The Opening of the Scientific Mind

[stahrwe]

Brought to you by my friends at Strange Notions - will you back yourself up?

The Opening of the Scientific Mind

[ant]

great article
spot on.

[Interbane]

In summary, scientists should refrain from materialism because materialism is bad. I'm not sure many minds will be convinced by an appeal to consequence.

[Interbane]

From the article: "The talk of singularities, as so many other buzz-words have, will likely die out before 2045"

Only because it will be replaced by a new buzzword as the technology comes to fruition.

[DWill]

I can't help be distracted by the "mother of seven" part. Always in awe (and some puzzlement) of people who push that envelope.

Sorry for that. I think it's interesting, in terms of our common debates about science supposedly wanting to pose as the ultimate truth source, that she shifts the blame to materialism and exonerates working scientists. I can well believe it's true that scientists are too busy with their jobs to go in very much for disputation. But I wonder still if materialism doesn't do its own duty as a straw man in her piece. I think she's saying that we're all by necessity materialists, but that there is a social or even scientific movement afoot that goes too far. Sam Harris is her poster guy for a kind of soulessness that she deplores. How representative is he, and is she even being fair to him?

But just to try to make it clear what I think, this view that we are more than the sum of our parts is fine with me, even though I wouldn't call the extra stuff "soul." I think that to have an expansive view of our nature that encompasses religion and art is also probably correct evolutionarily speaking. That is, our human groups "grew up" in such a psychological environment over the ages, so we are naturally fitted to it.

[youkrst]

the irony of the title was a little less than subtle.

the opening of the scientific mind.

it's been millenia now and the religious mind is still pretty resistant in some quarters. You can try running it under a tap, knocking it on a table edge, but that sucker still won't move

fortunately the "digital Areopagus" wont go the way of the actual library of Alexandria so maybe there is hope, yay!

and who was "unwilling" in Gelernter's opinion "to express sufficient hatred of religion to satisfy other atheists."

when will people get it that it's dumb ideas like taking virgin birth literally rather than as metaphor that others "hate". Shouldn't we all "hate" it when someone, religious or not, insists a common mythological motif is actual history!

Then Gelernter discussed the "roboticism" of Ray Kurzweil

now we've gone from one extreme to another.

science has banished human subjectivity

no it hasn't.

the "room with a view" to our mental states.

science studies mental states does it not?

The materialistic view of "computationalism" likens the mind to software and the brain to a computer, which means there is no interior reality. All is objectively exterior.

i haven't seen this "All is objectively exterior." claim.

"A world that is intimidated by science and bored sick with cynical, empty “postmodernism” desperately needs a new subjectivist, humanist, individualist worldview. We need science and scholarship and art and spiritual life to be fully human. The last three are withering, and almost no one understands the first."

"We need science and scholarship and art and spiritual life to be fully human. "

fully human? but not materialist, rationalist and darwinian surely, so partially human then?

On the other hand, materialism restricts the search for answers to that box, and our human intellect cannot tolerate such confinement.

then by all means let us ignore the box. let us escape our confinement.

scientists everywhere put on your Hendrix albums and check the lyrics to "stone free"

women here, women there try to keep me in a plastic cage
but they don't realise that it's so easy to break.

and you do not expect science to be the savior of mankind.

God forbid reason should trump faith

God forbid we should look for explanations that make sense, hell we got the trinity who needs sense.

For the materialists who presume a priori that there is nothing spiritual, it is reasonable that they conclude religion is false, roboticism is possible, and human subjectivity is nothing more than the objective output of the brain running its program.

there is a lot of lumping together going on there.

materialists are not the only ones reasonable in concluding for example that female circumcision is wrong, that taking death and resurrection literally is childish etc etc

"human subjectivity is nothing more than the objective output of the brain running its program."

well surely the writer concedes there is some of that sort of thing going on?

the undertone in these things is always one of panic, eeeek we are all going to satan's bbq if any of this stuff takes hold.

why not let it run it's course, keep an eye on it, and we'll see if it works.

it is not surprising that the materialists would assail anyone who suggests that their presumption was wrong, for that could mean entire careers and deeply held convictions were, from the first steps, on the wrong path.

here comes that monolithic irony again. How many priests and ministers turned atheist but kept preaching because entire careers and deeply held convictions were, from the first steps, on the wrong path.

A body and a soul cannot be reduced to a robot.

don't panic! we'll soon see. If it can't be done it can't be done, time will make fools of us all.

The subjective experience of the mind cannot be disregarded when this is the intellectual source of our greatest achievements—scholarship, innovation, and art. The pursuit of virtue, knowledge, beauty, and love cannot be illusions because they are the core of who we are. The human experience tells us every day that our existence is bigger than materialism.

"The subjective experience of the mind cannot be disregarded", are those evil materialists disregarding the subjective experience of the mind?

"this is the intellectual source of our greatest achievements—scholarship, innovation, and art." and also the source of some colossal blunders.

"The pursuit of virtue, knowledge, beauty, and love cannot be illusions because they are the core of who we are", who is suggesting we discard the pursuit of virtue, beauty and love whether they be illusions or not.

The human experience tells us every day that our existence is bigger than materialism.

but if someone wants to be a materialist surely you must let them. If you grant freedom of religion surely you cannot deny someone freedom to be a materialist?

Theology and philosophy do not need to rely on science to shore up those disciplines.

possibly not, but if theology puts up virgin birth as history not metaphor then science can come to the rescue and say "i can't go for that, no can do"

but even a child can pick a dandelion, grasp nothing other than beauty, and still admire the handiwork of the Creator.

yes, and then ask the Creator why he just caught lyme disease from a tick in the nearby grass that bit him while he was admiring the dandelion.

I say we all—anyone of any religion, agnostics and atheists—need to become more childlike in our pursuit of science and enjoy experiencing this awe. This is how to keep the scientific mind open, and it is protected by understanding the boundaries of science and insisting they be respected. There are plenty of examples in the human experience that demonstrate how clear boundaries bring about a true and legitimate freedom. Ask a parent.

now now, you naughty scientists, listen to your erstwhile parents, respect the boundaries we set you, and you shall have a true and legitimate freedom that doesn't scare the hell out of us.

Can a non-believer share that awe? Of course.

nothing to worry about then

I can testify that in the daily work, where the white coats and Neoprene gloves meet the test tubes and data, rare are disagreements about faith. When faith is discussed, it is in the spirit of camaraderie. "Oh, and what do you believe...okay, let's get back to work." In my experience as a non-religious scientist for over a decade in both academia and the industry, and in global relationships with other scientists of all different religions on four different continents, I never once heard any discussion about this conflict between science and religion, not even from atheists. Not once. Scientists, believe it or not, are curious and open-minded.

well there you go, it was an imaginary problem from the beginning.

Bullying is a display of insecurity

and trying to put boundaries on science is a display of security?

In conclusion, if scientists do not cross the line out of science and into ideology, and if theologians and philosophers do not cross the line into science, everyone can watch scientific discovery unfold together.

is someone advocating putting the berlin wall back up, this time between science and religion?

bad move, tear down the middle wall of partition and lets have a unified field

after all

"We cannot make much progress without a faith that in this bewildering field of human experience, which is so new and so much more complicated than we thought even five years ago, there is a unique and necessary order: not an order that we can tell a priori, not an order that we can see without experience, but an order which means that the parts fit into the whole and that the whole requires the parts."

[Dexter]

It doesn't seem like she read Sam Harris's piece very carefully, other than to pick out a sentence she didn't like.

Here's Harris:

People who fear the encroachment of the scientific attitude—especially those who insist upon the dignity of believing in one or another Iron Age god—will often make derogatory use of words such as materialism, neo-Darwinism, and reductionism, as if those doctrines had some necessary connection to science itself.

There are, of course, good reasons for scientists to be materialist, neo-Darwinian, and reductionist. However, science entails none of those commitments, nor do they entail one another. If there were evidence for dualism (immaterial souls, reincarnation), one could be a scientist without being a materialist. As it happens, the evidence here is extraordinarily thin, so virtually all scientists are materialists of some sort.

http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/our- ... diH1c.dpuf

So what's the objection? He's not sufficiently open to the idea of a soul and immortality? Why should he be?

[Dexter]

science has banished human subjectivity

no it hasn't.

I was also confused by this. She's a scientist and she thinks everyone is a behaviorist? It seems to me science is quite interested in subjective experiences.

She has a Ph.D. in Chemistry and a M.A. in Dogmatic Theology

Hehe.

[LanDroid]

"Exact science is the quantitative study of the quantitative aspects of objects in motion."

Peculiar. This definition seems to exclude the fields of psychology, psychiatry, mathematics, linguistics, geology, logic, paleontology, and biology from science. She mentions biology as the study of living things that are in motion, but what about dead creatures? The mental aspects of humans and other animals studied by psychology and psychiatry are not in motion. Rocks and geological features don't.....well I guess they do actually move on a deep time scale. Are words objects and do they move? Equations are not objects and are not in motion. Does Jaki somehow claim dinosaur bones, geological specimens, calculus, history, language, syllogisms, and human emotions all orbit the sun, therefore they're in motion? Doesn't he exclude these disciplines (and probably some others) from science since they either don't study objects, objects that are in motion, or both?

It is clear that science never could answer questions about the soul, it cannot reveal where consciousness comes from or what consciousness is. And clearly, immortality is not the work of science. As Jaki put it, “And it is always with measurement that the buck stops with science.”

Why does she think souls and immortality exist AND there will never be a shred of evidence for that? If science doesn't currently reveal where consciousness comes from or what it is, why does she think it will NEVER do so? Remember this thread:
http://www.booktalk.org/evidence-for-on ... 16541.html

It's a side issue, but she doesn't characterize the singularity correctly. Basically it means technology will advance to a certain level beyond which we are not currently able to predict or imagine what will be capable. Somewhat like A. C. Clarke's statement that greatly advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Kurzweil's "roboticism" is separate from, is not intrinsic to the singularity.

Dogmatic theology is that part of theology dealing with the theoretical truths of faith concerning God and his works, especially the official theology recognized by an organized Church body, such as the Roman Catholic Church, Dutch Reformed Church, etc.

I had to look it up. I wonder what "theoretical" means in this context, surely not the scientific use of the term?

[LanDroid]

Checking out her blog, Stacey Trasancos does indeed have some extraordinarily Strange Notions...

To do science well, a working knowledge of Catholic dogma is necessary. (Emphasis in original.)

...the Catholic Church has a legitimate right and authority to veto scientific conclusions that directly contradict her dogma.

http://stacytrasancos.com/without-dogma ... e-is-lost/

Einstein did science well. Did he have a working knowledge of.....sorry, the question is too stupid to finish...

"authority to veto"??? *cough-cough-gaaack* Whaaaat?

Oh vey...Quick, need beer to stop head spinning in reality distortion field...