Leaps of faith

[beige]

I managed to somewhat derail a religious discussion elsewhere by responding to some posts on the philosophy of science, and something came up there which I'd quite like to discuss further elsewhere with people who might at least to some degree agree with me

One person there stated something alone these lines (I did remove a small bit of text aimed directly at posters in the thread from which I copied and pasted):

Science is just as subject to the epistemological uncertainties as any other method of gaining knowledge. Saying things like, "Well, okay, it's not absolute truth, just highly probable and practically useful knowledge" doesn't really change the situation -- Science claims to be making truth statements about the external world -- not about our perceptions, or about guidelines that are generally but not necessarily true -- and ignores the massive leaps of faith that it must take to arrive at those truth statements.

That's one point that has been raised, that science is based fundamentally on flawed reasoning and is therefore useless as a method of experience, I'll get back to that in a second, but the other thing being brought up is that basically, there seems to be a general complaint from them that science cannot enhance our appreciation of the natural world because it relegates other forms of experience (which I deny) and that eventually this relegation of other experiences will leave science as the only arbiter of experience. In particular, they make mention of Heidegger (whose works I've admittedly not read). To me, what they're saying amounts to a serious slippery slope fallacy with very shaky foundations. I'm not sure is Heidegger himself argues that point better, but they don't seem to be able to. It seems to originate from a "well what if one day, overnight, the human race turns into a bubbling mass of pragmatists without any appreciation of the world outside their practical concerns." line of thought, from which they just take the idea that science will take over the entire spectrum of human experience and start sprinting for the finish line without stopping to think that it might be a tiny bit absurd.

Regardless, apparently this voracious destruction of alternative experience by science apparently means that it can't help us appreciate other experiences more fully.

But, coming back off that tangent a bit and going back to what is quoted above, do some viewpoints require us to make greater leaps of faith than others in order to reach them and accept them as potentially or probably valid? For example, they've been nattering a lot about the problem of induction, and yet - it seems to me to be reasonable to assume that as casual relations accumulate and correlate, that the leap of faith needed between each conclusion decreases, again I've not read Hume's work (my budget for book buying is limited until my student loan comes in, and something that's worded in the way most philosophy is needs a real hard copy book not an E-resource!), so maybe he puts it differently or better to them. I can see how basing a conclusion fro ma single casual relationship might be problematic, but science tends to work over vast interconnected lines of evidence, which I'd think mitigates that problem somewhat, even if only to a certain degree.

I'm not all that well versed in philosophy, but again it's something that I find interesting, and I do delve into it (albeit superficially) from time to time - but it seems to me to be quite remarkable that things involving this kind of wild speculation would be considered a great insight.

Still, tired, crazy ramblings aside - do you agree that some conclusions and viewpoints require smaller leaps of faith than others? Or is human reasoning, despite being practically successful, theoretically flawed such that every leap of faith is of equal magnitude?

[Feck]

Lot's of words trying to prove that things that didn't don't and won't ever happen are a valid way of experiencing things . Pot and Kettle and throwing the baby out with the bath water .Maths and science give us ways of knowing things that we cannot directly experience ,they form a system of gaining knowledge . Wandering of into LaLA land and claiming that science is a leap of faith and that makes their irrational baseless leaps of faith valid is Dumb Philosophers trying to make out they have a job to do ,like they inform us of anything ,just as the god of the gaps is getting smaller so Philosophy is crawling up it's own Meta arsehole and good riddance

[Thinking Aloud]

Science is just as subject to the epistemological uncertainties as any other method of gaining knowledge. Saying things like, "Well, okay, it's not absolute truth, just highly probable and practically useful knowledge" doesn't really change the situation

Whereas none of their "knowledge" is either probable or practically useful, except possibly as an opiate.

Science claims to be making truth statements about the external world -- not about our perceptions, or about guidelines that are generally but not necessarily true -- and ignores the massive leaps of faith that it must take to arrive at those truth statements.

And yet science's claims about the external world can be tested, and found to be true to the extent that we have computers, space ships, medicine and global communications. Even if they're based on a somehow false perception of the world around us, those "assumptions" that things work if you do x, y and z are always found to be true in that falsely perceived world around us.

"Leaps of faith?" Such as what, precisely? If they're going to start on the "we can never be sure if things we perceive (or we ourselves) are actually real" line, run - because it's the end of the conversation. There's no arguing that - and no point arguing that, because for them a table will never be a table - it'll be some "quantum uncertainties" that could instantaneously become an ostrich (and what is an ostrich?).

[Hermit]

do you agree that some conclusions and viewpoints require smaller leaps of faith than others?

To begin with, scientific knowledge does not require any leap of faith at all, because theories are provisional. Theories are held to be "true" pending evidence that falsify them. if you look at the history of science, you'll find plenty of them that have been either discarded altogether or found to be less accurate and/or less comprehensive than succeeding ones. This, in combination with observable phenomena and repeatable experiments as the source of such knowledge, leaves no space for faith in science.

The other issue you were wondering about, "it seems to me to be reasonable to assume that as casual relations accumulate and correlate", does not and cannot lead to proof of causality. That is Hume's most central and most cogently argued critique of induction. (Russel based a joke about it, which became very well known, but most of the people who laughed about, or were at least amused by it, never got its inherent message.) The upshot is that no matter how many times we observe A to be followed by B, we cannot discover any criterion that enables us to say something along the lines of: "This is no mere correlation. We can safely say this is an example of causation." In the absence of such a standard any belief in causation is a leap of faith, and almost everybody makes that leap many times on a daily basis. It's what enables us to survive.

Hope you don't mind the ambivalence of this comment.

[JimC]

Seraph wrote:

To begin with, scientific knowledge does not require any leap of faith at all, because theories are provisional. Theories are held to be "true" pending evidence that falsify them. if you look at the history of science, you'll find plenty of them that have been either discarded altogether or found to be less accurate and/or less comprehensive than succeeding ones. This, in combination with observable phenomena and repeatable experiments as the source of such knowledge, leaves no space for faith in science.

Spot on, IMO...

[Trolldor]

Faith is possible in the world of science, there is room for it.
Climate Change Skpetics, for example.

[mistermack]

The leap of faith required for most people to accept scientific theory is generally justified by the scientific method that has emerged, of publishing your work, explaining exactly your reasoning, and exposing it to the most vigorous criticism imaginable.
Put out something new, and it's reviewed by your peers, and then published for the world to rip it to shreds, if it can.
The system only breaks down, when it becomes "forbidden" to criticise, or to attempt to disprove the theory. This generally doesn't happen.
The only theory that I can think of that is "protected" from criticism is the anthropogenic cause of climate change. Criticise this, and you could be eased out of a job, if you're in the industry, or govornment.
It sets a very bad precedent, and could be the beginning of the end of honest science.
.

[hiyymer]

Seraph wrote:

To begin with, scientific knowledge does not require any leap of faith at all, because theories are provisional. Theories are held to be "true" pending evidence that falsify them. if you look at the history of science, you'll find plenty of them that have been either discarded altogether or found to be less accurate and/or less comprehensive than succeeding ones. This, in combination with observable phenomena and repeatable experiments as the source of such knowledge, leaves no space for faith in science.

Spot on, IMO...

Agreed. The question is whether everything can be scientifically deconstructed, or that the rational physical reality that science reveals is in fact all of objective reality. Science can't prove that. To believe so is a leap of faith. And a pretty difficult one, given the implication that reality is rational, fully caused, and life on an objective level is therefore meaningless.

[Hermit]

The question is whether everything can be scientifically deconstructed, or that the rational physical reality that science reveals is in fact all of objective reality. Science can't prove that. To believe so is a leap of faith.

It may be a leap of faith, but the predictive power of scientific theories makes the notion that they actually describe objective reality almost irresistible. For instance, perturbations in the orbit of Neptune led to the prediction that, if the theory of gravity truly describes objective reality, there must be another - yet to be discovered - planetary body in our solar system. That suggestion was made by Urbain Le Verrier in the 1840s. The body accounting for those perturbations was discovered 90 years later, and named Pluto.

Scientific predictions, such as the above, abound. The question arises that if scientific theories do not reflect an objective reality, how can they keep postulating the existence of as yet undiscovered physical entities as well as their behaviour that are subsequently confirmed by observation?

Speaking personally, I tend to shy away from that question. It is too metaphysical for my liking, and like all discussions of that sort, ultimately and comprehensively irresolvable. The instrumentalist approach seems preferable. It basically ignores metaphysics, ignoring "the nature of reality, and how can we know it" type contemplation. It limits itself instead to "What works best for us?" I am a thoroughgoing skeptic.

[hiyymer]

Speaking personally, I tend to shy away from that question. It is too metaphysical for my liking, and like all discussions of that sort, ultimately and comprehensively irresolvable. The instrumentalist approach seems preferable. It basically ignores metaphysics, ignoring "the nature of reality, and how can we know it" type contemplation. It limits itself instead to "What works best for us?" I am a thoroughgoing skeptic.

Most theists would tend to got that way too, don't you think.

[Hermit]

Speaking personally, I tend to shy away from that question. It is too metaphysical for my liking, and like all discussions of that sort, ultimately and comprehensively irresolvable. The instrumentalist approach seems preferable. It basically ignores metaphysics, ignoring "the nature of reality, and how can we know it" type contemplation. It limits itself instead to "What works best for us?" I am a thoroughgoing skeptic.

Most theists would tend to got that way too, don't you think.

Not the ones we are discussing here. Nor am I so certain that most theists "get that way too". The defunct RDF abounded with threads titled Science is a Religion, Science is a cult, Atheism and science are based on blind faith assumptions too and so forth, and there are plenty more where these came from. It is also easy to find newspaper articles of the Taking Science on Faith variety. So, while I have not conducted a survey on the matter, no, I don't think so.

[hiyymer]

Speaking personally, I tend to shy away from that question. It is too metaphysical for my liking, and like all discussions of that sort, ultimately and comprehensively irresolvable. The instrumentalist approach seems preferable. It basically ignores metaphysics, ignoring "the nature of reality, and how can we know it" type contemplation. It limits itself instead to "What works best for us?" I am a thoroughgoing skeptic.

Most theists would tend to got that way too, don't you think.

Not the ones we are discussing here. Nor am I so certain that most theists "get that way too". The defunct RDF abounded with threads titled Science is a Religion, Science is a cult, Atheism and science are based on blind faith assumptions too and so forth, and there are plenty more where these came from. It is also easy to find newspaper articles of the Taking Science on Faith variety. So, while I have not conducted a survey on the matter, no, I don't think so.

It's possible that they are talking about the non-instrumentalist interpretation of science. After all that's what "most atheists" seem to be propounding. Both sides can play that game.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

"Leap of Faith": I give up, I'm not going to think anymore, I'll just make something up or go with somebody else's wild ass guess.

[Hermit]

Speaking personally, I tend to shy away from that question. It is too metaphysical for my liking, and like all discussions of that sort, ultimately and comprehensively irresolvable. The instrumentalist approach seems preferable. It basically ignores metaphysics, ignoring "the nature of reality, and how can we know it" type contemplation. It limits itself instead to "What works best for us?" I am a thoroughgoing skeptic.

Most theists would tend to got that way too, don't you think.

Not the ones we are discussing here. Nor am I so certain that most theists "get that way too". The defunct RDF abounded with threads titled Science is a Religion, Science is a cult, Atheism and science are based on blind faith assumptions too and so forth, and there are plenty more where these came from. It is also easy to find newspaper articles of the Taking Science on Faith variety. So, while I have not conducted a survey on the matter, no, I don't think so.

It's possible that they are talking about the non-instrumentalist interpretation of science. After all that's what "most atheists" seem to be propounding. Both sides can play that game.

Does that mean you have now abandoned your claim that "Most theists would tend to got that way too"? If not, what are you trying to say?

I pretty much agree with you, by the way, in so far as belief in causality (which applies to pretty much everybody, regardless of their stance regarding god thingies) and the belief that theories reflect objective reality (ditto) requires a leap of faith. Neither Richard Dawkins (What is true) nor Sam Harris (on objective morality) are exempt from that, but then, both of them are about as hopeless as philosophers (of philosophy) can get.

[hiyymer]

I pretty much agree with you, by the way, in so far as belief in causality (which applies to pretty much everybody, regardless of their stance regarding god thingies) and the belief that theories reflect objective reality (ditto) requires a leap of faith. Neither Richard Dawkins (What is true) nor Sam Harris (on objective morality) are exempt from that, but then, both of them are about as hopeless as philosophers (of philosophy) can get.

I just meant that theists (at least moderate ones) are not anti-science and are happy to use it for what it does, but are not inclined to see it as an authority on the objective nature of reality; I guess what you call the metaphysical. That seems to coincide with your thinking. I asked my little sister once whether she believed in miracles, resurrections, etc. Her take is pretty naturalistic. She doesn't think God is intervening in the world on a regular basis. But at the same time she does believe that he sent down his son to clue us in. Her position is that God is certainly capable of doing that if he wishes, even though he has only done it once. He is all powerful after all. I can't say that coming from an "instrumentalist" position, there is much to argue about there.