People who worship science the most understand it the least. In the mad rush to prop up science as the antithesis to religion, stupid people are unwittingly trying to turn it into just another one. Science doesn't make moral judgments and it's not meant to. It's meant to create models of predictive utility. It doesn't seek to prescribe how things ought to be, but describe how things are in the most objective sense achievable. It can't tell you what's good or bad, or beautiful or ugly. It can explain why us humans perceive things as good or bad or beautiful or ugly (there's a whole branch of science called evolutionary psychology that deals with that), but science isn't meant to decide what is or isn't good or beautiful. And while we're on the subject, there's no such thing as "settled science". Science, by definition, is never "settled" because it's constantly seeking new information and changing based on emerging data. This is why the highest position any piece of information can achieve in science is as a theory. Theories don't graduate into facts, nor into laws. A fact is merely a data point, and a law is an observation. They have no explanatory power. A theory does. The law of gravity is simply the statement that objects with mass attract each other. The theory of gravity seeks to explain why that is. When a scientist seeks to explain something, they form a hypothesis and then design an experiment to disprove it— not prove it, disprove it. If that hypothesis can be substantiated experimentally, and that experiment can be reproduced with consistent results, and that hypothesis can be used to predict something else, then it becomes a theory. Ideally, science should have no dogma or orthodoxy, nor loyalty to any ideology or human conceit. When it does, that's called Lysenkoism and it leads to disaster. When it comes to morality and ethics, those are the domains of the philosopher and the theologian, not the scientist. The scientist's job is to give the best guess as to which falsifiable claims are true or false based on the most up-to-date, experimentally verified information, and let the philosophers and theologians do what they will with that information. That's not to say scientists should never concern themselves with ethics when the well-being of humans is concerned, but their own personal moral hangups should take a backseat to objectivity whenever possible, because what's true or false in reality is not influenced by any human's opinion of it. The great scientists of history— most of whom were religious up until the past century— understood this. While science can dispel myth and superstition, science is not meant to supplant religion because religion is not just myth and superstition. It's a constant throughout human history and an integral part of human psychology. Like it or not, humans have a predisposition toward religious thinking, which is why so many treat science like a religion, much to its detriment. In the absence of a "traditional" religion, humans fill the "god-shaped hole" with something else. They latch onto anything that brings the same sense of constancy, community, and (perhaps illusory) enlightenment religion brings. Some latch onto political ideologies, others onto fandoms or products (what I call "plastic idols"), some onto celebrities, and some onto a fundamentally wrong conception of science. They are no different from the religious zealot; their idol is their identity, and any criticism of that is seen as an attack on their person and on their tribe. Don't drag science down into tribalism.
People who worship science the most understand it the least. In the mad rush to prop up science as the antithesis to religion, stupid people are unwittingly trying to turn it into just another one. Science doesn't make moral judgments and it's not meant to. It's meant to create models of predictive utility. It doesn't seek to prescribe how things ought to be, but describe how things are in the most objective sense achievable. It can't tell you what's good or bad, or beautiful or ugly. It can explain why us humans perceive things as good or bad or beautiful or ugly (there's a whole branch of science called evolutionary psychology that deals with that), but science isn't meant to decide what is or isn't good or beautiful. And while we're on the subject, there's no such thing as "settled science". Science, by definition, is never "settled" because it's constantly seeking new information and changing based on emerging data. This is why the highest position any piece of information can achieve in science is as a theory. Theories don't graduate into facts, nor into laws. A fact is merely a data point, and a law is an observation. They have no explanatory power. A theory does. The law of gravity is simply the statement that objects with mass attract each other. The theory of gravity seeks to explain why that is. When a scientist seeks to explain something, they form a hypothesis and then design an experiment to disprove it— not prove it, disprove it. If that hypothesis can be substantiated experimentally, and that experiment can be reproduced with consistent results, and that hypothesis can be used to predict something else, then it becomes a theory. Ideally, science should have no dogma or orthodoxy, nor loyalty to any ideology or human conceit. When it does, that's called Lysenkoism and it leads to disaster. When it comes to morality and ethics, those are the domains of the philosopher and the theologian, not the scientist. The scientist's job is to give the best guess as to which falsifiable claims are true or false based on the most up-to-date, experimentally verified information, and let the philosophers and theologians do what they will with that information. That's not to say scientists should never concern themselves with ethics when the well-being of humans is concerned, but their own personal moral hangups should take a backseat to objectivity whenever possible, because what's true or false in reality is not influenced by any human's opinion of it. The great scientists of history— most of whom were religious up until the past century— understood this. While science can dispel myth and superstition, science is not meant to supplant religion because religion is not just myth and superstition. It's a constant throughout human history and an integral part of human psychology. Like it or not, humans have a predisposition toward religious thinking, which is why so many treat science like a religion, much to its detriment. In the absence of a "traditional" religion, humans fill the "god-shaped hole" with something else. They latch onto anything that brings the same sense of constancy, community, and (perhaps illusory) enlightenment religion brings. Some latch onto political ideologies, others onto fandoms or products (what I call "plastic idols"), some onto celebrities, and some onto a fundamentally wrong conception of science. They are no different from the religious zealot; their idol is their identity, and any criticism of that is seen as an attack on their person and on their tribe. Don't drag science down into tribalism.
@ReviewsPossum @DanielKrawisz It's all perspective. Science says we are just animals to be programmed.
@ReviewsPossum I found this book to be an interesting and useful discussion on where science and faith can intersect. Written by HH The Dalai Lama @DalaiLama goodreads.com/book/show/1006…
@ReviewsPossum Ironically enough, I feel like the statement "People who worship science the most understand it the least." also applies to religion. The most fervently religious understand religion the least, or something along those lines.
@ReviewsPossum Religion is the study of the supernatural world. Science is the study of the natural world. When properly understood, there is no contradiction between the two. Believing there is a contradiction is magical thinking, because magic tries to be both.
@ReviewsPossum Trying? There's a whole cult that believes "male" and "female" are optional.
@ReviewsPossum This happens all over small towns with tight religious cliques that frame things this way in the first place. Nonbelievers end up trying to subvert the role they're being assigned.
@ReviewsPossum @VIK19941 that's a pretty good point.
@ReviewsPossum What is that rage bait qoute tho? Why does she have foregin chicken scrtaches in her name…seems like a legit person.