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Not sure if this is just a moot point, but I'll say it because I'm genuinely curious to hear what people have to say. Anytime I hear theories like this, I feel
by MrGinkgo 3y ago
Not sure if this is just a moot point, but I'll say it because I'm genuinely curious to hear what people have to say. Anytime I hear theories like this, I feel wary of accepting it as an air-tight reliable outlook because of human limitations. Like, our understanding of quantum physics and all natural laws come from what we can percieve and measure, but there's bound to be phenomena which we can't percieve or measure (either yet, or ever) which limit our understanding of the universe. I understand that science is a constant process, and that we shouldn't jump to conclusions of any theories being "truth" because of this process, but anytime anything like this comes up, I'm always wary of the consequences that occur from all the people who DO dogmatically assert that it's undeniable, especially with how easily theories of predeterminism tend to enable unproductive, nihilistic outlooks. I don't necessarily see science as trivial pursuit because of our human limitations, but I feel like not enough people have learned their lesson about the consequences of eagerly accepting a "work in progress" as "ultimate truth".
- moritzwarhier 3y agoVery well put! > I don't necessarily see science as trivial pursuit because of our human limitations Me neither, quite the opposite, but the problem you are describing has always been a problem when discussing metaphysics, as it is commonly called. Science is aware of its limitations, that's what makes it science. But sometimes, people tend to conflate a materialistic world view (maybe even strong determinism) with believing in the scientific method. The "belief" I mean here is strongly tied to assigning the appropriate role in ones thinking to scientific facts. Proving an all-encompassing scientific world view is a logical paradox.
- broscillator 3y ago> But sometimes, people tend to conflate a materialistic world view (maybe even strong determinism) with believing in the scientific method. I would say more than sometimes. It seems that if you're not like that, you're immediately labeled religious.
- thefaux 3y agoReligious is also a modern pejorative. It's pretty silly the way it's used given that extreme atheism is just as dogmatic as so called religious faith.
- fo76yo 3y agoDisbelief in specific magical thinking of ancient people and belief in the magical thinking of ancient peoples are not all that similar. Though I see how they can look that way when you intentionally omit details about the claims of either side, as human discourse is reduced to Tweet size comments of negligible value.
- broscillator 3y agoNowadays there's many believers of simulation theory, which is pretty much magical thinking.
- GoblinSlayer 3y agoAnd like religion that belief is based on social memes, not on science.
- broscillator 3y agoRight but people are complex beings susceptible to social memes. Science fundamentally is a tool, but so is writing, which was used to establish and disseminate religion (in the beginning was the Word). The bible might contain wisdom and good lessons, but it's value is obfuscated and degraded by fundamentalist fanatics. The same can happen with the products of science.
- akomtu 3y agoI like to disturb materialists, aka believers in the mechanical universe, with three observations: physics stands on GR and QM; GR says that any thing can dissolve into light (photons) that can, in principle, form any other thing; QM says that the entire universe evolves as one entity, that QM calls the wave function.
- dotsam 3y agoScientific knowledge, like all knowledge, is fallible. All we can hope to do is correct errors and generate better explanations. There is no "ultimate truth" or airtight reliable outlook at which we can stop and say we know everything there is to know -- that would be a dogmatic assertion, and it is false.
- broscillator 3y agoI think you're just describing human nature. We can look back and see how incomplete theories about the world led to horrible acts, or to averting our eyes from those acts because we thought it was justified, or because we thought there was no better way, or out of fear. Yet there's the prevalent sense of "this time we're getting it right".
- pmontra 3y agoPeople did horrible acts because they did want to do those acts to those other people. They picked a theory to justify them.
- broscillator 3y agoI don't know, there's many stories of modern soldiers doing terrible things, coming back to the civilized world and living horrible lives due to PTSD and not being able to parse what they did. Are you suggesting every one of those soldiers for example, go out to war with the intent of killing children? Are you not open to the idea that the sense of normalcy can be shifted by the environment and context? Are you familiar with the milgram experiments?
- pmontra 3y agoI'm familiar with Milgram experiments. To refer to recent facts, hundreds of thousands of Russians fled the country after the start of the war in Ukraine [1] Reasons vary but I think both of us remember the wave of male migrants when Russia called for mobilization in October 2022. Some of them probably didn't want to get killed, others didn't want to kill people. I'm not merciful about this: the people of a country are responsible for who governs them, sense of normalcy notwithstanding. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_emigration_following_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_emigration_following_t...
- amanaplanacanal 3y agoSomehow I can’t blame the people of North Korea for the crimes of Kim Jung Un. Fill in the country and leader of your choice there.
- lmm 3y agoI don't think "this belief has negative consequences" is a good argument; we can only reach the truth by sincerely looking for it. To my mind the very concept of free will is nonsense; as soon as you make a sincere effort to pin it down it breaks down. Yes, there is no absolute proof that it's impossible, but like the second law of thermodynamics, I would be much more surprised to see it violated than, IDK, finding a real magnetic monopole.
- GoblinSlayer 3y ago>especially with how easily theories of predeterminism tend to enable unproductive, nihilistic outlooks That's an essential claim, not doubt. First, you're wrong that determinism is a synonym for predeterminism, science doesn't support it, because predeterminism contradicts the second law of thermodynamics. Next you're wrong that nihilism is bad. Is it a dogma? What if you're wrong? Especially since you know yourself your knowledge about nihilism is fragmentary and you spent only microscopic amount of effort to understand it and can't make grand conclusions about it. Then you also imply that delusion is somehow more constructive than truth. That's counterintuitive and needs proofs.