Does science assume the non-existence of fairies?

[Marshall]

Correct me if I am wrong, but i think the answer is NO.
AFAIK the issue simply doesn't come up.
When doing science, we do not need to have a list of things of which we assume the non-existence.

As a general rule, assumptions are positive, and one wants to proceed with as few assumptions as possible. To the extent possible one would like assumptions to be simple, and supported by physical evidence accepted by the scientific community at large.

People do not have to be taught to assume the non-existence of fairies. If they need to be taught anything along those lines it is simply (when doing science) not to bother fantasizing about stuff until some solid evidence for it comes along---showing, say, that it is playing some role in the natural world.

The moment there is some recognized physical evidence of fairies---like a remote surveillance camera sees them dancing in a ring---then *boom* fairies become part of the natural world and a fit topic for scientists to study. Scientists are always looking for new things to study and new fields of knowledge to explore.

Someone was asking about "supernatural phenomena/entities".

It is impossible for scientists to study supernatural entities, because the moment they see credible evidence for something *boom* it becomes natural, and they scurry off to apply for grants and study it.

This is my view. Please challenge it, if you wish, elaborate or add further reflections.

[kidjan]

Science (or better put, the scientific method) does not assume the existence of anything because it's just that: methods for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. So I think the question you're asking doesn't make complete sense.

Scientists, on the other hand, are just people attempting to practice these methods as best they can. So they may discredit the existence of fairies entirely without doing all of the obvious due-diligence.

Note that I do not believe in fairies, nor have I done the due-diligence.

[edy420]

Science can't prove the non existence of fairies but I can not prove that they do exist.
The difference between me and science is that I can use my imagination but science can not.

The downfall with science is that it is limited to relying on data.
That data is usually gathered by man but man can not see ANYTHING from all possible angles, we can only use our senses, current technology and current fact.
If I were to analyze our senses, current technology and fact I wouldn't really have anything credible to work with so to me my imagination is just as useful as science

Using my imagination fairies are very possible but not possible enough for me to take any real note of.
So imo, yes fairies do exist but because of the way I keep my imagination flexible they also do not exist.

[AHuxley]

If fairies are non-physical, and if science can be said to assume anything as a whole, and if one of those things that science can be said to assume is that it studies the physical, and if science is thought to be the exclusive source of knowledge qua science, then I would say that it does. But that's a lot of conjunctive ifs.

[mtbturtle]

If fairies are non-physical, and if science can be said to assume anything as a whole, and if one of those things that science can be said to assume is that it studies the physical, and if science is thought to be the exclusive source of knowledge qua science, then I would say that it does. But that's a lot of conjunctive ifs.

Sure is but I think it is a set of "ifs" that most of the scientists here anyway would be comfortable with. It it certainly the kind of assertions, assumptions, I've seen made often enough. Existence=physical/natural.

[AHuxley]

Ah, well... for what it's worth, I pretty much disagree with all of those "if's" (well, except perhaps the fairy bit... I haven't given that any thought, so I have no opinion there).

[Lomax]

I do not think it is a fair characterisation of fairies to call them non-physical or non-natural. Plenty of books manage to describe the colour, size, sound and behaviour of fairies, and little else besides these natural properties is ever mentioned. A scientific enquiry into the existence of fairies would simply include testing for the conjunction of these properties.

I would also protest that science is not restricted to physical objects, unless we use the term lightly. Numbers, for instance, are considered by many scientists to be abstract, non-physical, and existent.

Lomax

[AHuxley]

I do not think it is a fair characterisation of fairies to call them non-physical or non-natural. Plenty of books manage to describe the colour, size, sound and behaviour of fairies, and little else besides these natural properties is ever mentioned. A scientific enquiry into the existence of fairies would simply include testing for the conjunction of these properties.

We could also infer that they don't exist based upon the weight of this evidence (a book description), and I would argue that this would be a sound methodological decision. There would be no need to test for the conjunction of the properties at all, as any old book description isn't much of a basis to begin an investigation on.

I would also protest that science is not restricted to physical objects, unless we use the term lightly. Numbers, for instance, are considered by many scientists to be abstract, non-physical, and existent.

Lomax

In what way do you connect the belief of scientists to science proper? (I'm not saying I disagree, I'm just curious)

[mtbturtle]

I do not think it is a fair characterisation of fairies to call them non-physical or non-natural.

It's not exactly clear from what "fairies" are meant to be standing in as a substitute for. I take it that the question is more generalizable and not specifically limited to "fairies". I understood it to be about the kind of assumptions science makes about existence and whether or not it makes assumptions regarding the supernatural (things like gods, fairies, ghosts, souls). Some would place those in more distinct categories but I didn't get that sense from the OP.

[Lomax]

Hello mtbturtle,

I take it that the question is more generalizable and not specifically limited to "fairies". I understood it to be about the kind of assumptions science makes about existence and whether or not it makes assumptions regarding the supernatural (things like gods, fairies, ghosts, souls).

You may be right; but I think this brings us closer to my point. When we are talking about gods or souls or ghosts, the devil's advocate can always ask "what do you mean by that word? What is a god? What is a ghost?". Our answer can only be a description or definition, and this is what opens our statement to scientific enquiry.

All of your examples, by the way, are of natural entities - cartoonists have no trouble drawing fairies or ghosts; we all make claims about where the soul is, how long it lasts, and what may happen to it; th religious make new empirical claims every day about God - what His name is, what He likes and dislikes, who He spoke to, and what he did on which day. Do the parts which portray God as supernatural (such as Kant's claim that God is transcendental) actually tell us anything about Him?

So, when people tell me that we cannot prove that God does not exist, I am claiming: either we can prove that God does or does not exist, or we can prove that "God exists" is meaningless.

Lomax

[Lomax]

Hello AHuxley,

We could also infer that they don't exist based upon the weight of this evidence (a book description), and I would argue that this would be a sound methodological decision. There would be no need to test for the conjunction of the properties at all, as any old book description isn't much of a basis to begin an investigation on.

I fully agree. My suggestion is that we could investigate the hypothesis, if we wanted to, based on these empirical claims.

In what way do you connect the belief of scientists to science proper? (I'm not saying I disagree, I'm just curious)

I do not think the belief connection is particularly important, other than as a motive to the scientists. I suppose what I meant to say was: numbers are termed to be "abstract" and "non-physical" by some proponents of science, such as Quine, while they may still be termed "physical" by others (even within Quine's own theory, since he says that the difference between physical and abstract objects is only one of degree).

Lomax

[Marshall]

Thanks for all your responses!

What prompted this is someone asking, a few days ago, "are scientists actually taught by their philosophy profs to assume the non-existence of supernatural entities?"

My gut reaction to that is that AFAIK when a trained scientist does science they do not assume the non-existence of anything.

One tries to avoid unnecessary baggage. Don't assume irrelevant stuff you don't need to.

So "supernatural entities" is not the issue. The salient issue was that assuming non-existence of anything seems a bit peculiar.


So I started this thread in case anyone wanted to explore the idea of "assuming the non-existence of X" something that struck me as curious.
Maybe it's not curious at all! Maybe you can think of examples where one "assumes the non-existence" of something.

Note that assumptions are different from inference. I suppose we can infer non-existence under some circumstances based on some assumptions. Perhaps never with complete certainty (never get that 100%) but with reasonable likelihood. But I was not talking about inference.



=============================

Maybe some folks dislike the flippant reference to fairies. Let's try to accomodate that by defining something else with different connotations. Let us define a klorngdrool as a stationary, quiet, inert, hourglass shaped vessel filled with a purple material which disobeys most of the physical laws currently accepted by humans. My feeling is that, to do science, nobody needs to assume the non-existence of klorngdrools. The question simply does not come up!
Indeed perhaps on some other planet there are a number of klorngdrools!
So why, if one does not need to assume their non-existence, would one bother to assume it?

Or make up something else that pleases you better, and ask the same question.

[mtbturtle]

So "supernatural entities" is not the issue. The salient issue was that assuming non-existence of anything seems a bit peculiar.

What is the difference between assuming existence is natural (physical) and assuming the non-existence of "supernatural entities"?

[Marshall]

So "supernatural entities" is not the issue. The salient issue was that assuming non-existence of anything seems a bit peculiar.

What is the difference between assuming existence is natural (physical) and assuming the non-existence of "supernatural entities"?

Open discussion. If you see no difference, you are welcome to explain that.

Personally I have problems using a statement as a logical assumption if it has something undefined. I don't know what supernatural entities means. Fairies I have a conventional notion of. They are so and so big, they wear distinctive hats and out-of-date clothes. There is a family of things I would call fairies, not all have all the identical characteristics but there are a lot of shared family resemblances.

I also have problems using a non-existence statement as a logical assumption. It seems to require special care.

And assuming the non-existence of an undefined term is even more problematical.

=====================

Mtb, something in your post suggested a possible equation of "supernatural" with non-natural. I don't believe that is how people talk. Or maybe you didn't mean that. Do you think that "supernatural" simply means "not physical"? But what is physical? Material? Obeying physical laws as currently accepted by Terran scientists? Does nature actually obey those laws or are there other truer ones? Perhaps physical simply something like Dr. Samuel Johnson's rock, that he hurt his toe by kicking? Supernatural, as I have heard it used, seems to be different from simply "not physical".

In any case, it is up to participants to explicate and define their terms and argue whatever view they want. I just ask the question (for specificity I asked about fairies) and open things for discussion.

[mtbturtle]

Mtb, something in your post suggested a possible equation of "supernatural" with non-natural. I don't believe that is how people talk.

If by non-natural you mean not natural, then yes and that is also what I think most people mean and philosophically the kind of distinctions that are often made. The dictionary also agrees with this meaning. I'm pretty sure it's how people talk including here. Unless of course you mean something else by non-natural than not natural. Supernatural =/ natural

With that understanding I still do not see the distinction you are making. If everything that exists (existence) is natural, then there is no room for the supernatural, is there? If so I'm failing to see how this is accomplished.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/naturalism/

The term ‘naturalism’ has no very precise meaning in contemporary philosophy. Its current usage derives from debates in America in the first half of the last century. The self-proclaimed ‘naturalists’ from that period included John Dewey, Ernest Nagel, Sidney Hook and Roy Wood Sellars. These philosophers aimed to ally philosophy more closely with science. They urged that reality is exhausted by nature, containing nothing ‘supernatural’, and that the scientific method should be used to investigate all areas of reality, including the ‘human spirit’ (Krikorian 1944, Kim 2003).

[Marshall]

I take it that the question is more generalizable and not specifically limited to "fairies". I understood it to be about the kind of assumptions science makes about existence and whether or not it makes assumptions regarding the supernatural (things like gods, fairies, ghosts, souls).

You may be right; but I think this brings us closer to my point. When we are talking about gods or souls or ghosts, the devil's advocate can always ask "what do you mean by that word? What is a god? What is a ghost?". Our answer can only be a description or definition, and this is what opens our statement to scientific enquiry.

All of your examples, by the way, are of natural entities - cartoonists have no trouble drawing fairies or ghosts; we all make claims about where the soul is, how long it lasts, and what may happen to it; th religious make new empirical claims every day about God - what His name is, what He likes and dislikes, who He spoke to, and what he did on which day. Do the parts which portray God as supernatural (such as Kant's claim that God is transcendental) actually tell us anything about Him?

So, when people tell me that we cannot prove that God does not exist, I am claiming: either we can prove that God does or does not exist, or we can prove that "God exists" is meaningless.

Lomax

That is very clear! I like it! But I have a different image or concept of God that doesn't fit your logical framework. It is a very important human idea. Perhaps I might believe in it. I don't believe in any historical past conceptions of God, but I acknowlege this important idea--- made of our desire for life, our wish to see a purpose and meaning, possibly some other aspirations. Plus dopamine---the reward chemical :-D. God, for me, is something profoundly NATURAL made of the cells and chemicals in the brains of a billion people or more, maybe including you and me.

I don't want to argue in this thread. I like and respect your statement completely. But for me God is perfectly natural and it would be ridiculous to try to "assume the non-existence".

======================

However folks, Lomax, Mtb! Shouldn't we consider moving this to RELIGION FORUM?

The original impetus for the thread was here in Phil of Sci where somebody, I think TomW, asked something like
"do philosophy of science profs actually teach budding scientists to assume the non-existence of supernatural phenomena/entities??!!"

I thought that was a kind of sneaking God into a Philosophy of Science thread. It seemed to have a hidden message. Like: is it general practice to teach youth to disbelieve in the Judeo-Christian God??!!

It is hard for me to decide whether that kind of question belongs in PoS or in Religion.

For specificity I changed "supernatural phenomena/entities" to "fairies" and opened it up to see what people would say.

Mtb says: "...assumptions regarding the supernatural (things like gods, fairies, ghosts, souls)."

I agree with the implication here, if we try not to be too abstract, those are the paradigms of the supernatural, the typical cases of what is meant when one hears the word in ordinary speech.

Lomax directly without hesitation raises the issue of God, its existence or non-existence, and assumptions about it.

To me this sounds more and more like a Religion Forum thread? Shall I move it?

[neuro]

Let us define a klorngdrool as a stationary, quiet, inert, hourglass shaped vessel filled with a purple material which disobeys most of the physical laws currently accepted by humans. My feeling is that, to do science, nobody needs to assume the non-existence of klorngdrools. The question simply does not come up!

Agree that the question does not come up, and there is no need for assuming anything.
Maybe we should substitute "do not take into consideration" for "assume the non-existence of".
Then in my oipinion the answer would be: YES, "science" is inclined not to take into consideration a klorngdrool which disobeys most of the physical laws currently accepted by humans, as that would create a lot of complications (and would go against the golden rule of Occam's razor); still, at times it would be better to overcome such inclination: the Relativity theory would not have come up if one were not to take into consideration something which disobeys most of the physical laws currently accepted by humans.
Actually, however, it appears to be worth doing it when the physical laws currently accepted by humans appear inadequate to explain some phenomena which have been observed.

Amusing thread, I must admit.

[AHuxley]

I don't think there is any need to move the thread to the "Religion..." forum. One of the reasons the problem of demarcation exists is because we generally think that the knowledge gained through the process of science is somehow different, for good or for ill, from other types of knowledge. This often translates into the difference between scientific claims and "supernatural" claims so I'd say this discussion is directly related to the philosophy of science.

I agree with mtbturtle: As a sizable portion of individuals conceive of it, the scientific method excludes things by the assumptions often attached to it. Such an assumption need not be explicit to exclude. As you ask, what is natural? And what was scientifically natural before compared to what is scientifically natural now? If one believes that science studies what is "natural", this gives a basis for the exclusion of claims as an initial condition in ones methodology -- specifically, anything that is not natural. If the criteria for categorization of the supernatural isn't well thought out -- which would often be the case for people who hold that only the natural is worthwhile to understand -- then such an inference is the near equivalent to an assumption (possibly worse, as an assumption is usually at least deliberated, even if unproven). If one further claims that scientific knowledge is the only knowledge, then we have a working model of assumption of non-existence through science.

I also don't think there's anything wrong with excluding some things by axioms. I would argue against the above model of exclusion as I think it's ill founded and would actually hamper science. But would it matter if some axiomatic sets of scientific methodology excludes some options by assumption? I don't think so as there are other ways to knowledge, and there are multiple sets assumed by different people.

[reconsiderate]

Science can't prove the non existence of fairies but I can not prove that they do exist.
The difference between me and science is that I can use my imagination but science can not.

Not true. If you could operationalize a testable definition of fairies, using only your imagination; then you could proceed to systematically search for fairies in the most likely places or just utilize theories of biological structures to contemplate the practicality of fairy-bodies being viable.

Personally, I don't think it is feasible for bird-like wings to propel a body with mammalian density. Maybe if a fairy had bat-like structure with human head and legs - but how could a fairy have wings AND arms, since those are analogous structures?

The downfall with science is that it is limited to relying on data.
That data is usually gathered by man but man can not see ANYTHING from all possible angles, we can only use our senses, current technology and current fact.
If I were to analyze our senses, current technology and fact I wouldn't really have anything credible to work with so to me my imagination is just as useful as science

Imagination also relies on data; just not empirical (sensory) data. You can treat subjective data as empirically observable, but you can't subject it to the laws of physics. That's why you need fields like psychology and literature analysis to study to analyze subjective imagery.

Using my imagination fairies are very possible but not possible enough for me to take any real note of.
So imo, yes fairies do exist but because of the way I keep my imagination flexible they also do not exist.

You could say they exist as part of your imagination, your "subjective vocabulary," or even as part of a culture of images that extends beyond yourself and the present moment. You can study the history of fairy-discourse and/or expressions of belief in fairies in various documented oral accounts, which imo is still part of "fairy-discourse" generally.

[Lomax]

Hello Marshall,

One tries to avoid unnecessary baggage. Don't assume irrelevant stuff you don't need to.

I agree; if science is the study of natural laws, then supernatural entities are all unnecessary baggage. But there is some sense in which the OP might be argued against. If a natural law is a spatio-temporal relation between observations, then space and time themselves are not subject to natural laws; and as such, are supernatural, yet need to be assumed by science (note that I think this argument is misguided, but I can see why it might be postulated).

Maybe some folks dislike the flippant reference to fairies.

It is not that I dislike the reference. My reasons for picking up on it will hopefully become clear presently:

Let us define a klorngdrool as a stationary, quiet, inert, hourglass shaped vessel filled with a purple material which disobeys most of the physical laws currently accepted by humans.

The point is that you did manage to define a klorngdrool, and by virtue of this alone, its existence is testable. Indeed, there have been entities which disobeyed most of the physical laws currently accepted by humans. The very planet we sit upon is a case in pount. When Kepler discovered that the earth moves not in a circle around the sun (or vice versa, it makes no difference) but in an ellipse, the scientific community did not dismiss the earth as a supernatural entity. They simply revised the laws of physics. And therein lies the rub: the laws of physics are simply our way of describing the behaviour of some set of entities. There is no reason to discount any intelligible entity as "supernatural".

However folks, Lomax, Mtb! Shouldn't we consider moving this to RELIGION FORUM?

...

It is hard for me to decide whether that kind of question belongs in PoS or in Religion.

For specificity I changed "supernatural phenomena/entities" to "fairies" and opened it up to see what people would say.

...

Lomax directly without hesitation raises the issue of God, its existence or non-existence, and assumptions about it.

To me this sounds more and more like a Religion Forum thread? Shall I move it?

I do not think it will be necessary to move the thread; I am not particularly concerned with proving or disproving God's existence here, I am only claiming that God's existence must be empirically testable (in other words, I am proposing metaphysical naturalism). The reason I picked up on the God example, as well as the fairy example or any other, is that I think it helps to use specific examples, and I am willing to work with any specific examples that the members of this discussion want to offer.

I'm not too sure that I made any assumptions about God's existence (at least, I can't find any). But either way, the slipperiness of the very word "God" is that people tend to redefine it however they like, in order to get themselves out of corners. So I think it would make more sense to work with one of the more common notions of God. I do not dispute that desires, purposes, aspirations and dopamine all exist - I just think that calling them "God" causes unnecessary confusion (as Einstein and Spinoza did when they postulated God as nature).

As an aside, I cannot see why your conception of God does not fit into my logical framework. But perhaps that is the problem with the notion of frameworks: if they exist, they can only serve to limit us (and as a consequence, we can never have any evidence that they do exist). Inasmuch as this, I agree with you that science does not (or at least should not) assume the non-existence of entities

Lomax

[Lomax]

Hello AHuxley,

As a sizable portion of individuals conceive of it, the scientific method excludes things by the assumptions often attached to it. Such an assumption need not be explicit to exclude. As you ask, what is natural? And what was scientifically natural before compared to what is scientifically natural now? If one believes that science studies what is "natural", this gives a basis for the exclusion of claims as an initial condition in ones methodology -- specifically, anything that is not natural.

The problem is rather: if x cannot be rendered intelligible, then x does not denote an entity. It is on this basis that the naturalist claims she is not excluding any entities; the metaphysical naturalist claims that no supernatural entity can be properly described or defined, because definitions can only be made up of natural properties.

If we believe in the existence of analytic truths, then we can take the Logical Positivist approach: "it is true by definition that a supernatural entity cannot be rendered conceivable". However, if we reject the analytic-synthetic distinction, then all is not lost: we still have our methodological naturalism. And I do not know of an instance in which science has confirmed a supernatural entity. As I suggested to Marshall, it has always been possible simply to re-calculate the laws of physics, and there seems to be no reason why it won't be possible to do so in the future.

At this point, I expect you will protest that we are assuming the non-existence of the supernatural entity when we choose to re-define the laws of physics. Well perhaps we are; but "science" is not. Science lets us choose which theorems to keep and which ones to discard, and it is a matter of taste what we do. It would not be unscientific to treat gravity as a supernatural entity and devolve Einstein's physics back into Newton's; it would simply be more complicated, and that's why we don't do it.

Lomax

[Marshall]

This has certainly been a wide-ranging and stimulating thread. Thanks so far to everyone who has contributed. Especially Lomax, for clearly articulating many acute points.
Topics such as natural law, space and time, logical assumptions, testing of hypotheses, definability have come up and might be further examined here, serve as starters for other threads, or both.

I suspect that most of us agree that the original question was absurd. One doesn't bother assuming the non-existence of stuff, particularly if it is not defined in a stable fashion.

Whether or not one can test for something's non-existence is a different question. Interesting in in its own right! But what Tom_W had asked (which prompted the thread) was about teaching budding scientists to assume suchandsuch nonexistence.

I thought the ensuing discussion about testing and the historical evolution of our current laws of physics was a good deal more interesting than the initial question.

I want to emphasize and elaborate on what Kidjan said in the very first response---post #2 of the thread.
(I think his field is computing, something in the area of computer science.) He said, in effect, that the question was absurd and gave a Wikipedia link as source. The article on Scientific method.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method

Wikipedia, we've found, is a mixed bag. Some of the articles are quite helpful and reliable, others not. What do you think of their summary of the scientific method? I will copy the first few paragraphs.

Scientific method refers to a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new[1] knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning.[2] A scientific method consists of the collection of data through observation and experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses.[3]

Although procedures vary from one field of inquiry to another, identifiable features distinguish scientific inquiry from other methodologies of knowledge. Scientific researchers propose hypotheses as explanations of phenomena, and design experimental studies to test these hypotheses. These steps must be repeatable in order to dependably predict any future results. Theories that encompass wider domains of inquiry may bind many independently derived hypotheses together in a coherent, supportive structure. This in turn may help form new hypotheses or place groups of hypotheses into context.

Among other facets shared by the various fields of inquiry is the conviction that the process must be objective to reduce biased interpretations of the results. Another basic expectation is to document, archive and share all data and methodology so they are available for careful scrutiny by other scientists, thereby allowing other researchers the opportunity to verify results by attempting to reproduce them. This practice, called full disclosure, also allows statistical measures of the reliability of these data to be established...

There's more. You might want to check it out.

[Marshall]

Kidjan's simple comment on the original question was as follows:

Science (or better put, the scientific method) does not assume the existence of anything because it's just that: methods for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. So I think the question you're asking doesn't make complete sense.

Scientists, on the other hand, are just people attempting to practice these methods as best they can. So they may discredit the existence of fairies entirely without doing all of the obvious due-diligence.

Note that I do not believe in fairies, nor have I done the due-diligence.

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=15902&p=156268#p156099

[rainchild]

Here's my two cents: 1. I used to believe that that "natural" and "supernatural" were all and only unintentional terms for things we understand and things we don't understand, respectively. Then I realized that there were two problems with this: First, many things have been considered natural millenia before anyone understood them, from common minerals to the human body. Second, there are characteristics that supernatural phenomena are alleged to have: most typically violation of the natural order AND often sentient non-corporeal causality. For example, water elementals or undines were once believed to control the motion of water. A wizard could use symbols and spells to give orders to the undines, and so control water too. As science developed, we learned that spells don't work, and that impersonal forces can explain and predict observables far better than supernatural models. This is a perfectly legitimate reason for scientists to be skeptical about supernatural phenomena in general. That this also justifies at least prima facae skepticism about fairies should go without saying. 2. But what if some events are caused by non-corporeal sentient beings? If so, we would expect to observe inanimate objects behave in a manner that could be *reliably predicted* by imputing intentions behind said behavior. (See Samuel Dennett's distinction between the physical, design, and intentional stances in his book, "Brainstorms.") After a century and a half, psychical research aka parapsychology has failed to document any such phenomena.

[rainchild]

Lomax wrote: "So, when people tell me that we cannot prove that God does not exist, I am claiming: either we can prove that God does or does not exist, or we can prove that "God exists" is meaningless."

.

Hi, Lomax, Basically, you're saying that a statement is either verifiable or meaningless. That's Logical Positivism, which, while thought-provoking in its day, died years ago because the verifiability criterion for meaning cannot itself be verified.

Like it or not there is at least one other alternative to "God's existence is can be proven or disproven" and "The claim 'God exists' is meaningless." That alternative is the agnostic position, "God may exist, but his existence can't be proven or disproven." This agnostic alternative dropkicks the God hypothesis straight out of scientific discourse, but does not banish the claim "God exists" from the class of propositions that have meanings.

[AHuxley]

The problem is rather: if x cannot be rendered intelligible, then x does not denote an entity. It is on this basis that the naturalist claims she is not excluding any entities; the metaphysical naturalist claims that no supernatural entity can be properly described or defined, because definitions can only be made up of natural properties.

If we believe in the existence of analytic truths, then we can take the Logical Positivist approach: "it is true by definition that a supernatural entity cannot be rendered conceivable". However, if we reject the analytic-synthetic distinction, then all is not lost: we still have our methodological naturalism. And I do not know of an instance in which science has confirmed a supernatural entity. As I suggested to Marshall, it has always been possible simply to re-calculate the laws of physics, and there seems to be no reason why it won't be possible to do so in the future.

At this point, I expect you will protest that we are assuming the non-existence of the supernatural entity when we choose to re-define the laws of physics. Well perhaps we are; but "science" is not. Science lets us choose which theorems to keep and which ones to discard, and it is a matter of taste what we do. It would not be unscientific to treat gravity as a supernatural entity and devolve Einstein's physics back into Newton's; it would simply be more complicated, and that's why we don't do it.

Lomax

I'm not sure I gather what it is you're driving at here. I've tried reading this a few times as a reaction to what I initially wrote, but I'm not sure I follow. Do you mean by "the problem" that which is not expressed well by an opponent of metaphysical naturalism? I don't think I attacked metaphysical naturalism. I simply stated that as the scientific method is often conceived, the assumptions that go into this understanding of the scientific method predetermine the non-existence of some things -- in my specific model of such an understanding (which I won't claim is all-inclusive), that which is not-natural. I'm not sure how your response... responds to that argument. Do you mind trying again, or am I just totally misreading your intent?

[Lomax]

Hello rainchild,

Basically, you're saying that a statement is either verifiable or meaningless. That's Logical Positivism, which, while thought-provoking in its day, died years ago because the verifiability criterion for meaning cannot itself be verified.

It's not necessarily logicl positivism; it's simply verificationism. It's worth drawing a distinction between the strong-verifiability and weak-verifiability hypotheses.

The strong-verifiability hypothesis, as proposed by Carnap and Neurath, is that any true statement can be proven true by observation, at least in principle.

The weak-verifiability hypothesis, as proposed by Ayer, is that any true statement can be shown more likely to be true by observation, at least in principle.

Note that the weak principle is self-supporting, and was maintained by many of the most important critics of Logical Positivism, such as Quine and Goodman.

Like it or not there is at least one other alternative to "God's existence is can be proven or disproven" and "The claim 'God exists' is meaningless." That alternative is the agnostic position, "God may exist, but his existence can't be proven or disproven." This agnostic alternative dropkicks the God hypothesis straight out of scientific discourse, but does not banish the claim "God exists" from the class of propositions that have meanings.

Well, it is not too important whether I like it. The point is that your agnostic alternative is not a real alternative (or at least, that is the claim that I am proposing).

Before I proceed, I may as well lay out my position: I think that only the weak-verifiability claim can be rightly maintained, and I think that the analytic-synthetic distinction and empirical reductionism are both dogmas. The consequence is that we can only verify or falsify an overall theory, rather than some particular statement; or rather I might say, we can only verify a statement within some particular theory. This is a somewhat diluted version of verificationism, but no matter. The overall theory one holds still has to stand up to observation, because (with the death of analycity) there seems to be nothing else which can justify belief.

So, put short, I am proposing that there is no truth other than empirical truth, and I am proposing this because I have not yet seen evidence for such a truth (rather than because it is self-contradictory to have such evidence, as a Positivist might maintain). People might well tell me "God's existence is self-evident" or "I know of God's existence by revelation", but how am I to distinuish these claims from mere dogmas, or from the religious throwing their toys out of the pram? For that matter, what sense can I even make of these claims if they cannot tell me what God is? It is worthless to say "God might exist, but there's no way we can find out, and I don't know what God is anyway". So, put short: the way for you to prove me wrong would be to properly define God, without exposing Him, in principle, to empirical testing.

Lomax

[Lomax]

Hello AHuxley,

My apologies for having not been clearer before; I was rather tired. There is also some ambiguity in my post because I was discussing two different notions of the word "natural" (the first meaning "composed of natural properties", and the second meaning "consistently obeying natural laws").

I'm not sure I gather what it is you're driving at here.

I was trying to suggest that your claim that...

If one believes that science studies what is "natural", this gives a basis for the exclusion of claims as an initial condition in ones methodology -- specifically, anything that is not natural.

...is not true, because there is no supernatural for science to exclude (and if there were, science would not need to exclude it). I might also dispute this claim, that...

If one further claims that scientific knowledge is the only knowledge, then we have a working model of assumption of non-existence through science.

...because the claim that scientific knowledge is the only knowledge need not be an assumption (since not all claims are assumptions).

Do you mean by "the problem" that which is not expressed well by an opponent of metaphysical naturalism?

By "the problem" I meant "the problem with positing that science excludes the existence of non-natural entities".

I do agree that the scientific community works with certain assumptions (resistance to large-scale theory change, Occamist principles of economy*, and so forth) but rather where I think we differ is that these assumptions are not implicit in science itself. We could change our assumptions and it would still be possible to do science; it might generate different statements but the overall theory would amount to the same thing. It is simply the power of observation which keeps science in check.

Lomax

* Quine wrote a very good paperon the human bias in favour of simple theories.

[mtbturtle]

I suspect that most of us agree that the original question was absurd. One doesn't bother assuming the non-existence of stuff, particularly if it is not defined in a stable fashion.

Only if the question is limited to fairies :)

I still think that most scientists I've encountered (particularly here) and including in this thread do assume existence is natural and that this assumption whether necessary or not for the practice, application of science is equivalent to the supernatural does not exist.

As for our ability to stably, properly, intelligibly, meaningfully, rational, objectively (fill in whatever other superlative adjectives you would like) define something, I think that has absolutely no effect on the existence/nonexistence of anything.

I really don't know if scientists are explicitly taught the assumption that existence is natural but many seem to have picked it up somewhere along the lines.

[mtbturtle]

Like it or not there is at least one other alternative to "God's existence is can be proven or disproven" and "The claim 'God exists' is meaningless." That alternative is the agnostic position, "God may exist, but his existence can't be proven or disproven." This agnostic alternative dropkicks the God hypothesis straight out of scientific discourse, but does not banish the claim "God exists" from the class of propositions that have meanings.

Right although I wouldn't characterize it as "agnositic" myself. When it comes to science there really is no need to make these kind of grand metaphysical assumptions (such as existence is natural or what is meaningful overall). Rather as a perfectly good epistemology it should merely limit itself about what it is good at, designed to do which is make statements about, investigate what is natural.