Stephen Hawking

neologist wrote:

Scientific discovery and human reasoning have provided many answers.

But it is the height of arrogance to conclude that scientific discovery and human reasoning can provide all of the answers

Is one to conclude from your tone that it is not the height of arrogance to conclude that your preferred imaginary friend superstition can provide all the answers?

Jacob Bronowski Quote
From the "Knowledge or Certainty", an episode from the 1973 BBC series "The Ascent of Man", transcribed by Evan Hunt:

The Principle of Uncertainty is a bad name. In science--or outside of it--we are not uncertain; our knowledge is merely confined, within a certain tolerance. We should call it the Principle of Tolerance. And I propose that name in two senses: First, in the engineering sense--science has progressed, step by step, the most successful enterprise in the ascent of man, because it has understood that the exchange of information between man and nature, and man and man, can only take place with a certain tolerance.

But second, I also use the word, passionately, about the real world. All knowledge--all information between human beings--can only be exchanged within a play of tolerance. And that is true whether the exchange is in science, or in literature, or in religion, or in politics, or in *any* form of thought that aspires to dogma. It's a major tragedy of my lifetime and yours that scientists were refining, to the most exquisite precision, the Principle of Tolerance--and turning their backs on the fact that all around them, tolerance was crashing to the ground beyond repair.

The Principle of Uncertainty or, in my phrase, the Principle of Tolerance, fixed once for all the realization that all knowledge is limited. It is an irony of history that at the very time when this was being worked out there should rise, under Hitler in Germany and other tyrants elsewhere, a counter-conception: a principle of monstrous certainty. When the future looks back on the 1930s it will think of them as a crucial confrontation of culture as I have been expounding it, the ascent of man, against the throwback to the despots' belief that they have absolute certainty.

It is said that science will dehumanize people and turn them into numbers. That is false: tragically false. Look for yourself. This is the concentration camp and crematorium at Auschwitz. *This* is where people were turned into numbers. Into this pond were flushed the ashes of four million people. And that was not done by gas. It was done by arrogance. It was done by dogma. It was done by ignorance. When people believe that they have absolute knowledge, with no test in reality--this is how they behave. This is what men do when they aspire to the knowledge of gods.

Science is a very human form of knowledge. We are always at the brink of the known; we always feel forward for what is to be hoped. Every judgment in science stands on the edge or error, and is personal. Science is a tribute to what we *can* know although we are fallible. In the end, the words were said by Oliver Cromwell: "I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ: Think it possible you may be mistaken."

We have to cure ourselves of the itch for absolute knowledge and power. We have to close the distance between the push-button order and the human act. We have to *touch people*.

Shirakawasuna, you missed some of the play-by-play here. BD switched from Hawking to Richard Dawkins, who is a much more attractive target for the bible-thumpers. He has a habit of telling the idiotic wankers that they are all idiotic wankers.

. . . "science" doesn't claim certainty, people do. . .

kuvasz wrote:

. . . "science" doesn't claim certainty, people do. . .

Uh huh. . .

. . . baddog1 seems to be hilariously implying that if we like Dawkins, we should never disagree with him.

neologist wrote:

kuvasz wrote:

. . . "science" doesn't claim certainty, people do. . .

Uh huh. . .

Good for you, now you can stop pretending to be so santimonious and disengenuous, but I'm not about to bet on it.

I gave you pearls and all you did was trample them and miss the delicacy of Bronowski's intellectual insight and that is too bad because cogitating on his insight on the real world affects of holding fast to dogma is precisely what you need to begin to enlighten yourself.

I don't do missionary work with the feeble minded, kid you're on your own from now on.

ciao

It should be understandable why this kind of "thinking" appeals to the bible-thumpers, though. In fundamentalist religion, you either buy the whole package, or you are apostate.

Like how do I prove to myself that my wife loves me?

It is quite entertaining to watch folks participate in the circular threads like Wilso's fool's errand "Don't tell me there's any proof for creationism."

Of course, all of us have 'proof'. And we pretty much have the same 'evidence' from which we arrive at our 'proof'.

It is our varying methods of evaluation which fuel our debate.

Like how do I prove to myself that my wife loves me?

(OK, she stops hitting me when I say I'm sorry or bring flowers.)

Quite different from a well developed syllogism or a carefully constructed laboratory demonstration.

. . .because the religionists provide no plausible cause and effect relationship with which to provide at the least a "logical" fig leaf to cover their intellectual nakedness. . .

. . . You mean experiment. . .

Beat her up and see if she forgives you.

I've read many articles on him but none of his books; planning to soon though, beginning with: "A Brief History of Time".

Hawking's position on God is well documented as is his popularity in the science-community. Since most on here consider God and science to be like oil & water - what are your thoughts on this man?

No, I mean demonstration.

As in replicating

thereby demonstrating the truth of one's assertion.

neologist wrote:

No, I mean demonstration.

As in replicating

thereby demonstrating the truth of one's assertion.

Uh... is this something you think is necessary for science? Or do you just fancy operational science?