I’ve always understood Methodological Naturalism to mean the assumption we make in science that things are predictable, probabilistically at any rate.
It needn’t be true, and nor do we make any conclusion as to whether it is true or not, we merely proceed under that assumption, because it underlies the methodology that we call science.
But clearly some people, often citing Plantinga (here and here) regard it as some kind of error made by scientists that enables them to fallaciously reject religion, or at least compromise “religious neutrality”.
But oddly, it seems to me, Plantinga himself solves the problem he thinks “methodological naturalism” creates, but doesn’t appear to notice the solution. He writes :
So there is little to be said for methodological naturalism. Taken at its best, it tells us only that Duhemian science must be metaphysically neutral and that claims of direct divine action will not ordinarily make for good science. And even in these two cases, what we have reason for is not a principled proscription but a general counsel that in some circumstances is quite clearly inapplicable. There is no reason to proscribe questions like: did God create life specially? There is no reason why such a question can’t be investigated empirically63; and there is no reason to proscribe in advance an affirmative answer.
in which he seems to have got himself into a muddle. He seems to accept that “ordinarily” the assumption of methodological naturalism is what makes for good science, but complains that it is “clearly inapplicable” to some questions. Well, sure. And those questions include “did God create life specially?”
We can’t answer that using scientific methodology (i.e. methodological naturalism), but it doesn’t stop us asking the question, nor from believing that the answer is yes, even if we find evidence that it could also have occurred “naturally”. So far so good.
But then writes: “There is no reason why such a question can’t be investigated empirically63“. It can? How? So we check footnote 63, where he writes:
Why couldn’t a scientist think as follows? God has created the world, and of course has created everything in it directly or indirectly. After a great deal of study, we can’t see how he created some phenomenon P (life, for example) indirectly; thus probably he has created it directly.
So we can infer, I think, that Plantinga regards such an empirical method as a violation of “methological naturalism”.
And indeed it is. Moreover, it is exactly the “empirical” method espoused by ID.
So does that mean that ID is not science? Or that ID is science, but scientists are deliberately eschewing a methodology that would allow an ID to be inferred?
It seems to me that this lies at the heart of the non-connection between IDists and ID critics. It’s not that science can’t investigate intelligent causes (it can) or infer intelligent causation (it can), or that ID doesn’t posit a supernatural designer necessarily, it’s just method for detecting design. It’s that ID proceeds by drawing a conclusion from lack of an alternative explanation. In other words, it is based on rejecting a null hypothesis that it does not model.
So is all that’s wrong with “methodological naturalism”, in the eyes of IDists, the fact that we insist that the null is modeled? Is that it?
I think that’s what it boils down to, hence all those probability arguments, and challenges to ID critics to provide a probability estimate for Darwinian evolution.
But, if so, what an odd disagreement to have spawned so vast an argument!
(Hoping an IDist or two may weigh in here….)
Joe G,
If ID critics do indeed get ID wrong, the main reason for that would be that ID’s proponents are remarkably reluctant to explain what the hell this ‘ID’ thingie is. The closest I’ve seen to an ID-pusher-approved definition of ID is, the notion that some features of life, and/or the Universe in general, are best explained as the results of intelligent action. This boils down to somebody done something—not exactly an informative statement, nor yet one that anybody could build an experiment to test.
A second reason for ID’s critics to get ID wrong, if those critics actually are getting it wrong, is that ID-pushers tend to be… let’s be generous and say ‘highly unclear’… in their statements about ID. For instance, let’s suppose ID-pusher John Doe asserts both (a) that the way to refute ID would be to prove evolution, and (b) that ID is “not anti-evolution”. This pair of assertions contradict each other; Doe’s position on ID is just plain incoherent.
Still awaiting a comment, after a busy St. Valentine’s day, to #3093. Equivocating on #3094 was easy. Not sure that the PoS Elizabeth currently possesses is enough really to address this challenge of ‘naturalism,’ beyond the WAP variety. The thread’s title and purpose hangs in the balance.
Yes, there is.
However there isn’t any way to test if chimps and humans share a common ancestor without first assuming it.
Well Cubist the “theory” of evolution boils down to:
“Somehow, some things happened at some point in time, kept happening and keep happening to make things the way they are now.”
And actually the way to falsify ID is NOT to prove “evolution” as ID is not anti-evolution.
ID argues against blind and undirected processes having sole dominion over evolution.
IOW thanks for proving that you are totally clueless.
Mike Elzinga,
No Mike- evos tell us how evolution procedes and we take their word for it.
IOW you do not know what you are talking about yet feel the need to talk about it anyway.
I don’t know whether Elizabeth will respond. Here are my comments on 3093, where you say that Darwinism is an ideology.
As I look at it, many scientists question Darwinism. Some say that they are not Darwinists. That would seem to indicate that Darwinism is not an ideology for scientists.
On the other hand, the critics of evolution routinely call everyone they diesagree with (on evolution) a Darwinist. They call people Darwinists, who have said that they are not Darwinist.
It seems to me that what the critics of evolution mean by “Darwinism” is different from what the scientists mean.
Neil Rickert,
WRt Elizabeth responding, it has been my experience that when people realise they are in a tough spot, they choose not to respond (‘Sorry, busy day’ and ‘Good thought’ without follow-up are rather par for the internet course). Elizabeth knows she is not versed in PoS, which is the field that hosts the topic of ‘naturalism’. Why would she feel welcome to face a change in her worldview perspective (i.e. involving Darwinism and naturalism)?
Many people understand that Darwinism is an ideology, and Darwinian evolution is a scientific theory, for better or worse. What we face is a situation where natural scientists deny *any* ideological influence on their ‘science.’ This is a serious problem as in doing so they deny their own reflexive humanity and its influence on the practice of ‘doing science.’
“That would seem to indicate that Darwinism is not an ideology for scientists.” – Neil
Would you care to explain this conclusion further? Wouldn’t the rejection of the label ‘Darwinist’ or association with ‘Darwinism’ by (natural) scientists indicate that perhaps they are against the ideology, while being for ‘good science’? You are surely not suggesting that very many (natural) scientists reject Darwinian evolutionary theory in biology, are you?
“the critics of evolution routinely call everyone they diesagree with (on evolution) a Darwinist” – Neil
Yes, I agree that this happens on a regular basis. It is usually a symbol of under-educated people (usually fundamentalists) associating ‘Darwin’ with ‘atheism’ or ‘agnosticism,’ wherein they wish to establish differences between a ‘spiritual’ person and a person like Darwin. According to F. Nietzsche, “Darwin forgot the spirit.” Would you suggest otherwise, Neil?
The various non-Darwinian meanings of ‘evolution’ enable a discussion that welcomes people of ‘faith’ to the table, e.g. Dobzhansky, Fisher and Teilhard de Chardin. Whereas some (natural) scientists who are atheists promote the ideology of ‘Darwinism’ as a shield for their non-theistic personal views of the world, others realise that Darwin’s non-ideological contribution to science (which some people deny is even possible!) allows them to believe in both transcendence and an immanent mechanism of ‘change-over-time’ in the natural-physical world.
The ideology of Darwinism is often associated with loss of faith, secularism, agnosticism, ‘struggle for life,’ ‘survival of the fittest’ (from H. Spencer) and other ‘non-scientific’ themes. This is a different topic that just a simple (natural) scientific theory.
That puts a lot of spin on it.
Take Larry Moran as an example. He calls his blog Sandwalk to honor Darwin. In a recent post, he argued that Darwin was the greatest scientist ever. I don’t see any attempt there to avoid association with Darwin or Darwinism. Yet he says that he is not a Darwinist. Could it perhaps be that he thinks evolution is just a wee bit more complex than the picture that Darwin painted?
That is incorrect. If people say they are not darwinists then we refer to them as neo-darwinists, as in the modern synthesis- that is unless they declare they are not NDEs.
Then we ask.
When people say that they are non-Darwinists, they are usually saying that they are not neither traditional Darwinists nor neo-Darwinists.
That hasn’t been my experience. However what else is there besides darwinism, NDE, ID and Creation?
What is currently being taught in schools? My bet is the modern synthesis aka neo-darwinism.
Joe G,
There are many, many options. A countably infinite many actually.
This is a sort of a pet peeve of mine. There are very few either/or statements which have no other alternatives out of all the possible either/or statements and the quality of any either/or is entirely dependent on the reference frame. You can say, either this weight is x grams or it is not (a resolution-dependent statement). You can say, one plus one is either two or it is not (an axiom-dependent or convention-dependent statement). You can say, either you are a Darwinist or you are not (a logical error). One can understand evolution as it is currently understood scientifically and even agree that it is the best model we have, and not be a darwinist. The label is not meaningful unless you are using it to compare a person who does understand the science of evolution to someone who does not understand the science of evolution.
Outside of that, the idea that someone needs to ‘believe’ something in order to understand it and use that understanding in the conduction of their activities is simply wrong. The idea of belief is anachronistic in many ways.
The Neutral theory, Gould’s contingency ideas, Shapiro’s ideas of intelligent engineering at the cell level. There are probably others.
I don’t know. I assume that it is fairly general, a kind of “big picture” approach.
The neutral theory is part of the modern synthesis- it’s just another mechanism. And how is Gould’s contingency not part of the MT?
Shapiro’s ideas are new and I am sure the MT will assimilate them also.
I would say the options are limited but there may be many variations on those limited options.
For example- options 2- designed or not-> then there are many variations on the design side as well as the not designed side.
But it looks like you are assuming belief has something to do with the truth of the matter in some cosmic universal reference frame sort of way.
I get the impression that you are a latecomer to this ID/creationist shtick and that you have very little knowledge of the history of ID/creationism.
For those of us who have been dealing for over 40 years with ID/creationist attacks on science – especially on biology and evolution – your assertions seem quite naive.
Most of us who have had first-hand involvement in this know far more about your pseudo-science than you do. So you sound quite silly not being able to articulate one single concept in either science or in your own ID/creationism “alternative.”
So your comments appear to be simply taunting denigrations of science that have no basis in fact.
I am quite sure that you couldn’t past a concept test in any area of science. And from your unwillingness to articulate your ID/creationist alternatives and tell us what problems in science these are alleged to address, I am quite sure that you have not read or comprehended any ID/creationist authors either.
I gave you a partial list of ID/creationist terms; and you seem to show no recognition of them. Nor do you appear to be willing or able to articulate their meaning and justify their use in replacing concepts in science.
But you should not feel singled out in this; your naiveté about ID/creationism and its history is pretty standard among the followers of ID/creationism. Not one ID/creationist advocate in over 40 years has been able to articulate and justify why ID/creationism should become part of the science curriculum in the public schools; and you are not unique in this inability.
Gregory,
Apologies for the delay Gregory. OK, my thoughts on your post above:
Well, Gregory, I may not be a philosopher (indeed I am not a philosopher) but I am a trained scientist, and so I do understand, I would say, the fundamentals of the methodology. And I also have to say that I am perfectly prepared to face changes in my worldview perspective, and, indeed have done so, despite the rocking of my world that that entailed 🙂
Be careful of mistaking “many people understand that X is Y” for “many people define X as Y”. The word “Darwinism” denotes many things in different usages, some of which are coterminous with what I understand is the referent for your signifier (“Darwinian evolution”) i.e. to denote a specific, or sometimes a more general, scientific theory about adaptation and speciation.
I accept your broader point that science is not free of ideology. No field of human endeavour can be. What I would argue, however, is that the scientific method is specifically designed to be as resistant to ideological bias, or indeed any bias, as possible. Hence the whole paraphernalia of double blind control trials, inter-rater reliability coefficients, random sampling, minimisation of response bias, importance of replication, the methodology of meta-analysis, declaration of interests, availability of data, transparency of methods reporting etc etc.
In other words, it is precisely because scientists understand their vulnerability to bias that the methodology is what it is.
As for your expectations regarding a specific reply – I’m not sure which post you are referring to. I agreed that “methodological naturalism” is a poor term.
It seems to me that “natural methodology” would be better! Science occupies the domain of natural explanations. It does not possess the methodology, I would argue, to investigate unnatural ones.
What do you mean by “multi-protein configurations”? Do you mean new proteins? Or do you mean proteins expressed in new places under new developmental time-tables?
Just for starters:
Endler’s guppies
The Grants’ finches
Lenski’s bacteria
Almost the entire corpus of drosphophila research
GAs
Check out my new thread here
Petrushka asked: “Is there a way to test whether two humans share a common ancestor?”
Huh. Intriguing.
You’ll have to explain this theory of yours: In order to test whether chimps and humans share a common ancestor, one must first assume that they do. In order to test whether two humans have a common ancestor, one needs no assumptions.
What are the tests you are proposing to use, and your justifications for your prior assumptions, and their necessity for carrying out the tests?
Joe G,
“However there isn’t any way to test if chimps and humans share a common ancestor without first assuming it.”
Yes there is, (and it is done all the time). To compare two competing hypotheses, you first need to predict what your measured variable will look like under hypothesis A and Hypothesis B. Now, from basic principles and long term, multigeneration experiments with mice, bacteria and viruses we know what common descent looks like. So we can make predictions for what the chimp genome and the human genomes would look like if there we linked by common decent, or it they were independent.
There are a variety of ways we can look at this, but for example we can compare broken genes. If the chimp and human are NOT linked by common descent, then the broken genes should not look like each other (the original breakage event should be independent, and subsequent divergence of the genes will be random), if they are linked by common descent, then the breaking event will be the same, and subsequent divergence minimal.
This is exactly what we find for the ascorbic acid synthesis gene.
http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2008/05/the-revenge-of-1.html
And this is not the only broken gene we have compared, we have a number of other broken genes, defective viruses, and introns to strongly support common ancestry (as well as gene order, LINES and SINES similarity of functional genes etc. etc.)
But the basic point is that we don’t ASSUME common ancestry in these demonstrations.
Joe G,
Like another commenter, I would be interested in this method to test human relatedness which doesn’t assume they share an ancestor, or which cannot then be applied to other species (Can we test whether a bonobo and a chimp share a common ancestor?)
Ian’s comment reminds me of something of a more general nature that I noticed many years ago concerning the effects of immersion in ID/creationism.
There is a simple analogy to Ian’s description about common descent from a common source; and that is the simple operation of putting some kind of tracer in an evolving branching system. One can learn about underwater aquifers using tracers.
Part of the reason that I have dug into ID/creationist misconceptions and misrepresentations is that I have also had an interest in developing instructional materials that help students overcome misconceptions that inhibit proper learning.
One of the most disturbing effects of ID/creationism that I have noticed is that the enthusiasts who get caught up in it seem to lose some basic common sense about even some of the simplest thinking processes.
And this technique for finding common ancestry is related to a more basic ability that people usually develop in tracing their ancestors, tracing contamination in food sources and water, tracking down the source of defects in manufacturing, and many other common sense techniques for linking common phenomena.
This particular example is but one of many that indicate that total immersion in ID seems interfere with that kind of development; or to kill it if it ever existed. It is extremely difficult to get someone who has immersed himself in ID to go back and learn the fundamentals of science.
Just wondering, is Newtonism an ideology? Would you feel comfortable about calling modern physicists Newtonists?
Ian Musgrave,
Hi Ian,
Yes, ‘Newtonism’ would be considered an ideology. It is not a term often used and there are likely very few Newtonists around these days, whether in physics or optics or ‘outside’. Newtonian physics (or optics, etc.) is the ‘modern science’ or ‘scientific theory’ produced by Newton.
Here’s something you might want to check out – I was not aware of this until I got ‘outside’ of the ideological framework in which much ‘western’ (including Australian) PoS is presented:
http://webfiles.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/rereadingClassics/Hessen.pdf/V1_Hessen.pdf
Elizabeth,
First, I’m ready to rest my case in that you agree “that “methodological naturalism” is a poor term.” You started this thread (titled MN) with an assumption that it simply denotes ‘the scientific method.’ Iow, your philosophy of science requires you to conclude that only *natural* things can be studied by ‘science’ and its methods. My interpretation of ‘science’ is broader than that, allowing ‘sciences’ of *non-natural* or *extra-natural* things (but I’d prefer positive terms) too.
Of course, one indicator of your position is that you speak of science monolithically, as if there is only *one* thing known as “the” scientific method. This may be fine for teaching elementary school students about what ‘science’ is, but it is insufficient once one studies history and philosophy of science. Anyone who has followed ‘scientists’ around as they work knows that there are ‘multiple’ methods involved in ‘doing science.’ Thus, which science? and whose science? are among the first questions in contemporary ‘science studies’ courses.
By ‘elementary’ views of ‘science’ as a single method, I meant something like this: http://biology.clc.uc.edu/courses/bio104/SCI_meth.htm
“the scientific method is specifically designed to be as resistant to ideological bias, or indeed any bias, as possible.” – Elizabeth
In recent terminology, we can speak of ‘positive science’ and ‘reflexive science.’ The first type attempts to escape ideology as much as possible in its search for truth about the ‘real’ world. The second type attempts to embrace its ideology, while at the same time displaying the (inescapable) ideology in the science, so that readers/listeners will be able to interpret the ‘bias’ in the researcher or ‘scientist/scholar,’ as they likewise search for truth about the ‘real’ world.
Interesting that you chose ‘specifically designed,’ Elizabeth. I think we’d be mostly on the same page arguing with IDists that some things surely are ‘designed,’ while others simply cannot be ‘proven’ (or disproven) so ‘scientifically,’ e.g. in ‘natural’ sciences (thus, you return to the natural vs. supernatural ‘design’ question). Where we differ, however, is that I oppose ‘naturalism’ as ideological bias that disallows ‘sciences of non- or extra-natural things,’ whereas you seem to embrace it. Indeed, this may be explainable by the worldview positions that each of us hold.
Well havoc first you should read what I said.
Ian,
The only way to test to see if humans and chimps share a common ancestor is to assume it.
Experiments with bacteria tell us bacteria give rise to bacteria. With mice we have mice giving rise to mice and viruses give rise to more viruses. That doesn’t help you at all.
Broken genes? That’s a joke- there is no theory that says broken genes will hang around for thousands upon thousands of generations- never mind becoming fixed.
Ya see Ian there isn’t any genetic data that demonstrates that the transformations required are even possible.
and all your “data” can be used to support a common design.
Please provide the evidence that natural selection produced those guppies, finches and Lenski’s bacteria.
Ya see no one can tell the difference between NS and genetic drift or sheer dumb luck.
Gregory,
“Interesting that you chose ‘specifically designed,’ Elizabeth. I think we’d be mostly on the same page arguing with IDists that some things surely are ‘designed,’ while others simply cannot be ‘proven’ (or disproven) so ‘scientifically,’ e.g. in ‘natural’ sciences (thus, you return to the natural vs. supernatural ‘design’ question). ”
Well, the scientific method is admittedly a human artifact. It would be odd if it were not designed.
llanitedave,
Sure, it is fine to choose the elementary definition in supposing there is a ‘single’ scientific method, if that’s what floats your boat. But are you suggesting that ‘all’ or ‘most’ human artefacts are in fact ‘designed’?
Gregory,
Yes, I’d suggest that most artifacts that represent human cultural activities are in fact designed, whether consciously or not.
llanitedave,
O.k. and in the ‘designing’ of those artefacts, was something commonly called ‘intelligence’ (whether ‘consciously’ or not) involved?
This is taking a tangent away from the thread’s MN tomfoolery, but why not entertain it…
Joe G,
You say
“Broken genes? That’s a joke- there is no theory that says broken genes will hang around for thousands upon thousands of generations- never mind becoming fixed.”
So what’s YOUR explanation for the same gene being broken in the same way in all primates? Design? Chance? Necessity? What?
Well, in the case of the guppies it was an actual experimented with a manipulated variable, so we have a p value to tell us how likely it was that it was “sheer dumb luck”.
And “Natural selection” is a biasing of drift – what the experimenters measure is the extent of the bias.
Saying this doesn’t make it so, especially when I have given an explicit example where we do not make this assumption.
And apes give rise to apes, but the point is that they are different mice, different bacteria and different apes. One of those apes worked out that digital watches were really neat. Actually, the point was we know explicitly how genome sequence and structure is linked to heredity and ancestry, and that gene similarities are the result of common ancestry.
Go to the Journal of Molecular Evolution. In the search box type
pseudogenes neutral theory
report back on what you find. The first article in the list is particularly interesting, what theory does it detail and how does it relate to the persistence of broken genes?
Ya see Ian there isn’t any genetic data that demonstrates that the transformations required are even possible.
and all your “data” can be used to support a common design.
You keep saying this, but don’t back it up with any evidence.
What kind of designer puts identical broken parts into two different designs?
M.W. Gray et al. Mitochondrial evolution Science, 283 (1999), pp. 1476–1481
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/283/5407/1476.full
Lets focus on figure 2, what part of figure 2 does not constitute a test of the concept that engulfed bacteria evolved into mitochondria?
Gregory,
“O.k. and in the ‘designing’ of those artefacts, was something commonly called ‘intelligence’ (whether ‘consciously’ or not) involved?
This is taking a tangent away from the thread’s MN tomfoolery, but why not entertain it…”
I don’t think anyone has claimed otherwise. As I understand it, neither has Elizabeth.
Do you expect me to make the argument that intelligence is NEVER involved in design? Or do you expect to respond that because intelligence CAN design artifacts, then it MUST design biological structures? Because they aren’t the same argument, and the existence of human artifacts doesn’t support intelligent design in biology.
My expectations are for honest and sincere answers, not for something programmed, automatic or dictated from outside. The question was phrased with that in mind: “in the ‘designing’ of those artefacts, was something commonly called ‘intelligence’ (whether ‘consciously’ or not) involved?”
It would seem the unstated answer is ‘Yes.’
“the existence of human artifacts doesn’t support intelligent design in biology.”
Neither does the easily provable existence of ‘selection,’ free will and choice in human-social sciences support ‘natural selection’ in biology. What we have is a non-agent (i.e. ‘Nature,’ which is not a Person) being boot-strapped with a kind of ‘agent-like’ quality to suit the dehumanising ideology of biologists. The terms ‘adaptationism’ and ‘selectionism’ have been used in such cases.
All of this is a backdrop to the gaping hole in Elizabeth’s argument ‘for’ MN. Yes, she has now back-stepped, by saying ““methodological naturalism” is a poor term.” Yet at the beginning of this thread, she was equating ‘scientific methodology’ with MN, in her rejection of religious Plantinga.
So, what’s the score now with Elizabeth’s argument for MN? Has she yet accepted that ‘science’ and ‘scientific methods’ *can* study ‘non-natural’ and/or ‘extra-natural’ things, or not? Again, I’ve been criticising the WAP called MN, which Elizabeth seems to be supporting. Can there be a straight answer to these questions in ‘The Skeptical Zone’?
Gregory,
My expectations are for honest and sincere answers, not for something programmed, automatic or dictated from outside. The question was phrased with that in mind: “in the ‘designing’ of those artefacts, was something commonly called ‘intelligence’ (whether ‘consciously’ or not) involved?”
It would seem the unstated answer is ‘Yes.’
Since my answer was “I don’t think anyone has claimed otherwise.”, it’s hard to claim that as “unstated”. Your statement is uncontroversial and trivial, not one that forms the basis for a decent argument.
Neither does the easily provable existence of ‘selection,’ free will and choice in human-social sciences support ‘natural selection’ in biology. What we have is a non-agent (i.e. ‘Nature,’ which is not a Person) being boot-strapped with a kind of ‘agent-like’ quality to suit the dehumanising ideology of biologists. The terms ‘adaptationism’ and ‘selectionism’ have been used in such cases.
Whoa! The only ideology being invoked here is your own. The principle of natural selection in biology is analogous to artificial selection in human endeavors, but the evidence for natural selection is independent of human behaviors, so your referencing of ‘free will’ and ‘choice’ are about as irrelevant as one can get.
You’d do better if you freed yourself of your obsession with ideology, and busied yourself with study of real theory and evidence.
So, what’s the score now with Elizabeth’s argument for MN? Has she yet accepted that ‘science’ and ‘scientific methods’ *can* study ‘non-natural’ and/or ‘extra-natural’ things, or not?
Why do use the term “extra-natural”? Are you trying to avoid saying “supernatural” when that’s what you really mean?
Can there be a straight answer to these questions in ‘The Skeptical Zone’?
Looks like projection to me.
This is a confusing paragraph, because it seems crammed with misinterpretation. Biological selection is something quite different from human social sciences, so why try to relate them by force? Why not focus on the subject?
And it should be pretty clear that an agent or agency need not be a person, or have a mind, or be intelligent, or otherwise resemble a human being. Wind is an agent that makes waves in water, for example. By not projecting a wind-god onto this process, is a meteorologist “dehumanizing” wind? Is meteorology generally a “dehumanizing ideology” because it deals with natural agents like wind, rain, atmospheric movements, evaporation, etc.?
Wouldn’t it be better to accept that natural processes are natural, and that the study of natural processes necessarily makes the assumption that it’s studying what it is studying. This seems quite reasonable.
Wait, what? I’m supposed to be dehumanising? I missed that memo. And here’s me thinking that us biologists were supposed to be studying biology *duh*.
You do realise that biologists don’t give a rodents rectum what human social sciences think about selection? Natural selection has been demonstrated to exist in the Real World(tm). You may not realise it, but biologists actually do experiments and stuff (some of which involve climbing tees to count moths, some of which involve painstaking sequencing of genomes), where we can determine if something is the result of natural selection or not.
For example, it’s relatively straight froward to determine if the differences in copy number of the CCL3L1 genes between humans and chimpanzees is due to selection, drift or random deletion (by relatively I mean massive gene and SNP comparisons).
Compared to the (relatively) straightforward testing of natural selection, how would you test, in principle, the idea that the copy number variants of CCL3L1 were inserted in a protohominid 3 million years ago by the Uplift Institute?
I’d like to point out that science has no issue with intelligence (with a small i) or design. After all, tool-making intelligences (Pacific Island Ravens, Chimpanzees and humans) and designed objects are part of the natural world and subject to scientific scrutiny. this is how we determine that chimpanzee hammer-stone manufacturies are not just random piles of rocks.
Even large scale design scenarios can be tested, how can we tell that we are not the descendants of genetically engineered Slaver food yeast (lack of the tree of life rooting in yeasts, lack of abandoned Slaver overseers palaces on the Moon, lack of Tunctipun artefacts), or the result of the Uplift Institute messing with protohominids 3 million years ago (lack of BAM integration sites in our genome etc).
All “methodological naturalism” (how I hate that term) means is that in our explanations we can’t appeal to entities or events that are not in principle testable (like miracles or invisible pink Unicorns).
Since Elizabeth is still busy participating in other threads, I’d like to ask this question again to her directly, regarding the Title of this thread:
“So, what’s the score now with Elizabeth’s argument for MN? Has she yet accepted that ‘science’ and ‘scientific methods’ *can* study ‘non-natural’ and/or ‘extra-natural’ things, or not?”
Elizabeth wrote: “‘methodological naturalism’ is a poor term.” What conclusion are we to draw from this about her future communication? Will she continue to use MN to equivocate with ‘scientific methodology’ or adjust her language if a better alternative is available?
No, I don’t accept that scientific methods can study extra-natural things. I’d be interested in knowing why you think they can (if you do).
I don’t intentionally equivocate, Gregory, and now that I realise that the term appears to denote different things to different people, I will avoide it. I will stick with “scientific methodology”, which, I maintain, rests on the assumption that events are predictable.
I think that in order to study non/extra/super-natural things we would have to violate this assumption. That would be fine, but it would mean that we cannot then use scientific methodology.
Gregory,
Can you suggest how anyone might study something that is non-natural (in the sense of imaginary rather real)? If you look from the other end of the telescope anything “non-natural” that you can study must be real – by definition! Anything else would be imaginary.
So how do you suggest we investigate non-natural phenomena scientifically?
Obviously there are multple scientific methods, but I would argue that they are all grounded in the assumption that events are predictable. By the same token, I’d say that the are all grounded in empiricism, specifically, the idea that we fit models to data, and then use those models to predict new data.
Can you give an example of a scientific method that does not involve exactly that?
I am not familiar with either term. Could you give me a citation, in particular for “reflexive science”? I understand the principle you give, I think, for example as utilised in social anthropology. I guess I’m not seeing the point you are trying to make.
No, I neither oppose nor embrace “naturalism” as an ideology. And it certainly is not “explainable by the worldview positions that each of us hold” because for most of my life I held the view that what I called “methodological naturalism” was a necessary stance for conducting science, but rejected what I called “philosophical naturalism” – the view that the only reality is “natural” i.e. amenable to scientific investigation. In other words I held the view that knowledge of God was valid knowledge, but not verifiable by science.
I still hold that view, in a somewhat altered sense.
In other words, “naturalism” as an ideology has nothing to do, IMO, with the necessarily (IMO) assumption we have to make in science that events are predictable.
Hi Elizabeth,
Thanks for confirming that you’ll avoid using MN in the future. I’m glad to see that PoS can make a difference in how people speak about ‘science,’ ‘nature,’ ‘society,’ etc. It shows you take seriously ‘parking one’s priors at the door!’ 🙂
Wrt your question, the reason why is because I’ve studied outside of the Anglo-American system of higher education. For example, in German, the term ‘wissenschaften’ means ‘science.’ There are generally two types of ‘sciences’ – naturwissenschaften and kulturwissenschaften or geisteswissenschaften – which translate roughly as ‘natural sciences’ and ‘cultural (or spiritual) sciences.’
If you scroll to 1.4 on this site, you can see a map: http://www.rainerbusch.de/mo_21_methodologie.htm
Though I usually don’t link to Wiki, since it is for a ‘foreign’ term, here is a page that may interest you: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geisteswissenschaft
So, to answer your question and Alan’s, ‘Culture’ is an example of something ‘real’ that is not ‘Natural.’ Therefore, one can ‘scientifically’ study something ‘real’ that is not ‘natural.’ We are on the same page if I understand you both to be promoting scientific (critical) realism.
Unfortunately, the Anglo-American system (which I assume is home for most on this list) has a HUGE blind spot with its tendency toward reductionism when it reduces ‘non-natural’ things to ‘really’ being ‘nature-only.’ Thus, what is ‘non-natural’ is considered ‘non-real’ (or ‘imaginary’ in Alan’s terms).
Do you see now the distinction I am making, Elizabeth and why it may be a legitimate distinction to make (in some ‘scientific’ traditions)?
p.s. just a note to say that I posted this message before reading Elizabeth’s #3472, and will respond to that in the coming day…
The summary of evolution you present here is correct as far as it goes, but it doesn’t go anywhere near far enough. If someone asks “what ‘things’ does evolution say happened?”, real scientists can explain about the various processes that are hypothesized to be involved with evolution (i.e., stuff like point mutations, and the various forms of selection, and so on). Likewise, real scientists can explain how one might go about testing the hypothesis that Specific Process X was involved in producing Specific Result Y. So, sure, you absolutely can ‘summarize’ evolution as something happened and kept happening if you want to—but if you actually do that, you will unavoidably brand yourself as either (a) grossly ignorant of real biology, or else (b) grossly deceitful, depending on whether or not you were aware that your ‘summary’ left out virtually every part of what you presented it as a summary of.
The somebody done something summary of ID, contrariwise, goes exactly as far as ID itself does; whereas real evolutionary theory consists of gobs and gobs of details which your something happened pseudo-summary completely ignores, ID ‘theory’ doesn’t have any details whatsoever, let alone details which are ignored by my somebody done something summary of ID. If you wish to dispute this, joeg, feel free to explain what ID has to say about either the ‘somebody’, or the ‘something’ that was ‘done’ by that ‘somebody’.
Not yet, Gregory, because I’m still not clear what you mean by “non-natural”.
But thanks for your response.
I look forward to it 🙂
sez gregory: “So, what’s the score now with Elizabeth’s argument for MN? Has she yet accepted that ‘science’ and ‘scientific methods’ *can* study ‘non-natural’ and/or ‘extra-natural’ things, or not?”
I don’t know what your terms ‘non-natural’ and ‘extra-natural’ mean. Depending on what those terms refer to, scientific methods might well be able to study thingies of either or both of those two kinds. Please to give examples of ‘non-natural’ and ‘extra-natural’ thingies?