Innegativeion said:
TWRule said:
Well your standpoint still seems silly to me. Perhaps we can elaborate on this and reach some mutual understanding.
-If not
universal, impersonal natural laws apprehendable by science
then what is there?
-What do you define "material" as? Specifically. Reality is made up of a lot of stuff. Some of it might not fall under what you consider to be material.
-Natural selection is not a system built primarily upon chance.
Alright then, if you seriously want to understand...
I meant that science, by its method, makes certain presuppositions - metaphysically and epistemologically. These include, among other things, materialism and empiricism. Basically, that everything is material, and that we can gain knowledge of how the cosmos operates by using our sensory surfaces to directly observe and apprehend those material processes. I did not mean to imply that I subscribe to the same 'material/non-material' distinction that gave materialism its name, I was merely describing a common school of thought. The distinction is empty to me, but I imagine many would define it positivistically, as that which can be affirmed to exist through 'objective' empirical means. Moreover, in the same way that this distinction being empty to me means that I do not experience things as 'material', I also do not experience them as 'being composed of particles/energy', etc.
The idea that there are universal laws is an ancient idea, but they were thought to be either rational laws (which were intelligible to us primarily because it was assumed that both the cosmos was inherently rational, and that we were rational beings) or divine laws (which in many cases were 'personal', in that they had moral force founded in a relationship to one or more divine beings). These would be 'personal' or human-sensitive laws.
Modern science however, eschews the idea of any such ordering force in the universe that it cannot detect (naturalism, another of its presuppositions), leaving us with the predominant idea of a universe that is totally indifferent to our existence, and a nature that would as readily wipe us from existence as the next species. Our entire existence is and will always remain arbitrary and incidental - not significant for the life of the cosmos. This is what I meant by 'accident of natural selection', and because I have heard many prominent figures in the scientific and philosophy of science communities describe human consciousness as such - not because I meant to accuse all those with scientific worldviews of being indeterminists or some such (I was generalizing - I know there are many differing views that fall under what I'm referring to as 'the scientific worldview').
Furthermore, it lends itself to the assumption that there are universal laws, knowable to us, but only because it posits hypotheses that, although technically tentative and always falsifiable, are assumed to hold so long as statistically significant correlations under a certain number of reproduced experiments (of very specific types in accordance with the presuppositions of both the overarching scientific method and the hypothesis in question).
However, no amount of experimentation can ever validate much less prove the metaphysical presuppositions that science began with; there is no scientific way to validate the picture of the world that modern science has loosely cobbled together over the past few hundred years, nor would consistent, modest scientists ever pass off their work as 'truth' or 'fact' in an unqualified sense.
I have my own reasons for not taking on the metaphysical baggage that comes with a scientific worldview - namely, I don't think it provides us with a self-consistent or accurate understanding of human identity, but it does leave us imagining ourselves in a meaningless universe in which nihilism is the only pseudo-consistent philosophy. I prefer to continue the search for meaning rather than accept the popular authority of scientistic (that is, science-worshipping) persons who declare that my struggle is futile.
Because of this, I do not fear any form of the ever-so-common talk of the myriad ways the natural forces of the universe could possibly bring about humanity's downfall (the threat of global warming among them). I would not fear death in any case, but since I do not strictly and wholly identify my body with my self, I am even less concerned than I would be about its damage or destruction, and I see it as a weakness in others should they obsess over such things. To me, the real threat of the end of human life would be when we all embrace (consciously or not) and wallow in the meaninglessness of our existence.
So there you have it. Keep in mind that, as I said, I do not endorse negligence to the environment - but I do not think of the 'environment' in scientific terms.
I hope you understand my position better now - let me know if you have questions.