Science is based on faith?

[Use_Imagination_here]

Things that can't be proven or disproved can be assumed to not exist.

Incorrect.

Chomsky's Universal Grammar cannot be proven or disproven. To assume it does not exist however simply on that basis is to ignore mountains of supporting evidence which suggests but does not prove it's existence.

The same was true for the Higgs Boson possibly up until very recently.

...Both of those things can be proven. One of them WAS. And it's perfectly possible someone will come up with solid undeniable evidence for the other one.

I was specifically referring to things that CAN'T be proven. Like "there's an omnipotent space deity that can't be observed in any way and doesn't influence things in any way that can be observed (but apparently loves you)".

 

[deleted_by_strongbad]

Seriously, can this die?
Science is NOT based on faith.
Science is only based on faith for people who don't want to understand Science with a scientific perspective, but instead just want to hear something sciency and kind of remember it to reference at parties, or some such.

if you want this described well: read Carl Sagan's Demon Haunted World
if you want it funny, a little crass, and not politically correct: http://youtu.be/HhGuXCuDb1U - tim minchin's the storm

 

[blackrave]

Science is based on observations
When reliable observations aren't possible it is based on assumptions that doesn't contradict previous observations
assumptions=/=faith

 

[Uszi]

What? No. Come on, people.

Ya'll are letting various colloquial uses of "believe" "faith" "guess" etc drive this discussion.

The bottom line is, you can take a scientific truth on faith if you're lazy and you trust scientists. But the important thing to realize is that you don't have to take any scientific claim on faith. The whole point of science is that you can go out and look up the research, read the paper, shoot the scientists an email if you want (they actually respond sometimes, I swear, especially if you sound honestly interested in their work), or, you could in theory do the science yourself to verify the results.

Might be a little hard, in practice, to do the science yourself if you don't have access to, say, the Large Hadron Collider, but that isn't the point.

Regardless, you don't even have an option to verify a claim when it comes to a truly "faith" based one. We can't call up God and ask him about the problem of evil, nor can we recreate his methods to see whether or Jesus was begotten of the Father. We can't test whether or not Mohammed saw an angel in a cave. There's no way to observe what, if anything, exists beyond death and whether or not their is a system of reward based on our behavior while living. Etc, etc, etc.

tl;dr:

Science itself is not based on faith. One's acceptance of scientific truths may or may not be based on faith.

 

[Jonluw]

Huge snip

So I suppose this didn't deserve a reply...

 

[Kuredan]

I think that not just science (which was at one time called natural philosophy) but everything we deal with in life requires a type of faith. That faith is the core of both philosophy and science it could be loosely called "What we take as a given." It is an interface through which we evaluate our world.

Some faith is supported by a strong foundation, has the ability to have its suppositions repeated, and derives its value from what is observable. There is still a faith that the methods are sound, that the results of experimentation can effectively support or disprove a hypothesis, and that the previous data leading to experiment can be seen as true. You can't proceed with calculus if you don't take some of the principles of number theory and mathematical logic as a given. Those who find truth in science take issue with the word faith because to them it implies a religious connotation or believe the word would shake the credibility of the scientific method. What I mean by faith are the thousands of "mental shortcuts" we take everyday so that we are not constantly examining every facet of life to determine its veracity. We just bridge the gap and carry on with our lives, content that these shortcuts tell us broadly and minutely how the world works. These certainties give us confidence and allow us to build amazing supposition upon amazing supposition so that we strive higher and discover more.

Other types of faith deal with the indescribable and the undefined. They don't have a solid foundation. They're much more subjective: they vary greatly between people. Often these take the shape of religions, but the same can be said of the various branches of philosophy and even parts of psychology. They leave large swathes of grey area and they can be wrong or contradictory dependent on the person looking at them. What someone takes on faith here represents a much deeper gap between that which can be proven but it addresses an entirely different part of our psyche. It addresses why the world works, or who made it work, if there was a who. There's an emotional need to be satisfied in this faith and the answer is often described as sustaining.

The problem is that those inclined to a rigid structure of determining truth are uncomfortable with those uncertainties and find that a system for removing them is preferable to one with them all left in. Someone oppositely inclined would believe that their certainty stems from a personal choice; it doesn't have to proven, but that they choose to believe it is true. They may not even realize this, or would claim that there is an in inherent truth in what they believe, but it fundamentally is the same. Both would resist someone mandating which system they had to believe in if it was not the one they chose or in one that denies their truth.

This is just a very long-winded way of saying that people won't agree on this issue; they've been arguing this for thousands of years to one extent or another. I would humbly suggest that it's better to appreciate and respect those differences and not view those with different views as either ignorant fools or dangerous heretics. There's no reason to engage in brinkmanship; it causes greater division and more uncivil conversation.

 

[Ledan]

youtube downloader

When it comes to atheism vs theism, theism can be disproven purely by logic.

How so? I'll agree that certain god-concepts can be refuted using logic, but all of them?

God as an omniscient, omnipotent, benevolent god can be disproven by philosophy, and any faith based on circular logic can be disproven by logic. Prime example is believing in God because the bible says that God exists, and since it was written by God it must be true.

 

[spartan231490]

True, we can never be 100% sure that any particular scientific theory is actually reality, but when it comes down to it that doesn't ultimately matter that much. As long as science can produce useful and testable models which we can use to benefit our lives, science will always give incredible benefits to our species. In the end does it really matter if the theories are true or not if they can make our televisions, space rockets and cancer medicine work?

In the end does it matter whether or not there's really a god when believing in it gives so many people faith, hope, and happiness that they otherwise wouldn't have? And yes, you can say that faith has brought about a lot of death, I would argue with you but that doesn't matter, the fact is so has science. In fact, science has more responsibility for death than faith does, but both have benefits that outweigh the risks. So no, it doesn't matter, but it's an interesting experiment in thinking.

 

[medv4380]

What do you guys think?

This particular argument has a long history.

It goes back to Plato's Cave [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_Cave] and probably further. Basically, you cannot know if you are experiencing "reality" or not. Everything you know might just be someone Joshing you with shadows on a cave wall. This is the core of why you can prove to yourself that you exist with the "I Think Therefore I Am" logic, but that does not extend to anything outside of yourself.

This is the core of the debate in Science of Realism vs Instrumentalism [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumentalism]. These are both scientific philosophies. Instrumentalist believe that what we call "reality" is only the byproduct of our instruments measurements, and that "reality" could be radically different then what our instruments lead us to believe. Realists, who made great gains after Newton, believe that the measurements are reflective of reality. That is why they are called Realists.

Science became fixated on realism for a long time. All the way up to Albert Einstein. Then with Quantum Physics we've be able to show that our Instruments do change reality so they aren't capable of giving us "real" results of what reality is without them. From there Instumentalism has been making gains in the scientific community.

The only thing separating the two groups, Realist and Instrumentalist, is Faith. You ether have faith that you are experiencing reality, or you have doubt that you are experiencing reality.

David Hume [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hume] attempted to expand on this philosophy, and claim that the self doesn't even exist. Most people stop with the argument of Plato's Cave because arguing that you don't exist comes accost as nonsensical.

 

[CrystalShadow]

The words 'belief' and 'faith' are really loaded terms in this context, given that certain groups have been making no small effort to use them to draw false parallels between Science and Religion for political reasons, usually with the implication that science somehow is a religion. Even ignoring that though, I have to question the train of thought here. Ultimately, if we use the explanation you describe them as using, it seems to me that we run into the issue of everything being ultimately 'based in belief', to the point that the argument almost seems to suggest solipsism. I believe the world exists, but no matter how likely that seems, I can't prove it. I believe I'm not in a dream, but I can't prove it. I believe that the sun will rise tommorrow, but I cannot prove it until it happens.

Solipsism is not an inherently incorrect worldview though. The problem with it is that it is plausible (but unprovable either way), but accepting it renders meaningful discussion about the nature of reality impossible.

Once you start to question whether there is even such a thing as a 'reality' that has a consistent, testable set of rules, then taking that to it's logical conclusion would mean it's pointless trying to figure anything at all out about the world because it could all change without warning.

This does incidentally point to the basic assumption necessary for science to be useful though. If there is any truth to the notion that science is in any way based on 'faith', then it would be that it requires that there exists something which has consistent, predictable properties which can be measured reliably.

What use would science be if it could not make predictions after all, because the 'reality' it was describing kept changing?

It doesn't matter what the system is, as long as it has some consistency to it. You could still use the scientific method on something which would otherwise be termed 'magic', as long as it has consistent rules. But it's difficult to do anything meaningful in a scientific sense with something that does not appear to obey any rules whatsoever.

(Consider for instance a hypothetical case of telekinesis being possible, but only if all the people observing it believe it to be possible. That has predictable rules, but it also induces a situation in which disbelief would alter the results of an experiment. It would be challenging indeed to set up an experiment where the results depended on whether the experimenter believed an outcome was possible or not, but it still has enough of a logical basis that if something like this were the case, it could probably be studied scientifically - admittedly though, not without difficulty since you'd have to control for the beliefs of everyone taking part in the research, which would be the worst imaginable form of headache.)

Ah, never mind. The examples needed to point out the assumptions necessary for science to be invalid are very contrived.
There ARE assumptions involved, and in this sense you could claim it to be based on 'faith', but this is not quite the usual meaning of the word 'faith'.

For that matter, you don't need 'faith' in the sense that you NEED to believe in something for it to work.
I can do maths just fine without necessarily accepting the arbitrary axioms it contains as being true.
I do however need to accept the relationship between the axioms involved, and the remaining mathematics that depends on those axioms.
Remove the axiom and you invalidate everything derived from it as well. But that still doesn't require that you can prove or disprove the validity of the axiom itself. - Faith implies believing something irrespective of whether there is evidence or not.

But there is no belief inherently involved with a mathematical axiom. Merely the acceptance that what is derived from one cannot be correct without it being true.

It may be worth pointing out though that while science doesn't require faith in the religions sense, many of the things I've heard said by various scientists can be interpreted as 'faith' in something to do with science.
For instance, the statement that 'a theory should be beautiful' (which actually usually means it should be mathematically simple) is a statement of faith more so than science.

There is nothing implicit about either reality or the scientific study of it that would require it to be 'simple'. So holding the belief that this should be the case is a form of 'faith', even if the science itself is not. (ignoring the wider definition of 'faith' being thrown about so far.)

I consider Occam's razor to be largely a statement of faith when you think about it... But that's neither here nor there.

 

[Asita]

I consider Occam's razor to be largely a statement of faith when you think about it... But that's neither here nor there.

It really isn't though. Occam's Razor doesn't actually make a statement on validity. What it does is codify a rule of thumb, saying that "if two hypothesis are equal in all other respects, the one that makes the least number of assumptions is to be preferred". That's not so much faith based as it is simply logical.

 

[Harker067]

The big problem I have with their videos is frankly that they never defined faith. If you want to have this conversation with a word as badly defined as faith (spirituality is another one) then you have to start by very clearly defining what you are talking about.

 

[Viredae]

Well, you choose what side to "believe" in then, the side that can explain something to 99.999999% or the side that thinks the sun revolves around the earth. The simple truth is that the religious side does not offer any fact at all, just some references to a old dusty book compiled by someone high on fermented fruit parts 1000's of years ago.

The sun revolves around the sun? Methinks you're straw-man puppetteering too much here, my friend.

God as an omniscient, omnipotent, benevolent god can be disproven by philosophy, and any faith based on circular logic can be disproven by logic. Prime example is believing in God because the bible says that God exists, and since it was written by God it must be true.

You can't "disprove" something with pure logic, since it would boil down to simple conjecture, again, if you want to disprove something you have to use evidence, and since you don't have the capacity or resources to observe god, you technically cannot disprove his/her/its existence, but by that same logic you can't prove it either, hence where the "faith" comes in.

And the example of the bible is sorta moot, that's just one out of many religions that have more solid texts at their disposal, like I mentioned before, Islam doesn't really conflict with scientific facts all that much.

 

[Bifford]

I'd say the only thing about science that resembles faith is that the layman generally takes on faith what the scientists tell him is the truth. Yes, the evidence and arguments are there for him to study, and he might have read the simplified version provided to the public, but it is rare that anyone other than a professional in the relevant field will have studied ALL the evidence and considered ALL the classical arguments and modern troubles.

It goes the same for evolution. I know the basic idea: successive generations of an animal adapt to better fit their ecological niche, because genetic mutations cause minor changes in offspring, and those offspring who lucked out and were born with impractical changes die and leave the gene pool, whilst those who turned out to have a useful change would survive to pass on that useful mutation to its offspring. Basically, nature likes to shuffle things around and go with whatever sticks.

That's all I understand. Really. I haven't read Darwin's books, nor studied any fossils or read the mountains of literature arguing the case for evolution. To do that, I'd have to go to college for four years before I could confidently say "yes, evolution IS the truth". I just accept it on faith because the simple summary I wrote above kinda makes sense.

I think a lot of religious types go through a similar process. Contrary to popular conception, they don't accept religious dogmas blindly. They think those things through a lot and sometimes develop very elaborate rationalizations to reconcile belief with reality. Like me, they've probably never studied the Bible in any considerable depth; they just watch Christian cartoons or listened to their preacher interpret choice passage (Penn Jilette once suggested that anyone who read the Bible cover-to-cover would become an atheist, but I'm skeptical of that claim).

 

[irishda]

When it comes to atheism vs theism, theism can be disproven purely by logic. As for science, yup it's never 100% but it is the best model we have.

I've seen the logical disproofs of theism. For most of them, it all largely depends on your definition of the individual pieces. For instance, the most common one is the Epicurus one.

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? He is not omnipotent. Is he able but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both willing and able? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither willing nor able? Then why call him God?

Seems logical. Yet the entirety of the argument is hinged upon the assumption that the prevention evil is the basis for benevolence. But sometimes is it not better for someone to suffer, that they might enjoy and appreciate their blessings or arise stronger and wiser than they were? Is it right for a child to never know pain, to always have what they desire? Or does that make them spoiled and wicked?

The only argument that holds weight is the "disproved through lack of proof", but to raise that is to ignore the very definition of faith.

Suffice it to say, science and faith are not incompatible, and believing in one, the other, or both does not make one a better or worse person.

 

[TheBelgianGuy]

if you want it funny, a little crass, and not politically correct: http://youtu.be/HhGuXCuDb1U - tim minchin's the storm

That is possibly the most pretentious strawman I've ever seen.

 

[Bullfrog1983]

It is impossible for science to explain everything in the universe. Before scientists began questioning why things act the way they do, the same explanation was always given: "Because god wills it." So science has its roots in faith but at the same time has to question faith to prove itself, pretty much the basics of theory. However science is not omnipotent or infallible like the god/gods that people believe in today. It still fails to explain things and faith has much to do with creating anything or explaining anything because you always begins with theory.