Atheism

If something is so...it is so, whether we can understand it or not.

The fact that science cannot agree on some things does not impact on whether it is so or not.

Tyson's statement was not well worded...but the idea he was trying to impart makes plenty of sense.

It is worth noting that a preponderance of evidence points to significant human contribution to global warming. It appears that a significant majority of scientist would agree with that.

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@panzade,

Quote:

The good thing about science is that its true whether or not you believe in it

Do you believe this is correct? I'm not referring to the scientific truths that underpin our technology. But scientific discovery is, by nature, falsifiable. How may we claim the search for truth to be equal to truth itself?

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Trolls everywhere . . . the very fact that scientific theories and hypotheses are falsifiable, that they are subject to review for reliability, separates them entirely and irrevocably from religious superstition, which brooks no questions, and asserts "truth" without reference to any evidence, never mind testable evidence.

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@neologist,

I think you have a bit of a misconception about what "falsifiable" means. It does not imply "false"
Its like a "theory" in which the only way to prove it, is to not disprove it.

As set said, falsifiability is a process not a condition .

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@neologist,

Quote:

How may we claim the search for truth to be equal to truth itself?

We can't.
The search for scientific truth can be full of falsehoods but they don't affect scientific truth

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As I've mentioned before, scientists and atheists waste far too much time pooh-poohing Christianity instead of examining it scientifically!
Jesus's 37 miracles make fascinating reading and were often very different in how they were carried out, for example some he performed by "remote control" without even seeing the patient, such as when the Roman Centurion asked him to come and cure his servant and Jesus said "Go back and you'll find him cured".
But at the other end of the scale the cures required a "hands-on" approach such as when he spit in the dust to make mud pies to plaster over a blind mans eyes to restore his sight, as if the atoms and molecules in the mud were needed to transform into new corneas or whatever.

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@panzade,

panzade wrote:

The search for scientific truth can be full of falsehoods but they don't affect scientific truth

Exactly my point.

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@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

I think you have a bit of a misconception about what "falsifiable" means. It does not imply "false"
Its like a "theory" in which the only way to prove it, is to not disprove it.

As set said, falsifiability is a process not a condition .

Please read carefully. Science discovers many truths. We would not have technology without it. But the process itself is not equal to the truths discovered. It may be called necessary, It may be called worthwhile. It may even be called heroic, as in the case Galileo who was persecuted, or the Curies, who sacrificed their health. But labeling it as 'truth', seems inappropriate to me.

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@neologist,

good, we agree.
Like Frank said: ...awkwardly worded ...but an important distinction between faith and science. IMO of course.

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@Setanta,

Quote:

Trolls everywhere

You are right. I started a thread on Islam and one or two dropped in.

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@neologist,

Im not sure here you want to be with that assertion neo. "Scientific Truth" can be tested for its "truthness". One way is by falsification, another is by evidence, another is by experimentation.
If you cant submit the concept to one of the above, I worry about the source.

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@farmerman,

I have no problem with the truths discovered by science. I cooked breakfast using several truths this morning. But science is a process. Calling it 'truth'. is an awkward misnomer.

I honestly did not mean anything more by that.

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Scientific truth is a concept which, unlike the vague maundering of front porch metaphysicians, has a direct relation to the inductive processes of the scientific method. That someone may imperfectly describe a process which will lead to the falsification of an hypothesis is not evidence that scientific truth is mutable, or unreliable. It is simply evidence that a mistake was made--and those mistakes can usually be corrected, allowing us to more closely approach scientific truth.

I note that Neo is completely ignoring the criticism that his suterstitious "truth" has no underpinning of evidence. The dog and pony show in the search for truth is the blind faith assertions of the god botherers.

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@neologist,

Quote:

How may we claim the search for truth to be equal to truth itself?

Otherwise you have defined a blind alley .
I would imgine that the process of discovery must always be equal to its product, whether by design or fortuitous accident.

Einstein was a perfect example of some dude who was able to ask the right questions. He wasn't worth a damn in the lab, but he could sure define the problem.

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@neologist,

Most people question the accuracy of science, when it collides with their religious dogma. They don't want to accept that evolution is a proven fact, for instance. Hence, the quibbling over "science." - There are scientists who sell out to money and big business interests, being little more than prostitutes, but we are not discussing them, here.

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Facts beget facts.
You cant get good facts from bad data. (Sounds almost like a parable I herd once)

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@farmerman,

"Falsifiable" means: it can theoretically be proven false. Neo is perfectly right to insist that doubt is a fundamental tenet of science and that the statement "science is true" is misleading. Science is done by folks who always assume that they might have had it wrong.

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@Romeo Fabulini,

Romeo Fabulini wrote:

Huh, scientists can't even agree whether global warming is a natural thing or caused by human pollution..

Actually the vast majority of scientists (around 90%) agree that global warming is happening and that human activity is contributing to the already occurring natural process.

What they haven't defined yet is what proportion of the warming is due to human activity and what proportion is purely natural.

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@rosborne979,

Quote:

What they haven't defined yet is what proportion of the warming is due to human activity and what proportion is purely natural.

In a nutshell

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Dawkins and his fanboys believe it's true to say the eye has been wired "back to front".
Biologists have pointed out to him that if it was wired in the "improved" way that he suggests, we'd all be blind as bats.
But he STILL maintains his way is best and sticks with his proven falsehood rather than admit he's wrong.. Wink

"For the retina to be wired the way that Professor Richard Dawkins suggested, would require the choroid to come between the photoreceptor cells and the light.…The idea that the eye is wired backward comes from a lack of knowledge of eye function and anatomy"
http://creation.com/book-review-of-dawkins-climbing-mount-improbable

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