Pajamas Media » Getting It Wrong about Atheism and Science

Getting It Wrong about Atheism and Science

David Berlinski's article on atheists manipulating the sciences is both deceptive and illogical. Here's an attempt to set the record straight.

April 29, 2008 - by John Derbyshire

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Before we begin, let me tell a brief David Berlinski story. I’ve told it before here, but it bears retelling.

Three years ago The New Criterion sent me one of David Berlinski’s books to review. I didn’t think much of it, and said so rather bluntly in my review, which you can read for yourself here.

A short while after the review was published, TNC forwarded to me an email from David Berlinski, thanking me for having taken the trouble to review his book, regretting that I hadn’t liked it, and wishing me well!

Now feeling terrible about having slighted David’s book, I emailed back suggesting that by way of balance, I might ask the editor of TNC to give my next book to David for review. He emailed back in the same friendly and civil tone, saying he didn’t think that would be right at all.

I call that an extraordinarily high standard of gentlemanly collegiality. Our exchanges were entirely private, so you can’t put it down to moral potlatch display on David’s part. It can only be sheer innate decency. So I enter these exchanges liking and respecting David very much, hoping his latest book sells well — I worked off my guilt for that last one by telling everyone I met to buy it — and determined to try to reach David’s level of civilized discourse.

OKAY BERLINSKI, YOU DOG-FACED MORON … Nah, just kidding. Well, what have we got here?

After some routine slandering of scientists as having “acquired” the “authority” of Soviet commissars — I await with interest the demarcation of ZiL lanes for the sole benefit of atheistical biologists heading for their country dachas — I see this: “It is curious that so many scientists should have recently embraced atheism.”

Now I recall why I disliked David’s book so much. There was something like this on every page — something that fires off the chain of reactions: Is it? … What does this actually MEAN? … Does it, in point of fact, mean ANYTHING? … Oh, the heck with it!

What, in that particular sentence, does David mean by “recently”? Since the seventeenth century? Since that rash of atheist books came out a couple of years ago? The only clue David gives us is a list of physicists in the following sentence. It’s a pretty random list, with a 200-year jump from Newton to Maxwell, so let’s try to be a bit more systematic.

Here are the top twenty physicists from Charles Murray’s Human Accomplishment:

Newton, Einstein, Rutherford, Faraday, Galileo, Cavendish, Bohr, J. Thomson, Maxwell, P. Curie, Kirchhoff, Fermi, Heisenberg, M. Curie, Dirac, Joule, Huygens, Gilbert, T. Young, Hooke

Due diligence at this point would require me to go to my local library and read up on these notables in the Dictionary of Scientific Biography. That would involve me leaving my very comfortable perch up here in the tree house, though. I am therefore going to yield to sloth and run up a rough-approximation list for the piety of these people, using the best resources I have at hand: William H. Cropper’s Great Physicists, Wikipedia, and my own fast-cratering memory. Here’s what I get.

eccentric Anglican, functional atheist, functional atheist, devout Sandemanian (fundamentalist Protestant), devout Catholic, conventional Anglican, secular humanist, “social” Anglican, devout Presbyterian, agnostic, nominal Lutheran, agnostic, atheist, agnostic, atheist, deist, deist, nominal Anglican, Quaker, nominal Anglican

No doubt I have got some of them wrong, and there are of course hours of argumentation there. Several million words must have been written just about Einstein’s religion, though the matter seems plain enough to me. (He explicitly and emphatically denied any belief in a personal God, and his “Old One” was so remote and inactive that even “deist” doesn’t really fit Einstein. His Old One was really little more than a figure of speech, I think.) Still, I believe my list sufficiently refutes your statement that “the great physical scientists … were either men of religious commitment or religious sensibility.”

Let us proceed!

Then a question on “how the universe arose.” Punchline: “Given the account of creation offered in Genesis and the account offered in A Brief History of Time, I know of no sane man who would hesitate between the two.”

A few points at random:

What an extraordinary sentence to commit to print! Its clear implication is that Stephen Hawking is insane. Its only slightly less clear implication is that anyone who does not accept the Genesis account of creation — a category that would include at least half of those top twenty physicists in my last section — is insane. Furthermore, I am insane, and so is my wife. You had better alert the authorities, David.
Why restrict our choices to just Hawking and Yahweh? There are plenty of other accounts of the origin of the universe for us to choose from. There is a whole raft of them here. Why are you so cavalierly casting aside Mbombo, the white giant of the Makuba, who one day “felt a terrible pain in his stomach, and vomited the sun, the moon, and the stars”? Are you some kind of a racist, David? Or look at this lovely creation story from Tibet. You should at least try to be a little multicultural, David.
What’s wrong with saying: “I have no clue ‘how the universe arose,’ and I don’t believe anyone else has, either”? OH MY GOD, I HAVE RIPPED OPEN THE FABRIC OF SPACETIME! … AAAAAARRRRRRRGGHHHHHHH! …

“And there is Darwin’s theory of evolution.” Indeed there is. Do you have anything to say about it? No. That is not very surprising. Creationists never do have anything to say about it. They mention it, as you do, and as the authors of that silly movie do, only to at once veer off into questions about biogenesis, a topic about which nobody really knows anything, and that Darwin was not very interested in, and that forms no essential part of his account of the origin of species. I would love to get a conversation going with creationists about the origin of species, but they seem to be even less interested in this topic than Darwin was in biogenesis.

Dawkins is plainly trying to say the same thing in that exchange you quoted, but the movie editors cut it up to make him look stupid.

Metaphysics and philosophers’ opinions about metaphysics — and even scientists’ opinions about metaphysics — form no part of the scientific enterprise.

“What reason do we have to suppose that God might not exist?” Well, his being invisible, inaudible, intangible, nonaromatic, flavorless, and undetectable by any known instrument is a pretty good start. But why is there any burden on atheists to prove that God does not exist? How would you set about proving that Poseidon, Wotan, Ahriman, Unkulunkulu, or the Great Manitou do not exist, David? Come on, give us a clue. I don’t want a detailed 80-page proof in each case. Just outline for me what your proof procedure would be.

Finally, back to those old commissars. “Who knows what mischief Soviet citizens might have conceived had they imagined that the Politburo was not, after all, infallible?” Another one of those say-what? questions. The answer, I think, is that the Soviet party bosses knew perfectly well, and made sure that the citizenry knew that they knew, and would deal with such “mischief” very briskly.

Underlying your last comments, to the degree I can squeeze any sense out of them, is the vague notion that atheism is a sort of religion — “a doctrine,” you say — that people sign on to, perhaps after undergoing some formal instruction from a properly ordained minister. Possibly it does take that form in some individuals, but far more often it is merely an indifference to supernatural explanations, on the part of people who find natural explanations sufficiently interesting. As one of those atheistical book authors says — Hitchens, I think it is — an atheist just believes in one fewer god than you. He is an atheist in respect of Yahweh in just the same way, and for just the same kind of reason, that you are an atheist in respect of Unkulunkulu.

What is your problem with Unkulunkulu, David? Why are you not willing to accept his mighty power? Are you secretly, in your inner heart, one of those arrogant atheists? Well, of course, so far as Unkulunkulu is concerned, you are!

British-born John Derbyshire is the author most recently of Unknown Quantity: A Real and Imaginary History of Algebra. His Seeing Calvin Coolidge in a Dream: A Novel was a New York Times “Notable Book of the Year.

250 Comments

Turandot:

Well, how odd. Just yesterday, the charming Mr. Derbyshire sneered that Dr. Berlinski is an “eccentric non-Christian crank,” and now, just a few hours later, you like and respect Dr. Berlinski very much….

I do owe the odious Mr. Derbyshire my thanks. His 04-28-2998 National Review Online temper tantrum, _A Blood Libel on Our Civilization_, inspired me to promise myself never to visit NRO again as long as I live and to erase National Review forevermore from the publications I subscribe to, thereby saving me time and money.

Apr 29, 2008 - 2:22 am OmegaPaladin:

Despite Derbyshire’s witty writing style, it seems to the same material to which we are accustomed. Atheism is the rejection of any and all divine claims. In general, atheists are strict naturalists who deny the supernatural. The idea that atheism and the selective beliefs of a theist are equivalent does not bear close scrutiny. Someone who believes in one god can agree with a polytheist or a pantheist that reality is not limited to that which is perceivable by the senses. An atheist generally cannot say that.

Apr 29, 2008 - 3:09 am freetoken:

John here has written a much more cogent article than the early piece Berlinski.

While I may believe Theism is more defensible than Mr. Derbyshire may believe, still I think it is important to be clear and above board in our thinking and discourse of these matters. So, Kudos to John.

Too much of Berlinski’s earlier essay was indeed slanderous, for which he should be ashamed. Should Mr. Berlinski wish to respond to the essay here let’s hope he will be a bit more circumspect.

Apr 29, 2008 - 3:21 am Snippet:

This exchange has been an excellent example of the difference between using your (considerable) intellect to prop up a belief that provides comfort, and using it to derive as much information about the world as is possible at this time.

Apr 29, 2008 - 5:11 am Teri:

Re: origin of the species. The Bible is clear that God created everything according to its KIND. From there, biological change within each species took place.

Apr 29, 2008 - 6:08 am Snippet:

An atheist or a scientist may acknowledge the existence of unmeasurable things.

But he or she will not make such things the object of SCIENTIFIC inquiry, and will be annoyed by those why try to force her to do so.

Apr 29, 2008 - 6:42 am Byron:

Scientific theory is data-driven, and it eventually changes as the data demand; scientific theory has no claim to be taken seriously independent of the data it purports to explain. The creationist-ID account is completely different, remaining the same irrespective of whatever new data might come to light; it explains everything and anything by exactly the same theory. Creationist theory is not data-driven, but exists independently of data. That means that it is factually empty and impervious to falsification. No creationist will specify any set of observations that would cause him to discard his explanatory theory. Creationism-ID is not only not science, it’s antithetical to science. That such a thoroughly dogmatic view should be attacking science on grounds of dogmatism is entirely bizarre and entirely backwards.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:01 am griefer:

Science is a series of heresies opposing orthodoxies, ie the consensus model of the system.
All good scientists are heretical in nature.
Berlinsky’s aregument makes no sense.
Creationism/intelligent design is the orthodoxy…what civilization believed for thousands of years.
ToE(theory of evolution) is the heresy.

and yes, a disproportionate amount of scientists ARE atheists or secular humanists…..but the hidden variable is likely IQ.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:01 am Anthony:

I am a believing Catholic. Why can’t we just accept that the universe “is” and get on with understanding it as best we can. I do not read the Bible to understand thermodyanmics nor do I read a science book to understand salvation. The Big Bang theory was posited by an astrophysicist who was also a Catholic priest. If he saw no conflict between his scientific life and his faith life, I won’t either.

I like this quote: “Science gives us knowledge, and religion gives us meaning. Both are prerequisites of the decent existence.” It is from Michael Heller, a cosmologist and Catholic priest from Poland, on occasion of winning the Templeton Prize this year.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:05 am David Berlinski:

1 If I remark that no sane man would hesitate to choose between A and B, it hardly follows that either A or B is insane. This is a point of logic. It is obvious.

2 To suggest that Mbombo or Unkulunkulu have an enduring claim on our attention is to ignore the striking insight achieved by the ancient Hebrews: That various scattered deities are nothing more than local manifestations of a single God. “As all suns smolder in a single sun,” Chesterton observed, “the word is many but the Word is one.”

3 There is nothing wrong in saying that one has no idea how the universe arose. I say it regularly. What Mr. Derbyshire might mean by “OH MY GOD, I HAVE RIPPED OPEN THE FABRIC OF SPACETIME! … AAAAAARRRRRRRGGHHHHHHH!” is anyone’s guess.

4 A movie is not required to make Richard Dawkins look foolish.

5 I would be happy to join John Derbyshire in a debate about the origins of species.

6 Both consideration in the law of contracts and manifolds in differential topology are “invisible, inaudible, intangible, nonaromatic, flavorless, and undetectable by any known instrument.” What of it?

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:18 am TRO:

After reading both side of this debate I can only reach one conclusion. John Derbyshire is not a very nice person. If one can sneer in words, Derbyshire is a master of it.

Berlinski isn’t just a nice guy, he’s a fricken saint for even talking with Derbyshire.

But since you have to have God to have saints I suppose Derbyshire will just consider him a friendly primate and then study him.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:24 am James:

Possibly (atheism) does take that form ( a doctrine) in some individuals, but far more often it is merely an indifference to supernatural explanations, on the part of people who find natural explanations sufficiently interesting

I can only conclude that Derb has never read a single issue of New Scientist.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:30 am jp:

the funny thing is that the Scientific Method pressuposes Theism/Creator/Designer.

for an atheist to be Rational, they would have to throw out the SM and create their own that doesn’t pressupose a creator. See David Hume’s problem of Induction.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:31 am Joe Shipman:

Derbyshire has written several times that, although he is no longer a Christian, he is a theist. He is defending atheists here against what he sees as unfair accusations, but that does not make him an atheist. It’s remarkable how often “defending X” gets confused with “agreeing with X”.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:33 am eskotek:

Which is more scientific … Theist, Mysterian, Agnostic, Athiest ???

Despite sightings and claimed abductions UFOs are not good evidence of life from other stars. Does absence of good evidence constitute evidence of absence of life anywhere else in this or any other universe? Assmume the scientific answer is no. If life can arise naturally here then it certainly can arise elsewhere and elsewhen.

Having arisen and evolved a million years beyond our current scientific understanding can we place any limitations on what they might be capable of? Creating new universes, virtual realities and life forms for example. Even one naturally occurring super species may then create many new realities so the ration of created realities to natural realities may be some large number. Let’s guess that to be on the order of million to one.

It then follows that any reality a life form finds itself in is a million times more likely a created reality than a natural one.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:33 am griefer:

Neither is a movie required to make David Berlinski look foolish.
There is a strong correlation between profession:scientist and faith:none, but the hidden variable is not a desire to rule the the world.

it is IQ and g.

Berlinski’s post is IQ-baiting.
How seductive is this meme?

You are just as smart as those snobby scientists!
You are smart where it really counts!
God-smart.

lulz!

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:42 am James:

“Does it not occur to you that by purging all sacred images, references, and words from our public life, you are leaving us with nothing but a cold temple presided over by the Goddess of Reason — that counterfeit deity who, as history has proved time and time and time again, inspires no affection, retains no loyalties, soothes no grief, justifies no sacrifice, gives no comfort, extends no charity, displays no pity, and offers no hope, except to the tiny cliques of fanatical ideologues who tend her cold blue flame?”

The author of these words was the John Derbyshire of several years past. I don’t know if he’s just being contrarian these days or if he actually means the things he says. But the Goddess of Reason seems to have gone up in his estimation. And he’s carrying on like a “fanatical ideologue”.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:43 am Tom:

Methinks that Mr. Berlinski prevailed here. Derbyshire’s effort was of a piece with Dawkins, et. al.: full of bluster, cliche-ridden, shallow, and ultimately unpersuasive.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:44 am Earl:

The origin of species is not really in question….natural selection would seem to suffice, although I don’t know anyone who claims to have actually seen it happen.

The more interesting question is the origin of genetic information, a question that materialists meet with either obfuscation or hand-waving.

One does have a bit of sympathy for them — as there is no chance of any empirical experimentation establishing their view that it was all done by random processes without any input from intelligence.

They forfeit our sympathy when they nevertheless demand that their “doctrine” be taught as fact, and employ various forms of ridicule (and worse) to intimidate those who point out that, in this respect at least, the emperor has no clothes.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:44 am jcsida:

Bravo, John, for taking on those whose only defense is to fall back on dogma. For as even Origen (no pun intended) of Alexandria, one of the earliest christian theologians (3rd cent.), said,

“Who could be so silly as to think that God planted a paradise in Eden in the East the way a human gardener does, and that he made in this garden a visible and palpable tree of life… I do not think anyone can doubt that these things, by means of a story which did not in fact materially occur, are intended to express certain mysteries in a metaphorical way.”

and

“[W]e found fault with those who, taking the words in their apparent signification, said that the time of six days was occupied in the creation of the world”.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:47 am Art:

The absence of free will. The jumbling of chemical reaction and electrical impulse. Debating a Darwinist is like arguing with your toaster. Their opinions are simply the recitation of some genetically predetermined chant and they can never be held accountable for their actions. It’s always “my genes made me do it”.

The very foundation of science is faith. Faith in an orderly and rational universe. Let me see, which religions present that world view, hmmm. Tell us again, how exactly did biological life emerge from inanimate, inorganic matter? What exactly is the plausible materialistic explanation for lifes origin? Let’s start there, and remember, no faith allowed.

I’m pretty sure that the worship of Unkulunkulu requires child sacrifice, at least for those with some abnormality, but their high priest has a perfectly rational explanation for this behavior, “Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. It is surprising how soon a want of care, or care wrongly directed, leads to the degeneration of a domestic race; but excepting in the case of man himself, hardly any one is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.”

Worship of Unkulunkulu also requires the acceptance of a priestly cast who claim infallible insight and knowledge of the workings of the universe. All debate has ended and those unwilling or unable to accept the prevailing consensus will be denied credentials, grants and tenure.

But there is hope, at least for the SLDS cult recently raided and broken up in Texas. According to the high priest of Unkulunkulu there is no fixed morality, “We may, therefore, reject the belief, lately insisted on by some writers, that the abhorrence of incest is due to our possessing a special God-implanted conscience.”

Hallelujah.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:49 am John Derbyshire:

David: From your remark that “I know of no sane man that would hesitate between the two” it follows that those people you are aquainted with who DO so hesitate are not sane. A fortiori, a person known to you who not merely does not hesitate, but opts for Hawking over Yahweh, must be insane. Therefore Hawking, me, etc. are insane. The logic seems faultless to me.

You have affirmed you belief in the Genesis creation myth. The Mbombo and Unkulunkulu creation myths are DIFFERENT. By picking one, you are discarding the others.

How does “There is nothing wrong in saying that one has no idea how the universe arose. I say it regularly,” square with your affirmation of the Genesis account?

“Consideration in the law of contracts and manifolds in differential topology” are creations of the human intellect. At any rate, I have been unable to find any reference to either in the Book of Genesis. We thought them up and found them useful. Is that your view of the Deity?

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:50 am MHatch:

It is common for Darwinists to define human actions as evil e.g., anthropogenic global warming.
Where in the theory of evolution is evil defined?

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:51 am griefer:

Berlinski’s post is a petty whinge about how those controlling elitist scientists refuse to research IDT on their own dime or discuss it in classrooms dedicated to actual curriculae, which college students are paying for.

Again, creationism/IDT is the orthodoxy, ToE is the heresey that replaced it.
We don’t go backwards in Science.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:52 am griefer:

And you can’t make us.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:52 am Ann:

” The Big Bang theory was posited by an astrophysicist who was also a Catholic priest. If he saw no conflict between his scientific life and his faith life, I won’t either.”

There are a growing number of astrophysicists are rejecting The Big Bang theory as well as “Genesis”. Check out the March 2008 Scientific American. There have been many who don’t look at the Universe as a thing, but everything, with no beginning, middle, or end. Other than that, a great rebuttal John.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:57 am griefer:

Earl, we are in the opening days of the “Two Week Revolution” of nanotech. We can make nano-assemblers.
Right now we can build small, simple organic molecules using bio-assemblers modelled on RNA strands. Pretty soon we will be able to fabricate synthetic life in nanoscale.

I really think you should move your arguments to oppositon of the cosmologists.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:58 am griefer:

btw I am a theist.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:04 am New European:

It seems to me that every objectionable property of liberals gets projected on darwinists.

Just because someone thinks that evolution is the most likely explanation for the origin of species does not mean that he believes in anthropocentric global warming, the absense of free will and moral relativism.

You do not have to be a liberal to believe in evolution. It is simply the best theory we have right now. And as long as creationism can not make a single falsifiable prediction, it is not a scientific theory but a belief system.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:14 am griefer:

erm…”we can build” should be “we can stack”
pardon

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:19 am griefer:

Tom, Berlinski just got punked by the Derb.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:24 am Herschel Smith:

Warmed over, rehashed, recapitulated objections leveled by atheists well before the author and completely obliterated by defeator arguments.

See Greg Bahnsen v. Gordon Stein debate “Does God Exist?” as only one example in thousands.

I’m sorry that I wasted two minutes reading this drivel and 30 seconds responding. Where will I go and what will I do to get 2.5 minutes of my life back?

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:25 am Earl:

When scientists construct molecules, machines, or even a living organism itself, we learn absolutely zero about the origin of any of these things by mere matter in motion.

There is a serious logical disconnect involved in arguing that watching intelligent agents do their thing somehow provides evidence that the artifacts they make can come about by random means, guided solely by (unintelligent) natural selection.

People who fail to see the distinctions involved cannot rationally object to being suspected of a “religious” commitment to their preferred story of origins.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:29 am M. Simon:

Godless Communism is no longer in vogue. At least in America.

With the advent of Liberation Theology we have Godly Communism. I liked the old kind (scientific Marxism) better. It could be falsified.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:32 am R.C.:

I am a Christian, and if anyone doubts what I mean by that, just let me borrow a phrase and state that I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and…well, and you know the rest, and I believe all of it;

I have e-mailed Derb before, challenging him on his treatment of Theism;

…and I’m here to tell you:

His criticism of Berlinski here is spot-on deserved. It is justified.

Look, folks. Defending Theism in general and Christianity in particular DOES NOT require that we defend every slapdash, incomplete, or flawed argument a fellow believer might make on God’s behalf.

We ought to be manly and mature enough to recognize that sometimes we ourselves make stupid arguments exhibiting carelessness or ignorance. When those arguments are defeated, we ought to demonstrate such virtues as honesty and humility and acknowledge it (even if our debating opponents make capital of it).

After all, it’s not as if the truth isn’t on our side! We needn’t exhibit the insecurity of someone who isn’t sure. I can hardly be afraid God doesn’t exist; we conversed just this morning. One of my mother’s friends was miraculously healed of M.S.; a couple of my life-altering decisions were made on divine guidance which I didn’t understand at the time but now do; His tender mercies are new every morning and it ain’t all hallucination.

Our role, conversing with Derb or anyone else, is to demonstrate the fallacies of bad argument — our own or the opposing team’s! — and in so doing to demonstrate the kind of honesty which befits a God-fearing person.

So let us be forthright, gracious, and magnanimous…and let us be more rigorous about eliminating the worse arguments among our own.

Derb is right: A probable majority of the great physicists of recent memory leaned toward atheism, agnosticism, and deism. That intelligent men can hold incorrect views demonstrates (a.) that there is a certain academic culture which favors these views, just as academic culture favors Marxism, and (b.) the truth is, while self-evident, not obvious. (That is to say: Like the truth that “all men are created equal,” theological truth provides evidence for itself when the matter is closely examined, but can go undetected for centuries if not.) This means it is JUST NOT TRUE for Berlinski to suggest that no sane man would choose Impersonal Creation over the Genesis Account. (And what’s more, it’s churlish bad manners.)

Now, Derb himself is not infallible, even when speaking from the Chair of St. Popper. He offers various pagan gods (with their creation stories) as alternatives, and neglects to notice that these “gods” don’t fulfill the Judeo-Christian definition of “God” as Creator in so far as they emerge from (and are thus dependent on) a pre-existing (and therefore unexplained) universe, instead of creating the universe wholesale from nothing: the unique Judeo-Christian idea.

Because of this, “Unkulunkulu” is simply not a God, in the Judeo-Christian sense, at all; he is in a different category of being. What a shame that English uses the same word for both categories, and that we have only the presence of a capital letter (”God” vs. “god”) to distinguish between that which is eternally self-existing and a notion far closer to stories of woodland fauns and leprechauns!

Derb misses this because he’s woefully uninformed and thoroughly uninterested in getting informed; he once commented about his surprise that Americans actually read books to learn more about their religion, a notion apparently foreign to the watery Anglicanism of his upbringing.

But, outside realms where Derb is uninformed, his criticisms are worth consideration. Berlinski’s comment about the Politburo really was asinine. His attempts at witticisms really are sometimes even worse than my “St. Popper” papal reference, above. Constructive criticism really could do him some good.

So don’t get all flustered about Derb using his first-rate mind to say so.

Instead, my brethren, “Always stand ready to give a logical defense (apologeia) for the hope that is in you, yet with grace and reverence.”

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:35 am Ten:

One of the more entertaining aspects of the contemporary mind is it’s proclivity to trip all over itself disclaiming views, half-baked as they may be and frequently are, that may wrankle other contemporary minds. A number of examples appear in this thread, not least of which that science is science and religion is religion and by invoking them in purely those limited, contemporary, postmodern contexts, we can leave them nicely sorted and pigeonholed there.

Surely science, therefore, masters faith. Surely faith is antiquated. This must be obvious.

In other words, the resume of science is unimpeachable. Religion is debunked superstition. Entering the debate requires those disclaimers, lest we not be allowed…to enter the debate.

Which leaves insight, wonder, awe, inquiry, and even open-mindedness, et al, on the sidelines. And surely too love, beauty, principle, justice, and hundreds of other quite real phenomenon, not a one of which is scientifically provable. Philosophically yes; scientifically, no.

So flip this topic over on its other side: In our enlightened, scientific, objectified frame of modern reference, with all its debunking performed and all the quaint old notions its banished, banished, how is it that the spiritual quality of man, as often as not codified and given form in his finest religious enlightenment, has an entire dimension of experience completely outside of the Darwinian standard of our contemporary, scientific day?

In other words, from where comes secular, postmodern, declared, presumed science, painted up as objective, irrefutable objectivity while it’s actually faith-bound and highly idealistic, or it’s various soon-to-be-fact pursuits of hopeful knowledge, they possessing all the properties of faith?

I mean, one day fairly soon, science will alone possess the grand unification of all there is. But that’s neither faith nor is it foolish.

You see, among other things, humans absolutely violate the survival of the fittest rule — we function in the realm of ideas and conscious thought, the physical, scientific universe having somehow developed these decidedly unscientific qualities for reasons only it knows. Plus, humans have an experential quality that contains a entire universe of abstracts utterly useless to the “scientific”, Darwinian trajectory atheists place so much faith in.

Yet, there they are. And they penetrate, well ahead of science, down into the soup of the building blocks of the universe itself. The entire nature of the physical universe, even apart from the great, eternal, problem of its own genesis — one that tears to shreds the false “scientific” constructs of natural versus supernatural — is based on the “faith” that things just are as they are and do as they do.

Penetrate the quantum realm to see this writ large: Below the approximate threshold between Newtonian space and the great mystery of the quantum realm — in other words, when dealing with what this entire construct known as reality is based upon — lies physical self-motivation: Subatomics do what they do simply because they do so! We conjure up Forces to explain what they do, but we leave the question of how they do so functionally ignored.

And this is “scientific”. To the point we’ll trust this vast sea of openendedness, Dawkins-like, to resolve itself, it’s apparent historical proclivity to do nothing whatsoever of the sort notwithstanding.

Because to be faithful to science, we must. Just as we must leave the question of why for the philosophers. So much for grand unification, no?

Imagine: Hard, objective, real, tangible, mystery-solving, answer-bearing (faithful) science knows not a thing about why, and very little, at some very pertinent, physical levels, about how.

Of course, those abstracts will (or should) gnaw at us, even as I have used the common words devised to define them in these simple sentences.

But of course, presumptive, displacing science is not faith. And the sheer faith that science will unfailingly produce An Answer is, of course, somehow also not faith, even though science, by nature, produces as many questions as answers, that being its very nature.

All of this not to bang too much on science — it is as some have observed: The best we have at explaining the physical nature of things. But the experential nature of the human soul, not so much. And the underlying causation and reasons for the existence of All, not at all.

This is no argument for intelligent design. But it’s supremely ironic that science, when used as The Sole Eventual Answer so many faithfully use it as, must then depend so firmly on limiting perspectives and defining parameters. Perhaps it really shouldn’t be used that way. Perhaps we should acknowledge that in reality, science is quite beholden to the faith it clearly resides inside, and that the ability the conscious mind has to grasp realities entirely outside of the sciences proves that they are not masters. They are dependents.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:36 am Matt:

griefer: “There is a strong correlation between profession:scientist and faith:none, but the hidden variable is not a desire to rule the the world. it is IQ and g.”

I am not at all sure about this. As a grad student in a university physics department, I can certainly agree that there’s a lot of scientists who profess atheism. Even more common are those for whom religion simply isn’t enough of their mental landscape to even care enough to call themselves atheists. But I’m really not sure the percentage of the practicing religious is much lower among university physicists than it is among the general population. How many of those at your local Starbucks go to church, or pray regularly, or read their Bible, or in any way take their professed Christian or other religion seriously? I don’t know, but it’s surely not many.

I submit that the hidden variable is not IQ. It’s honesty. A scientist will at least not lie and check the “Christian” box on the survey when there’s nothing in his life to warrant self-identifying as such. The average Joe will.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:39 am Etain P:

But why is there any burden on atheists to prove that God does not exist?

Well, because you are the ones making the claim that God Does Not Exist. Not may not, not god is unlikely, not god doesn’t really make a lot of sense. You are taking the bold step of saying that you CAN prove a negative and God absolutely positively DOES NOT EXIST.

Even if every religion on earth is wrong, Science can only really support agnosticism. If you said ‘there’s no evidence of god, and science remains agnostic on the subject til some turns up, anyway let’s change the subject from something we can never prove and talk about these molecules!’

But that’s not what you say. you say ‘god absolutely doesn’t exist and you people are hanging out with an invisible friend, god you’re stupid.’ If you were less obnoxious about proselytizing your faith you’d get less static about it.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:44 am ern:

It’s unfortunate that so many of the pro-Derbyshire posts here confirm what Berlinski says about scientists and atheism. Particularly the arrogance of atheist science, and the reduction of faith and belief in God to literal readings of Genesis (the comments about IQ, which are simply bigoted, are a good example).

Unlike others who want to say that either Berlinski or Derbyshire (take your pick) is a hack, I think both make good points. I *have* read recent issues of many science magazines, and the opposition to theism isn’t as casual as Derbyshire implies. It is *often* virulent and bigoted. More so among the fellow-travelers than the scientists themselves, of course.

For the record, I am a theist who does not read Genesis literally (like most Christians), and who has no particular problem with Evolution. I think the conflict over these things has more to do with science intruding rudely on theology (Dawkins being a good example) and vice versa with ID. It’s the constant sniping that’s the problem. Dawkins and his ilk only make the debate more difficult (same with ID). Neither side really seems to want to admit their own role in poisoning the debate. It’s all about reducing their opponent to the most ridiculous theory.

There is a wide middle ground here.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:48 am Ten:

One problem with griefer’s (nishi’s?) IQ. To griefer/nishi it’s all IQ, 24/7, thereby subscribing to the quite religious view of special knowledge.

Which, naturally, leaves perspective at the curb.

If perspective was irrelevant, there’d be a linear consensus among scientists (and for that matter, among every subset within the IQ architecture.)

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:49 am CB:

I have a fair amount of personal respect for Derb, given his willingness to regularly engage people directly (and privately, via e-mail). I also realize he’s aiming somewhat for humor here, but I fail to see the difference in speciously querying Berlinski on Unkulunkulu and the editing of Dawkins’ comments that Derb in “Expelled” (which I, or for that matter Derb, haven’t seen.)

I’m not all that familiar with Berlinski’s work but it strikes me that “ID types*” and Darwinists spend a lot of time talking past one another about these issues, and that much of the intellectual dishonesty in this debate comes from a refusal to take either side at their intended meaning. This may be perfectly unintentional or the result of frustration, but it seems quite common.

For example, Derb postulates an either/or scenario in Berlinski’s work in order to play off a multi-cultural riff of world religions and comically imply that Berlinski hasn’t given much care to alternatives to Christianity. However, this relies on a completely literal reading of Genesis, something few Christians would sanction as the basis for a scientific rational for understanding what happened. The essence of any reference to Genesis in a scientific context is to that of a Creator. Perhaps Berlinski tries to draw in other inferences from Genesis (the birds/reptiles order is interesting, given the recent discoveries of dinosaur/chicken relationships and those might be interesting from a theological and literary perspective, but the essence of Genesis is that God created life in a way that is beyond our ken.

So, while Derb has a bit of fun drawing in the cornucopia of world religions, the essential conflict between created and chance life is obscured. Getting to the heart of that may not be as much fun (and is immensely difficult, given the chasm between metaphysics and science - which Derb has always correctly pointed out) but it might provide more room for some understanding and carve out some common ground or at least some common understandings.

*Creationist may be technically accurate, since that refers to anyone who believes the material universe is the product of some intelligence, but as Derb uses it pejoritatively, like an epithet, I prefer the ID term - which is more generic in polite usage.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:51 am R.C.:

Ann:

It is true that a growing number of physicists are searching for something that would explain the Big Bang.

I myself have problems with this search, however:

(1.) The “arrow of time” represented by increasing entropy is better explained if the cosmological system does not pre-date the Big Bang; otherwise, we have to ask how a pre-expansion universe at a lower state of order got into a higher state (the point of the Bang). That requires recourse to energy-sources from outside our space-time, and now we’re talking miraculous intervention all over again.

(2.) This is acknowledged by scientists who think in higher dimensions (e.g. string theorists) and they’re willing to allow for a collision of “branes” in a higher-dimensional “bulk” to be the source *of* our space-time from *outside* our space time. This allows them to posit something outside our universe, but something which is decidedly Not God.

And they might be right! But they have no proof from which to say so, for, as Douglas Adams humorously observed, one can’t “fire missiles at right-angles to reality.” One can’t interact with that which is outside our space-time in any meaningful way. No experiment is possible. The preference of a Materialist for a purely material First Cause outside our space-time is just that, a preference. He LIKES it more than the notion of a Personal Cause.

Which is, I think, the origin of all of these “What Caused The Big Bang” theories. Hubble himself didn’t like the notion of the Big Bang; he and others have always complained that it smacked of divine intervention. And they’re right, so let’s not be surprised if they go looking, with a certain feverish intensity, for any alternative!

And you know what? One day they may find one (one that they can experimentally demonstrate, I mean, not just one they can pleasantly imagine), and it STILL won’t matter to the whole Theism/Atheism argument. It really won’t. Because whatever they find either has Causality in space-and-time as events in our universe do, or it is, itself, miraculous. And if it has Causality, then we’re back to searching for a First Cause, all over again.

Scientists are our friends. Seriously! Sure, I know, they keep making philosophical pronouncements on the basis of scientific discoveries, thereby demonstrating that, however professionally trained they are as scientists, they’re often rank amateurs at philosophy. But everyone has character flaws. Is it any surprise that the character flaw most endemic to some scientists, is that of being a know-it-all?

Let us then be who God made us to be, and be as forgiving and tolerant of the character flaws of others as we can. Even if it’s Darwin, Dawkins, or Derbyshire.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:53 am David Gillies:

Sez MHatch: “It is common for Darwinists to define human actions as evil e.g., anthropogenic global warming.
Where in the theory of evolution is evil defined?”

Quoi? WTF? My straw-manometer just pegged the dial. Apart from the tendentious and baggage laden description of, say, an evolutionary biologist as a ‘Darwinist’ - which, we are meant to read, is a member of some sort of weird sect like the Exclusive Brethren - if any time a public figure identified with the defence of the science of evolution against obscurantism opines that ‘global warming is evil’, he is speaking as a private citizen, and not with his ‘Darwinist’ hat on. As such, we should pay him as much (or as little) heed as we would anyone else.

As for ‘evil’ in the neo-Darwinist synthesis: there have been many and varied approaches taken under its aegis to the problem of why altruism arose.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:03 am Luke:

A very nice takedown of an irrational piece.

That said, you ought not have whitewashed Dawkins. He’s an “evangelical atheist” who goes out of his way to both insult other belief systems and convert others to his.
Hitchens (while I respect the man) also has a stated bias. While you cited him in his statement about merely believing in one God less, you neglected to do so with respect to his arguments that religion is a negative force.
Both have written books forthrightly stating their positions.

For full disclosure, I believe in ID. Within certain limitations and under certain definitions.
That God created life and put in place the mechanisms of evolution (of which we still only have a limited understanding) is philosophically defensible.
Arguing that “random mutation” is unlikely to have created the results we observe through the fossil record and direct observation is also perfectly defensible. Making this arguement implies design, which in turn implies a designer.
Neither is falsible, but then, neither is the current proposed mechanism of randomn chance.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:04 am Ten:

Excellent post, R. C. May I take it as a confirmation of the great diversity of scientific (or philosophically scientific) perspective as well as the semantic issues within the constructs of “natural” and “supernatural”?

One could argue a powerful case that matter and energy are themselves constructed of supernatural constituents.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:08 am JA:

Mr. Derbyshire,

I enjoy reading you, and particularly on this subject. A couple thoughts:

You write (in your Berlinski review linked above): “I am aware that galaxies collide and pass through each other, but are there really instances of them merging?”

You may know this by now (the review was from 2005), but galaxies do merge. To supply a ‘for instance’, check out the super-galaxy Messier 87. You can see a great representation of the galactic filamentary structure here (first five minutes, I believe), with M87 anchoring our nearest galaxy cluster:
http://www2.slac.stanford.edu/lectures/info_2007/2007_08_28.htm

Our current models suggest mergers account for the 10% or so of galaxies that are elliptical.

That’s one. Two, it’s possible that, upon reading your writings on science and religion, one takes away the idea that you come down on the side of science because its methodology is superior in principle and in fact, but for me, personally, I don’t think you stress this point hard enough. As Nietzsche wrote, “The most valuable insights are arrived at last; but the most valuable insights are methods.” Truth claims arrived at from pure reason, intuition (redundant, I know), and revelation are epiphenomena of a species-specific pathos; they are radically contingent, pure cacophony produced by methodological noise.

So when someone tells you that, at bottom, one must also have faith in science, so neener-neener, you can say, yes, this is true, but my faith is elevated to procedure, whereas your faith is mired in result. He’ll either get it or he won’t, but by definition, you will have won.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:19 am eskotek:

The flaw in the athiest science argument can be illustrated by analogy.

UFO sightings, abuction stories, and comet suicide cults are not good evidence for the existence of life on other planets.

Hence there is no good evidence for life on other planets. Therefore the scientific conclusion is that life does not exist on other planets.

However if life is a natural development on this planet then (scientific or not) it exists elsewhere with near certainty even without “good evidence”. So in this case the scientific (according to Derbians) conclusion is almost certainly wrong.

By constraining a definition of science so that it produces wrong answers in a particular case, they discredit it’s usefulness to apply it to that case.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:21 am griefer:

R.C. is right. Next month I think we will discover Higgs Bosons at CERN.
But Berlinski and Stein and their ilk will have to start moving faster to keep up with science.
The goalposts keep moving. I personally think we will be able to fabricate synthetic life in nanoscale, unpick the fabric of spacetime, map the omnium and build atoms from scratch in picoscale.
And I’m a theist!

“however professionally trained they are as scientists, they’re often rank amateurs at philosophy.”
and that is exactly why we decline to discuss pilosophy in our science classes and our laboratories.
You have your own universities and colleges and schools like Oral Roberts and BYU where people are trained to discuss philosophies.
Go forth and discuss IDT there.
lulz!

The big problem I see is the attempt to demonize science and scientists. Are we really ready for another Dark Age?

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:22 am griefer:

“One could argue a powerful case that matter and energy are themselves constructed of supernatural constituents.”

yes Ten, exactly, and that discussion belongs in a course curriculum at Oral Roberts, and not in my quantum mechanics class.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:25 am griefer:

at MIT

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:27 am griefer:

And Luke is correct, Dawkins is an evangelical atheist….he is a proselytizer.

Dr. Francis Collins(observant catholic) and Dr. Scott Atran(atheist) are much better advocates for the interaction of thinker-believers and thinker-nonbelievers.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:32 am fergusrush:

I believe Mr. Berlinski has previously noted that arguments such as this can also be used against mathematics and its objects. I find it strange that Mr. Derbyshire, the author of a book about algebra, apparently fails to see the irony of denying the immateriality of “God” while implicitly accepting the immateriality of numbers and other mathematical concepts.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:38 am JA:

In other words, ladies and gentlemen, science is only open to Methodological Challenges; if the subject is This Universe, science is not vulnerable in any other way.

If you can enter that arena, have at it. If you can find a better discovery procedure than the scientific method, you will have earned a preeminent place in the pantheon of human genius.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:38 am griefer:

Look…like JA says.
Science is the ultimate free marketplace of ideas.
For an idea to be discussed, it must be better than the current model.
IDT is the orthodoxy, the last years model.
You are trying to force us to buy an inferior last years model when we already have the current, superior model.
Good luck with that.

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:45 am Snippet:

>> What exactly is the plausible materialistic explanation for lifes origin? Let’s start there, and remember, no faith allowed.

No faith allowed?

OK. Here goes:

Don’t.

Know.

This is how those of us who respect the scientific method respond to questions when we don’t yet have enough data to justify a specific answer.

As you can see, Berlinsky is quite correct. We are horribly arrogant.

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:01 am Ten:

What motivates quantum particles, griefer/nishi?

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:14 am griefer:

hahaha
trudat

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:17 am The Snob:

If I wanted an opinion on a suit, I might ask a fashion editor. If I wanted to find out how to cut a piece of metal perfectly in half, I’d ask a machinist. I would not expect the machinist to know much about the right cut of suit for my body, and I wouldn’t expect the fashion editor to know much of anything outside his area of expertise.

My impression of science today is that like many other fields, it rewards extreme specialization. Quantum physicists spend decades studying increasingly narrow but deep gaps. Biology is probably similar. These people are many things, but they are not generalists, and while it might be entertaining to find out what a quantum physicist thinks about Renee Zellweger’s Oscar gown, I wouldn’t expect the slightest level of expertise. If they are not qualified to comment on a dress, why should I care whether they think that the Bible is the revealed word of God Almighty?

FWIW, my fear is that we are descending into a world where both left and right embrace mutually-exclusive but equally-pernicious sets of non-truths. The left for its part is quite comfortable to dismiss every bit of reason that calls even its peripheral tenets into question.

The real danger in the Right embracing anti-scientific thought is that it increases the acceptability of these ideas generally. So we don’t just get more authority for Pope Benedict, we also get more authority for the Rev. Wright to talk about how white math turns black men into social outcasts.

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:26 am griefer:

Ten, that question goes to……….BYU!
hahahaha

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:38 am griefer:

seriously…wtf are “quantum particles?”
quantum mechanics is the relationship between quanta and elementary particles.
did you mean superparticles? exotic particles? gluons? quarks? charmed quarks?
upquarks? downquarks? jinnparticles? higgs bosons?

and “motivate” wtf does that mean? do you think particles are running around in little nanocars? do you think they are sentient?
jeez..the two properties of particles are mass and decay, moron.

and Berlinski got totally punked by the Derb.

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:50 am CB:

Greifer writes:

“There is a strong correlation between profession:scientist and faith:none, but the hidden variable is not a desire to rule the the world.

it is IQ and g.”

With all due respect, this is nonsense. There are plenty of people with above-average IQ who espouse a strong faith (and plenty with below-average who happily ignore faith as much as science). This is the kind of egocentric twaddle that poisons these debates. I doubt it would withstand scientific scrutiny. Indeed, Dawkins claim of a genetic source for religious faith, while I disagree with it, demonstrates that the simplistic and self-serving idea that intelligence leads to irreligiousity is not even seriously taken by one who himself on occasion bolsters the idea with ill-considered rhetoric.

I would posit the following correlation as being more likely (but far from all-inclusive). People who gravitate towards a materialistic philosophy of existence are more likely to gravitate towards materialistic disciplines. Again, there are a fair few philosophers and scientists who weigh against that as a rule, but it’s a far fairer and objective concept than the pretense that intelligence is confirmed by a rejection of religion.

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:50 am CB:

One last observation regarding the following comment:

“‘What reason do we have to suppose that God might not exist?’ Well, his being invisible, inaudible, intangible, nonaromatic, flavorless, and undetectable by any known instrument is a pretty good start.”

The problem with this statement is its sloppy generalization. There have been plenty of observations of God recorded throughout history. Now, it’s fair to say that, given the contradictions in those observations, that some of them are unreliable. What it is not fair to suggest though is that the absence of a scientifically-measurable God is somehow a crushing blow against the notion of God’s existence.

The same argument might be used to squash the concept of spontaneous/chance-based organization of life, etc. Most of all though, it stems from a kind of organized subjectivity. It suggests that because certain individuals, groups, etc. don’t encounter God that they can rightfully claim that He doesn’t exist.

Well, I’ve never been to Wales, but I have it on good authority that it’s there.

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:56 am Ten:

What motivates the smallest, irreducible quantum particle, griefer/nishi…is its motivating force. And what motivates that is what motivates that. Turtles upon turtles.

So unless there is no limit to “physical” reductionism — to little levers operated by yet more little levers — we should agree that science will indeed never explain anything outside of observable properties. And if there is a limit to physical reductionism, below which level stuff simply does inexplicably what it does…science will never prove anything outside of observable properties.

Ergo, at some deep level, stuff simply is what it is, a principle akin to…faith. With its mystical Origin akin to the supernatural, and presumably possessing the properties of the intent and will to set up such order, the force to pull it off, our awe at comprehending it, and perhaps even, the mutual love that comes from observing such properties. From which comes truth, honor, principle, beauty, and a host of other decidedly unscientific properties, all of them existing, ironically, within a cold, godless, random Place that assembled itself.

Because is it not a tenant of detached, isolated, secularized quantum mechanics that it exhibits inherent, self-motivated behaviors and group interactions (at something akin to Einstein’s spooky actions at a distance) but not Newtonian properties? Correct me if I’m mistaken, it’s not my field.

That discussion does indeed belong in a course curriculum at Oral Roberts, as well as in your quantum mechanics class. At MIT.

That it’s typically philosophically explored in neither is an inverse of the observable, philosophical notion that at the end of that detached scientific era, God must be again Infinite and the Universe will be again infinitely mysterious and the two shall become inseparable. Again.

I do believe that having been conflicted against God for so long, and quite understandably so, science will one day discover not your or my God, but the conviction that there is a Singularity, and that for all intents and purposes, It is indistinguishable from “God”. Such as It may be.

After which point (and with the diversion of Science! out of the way) we can accept again that the mind had already deduced and reasoned that “God” and God’s attributes were simply the sheer nature of things (that semantic conflict between the natural and the supernatural crops up here again, as does the observable fact that science cannot be expected to issue answers) and get on again to the abstract evidences of consciousness, not least of which are free will and the essential nature that all consciousnesses possesses a philosophy thereby.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:01 am Ten:

nishi, you really do lack all meaningful perspective.

jeez..the two properties of particles are mass and decay, moron.

Thanks for making the precise point. And for missing the obvious irony. And the wordplay. And for bundling it all up, again, in your own tidy little IQ.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:03 am CB:

JA makes a critical error, in my opinion, when he writes:

“So when someone tells you that, at bottom, one must also have faith in science, so neener-neener, you can say, yes, this is true, but my faith is elevated to procedure, whereas your faith is mired in result.”

The error is grounded in a fundamental assumption that because science is based on a method for interrogating the material world (or at least the parts we can get at) and because the most direct part of our existence is grounded in that material world, that the method science employs is superior.

Upon further reflection, something close to a tautology emerges: “We are material so anything that examines the material is superior.” The assumption presupposes either the absence or the impossibility of getting at metaphysical reality.

I certainly don’t subscribe to certain relativist concepts of the material world (i.e. that it is more or less our perception that is real and not necessarily any reality beyond that - that sort of thinking, which I’m simplifying a bit for brevity’s sake), but there is a difference between the efficacy of a method designed to get at the most direct part of experience and the “superiority” of faith based on it.

This is especially so when the “faith” in question has more to do with the assumptions about God, the source of life, the universe, etc. derived from materialist reductionism, rather than the specific things that science can authoritatively tell us.

In other words, JA seems to be arguing that any conclusions he reaches about metaphysical matters are sounder, simply because he reached them through his reliance on a material process.

The contradictions of such a position should be readily apparent.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:14 am Ten:

Derb aside, nishi, allow this illustration:

This, quantum mechanics is the relationship between quanta and elementary particles, implies precisely this: So unless there is no limit to “physical” reductionism — to little levers operated by yet more little levers — we should agree that science will indeed never explain anything outside of observable properties. And if there is a limit to physical reductionism, below which level stuff simply does inexplicably what it does…science will never prove anything outside of observable properties.

The mark of a good mind, nishi, likely includes the ability to originate a broader, more creative perspective when confronted with paradox. I fear you cannot see the reality trees for the self-limiting, hidebound elitism of your young, presumably peer-approved predispositions about it.

I’m unaware of any proofs — especially within the context of existence boiling down to the two faithful properties of mass and decay — by such acclaim.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:16 am Ratatosk, Squirrel of Discord:

Scientists often confuse the model with reality. That is, they find a reasonable way to map out what MAY have happened, and then confuse it with what DID happen. Christians, often confuse the scriptures with reality, that is, they confuse Hebrew legends, myths and stories with history (for example, care to provide any secular evidence for King Saul, King David, King Solomon and his temple, or Hebrews in Egypt as Slaves?).

Both groups, seem to me, rather silly.

How much less dishonest to be able to say (as only a few from each group seem able) “We don’t know, and it doesn’t matter all that much anyway.”

If you want to believe in a God, or Gods or no Gods, then choose for yourself. However, if you are foolish enough to hold your belief as fact, then you appear no better than the fool on the other side. We do not know if a deity of any sort exists, Yahweh has been pretty silent for about 2000 years, his Son appears to have gotten lost on his way back and Zeus and the gang apparently moved out of Mt. Olympus awhile back. Further, we DO NOT KNOW what happens after death. There may be Heaven or Hell, there may be reincarnation, there may be nothing… none of us will know until we experince it ourselves. ANYONE who tells you differently, is lying. They may be the nicest old pastor form a quaint little town, a bombastic megachurch Reverend or Richard Dawkins… not so different in the end.

There was only one Commandment that Moses really needed to bring down from that Mountain:

“Thou Shalt Think For Yourself, Schmuck!”

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:18 am Tanstaafl:

For those interested in a great exchange regarding the “Science-VS-Religion” as well as a review of Ben Stein’s new documentary “Expelled” go to http://politerminal.blogspot.com

Cheers!

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:25 am jp:

See Greg Bahnsen v. Gordon Stein debate “Does God Exist?” as only one example in thousands

second, and would note that it can be found on youtube. The ultimate smackdown

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:29 am Reginald Selkirk:

“Given the account of creation offered in Genesis and the account offered in A Brief History of Time, I know of no sane man who would hesitate between the two.”

Derbyshire seems not to have noticed that it is hesitation that Berlinski is defaming, not one choice or the other. Perhaps he is hoping that both the scientifically literate and his Young Earth Creationist friends from the Discovery Institute, where Berlinski is a senior fellow of the Center for Science and Culture, will presume their own choice is the sane one.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:35 am jp:

same logic applies to the Laws of Logic, something materialist can not account for and are ultimately irrational.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:36 am griefer:

“as well as in your quantum mechanics class. At MIT.”

nope
keep it your unis and bible colleges, tyvm.

In my quantum mechanics class we study the double slit experiment and the quantum teleportation experiment. We are busy unpicking the fabric of the metaverse at CERN, WITH EXPERIMENTS.
Over the last 50 years we built tools and metrics for the science of the very small.
And we plan to use them.
We shall not waste time speculating about supernatural “motivations” when we plan to discover physical ones.
This does not threaten my perception of god…he is unknown and unknowable.
And we will get there eventually.

But until that time i will not tolerate whining because we won’t discuss god in our universities. You have plenty of unis and colleges and churches.
Go discuss god there.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:46 am griefer:

Nor will I tolerate the slander of Science or scientists.
By either Berlinski or Ben Stein.

I did not say that high IQ made one into a atheist perforce.
I said there was a strong correlation between high IQ and being a scientist, and a strong correlation between high IQ and being an atheist.
High IQ being the “hidden” variable.
Berlinski said there was a strong correlation between being an atheist and being a scientist.
Not me.
Decide for yourself, but remember, correlation is not causation.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:53 am JA:

CB: “In other words, JA seems to be arguing that any conclusions he reaches about metaphysical matters are sounder, simply because he reached them through his reliance on a material process.”

Science says nothing about metaphysical matters; these constructs are outside science’s purview, and senseless therein.

However, I can say something about metaphysics. Wittgenstein was correct when he wrote, “The whole modern conception of the world is founded on the illusion that the so-called laws of nature are the explanations of natural phenomena”; was wrong when he asserted the insensibility of making propositions about the world as a whole (see Godel, Incompleteness); and was right when he wrote:

“The correct method in philosophy would really be the following: to say nothing except what can be said, i.e. propositions of natural science — and then, whenever someone else wanted to say something metaphysical, to demonstrate to him that he had failed to give a meaning to certain signs in his propositions. Although it would not be satisfying to the other person…this method would be the only strictly correct one.”

The question “Why existence?” will forever be senseless and therefore unanswerable. “The facts all contribute only to setting the problem, not to its solution.”

Apr 29, 2008 - 12:07 pm Ten:

I see, nishi.

So even though the double slit is akin to a mental experiment (in that it naturally asks if particles are sentient and what effect the observer could possibly have, even though I did not ask you either and you still concluded I was suggesting particle nanocars) you cannot bring yourself a perspective that simply allows itself to ask to what level of reducibility you will, in faith and by asserted intent, go in search of irreducibility.

This simple mental experiment is pointless, because, you know, you’ll prove the merit of science either by reducing stuff forever or by reducing it to the point you have to accept that it floats on a entity or entities that simple are. And that simply do.

In other words, The Bottom Turtle, an act of supreme faith (at least until the CERN fires up at which point you’re faithfully sure you’ll answer all why’s with all facts about the nature of all things.)

“We shall not waste time speculating about supernatural “motivations” when we plan to discover physical ones.”

But we shall not first deduce what “supernatural” means, or for that matter (no pun) what abstract or semantic device limits if from the “natural”.

Lovely. The trees of logic lost in a forest of faith. Outcome bowing to procedure, the unapproved to the approved, the question to the assertion, and the observation to the presumption.

Apr 29, 2008 - 12:12 pm Ratatosk, Squirrel of Discord:

Ten,

You are babbling. Please stop.

Apr 29, 2008 - 12:24 pm Ten:

I’d expect such blissfully unaware confidence, Ratatosk, from a guy who’d condense Moses as only you have.

Apr 29, 2008 - 12:42 pm griefer:

the Pajamafia just deleted my comment where i informed you all that Berlinski is a DI Stooge, and this is all Wedge Strategy craplogy.

we are wasting our spacetime here.

Apr 29, 2008 - 12:46 pm griefer:

i suggest you put my comment back or i will get the derb to post it on NRO and also the fact that you are supressing info.

Apr 29, 2008 - 12:47 pm griefer:

euwwwwwww
the Discovery Institute?
Berlinski you are a DI stooge and this all wedge strategy crapoloy.

The Wedge strategy is a political and social action plan authored by the Discovery Institute, the hub of the intelligent design movement. The strategy was put forth in a Discovery Institute manifesto known as the Wedge Document,[1] which describes a broad social, political, and academic agenda whose ultimate goal is to “defeat [scientific] materialism” represented by evolution, “reverse the stifling materialist world view and replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions”[2] and to “affirm the reality of God.”[3] Its goal is to “renew” American culture by shaping public policy to reflect conservative Christian, namely evangelical Protestant, values.[4]

Intelligent design is the belief that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not a naturalistic process such as natural selection. Implicit in the intelligent design doctrine is a redefining of science and how it is conducted. Wedge strategy proponents are dogmatically opposed to materialism,[6][7][8] naturalism,[7][9] and evolution,[10][11][12][13] and have made the removal of each from how science is conducted and taught an explicit goal.[14][15]

The strategy was originally brought to the public’s attention when the Wedge Document was leaked on the Web. The Wedge strategy forms the governing basis of a wide range of Discovery Institute intelligent design campaigns.

mondo waste of spacetime.
may i respectfully in you, David Berlinski, to take you social engineering and forcibly insert it where the sun don’t shine?

Apr 29, 2008 - 12:56 pm clazy:

If both science and religion would be judged by what they do, and if each concerned itself only with what it might affect, the two would have nothing to say about each other.

Apr 29, 2008 - 1:12 pm Earl:

“I personally think we will be able to fabricate synthetic life in nanoscale, unpick the fabric of spacetime, map the omnium and build atoms from scratch in picoscale.”

You may be right, of course…..but when that happens, what will it have demonstrated, please?

A. that random events can fabricate life and do all that other stuff?

B. that pre-existing intelligence can do those things?

This is the conundrum that materialists don’t wish to deal with, not that I can blame them. The ultimate “empricists” are faced with the fact that their origins story is no more subject to confirmation or falsifiability than is the Creation.

Apr 29, 2008 - 1:16 pm CB:

JA quotes:

“The question ‘Why existence?’ will forever be senseless and therefore unanswerable. ‘The facts all contribute only to setting the problem, not to its solution.’”

With all due respect, you are only resetting the problem I called attention to, albeit in philosophical terms that accomodate the materialist position.

“Why existence?” If one chooses to believe that question of existence is senseless, particularly (and ironically) given the significant amount of order/symmetry/code (to use Flew’s reference to DNA) in the universe, well that’s one’s choice. As we do exist, it’s a pertinent question.

The difficulty of the question does not make it senseless though, anymore than the difficulty of getting to a universal field theory or complex dimensions will dissuade the determined physicist. If physics is an infinite regression of material complexity, I suspect physicists will keep on studying it and certain physicists will keep on making pronounciations beyond science as to what it all means. One might maintain logical consistentancy in suggesting a certain meaninglessness to such physical endeavors, but it would hardly give scientific method a leg up as a broad source of support for faith in sussing out even its own material domain, much less existence in general.

As to the unanswerablity of the question, this too assumes a materialist universe, a faith in nothingness beyond the “natural” (read material) existence. Simply put, the existence of God would (does, given my own faith) shatter such presumptions, because the answers, answers that matter about the metaphysical world, would very much be within our grasp, either through communion with God or through reason based on the historical presentment of God both past and future. The question of God’s existence and the faith required therein only attest to the nature of metaphysical answers, not to the certainty of whether seeking them is senseless or not.

In other words, the notion of absurdity in seeking the metaphysical only draws strength from a contrary faith in the absence or meaningless of the metaphysical. Given the many complexities of human experience that defy easy material reduction, from religious experience to the one you’re having in your mind as you mull this over, such assumptions seem more than a bit presumptuous.

Apr 29, 2008 - 1:30 pm CB:

“I did not say that high IQ made one into a atheist perforce.
I said there was a strong correlation between high IQ and being a scientist, and a strong correlation between high IQ and being an atheist.
High IQ being the “hidden” variable.
Berlinski said there was a strong correlation between being an atheist and being a scientist.
Not me. ”

You merely implied the correlative link between intelligence and atheism. I don’t recall focusing on the correlation between atheism and science, so Berlinski’s comments are somewhat superfluous here.

However, these kinds of presumed correlations exist in a vaccuum of their own making. All kinds of non-normative ideas and personality types have correlations with higer IQs, including, if I’m not much mistaken, psychopaths (or perhaps more accurately sociopaths). This also presumes IQ is a reliable indicator of intellect. If this were true, Marilyn Vos Savant would be considered the most brilliant person on earth. I’m sure she’s a nice lady but I’m not prepared to suggest we offer her that particular crown.

My point is that such correlations are self-serving and offer little to the discussion. The point stands, I believe.

Apr 29, 2008 - 1:44 pm JA:

CB: “The difficulty of the question does not make it senseless though, anymore than the difficulty of getting to a universal field theory or complex dimensions will dissuade the determined physicist…As to the unanswerablity of the question, this too assumes a materialist universe, a faith in nothingness beyond the “natural” (read material) existence.”

It’s not merely difficult, it’s impossible — logically impossible. And the bottom is not “nothing”, but “something”, insurmountably ineffable — a set of principally unstatable questions and answers which we elide by necessity (Wittgenstein says we “climb the ladder and pull it up behind us”).

The Way, if spoken, is not the Way — etc. In other words, the truths metaphysics seeks to explain are inexpressible in a perfectly precise sense. “We” know they are there, of course, because “we” are here. But we’ll never be able to “think” these truths, or say them.

This is not a material necessity, but a logical one. The answer to “Why Existence rather than Non-existence?” cannot be captured in language, and the question is poorly-formed.

Of course, that doesn’t stop you from saying stuff about it. It just means that it is logically impossible to distinguish the truth or falsity of your proposition.

Apr 29, 2008 - 2:11 pm Concerned Citizen:

A thought from Mr. Li Hongzhi on why we shouldn’t believe science is the ultimate truth:

“Many people have thus formed a fixed notion (about science). If people of previous generations set
forth certain laws and doctrines, such as Einstein’s theory of relativity, people then regard
them as the pinnacle of science. People’s thinking in later generations is then confined
within these things, and if someone dares to think higher or intends to go beyond them in
his research, immediately there will be people who say, “Can you really surpass
Einstein?” Why is that? The existing physical environment of modern empirical science
is restraining people. If a truly accomplished scientist exceeds the insights of previous
generations, he will find that although the previous generations’ insights are true and
correct within their domain, once someone surpasses them he will discover that they are
not true per se, and in fact serve to limit people. A truly accomplished person who thinks
for himself will dare to break through them. You will have truly accomplished something
when you break through the conventions set by others.”

Apr 29, 2008 - 2:18 pm Gabriel Hanna:

People’s thinking in later generations is then confined
within these things, and if someone dares to think higher or intends to go beyond them in
his research, immediately there will be people who say, “Can you really surpass
Einstein?” Why is that? The existing physical environment of modern empirical science
is restraining people.

Wow, this is dumb.

Speaking personally, as a physicist, I would love nothing more than to surpass Einstein. I doubt I will ever have the opportunity.

Any of us would love to be the one who does that. We just realize how high the bar is set.

There is nothing sacred about Einstein and nothing he says is taken as gospel.

All of us want to be the one who changes everything. Nobody is limited by Einstein.

Apr 29, 2008 - 3:41 pm G Vinson:

As I told you before John, on this topic you simply sre blinded.

I’ve read Berlinski’s book. You offer nothing but drivel in response to it….like reviewing a movie you have never seen.

Unbelieveable.

Apr 29, 2008 - 4:04 pm Andrew Garland:

Jim: There is a God.
Bob: Prove it.
Jim: OK. I have here a potato. You see that I take a 1/8 inch slice of it.
Bob: With the skin?
Jim: Are you looking? Here, try to bend it.
Bob: It bends a little.
Jim: Give it a good bend.
Bob: It broke. It doesn’t bend very much.
Jim: OK, here is another slice.
Bob: Am I going to bend this one too?
Jim: Here, I drop it into this hot oil.
Bob: I see it sizzling in there. I like potato chips.
Jim: Do you see what it is doing?
Bob: It is sizzling, and getting brown, and curling up.
Jim: Yes, curling up. Bending a lot. Now, you couldn’t bend that chip, and I couldn’t, and I can’t imagine any power on earth that could bend that chip. But, see, it bends. So, there is a God.
Bob: Did you learn that in philosophy class?

Apr 29, 2008 - 4:16 pm Earl:

“I personally think we will be able to fabricate synthetic life in nanoscale, unpick the fabric of spacetime, map the omnium and build atoms from scratch in picoscale.”

You may be right, of course…..but when that happens, which of the following will it have demonstrated?

A. that random events can fabricate life and do all that other stuff?

B. that pre-existing intelligence can do those things?

This is the conundrum that materialists don’t wish to deal with, not that I can blame them. These ultimate “empricists” are faced with the fact that their origins story is no more subject to confirmation or falsifiability than is that of the Creationists.

Or am I missing something?

Apr 29, 2008 - 4:31 pm NP:

I think you’ve got it wrong. Berlinski obviously means that no sane man would think twice about believing an Iron Age creation myth involving a magic tree and talking serpent. At least, if Berlinksi is sane, that’s probably what he means.

Apr 29, 2008 - 4:52 pm Allan:

OK Mr. Derbyshire.
Now your consciousness is invisible, inaudible, intangible, nonaromatic and flavorless, and undetectable by any known instrument.

Thus, Mr. Derbyshire, I deduce, your consciousness, i.e. YOU, do not exist.

Apr 29, 2008 - 6:41 pm ChrisPer:

I am appalled.

As a Christian I am under no obligation to support sophistry, confusion, manipulation and outright falsehood by other Christians. Some would say that it is my duty to judge truly on this earth. My fairly-well-informed judgement is that Berlinski’s piece and his comment in response to Derbyshire are manipulative rhetoric, not arguments.

As a Christian, a geologist and a student of critical thinking, it pains me to see just how bad his work and the comments of his supporters are.

There is only one way to be honest and at the same time a literal creationist: you must believe that God created evidence for an old earth and evolution. Honest men and women have spent many combined lifetimes using honestly recorded observations and honestly developed arguments to get to the current state of knowledge.

Don’t imagine, fellow believers, that faith and vehemence substitute for truthfulness.

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:00 pm Concerned Citizen:

Gabriel, I think you misunderstood Mr. Li’s quote:

“People’s thinking in later generations is then confined
within these things, and if someone dares to think higher or intends to go beyond them in
his research, immediately there will be people who say, “Can you really surpass
Einstein?” Why is that? The existing physical environment of modern empirical science
is restraining people.”

Mr. Li said “existing physical environment” — this is the people around you and the way they think, as well as the world around you and the method of modern science that focuses on measurement, not experience. Your ideas will not be immediately accepted by others because they are threatened by the new paradigm. They won’t understand and appreciate what you are trying to do because it doesn’t fit into accepted wisdom and everything they think they know. Just look at Copernicus, Galileo and more currently anyone doing research on climate change that demonstrates the world is cooling. Some things just can’t be measured, like time-space in other dimensions, but you might be able to experience them in some way. Science hasn’t given a good answer what happens to a person after they die, for example.

If you are looking for the ultimate truth, it’s out there, but you’ll have to look somewhere besides science. I think that’s what Mr. Li is saying. Best regards….

Apr 29, 2008 - 7:06 pm G Vinson:

I think its fruitful every once and while to return to exactly what it is that the argument is over. Darwin says that life’s system came about by random mutations of the organism over long periods of time, followed by natural selection.

This is a description of just one of those systems: vision.

“When light strikes the retina of the eye, a photon interacts with a molecule called 11-cis-retinal, which rearranges within picoseconds to form trans-retinal. The change in the shape of retinal forces a change in the shape of the protein, rhodopsin, to which the retinal is tightly bound. The protein’s metamorphosis alters its behavior, making it stick to another protein called transducin. Before interacting with activated rhodopsin, transducin had tightly bound a small molecule called GDP. But when transducin interacts with activated rhodopsin, the GDP falls off and a molecule called GTP binds to transducin. GTP-transducin-activated rhodopsin now binds to a protein called phosphodiesterase, located in the inner membrane of the cell. When attached to activated rhodopsin and its entourage, the phosphodiesterase acquires the ability to chemically cut a molecule called cGMP. Initially there are a lot of cGMP molecules in the cell, but the phosphodiesterase lowers its concentration, like a pulled plug lowers the water level in a bathtub. Another membrane protein that binds cGMP is called an ion channel. It acts as a gateway that regulates the number of sodium ions in the cell. Normally the ion channel allows sodium ions to flow into the cell, while a separate protein actively pumps them out again. The dual action of the ion channel and pump keeps the level of sodium ions in the cell within a narrow range. When the amount of cGMP is reduced because of cleavage by the phosphodiesterase, the ion channel closes, causing the cellular concentration of positively charged sodium ions to be reduced. This causes an imbalance of charge across the cell membrane which, finally, causes a current to be transmitted down the optic nerve to the brain. The result, when interpreted by the brain, is vision.”

This complex cascade of chemical reactions is what Darwin says came about by nothing more than sheer dumb luck - random mutations in the DNA code as it is copied from one generation of organisms to another. Actually he didn’t say that, only because he no idea of how complex the entire system was. However, he did give us random mutation, and the power of random mutation could not only synthesize these specific proteins in the first place, but could then place them in the stupidly complex matrix that causes organisms to see. Yeah, sure.

I know all the Darwinist out there would love to argue over the Big Spooky in the sky, but first you have deal with the realities of modern knowledge. Something that Derby refuses to do, as plainly witnessed by his review of Expelled and Berliski’s comments.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:21 pm griefer:

i repeat…do not engage.
Berlinski is a Discovery Institute stooge.
he argues in bad faith.
his entire piece is wedge strategy social engineering.

a colossal waste of spacetime.
you could be reading Penrose or Susskind or Scott Atran.

Apr 29, 2008 - 8:35 pm G Vinson:

Griefer:

Susskind? Are you certain you want to go there?

Susskind, when asked about the possibility of a failure to establish the multi-verse theory, (would that leave us with ID) he says - “I doubt that physicists will see it that way. If, for some unforeseen reason, the landscape turns out to be inconsistent - maybe for mathematical reasons, or because it disagrees with observation - I am pretty sure that physicists will go on searching for natural explanations of the world. But I have to say that if that happens, as things stand now we will be in a very awkward position. Without any explanation of nature’s fine-tunings we will be hard pressed to answer the ID critics”.

Four things are in complete display. 1) there is a rush to get an explanation 2) because one does NOT exist (griefer), and 3) ID is the explanation to beat, 4) ID explains natures OBSERVED fine-tuning, where materialism cannot.

Wow, a theory that actually fits the evidence. Its that whole “First Cause” thing. Poor materialists, they wished the laws of nature could just be excused when it gets hot in the kitchen.

(Biology has been getting away with it for at least 50 years.)

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:24 pm Rob Lockett:

John Derbyshire writes: “What reason do we have to suppose that God might not exist?” Well, his being invisible, inaudible, intangible, nonaromatic, flavorless, and undetectable by any known instrument is a pretty good start. But why is there any burden on atheists to prove that God does not exist? How would you set about proving that Poseidon, Wotan, Ahriman, Unkulunkulu, or the Great Manitou do not exist, David? Come on, give us a clue. I don’t want a detailed 80-page proof in each case. Just outline for me what your proof procedure would be.”

In my opinion, there is an important distinction between claims of deity John. And that distinction is the historical appearance of Jesus Christ ‘In The Flesh’.

—Jesus came in the flesh (empirically). Intelligent design is a powerful tool to do just that because it points to the ‘alien author of life’ who is ‘not of this world’.

At least one, ’scientifically minded person’ has said to me that any empirical proof of alien life would verify the hypothesis; especially if they had the same DNA as we. By manifesting Himself ‘like a son of man’, Jesus fullfilled these ’scientific’ requirements.

There is a larger theme for the two witnesses, and it is the coherence between the spiritual (philosophical) and material (empirical) witness that is so powerful in the life of Jesus.

John 8:12 When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” 13 The Pharisees challenged him, “Here you are, appearing as your own witness; your testimony is not valid.” 14 Jesus answered, “Even if I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is valid, for I know where I came from and where I am going. But you have no idea where I come from or where I am going. 15 You judge by human standards; I pass judgment on no one. 16 But if I do judge, my decisions are right, because I am not alone. I stand with the Father, who sent me. 17 In your own Law it is written that the testimony of two men is valid. 18 I am one who testifies for myself; my other witness is the Father, who sent me.”

He came ‘in the flesh’ (right down to our DNA) in order to reveal Himself ‘empirically’. He performed miracles to ‘prove’ who He was. He then gave many ‘convincing proofs’ (as Paul said) for His resurrection.

Let us have some sympathy for the doubters, because it was only ‘after’ Thomas ‘touched Him’ that he fell to his knees and declared, ‘My Lord and my God!’

We do not have a God who is ‘only spiritual’ (though God is spirit), He also lowered Himself to our level, not only to reveal Himself in ‘our empirical terms’, but to pay the penalty for our sin.— ( http://rob-lock.livejournal.com/ )

Apr 29, 2008 - 9:55 pm CB:

JA writes:

“In other words, the truths metaphysics seeks to explain are inexpressible in a perfectly precise sense. “We” know they are there, of course, because “we” are here. But we’ll never be able to “think” these truths, or say them.”

I appreciate the patient and polite discourse JA offers and endeavor to continue in that vein. It seems to me that there are two key weaknesses in the line of reasoning JA posits.

First off, there is little that can be explained in a “perfectly precise sense” if one looks closely enough at the thing being explained. Mathematics for example, claims precision, but exists as an abstraction of the reality it describes. A simple example is the concept of 1 + 1 = 2. This is “perfectly precise” in the abstract, but complicated once we decide to apply the equation to two real objects, say apples (if only to keep the Genesis thread fresh in our minds :). One apple plus one apple equals two apples, but the apples themselves are unique. The equation only serves to describe the precision of counting the objects, which again is an abstraction of the things themselves.

In language, we resort to a number of similar tactics to convey meaning (and Wittgenstein is of course a major authority on how some of this happens) but the assumption that because a truth cannot be expressed in language that it cannot be got at is a falsity.

Thought is another matter, but only because we tend to think in terms of our experience. Yet, reason allows us to reach greater levels of truth in the exploration of the material world, and not always based on direct experience. We synthesize and imagine and draw upon our specific experiences of mind as well as senses to envision certain conclusions.

Take Descartes famous observation “cogito ergo sum,” for example. This is not a simple material formulation. Descartes is addressing a sense of being, and in the context of his philosophical investigations, particularly one that is not necessarily connected to a material reality (though he reached that natural conclusion soon enough). The sense of being is as much a metaphysical truth as a physical truth. Whether or not one believes in metaphysical truths is immaterial, for if they exist, Descartes is clearly onto one.

It is the disagreement in the existence of metaphysical truths that JA latches on to, and this is an assumption, not a methodically proven fact.

Approaching this idea of “perfectly precise” (which is itself an imperfect formulation, but fair enough in a general linguistic sense) physics and the other material sciences offer much that is far from perfectly precise, but is broadly accepted. Evolutionary theory is full of imprecisions (from the origins question regarding DNA to speciation to the question of mind itself), yet practical applications abound. Physics probes deeper and deeper into the minute recesses of material reality and there are many questions left unresolved and even the speculation that reality may be unresolvable in terms of a fundamental material substance/particle/wave.

Yet science clearly presents useful and practical outcomes and observations, and many scientists, partly on faith it would seem, are comfortable ruling out or limiting metaphysical truths based on this far from this “perfectly precise” standing.

One may argue that science is “more precise” than metaphysics but it is arguable that it is not necessarily more practical where some things are concerned. Moral truths/imperatives, for example, do not rely on physicality for their power. There are physical outcomes to the application of these truths, but the truths themselves are not expressly determined by the methodological interrogation of material reality.

In other words, just as science finds some consensus on material matters, humans have found a fair amount of consensus on some matters that could be classified as metaphysical - laws, sense of being. Saying that these are not precise in no way dulls their power or their meaning.

In other cases, such as religious experience, there is a fair amount of testimony. Certainly, one may disbelieve (or believe) such testimony, but the question remains one of one’s faith in the experience and not one of access to the truths of those experiences. We come full circle then to the acceptance (of at least the possibilty) or rejection of metaphysical truths. The assertion that one can not get at their preciseness is itself a kind of word game, divorced from the experience of many.

Finally, the historical aspect of religious experience, of which Christianity provides the strongest example in my opinion (one of many reasons it is my faith), cannot be disregarded as lightly as it is here (and tends to be in philosophy of a secular bent). Yes, there is a variety of such experiences and surely many cannot be true if one of them is. Yet, if one is, then metaphysical truths are among us. That they rely upon faith to draw the viewer to them does not diminish their power as truths (and not simply experiences).

To put it in direct terms, if a man sees God, no matter how many who are not there tell him he is a fool and a liar, the truth remains with him. If others believe in that truth, it reamins the truth, even if the others rely upon faith to access it.

And while this truth may not be falsifiable under the terms of the scientific method, or “precise,” that individual who recognizes it understands their place in the cosmos to a degree that physics and biology cannot reach.

That others deny this does not change the nature of the truth or the way in which it may be reached.

Apr 29, 2008 - 10:49 pm Gabriel Hanna:

Do tell us all about what Darwin said.

Because Darwin said no such thing.

Darwin never heard of genes or mutations.

This is the problem with arguing with Darwin deniers–they haven’t read Darwin, they have read only characterizations of Darwin.

Modern biologists know a lot more about biology than Darwin did. Darwin, in “The Origin of Species”, talked about a lot of things, like inheritance of acquired characteristics, that biologists no longer believe.

Biologists do not worship a hundred-year-old book.

The Big Idea that Darwin gets credit for is that inherited traits which aid reproductive success will spread through a population.

Apr 29, 2008 - 11:48 pm griefer:

Vinson, i am a scientist and a believer.
Susskind is awesome. We may find god in a gap, so?

But i do not waste time arguing with DI scum.
and that is what Berlinski is.

/spit

Apr 30, 2008 - 4:45 am CB:

A few additional (!) thoughts along the thread JA and I have been traveling:

The abstraction of mathematics itself points to a metaphysical quality. Derb has more or less acknowledged this by pointing out that his status as a Mysterion, as opposed to an atheist, is in part based upon the idea that mathematics and other principles, while corresponding to reality, appear to exist apart from specific reality. (I’m paraphrasing, but hopefully not far afield from the original idea.)

My earlier reference to the abstract quality of mathematics echos this very point - albeit backhandedly, given that I was on about the nature of “precision.” I think it’s fair to point out that what we often think of as material precision just as often relies upon certain abstractions. That these abstractions correspond to the material world doesn’t make them material in and of itself - and this is what I was trying to get at in regards to the metaphysical aspects of law and being.

The notion that metaphysical truths cannot be gotten at then is based on the practice of cordoning off metaphysics right around the area of incomprehensibility. This brings us right back to the essentials - the assumption of physicality or material existence upon all that we consider to be “precisely” known is a stolen base, one that all too many steal in trying to assert the superiority of scientific method as a basis for broader assertions.

This certainly brings out paradoxes in JA’s posts as well, which stemed from assertions about faith grounded in science. Faith in what? In the material things that science can get at? Not so much faith as the directly observable there. Faith in the broader metaphysical conclusions? JA contends that no one can get there. This leaves the assertion of no metaphysical reality as the default position, but just as atheism is in a sense a religious perspective (in the fundamental sense of religion as ideas about God, as opposed to the idea of religion as directed practice of those ideas towards God) the concept that there is no metaphysical reality is itself a metaphysical question. The answer therein is also metaphysical, and let there be no confusion about metaphysics as an area of philosophical inquiry and the broader idea of metaphysics (or metaphysical) as the domain outside the material physical world. In the case of that particular question, they overlap.

So the idea that metaphysical truths cannot be gotten at is posited itself as a metaphysical truth - which is much along the lines of the nonfoundationalist paradox regarding metanarratives (that the proposition that there are no encompassing metanarratives that explain reality is itself a metanarrative).

This then tends to be