talkmagic.co.uk

mark lewis wrote:Does anyone want to talk about the torn and restored newspaper?

Oh yes please! Anything but philosophy*!

Can one pour a glass of milk into said newspaper before tearing it, or would that be messy?

* I have a degree in it so I know what I'm talking about. And, most importantly, why I don't want to.

I've heard that a skilled magish can take several solid metal rings and amazingly they link and unlink on command - can't be true, can it?

Mandrake wrote:I've heard that a skilled magish can take several solid metal rings and amazingly they link and unlink on command - can't be true, can it?

I think that unless you can prove that assertion with scientific evidence (double-blind tests, if you please) it is clearly nonsense.

That last comment made me laugh out loud!

Ok, I'm gonna dive in.

/Takes deep breath/

FAITH

Rather than argue the semantics, I think it's useful to differentiate faith as it relates to religion, and faith as it relates to the secular. The two have very different foundations, so different in fact, that I feel like they should not share the same word for the confusion it causes.

Both worldviews seek to explain the nature of existance. What both share in common is the notion that faith is trust in the truth of an idea. What the particular idea is and why one should trust the idea is where the two notions of faith part ways.

With religious faith, the idea is (with some minor variations) that of a creator being, from which stems all life, the universe and morality.

In opposition to this is the idea of faith in rationalism and the scientific method, which seeks to explain the nature of the universe through observation and experimentation.

So the question arises: why trust one of these views, when compared to the other?

For theists, the truth of their position rests on blind faith. There is no concrete way to prove beyond doubt the truth of their propositions (e.g. 'God is good', 'That which God loves is good', not to mention the more literal interpretations of Genesis). The theist simply has to accept these propositions 'as is', without recourse to evidence or experimentation.

For the rationalist/ scientist, faith in the truth of scientific method stems from the amount of empirical evidence that has been found to support that particular worldview, and the ability of scientific laws and theories to successfully predict (sometimes with incredible accuracy) the outcome of future events.

A scientific theory hinges on empirical findings, and remains subject to falsification if new evidence is presented. That is, no theory is ever considered certain. Theories very rarely result in vast changes in human understanding. Knowledge in science is gained by a gradual synthesis of information from different experiments, by various researchers, across different domains of science.

Rationalists criticize religious faith arguing its irrationality, and see faith as ignorance of reality: a strong belief in something with no evidence and sometimes a strong belief in something even with evidence against it (indeed, in some cases, the more evidence there is against a particular religious tennet, the greater the faith in that tennet).

Of course science still works weather you have 'faith' in it or not (it's not faith that keeps aeroplanes flying at 30,000 ft.)

Bertrand Russell noted, "Where there is evidence, no one speaks of 'faith'. We do not speak of faith that two and two are four or that the earth is round. We only speak of faith when we wish to substitute emotion for evidence."

BigShot wrote:(We *may* be able to prove evolution (as understood by the layman) is possible. It is utterly impossible to test, empirically, whether or not it DID happen - and fossils prove nothing other than the existence of fossils - but other than that caveat I think the above statement is solid.)

Going to that extreme, it is actually impossible to prove anything; all you ever know is the results of your experiment. In fact, science doesn't really claim to prove anything (that is the realm of maths, which I consider to be mainly a tool for doing science anyway!) all it can do is put together the best theory based on the evidence.

That said, when there is sufficient evidence from sufficient sources it can be said that something is proven to a reasonable degree of accuracy; for most purposes, Newtons laws are adequate despite the fact that we know them to be only part of the story. In that case, it can be said that the amount of different data present in favour the current theory of evolution is sufficient to constitute proof even if every single genetic mutation has not been identified (and never will be).

So do I take evolution on faith? No, I have read a few papers on parts of it and take the evidence as it stands. In order for the layman to do this they must have some degree of faith in the peer review process (and for other fields, double blind testing etc) as that will be something that they may not have seen in action, but the faith is not placed in the theory but in the process for weeding out weak or poor science. For those who have been involved with the process, no faith is required in the process as it has been observed, however, faith may be needed in the practitioners.....

Ultimately, I think it all comes back to what our base assumptions on the nature of reality are; is observable reality real and observable or is it all in my head?

I will point you towards today's xkcd; http://xkcd.com/820/

Cogito ergo cogito to play it safe.

Now Russell has been invoked, allow me:

"If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time."

- Bertrand Russell 'Is There A God?'

Faith: some do, some don't. End of.

BigShot wrote:(We *may* be able to prove evolution (as understood by the layman) is possible. It is utterly impossible to test, empirically, whether or not it DID happen - and fossils prove nothing other than the existence of fossils - but other than that caveat I think the above statement is solid.)

The question is, why does the fossil record exist? Various explanations have been put forth throughout history to explain what fossils are and how they came to be where they were found. The fossil record goes way beyond proving it's own existence. As a body of evidence it gives very strong credence to the theory of evolution through natural selection.

nickj wrote:Going to that extreme, it is actually impossible to prove anything...

- this is of course Nihilism, an intellectual dead-end.

nickj wrote: all you ever know is the results of your experiment. In fact, science doesn't really claim to prove anything ...

Kinda true actually. It's a common misconception that the aim of scientific method is to prove something true.

There is, however a big problem with this. It is impossible to prove something as true indefinitely.

Take the proposition "All swans are white". In order to prove the truth of this statement I would have to observe every single swan in the universe both past, present and future. This is of course impossible.

It is possible to prove that a falsehood can exist indefinitely.

For example: I walk along a river everyday. Each day I notice that there are white swans on the river. This leads me to formulate the hypothesis that 'all swans are white' (a 'truth'). Each day that I see another white swan, I feel that I have more evidence to support my hypothesis. The more evidence I have to support my hypothesis the more 'accurate' or 'true' I feel the hypothesis to be. However, all it takes is the sighting of one black swan to falsify the hypothesis. It doesn't matter how many 100's of white swans I see after that, the hypothesis remains disproved.

Using this approach, the scientifc method (as espoused by Popper et al) posits that once all falshoods have been removed, the only thing that can remain is truth.

I really don't do this long winded reply thing so will go with this:

From Fox Mulder's poster: I WANT TO BELIEVE.

What proof is there that science is real? I shall require irrefutable scientific evidence that this is the case. Please see to it immediately.
And if the word "empiricism" is used again I shall scream.

For the record I do believe a china teapot is running around up there. I understand that an astronaut accidentally opened a window or something.

SpareJoker wrote:Kinda true actually.

I should hope so since my background is in physics (astrophysics actually, so if you want to ask me about that teapot...)!

Proof is an unfortunate concept really; as you say, it only takes one exception to show an accepted theory to be false, but only infinite effort could ever absolutely "prove" one. Fortunately, for something to become and accepted theory, as opposed to a hypothesis (two concepts often confused by laymen), there needs to be a significant body of evidence to support it, amounting to what could be considered proof until that exception comes along.

Mark, I can't give you proof, but I can give you evidence that it seems to work; you are using a computer. If you are actually using the power of your mind to post on here then you may be able to show that many accepted scientific theories are false and you should go and get tested!

PS, Empiricism.

Vanderbelt wrote:I really don't do this long winded reply thing so will go with this:

From Fox Mulder's poster: I WANT TO BELIEVE.

Sorry bud, but sometimes complex questions requre (somewhat) complex answers.

"I want to believe"? Fair 'nuff. What do you want to believe: lizardemen rule the world, life after death, radical emperialism, that there are no beliefs?

Mark Lewis wrote:And if the word "empiricism" is used again I shall scream.

Again, apols, but the terminology goes with the territory (which in this case is Ontology - the study of how we know what we know)

PS. In cyberspace, no-one can hear you scream

Ive never believed in God...and no matter how much others try and push their religious veiws onto me, well the more I back off. Ive had bibles thrown in my face by someone who's burnt my Harry Potter videos telling me magic is evil.
I saw the look in here so called religious eyes, as she gathered round the burning bin in the middle of the street warming her hands on the fire.

I'm going to go back to the original question, which as I understood it was not about religion, science, or epistemology, but was simply: does what you already know and believe affect what you perceive or are willing to believe about new events?

Briefly, the answer is yes. What you already know and believe make up your mindset. Your mindset in turn has a strong influence on what you're willing to accept as true. This is why some "counterintuitive" scientific discoveries take a long time to become generally accepted and understood.

It's also why you're very unlikely to believe me if I say aliens landed in my back garden this morning and joined me for breakfast. According to your mindset, it's far more likely that I'm lying, joking, or hallucinating than that little green men shared my Cheerios. But you might believe me if I could produce good evidence, such as photos and a sample of alien gadgetry.

If your mindset were different, making you a strong UFO believer, you'd be much more likely to take the story at face value, and would accept weaker evidence as sufficient. If you were an absolute UFO denier, you'd refuse to accept the story, no matter what evidence was available.

If the evidence becomes so overwhelming that a mindset can't stand up against it -- say, I bring the aliens to meet the UFO denier in person -- the result is psychological distress until a new mindset can be established that takes the new evidence into account.

Some experiments have been done investigating mindset. For instance, people with strong political opinions who listen to a neutrally balanced lecture will selectively hear and remember the points favourable to their side, and forget opposing points.

To drag the discussion a bit closer to magic... Magicians exploit audiences' mindsets all the time -- as a simple example, the belief "a hand holds one thing at a time".

Sophie wrote:Ive had bibles thrown in my face by someone who's burnt my Harry Potter videos telling me magic is evil.
I saw the look in here so called religious eyes, as she gathered round the burning bin in the middle of the street warming her hands on the fire.

Seriously?!