One last comment before winding up this discourse is appropriate here. The branch of natural philosophy known as science incorporates three tenets or assumptions that are seldom discussed these days. I personally believe in them but some do not and there is much philosophical literature discussing these issues. The issues turn out to be surprisingly complex so I’ll insert them here because they are sometimes referred to in disparaging scientific theories. These issues are causality , universality ,and simplicity.

Causality is just what the term implies. Simply put if you swing a bat and hit a home run then the home run was caused by your hitting the ball with a bat. It was not a coincidence. In the same way science assumes that causality operates in nature and one purpose of science is to discover the causes of phenomena. Thus lift created by air flowing over an airplane wing causes an airplane to fly, electricity flowing through a light bulb causes it to heat up and shine, blowing air into a balloon causes it to expand,and so forth.

Causality seems fairly obvious and its assumption has served mankind well but there are those who question it. I’ll just note that when considering the realm of validity for quantum mechanics (which is the realm where most modern electronic devices operate) the situation is not so clearcut. While a system’s average behavior can be described and predicted, predicting specific atomic or nuclear behavior is still impossible thus violating strict causality.

Universality is the assumption that physical process in the universe are homogeneous. That is, they are the same everywhere. We don’t live in some sort of unique corner of the universe where the physical processes are somehow different. Thus the results of experiments here on Earth can be directly applied everywhere to explain things such as the motion of the stars, planets and Galaxies. The same physical constants we measure here on Earth are valid universally and the same processes such as chemical or nuclear interaction, thermodynamics, Doppler shifts and so on also can be applied universally.

Simplicity is the property of choosing the simplest theory to explain phenomena. Scientists often refer to this as preferring an elegant theory rather than some sort of “clunky” construct. Frequently the principle known as Occam’s razor is invoked to choose among competing theories.

In my opinion denying these assumptions is equivalent to denying the validity of science and to me there is just too much supporting evidence available validating science. If you don’t believe this then you should get rid of your car, appliances, phones, and other technological products or else you’re hypocritical. Unless you believe that possessing all this technology is just a lucky coincidence. Causality and universality have served mankind well and I see no need to abandon them.

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Tags: Evolution, religion, Science

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