Comments on: Science isn’t based on faith

By: Rudd-O

Rudd-O — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 21:53:41 +0000

Oh how convenient, you’re using an invented definition of faith that is IN THE BIBLE, which is a series of made-up histories.

“Also, faith must be based on evidence”. That is OXYMORONIC. If you have evidence to back up your belief, then it isn’t faith anymore.

By: MPK

MPK — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 13:16:31 +0000

The definition of faith is the following: "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Hebrews 11:1

Also, faith must be based on evidence, for the Biblical concept of "faith" is actually "trust". To have faith in God is to trust God. I build my faith or trust upon facts and evidence. Blind faith is a bad idea.

With regard to science, I have always seen it the same way. I must "observe" and I must test. These develop a foundation of evidence.

On the other hand, I believe the confusion in science comes about by the interjection of belief systems into science. While the belief systems of evolution and creationism are good places to start, they are not science until beliefs are replaced by facts thru observation.

Thank you.

By: carlos

carlos — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 17:54:12 +0000

please s/existence of empirical evidence/strict requirement that any proposition have statistical significant empirical evidence to back it up/ above,thanks.

By: carlos

carlos — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 17:50:40 +0000

Science doesnt need to make the assumption that “the universe follows a set of rules”. It could also be possible that the universe lacks any symmetry whatsoever, and the experiments would then show just that. Take Ohms Law for example, some times you would measure U=IR, other times U=2*Pi, U=exp(I/k) etc. There wouldnt be any Ohms Law left, but that doesnt mean there wouldnt be any Science left, since it was science that just showed you that there was no possible Ohms Law in the first place. In this sense, science is never the idea that there the universe is describable by a set of rules, but rather the practice of observing/measuring different phenomena and finding out the formalism - if any exists - that best describes such phenomena.

Of course, I’m trivializing a lot of things, and Science is a bit more complex than I’ve just described. Trying to describe how scientists come up with experiments and theories is like trying to describe how Mozart composed music or Picasso painted Guernica, science its just as complex a creative process as great art, if not more so: Art doesnt have to correctly describe the universe.

More to the point, the solution to the faith/science “debate” is very simple: science is based on evidence, faith (by definition) isnt. Questions of wheter reality is “real”, Hume’s “skepticism” of causality, etc. are superfluous: In physics, for example, “reality” is defined by what the experiment tells you, causality is just a topological property of the formalism and time direction is a consequence of the Second Law. (Well, OK, its a little more subtle than that…) Any need for “faith” in science is negated by the existence of empirical evidence.