tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3681740221183857496.post2367012734730760268..comments2023-09-07T00:55:11.381-07:00Comments on χειρ: Feyerabend's autobiography, a reviewUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3681740221183857496.post-35758362216367586142010-06-10T08:25:20.664-07:002010-06-10T08:25:20.664-07:00There are parallels if not direct lines of influen...<i>There are parallels if not direct lines of influence between scientific and non-scientific, even religious, ways of knowing.</i><br /><br />Here is how I would understand that relation: We all operate using the same kind of biological machinery and similar knowledge (culture). There aren't really different ways of knowing at the operational level of the brain, it only appears that way because people give more weight to different sources of information. <br /><br />I would tentatively create three groupings: artists, realists, and sheeples. Some people, at different times for each, stress intuition and imagination while others stress coherence and reconciliation between reality and personal experience and still others stress dogma and obedience to authority.Aratina Cagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05191120796865740975noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3681740221183857496.post-2590361584684808802010-05-31T13:46:28.619-07:002010-05-31T13:46:28.619-07:00Feyerabend claimed that non-scientific ways of kno...Feyerabend claimed that non-scientific ways of knowing "kept people alive and made their existence comprehensible." If I can comprehend my existence, does that imply that I can explain it? Maybe. If I can explain my existence, does that imply my explanations are true? Of course not. <br /><br />Some people are more decisive than others. The problem with being decisive is that I have to make the right decisions or else ensure that any decisions I make have the right exit clauses attached to them so that I can escape when they lead me to the wrong conclusions. <br /><br />Oddly enough, the same reasons I was impelled to leave religion are the same reasons why I cannot unequivocally deny that it may have positive utility for some people. It is the principle of non-absolutism or non-exclusivity, stated positively it is the principle of plurality, and the Jain term is anekantavada. Is Jainism a religion? It is a religion for some, but it also contains a system of philosophy. Some physicists have found parallels between Eastern ideas and their discipline of study. To provide one example, Neils Bohr had the taijitu (yin yang symbol) inscribed on his coat of arms. There are parallels if not direct lines of influence between scientific and non-scientific, even religious, ways of knowing. <br /><br />I agree with you that religions and science are part of the same tree of knowledge, with religious traditions near the base, and no longer actively contributing or playing the same role they once did. These are interesting days we live in!Eric Schaetzlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17658689292611460708noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3681740221183857496.post-37718611197117449612010-05-31T07:41:04.783-07:002010-05-31T07:41:04.783-07:00we could find many significant differences between...<i>we could find many significant differences between the methods of science and religion, but the explanatory power of both has built in limits.</i><br /><br />The explanatory power of religion? I'm sorry, I just don't see any. Religions cannot explain anything, and everything they tried to explain in the past (like why it rained on one's day of birth) has been proven wrong. <br /><br /><br /><i>He also asked the question: where does one draw the line distinguishing science from non-science? Feyerabend argued that in practice, that line doesn't exist.</i><br /><br />Perhaps Feyerabend took too narrow a view of that line with respect to time and precedent. <br /><br />I read how Feyerabend held dropping stones from towers as supportive of geocentricism over heliocentricism despite observations through telescopes supporting heliocentricism, therefore the Roman Catholic Church was practicing science, but that misses the larger picture of how even a theocracy will practice science. It doesn't make Roman Catholicism scientific. <br /><br />Science also has a way of evolving over time. You get lots of fruitless branches that die off. I would even go so far as to say that ancient religions are dead branches near the base of the Tree of Science. <br /><br />Making things up whole cloth, which is fundamental to religious traditions, is itself a fine art that can complement or shape frontier science, but such methods are not science.<br /><br /><br /><i>it allowed us to improve our understanding of the world despite using "non-scientific" means.</i><br /><br />But, religions do not improve our understanding of reality (unless one is an adherent of said religions), do they? Yes, they will improve our understanding of various human cultures, but one need not be an adherent of the religion under scrutiny to gain such a cultural understanding, either. <br /><br />Science, to me, is very much post hoc. Anything goes for ideas or discoveries but only time will tell if those ideas and discoveries are born on a living branch of science or on one about to wither and die.Aratina Cagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05191120796865740975noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3681740221183857496.post-85625104823022285822010-05-27T08:52:10.958-07:002010-05-27T08:52:10.958-07:00Feyerabend did not question the existence of an ob...Feyerabend did not question the existence of an objective reality, just the means by which science apprehends it. Is science an ideology like any other? No, not exactly like any other, we could find many significant differences between the methods of science and religion, but the explanatory power of both has built in limits. He also asked the question: where does one draw the line distinguishing science from non-science? Feyerabend argued that in practice, that line doesn't exist. Which is a good thing, because it allowed us to improve our understanding of the world despite using "non-scientific" means. Does that make him an accomodationist for religion? I think he's more interested in stating facts, than advocating a position.Eric Schaetzlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17658689292611460708noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3681740221183857496.post-71544723543352698612010-05-25T20:58:54.335-07:002010-05-25T20:58:54.335-07:00Feyerabend places the scientific tradition on an e...<i>Feyerabend places the scientific tradition on an equal plane with other traditions, including religious traditions. I think this is for several reasons: science is not objective, nor are its products always beneficial.</i><br /><br />At first I was going to disagree but now I'd rather clarify. Science, as a tool and process of human inquiry and as a collection of vetted knowledge, can never be separated from the collective human mind. It will always be colored by human cultures as a human endeavor. However, that does not mean there is not an objective reality. <br /><br />It is with respect to objective reality (as opposed to our individual subjective realities) that science obliterates religion and other human traditions in its capacity to generate reasonable knowledge about the natural world for us humans to digest. <br /><br />Religions, if they do happen to give us any knowledge about reality (which is highly doubtful to me), arrive at that knowledge arbitrarily (sometimes that happens in science, too) and have no way of quantifying the significance of their knowledge other than through human authorities (including authors, prophets, and priests). Even simple trial and error is worlds better than religion for the purpose of learning about reality.<br /><br />And while science itself may not be objective, in the sense of it existing on its own outside of human culture, the things it describes and explains are. So, in no way would I accept science and religion as equals. Religion is clearly inferior unless one is wishing to establish a theocracy.Aratina Cagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05191120796865740975noreply@blogger.com