorn, they ignore your argument from tautology, and continue to discuss the real issues, like falsifiability, you get all pissy. It’s very tedious, so most people just ignore you and walk away from the discussion.
You’re not impressing anybody with your bitter invective, because you’re an annoying crank, and we know it, even if you don’t.
Torbjorn and I understand why tautologies are boring and falsifiability is interesting. If anybody here doesn’t understand the scientific method, or what a theory is, it’s not us. It’s you.
Yeah. Lucky for me there was nobody really smart like you on my tenure committee.
Your atheist prosetlyizing isn’t helping KCFS, boys.
Whats your purpose?
To help the creationists win so you will still be able to make jokes about Kansas?
Think about it.
Your atheist prosetlyizing isn’t helping KCFS, boys.
Whats your purpose?
To help the creationists win so you will still be able to make jokes about Kansas?
Think about it.
I know when it does not apply. For example, “maybe will will one day find an example of a four-cornered triangle” is invalid.
Yes, it’s a statement repeated by stupid people because they don’t understand logic.
Negatives can be proven all the time. Proving any positive statement true is equivalent to proving its negation false, and vice versa.
Proving a universal negative from specific evidence is impossible. The fact that I’ve never come across a four-cornered triangle does not constitute proof that they are impossible and do not exist. A simple rational analysis of the meaning of the word ‘triangle’ constitutes proof that they are impossible and do not exist.
As an aside, any true argument stated in a single segment is tautological. This explains why you’re so uninterested in true arguments…
Anyone can define a category in such a way that they can make true statements about that category. That isn’t interesting. What is interesting is that by using the definition of ‘supernatural’ that is understood in science, we can easily show that it does not exist.
Science rejects the concept of the supernatural. It does so outright.
Yer buddy iz baaack. No one but the Bird Flu Troll even givez a drizzly zhit about KCFS. But BFT doez, cuz he got hiz zorry butt banned there.
Of course you can prove negatives, and people do it all the time. (In one step, even, by a basic rule of deduction, modus tollens: (P->Q; ~Q) => ~P.)
I agree that “you can’t prove a negative” is a misleading way of saying an important truth. It’s confusing to people who don’t know basic logic, and to people who mistakenly think that the people they’re talking to don’t.
I think we can agree that that’s a red herring.
Right.
Such an analysis only works for words like “triangle,” with well-defined, agreed-upon, definitions. It doesn’t generally work for words like “species” and “atom” which refer to dimly-understood, provisionally-described things in the world, before the empirical/theoretical dust has settled.
Such words don’t have definitions in the same sense that mathematical abstractions do; they do not have necessary and sufficient conditions except in light of a finished, agreed-upon theory.
So far as I know, there is no such uncontroversial theory of the supernatural. At best, the word “supernatural”, now, is like the word “species” in 1800 (pre-Darwin), or the word “atom” in 1900 (pre-Rutherford). (And at worst, it’s just incoherent bullshit.)
If you logically prove that those things don’t exist as defined, people can just guess that you have the wrong definition—and probably should.
For your proof to work, you have to show that the concept of the “supernatural” is more like the concept of “triangle” than the concept of “atom” or “species,” in the requisite way. Good luck with that.
Your concept of the “supernatural” is just the complement of the “natural.” There’s a certain intuitive appeal to that, but you can’t assume it’s an intensional definition, decontextualize it, plop it down in a new theoretical context, and assume it works there, with new referents, too.
I don’t think you can do that validly, for two reasons:
(1) to the extent that “supernatural” is defined negatively, it’s defined relative to a particular concept of the natural; if you define it negatively relative to a different concept of the natural, all bets are off, and
(2) supernatural mostly isn’t defined negatively; intuitively, it’s assumed that there’s such a thing as something like magic, which is governed by special principles. The natural is what’s defined negatively, as what’s not special in that way.
To a significant extent, anyway, “supernatural” is like “artificial.” Both are presupposed to be about positive properties, not just a lack of “naturalness.”
You can’t really define what’s supernatural as just what’s not natural. That’s a description, which may or may not have the right extension (i.e., denote the same set of things) but it is not a proper definition—it does not actually express what would make something supernatural.
That would be like saying that the “artificial” (whatever that means) is just the complement of the “natural” (whatever that means), and similarly taking it out of context, using your “scientific” definition of Natural(TM) and assuming it still works.
But the “artificial” is only the complement of the “natural” for a certain sense of “natural”—not the very broad “scientific sense” of Natural(TM) you’re talking about.
Suppose I agreed that “artificial” just means “not natural,” in any context. You might plug in a “scientific” definition of Natural(TM) and show, by complementation, that the “scientific” definition of Artificial(TM) yields an empty set of referents. Turns out that nothing is artificial if it has observable effects. (Huh? Somewhere along the line, we lost the prototypical examples of things made by people, presumably because they have interesting observable effects.)
In some weird sense, I think that’s even true and interesting—there’s a useful insight in the idea that even “artificial” things are Natural in the broader sense of what’s within the scope of science. They are, and we can study “artificial” phenomena like computers and moral codes as Natural(TM) phenomena. Cool.
That’s great, as far as it goes. Some people are actually confused about that, and it’s good to let them know that something being artificial does not preclude doing real science about it. But that really is as far as it goes.
We can call that Natural(TM), if we want, but it doesn’t much matter whether we attach that label. And if we do, we have to be very careful not to confuse it with other senses of the word “natural,” or we get absurdities.
For example, science doesn’t really “reject the concept of the artificial, outright,” in the obvious sense of the word. It accepts, makes scientific sense of, and uses that category just fine, within the larger context of the Nature. Some sciences, like achaeology, use that category all day, every day.
I could similarly say that science can study the (alleged) supernatural just fine, because it’s (purportedly) part of Nature(TM) in the broad “scientific” sense. Like the artificial, science can study the supernatural because it’s all part of Nature(TM) in the broader scientific sense.
I do believe that, and think that it’s interesting in some discussions. In particular, it’s useful for rebutting people who declare the “supernatural” to be somehow off-limits to science because “science can only study the natural world.” But that’s about all it’s good for—showing that some people are confused about different senses of the word “natural,” and unduly limiting the scope of science.
Not everybody who believes in the supernatural believes that the supernatural is entirely beyond the scope of scientific inquiry. And the ones who do believe it usually believe it because of misconceptions about the limits of science, not because they think the supernatural has no observable effects. They generally don’t think the latter at all. That is not what supernatural has ever really meant.
Many supernaturalists define a narrower concept of the natural as more or less the complement of the supernatural—and mistakenly think that distinction relevant to what science can study, by conflating “natural” and “Natural(TM)” and constructing a fallacy of four terms. They are conflating the folk sense of the “natural” (which is the complement of the supernatural) with the broader scientific sense of Natural(TM), which includes anything with observable effects.
Unfortunately, you seem to do the same thing, accepting that conflation, and constructing a similar fallacy of four terms.
(You’ve denied this, and berated me for it, but not shown why I’m wrong to think that. I think I do know what a fallacy of four terms is, and I do think I’ve detected one in your argument. Maybe I’m wrong, but there are only a couple of ways to prove it.)
For your argument to work on a stronger interpretation, where science actually rejects what they mean by supernatural, you have to at least show a disanalogy between the natural/supernatural and the natural/artificial distinctions; you have to show that your argument is valid when applied to one distinction, while being clearly invalid when applied to the other.
(In particular, why are you allowed to define “supernatural” negatively, and expect it to mean the same thing in different contexts where you change what you define it relative to? How can you assume that there isn’t a positive feature of the supernatural that has escaped your analysis, without begging the question of whether the word “supernatural” refers to some dimly-understood actual thing?)
One way would be to show that “natural” and Natural(TM) really refer to the same things, and that supernatural is just the complement of natural; I think I’ve shown that neither is clearly true.
Otherwise, you have to show that there is no possible theory under which the folk-sense idea of the “supernatural” could make scientific sense, as “artificial” does. That’s hard. It can’t be done by the simple “semantic analysis” of simplistic “meanings of words” that you’re doing.
If it could be done that way, we could similarly rule out the “artificial” and say that archaeologists are being unscientific when they refer to “artifacts.” But they’re not.
Your argument makes sense, as I said above, only on a certain interpretation doesn’t conflate “supernatural” and “Supernatural(TM),” and only supports certain conclusions.
It does not make sense in a way that supports some of the things that you have said, e.g. that it’s nonsense to talk about “studying the supernatural scientifically,” because science “rejects the category of the supernatural, outright.”
That makes no more sense than saying that it’s nonsense to talk about studing artificial things scientifically, because science rejects the category of the artificial.
Scientists generally accept that there are distinct senses of the word “natural,” relevant to different distinctions. There is no One True Scientific Definition of “natural” that describes what science can study and also describes what’s not artificial, or not supernatural.