Re: [asa] Education, Medicine, and Evolution

Falsifiability is religious in the sense that it introduces a
metaphysical component.

At 12:38 PM 6/2/2008, you wrote:
>On Mon, Jun 2, 2008 at 4:48 AM, Collin R Brendemuehl
><collinb@brendemuehl.net> wrote:
> >
> > Naturalism's philosophical failures are many.
>
>Any in particular?

Any in particular? Really? I named two.

> > Mayr's toleration of a paradox as something to be appreciated is one of my
> > favorites:
> > * Many authors seem to have a problem in comprehending the virtually
> > simultaneous
> > * actions of two seemingly opposing causations, chance and necessity.
> > * But this is precisely the power of the Darwinian process.
>
>Perhaps the simple answer is that it is at best a strawman. Where does
>Mayr makes his claims and what does he say. Vague assertions without
>detail do not further the conversation. I have asked you for
>references before and all I got was a book. Perhaps you could outline
>what exactly Mayr claims? As to the simultaneous actions of two
>seemingly opposing causations of chance and necessity, this may cause
>some confusion to some authors however they are neither opposing nor
>problematic. The 'power' of the Darwinian process are the combination
>of two processes namely variation (which is observed and quite well
>understood) and selection (which is observed and reasonably well
>understood). The two forces are not opposing but combining. Thing of
>course are far from that simple and when adding additional components
>and factors such as neutrality, one comes to understand why evolution
>has been so successful.

Straw man? Hardly. Mayr's devotes a section to discussing the
subject of chance and necessity.
You can say what you want, but facts are facts.

You say it's "vague" after I've provided a quote? That's disingenuous.
But again, from What Evolution Is, 2002, Perseus Publishing, p 229
Many authors seem to have a problem in comprehending the virtually
simultaneous actions of two seemingly opposing causations, chance and
necessity. But this is precisely the power of the Darwinian process.

> > Rosenhouse's "lawlike" certainty is another favorite.
>
>Again, you present a statement but lack an argument. Rosenhouse
>exposes the mathematical problems in the Intelligent Design claims and
>provide a much needed introduction to Hardy Weinberg's theorem and
>Natural Selection. Of course these are theoretical concepts based on
>logic, reason and found to be quite useful in understanding how
>variation spreads through the population under selection. Such is the
>power of reason and logic and the combination of probability
>distributions and selection.

Rosenhouse's conclusion is that the process must work in a certain manner.
As a premise behind his mathematical argument against BAI he stated
clearly "Natural selection is a lawlike process."
Your point is specious. Of course he was making that argument. I'm
talking about *how* he arrived at his point.
The "lawlike" assumption is weak. It's a type of determinism.

> > And I pointed out two of the similar problems in Chrisitian theology.
> >
> > A good return question is: What is "science"? Hence my early post.
> > If you include the Received View along with falsifiability then you add a
> > great deal of metaphysical baggage -- as much as any religious view.
>
>How is falsifiability a religious view?

I'm using "religious" in the manner that Clouser establishes in "The
Myth of Religious Neutrality".
When a principle because a metaphysical assumption it takes the same
place as does any deity.
Hence it is "religious" though it may not be in any sense ecclesiastical.

> > Does that make it "non-science" because it is no longer physicalism?
>
>Nope, remember that physicalism is a metaphysical application of
>science rather than a methodological application of science.

Physicalism, according to Suppe, is the attempt to remove the
metaphysical and test only the physical.
I'm using the term correctly.
See "The Structure of Scientific Theories". (I don't have a page #
at the moment.)

> > It raises some serious questions. Or if you want to include the
> > theoretical sciences, even within natural studies, you've got a great
> > deal of non-physical testing and reporting going on, and much of it
> > merely mathematical (e.g., tachyons and quantum theory) and not
> > at all physical-world testable.
>
>Science does start with a lot of speculations and hypotheses that
>follow from said speculations which can then be tested. When it comes
>to ID, they somehow refuse to follow a similar path and develop a
>positive hypothesis of design, and instead focus on disproving
>Darwinism under the flawed concept that this somehow should present us
>evidence in favor of ID.
>
> > What is "science" at this point should not reject external causality.
>
>Of course not, it's just that science may never be able to prove or
>disprove the kind of external causality imagined by IDers

Ok. So it's acceptable to assume other external (and impersonal) causalities?

> > If it does, then to be consistent it must return to the old physicalism.
>
>Not at all. Science does not reject the magical, the supernatural, nor
>does it accept it, because it adds nothing to our scientific
>understanding. Science in other words is consistent with Naturalism,
>Physicalism and Religion as it remains neutral on these matters.

Can't grant that.
If science is free to find some sort of compatibalism within quantum
theory, then the door is open.

>"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.

Sincerely,

Collin Brendemuehl
http://www.brendemuehl.net

"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose"
                                                 -- Jim Elliott

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Received on Mon Jun 2 13:27:26 2008