Venom
Babylon Candle
- Joined
- Feb 10, 2008
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Yes, biology exists. However, the onus is on you to explain why this precludes any higher being's involvement--the best you can say is that you choose to restrict your epistemological grounds to science, but then appealing to the philosophy of science puts you in the same position as theistic believers--you're still laying your chips down at the foot of a belief system, to the exclusion of other belief system choices.
Christianity does not preclude the symphonic directives of biology, it includes it--the Bible is full of teachings about that which is living, tangible and physical. OTOH, those who assert that biology is the only logical option for knowing have to make a case for disowning every other major epistemological inquiry. Yours is a tall task.
re-read my post:
1. A metaphysical truth would require an "a priori synthetic"
2. For it to be A priori, the justification does not rely upon the experience.
3. A good approximation is that an a priori must be "necessary and universal".
4. For it to be synthetic, the predicate concept can't be contained in the subject concept.
5. If the predicate cant be deduced from subject, you're almost never going to avoid an induction: eg "All bachelors are happy" basically equals "All bachelors are probably happy" because the first statement is only true as an induction.
Conclusion: To have a true metaphysical statement, you'd have to state something that was an induction, yet necessary and universal. One of the primary elements of an induction is that its NOT something that follows with absolute necessity.
Thus a "true" metaphysical statement is likely impossible (the only thing that I think stands a chance is stuff regarding "happiness being desirable"...another thread, another time).
So how does this apply to your post?
1. A metaphysical statement, an a priori synthetic, is going to only ever be "true for you". You, and only you (the rhetorical you).
2. Science generally rests on induction. Its not going to be as 100% true as mathematics. However, this does not put science on the level of theists (read: metaphysical belief) because much of science would be a posteriori synthetic. This would mean its an induction after experience. This means its an experience that everyone could have and theoretically test. Thus a posteriori synthetic wont necessarily be restricted to only being "true for you", like an a priori synthetic would be (metaphysical statements).
3. So yes, science would be on a metaphysical level when ever it makes inductions not based on experience (ie lacks experience, ie lacks evidence). Some religious people complain that when scientists are so sure of themselves, they are basically acting on metaphysical belief. This is not true most of time. When a scientist is so sure of his beliefs, as to attribute deductive certainty to his inductions, he is not being metaphysical, he is merely being illogical.
Again, I believe that people have the right to believe what ever they need to believe, I just think that scientism should not blindly be applied to all of science.