Scientism

[pbrower2a]

(10-30-2019, 05:25 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: See through the dominant worldview!









The 10 dogmas of scientific materialism
Scientists remain shackled to dogmas of a materialistic worldview. These dogmas include the following:

1. Everything is essentially mechanical.
2. All matter is unconscious.
3. The total amount of matter and energy is conserved.
4. The laws of nature are fixed. They are the same today as they were at the beginning, and they will stay the same forever.
5. Nature is purposeless, and evolution has no goal or direction.
6. All biological inheritance is material, carried in the genetic material, DNA, and in other material structures.
7. Minds are inside heads and are nothing but the activities of brains. When you look at a tree, the image of the tree you are seeing is not “out there,” where it seems to be, but inside your brain.
8. Memories are stored as material traces in brains and are wiped out at death.
9. Unexplained phenomena like telepathy are illusory.
10. Mechanistic medicine is the only kind that really works.

None of these claims are actually scientific. Rather, these are philosophical beliefs grounded in an outdated science. Dr. Sheldrake goes on to illustrate how each of these dogmas has its own shortcomings, point by point.
https://www.space.news/2016-09-01-the-10...futed.html

1. OK. I took a college course in philosophy, and I was able to conclude that even if the material universe can be reduced in theory to the interaction of sub-atomic particles, understanding of complex phenomena by deriving the behavior of large objects from a deterministic study is impossible. Philosophical materialism may be reality, but we lack the means (and always will!) to understanding many important things. 

2. Matter is unconscious. Even in a conscious body, much that goes on is done without conscious thought. The liver detoxifies what we take as food without us having to think of what is going on, and the immune system attacks pathogens without obvious mind. White blood cells act much like protist cells -- independently and without mind. A protist cell is incapable of thought. 

Unless one is a medical specialist or biologist whose focus is an organ other than the brain, the brain is the most interesting organ of a person. Certainly not the liver, lungs, spleen, kidneys, stomach, intestines, lungs, or whatever. In our practice we do not think of an internal organ unless it is pained due to disease or injury. 

3. E = mc^2, which explains how nuclear fusion in stellar interiors generate the heat that we feel and the light that we see, as well as some other energy. In our sun, two protons that strike despite magnetic forces trying to separate them transforms one of the protons into a neutron and a positron, the positron quickly striking an electron that has a magnetic charge attracting a positron; an electron and positron obliterate each other in the formation of energy as photons.  The proton and neutron  then join as a deutrerium nucleus and get really stabilized as an alpha-particle (a helium-4 nucleus). 

4. The laws of nature do not exist for our convenience, but we know some of them by instinct. Without them the universe would be incomprehensible chaos in which anything would be possible, like 2+2  can be something other than 4. Mathematical and physical laws are generally quite rigid.

5. Nature is purposeless unless one has some sort of God (or gods) attached.

6. Cultural identity is a consequence of upbringing. Were I raised in certain environments I might have very different tastes in music. It is not the partial German ancestry that causes me to find J S Bach awesome. It is also obvious that nobody born before Bach started creating music could ever be under his influence. 

7. It is our senses that give us information that our brains process. All of us process similar information somewhat differently. "Mind" is a philosophical construct.

8. True to the extent that we do not share those memories with people who can relate to them. Many memories are irrelevant to those who think such lore absurd or boring. Much of life is the obliteration of bad and useless memories. 

I do not keep a diary. My life is not that interesting. 

9. Telepathy is often best explained as body language. 

10. There is obviously more to medicine than surgery, pharmacology, and rehabilitation. Those are essential. I am a poor candidate for psychological treatment on some matters because most of my issues are philosophical.