Hi Krimel, Mark,
> [Krimel] > I don't think that "satisfaction" is a criterion for truth. It is a happy > coincidence when knowledge makes us happy but I fear that often it is just > a > sign that we are on the wrong path. I think it is true that I will die one > day but I don't find that terribly satisfying. If all you want is beliefs > that make you happy why not drop the pretext and take up painting? > > Science may not be the only path to truth or knowledge but I do think that > other paths are in many ways subservient to science. One can't seriously > advance a philosophy that claims that the earth is only 10,000 years old. > Although that is the position advanced by the ICR and taught to students at > private Christian schools. I for one think inflicting these ideas on > children is a form of child abuse. > Steve: While satisfaction doesn't work as a criterion for truth, it is worth noting that from an evolutionary perspective, we only come to seek to know truths or have beliefs at all as a means to satisfy certain desires. The desires that scientific beliefs satisfy may not be the same as the desires other sorts of beliefs may satisfy, so we may not need to worry about whether a scientific belief is consistent with some other belief if the desires they serve are kept separate. So I wouldn't say that there is necessarily any subservience of other sorts of non-scientific beliefs to science. Rorty wrote that "On a pragmatist account, scientific inquiry is best viewed as the attempt to find a single, unified, coherent description of the world--the description that makes it easiest to predict the consequences of events and actions..." This attempt is the attempt to gratify particular desires--the desire to predict and control. If a belief is not held in hope to predict and control then we need not worry about whether it agrees with science. For example, the belief that my wife is the right person for me is not subservient to any path of justification to satisfy others let alone the scientific attempt to find a single coherent description of the world. Likewise, it seems to me that if Mark's belief in God is not part of a hope to predict and control, then it need not conflict with science. Best, Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
