"Naturalism of the gaps" and testing for "Beginings"

[Nightmare060]

Hey everyone.

This is something that has made me repeatedly facepalm in my debates with a theist freind over skype (the same guy who the "shark jesus" meme seems to have started from).

He frequently keeps pointing out that because scientific naturalism can only work with physical properties within our universe, we cannot test anything outside our universe, and thus naturalism can't explain what caused the universe to "Begin", so the only explination can be a supernatural, metaphysical, timeless, changless, all powerfull and (for some reason) personal being.

As you can guess, he is an avid parroter of william lain craigs arguments, albiet in a but more deapth and cohierance that the man himself tends to go into. He also frequently suggests that when I say we will probobly learn most about the "cause" through science because of it's track record, he throws the term "Naturalism of the gaps" notion at me, suggesting that if he assumes god, then I asume naturalism as the "cause" of the universe. He also throws out a probability argument usualy used against anacdotal evidence. That if you flip a coin 100 times and get heads every time, it doesn't mean that is is more likely that you will get heads again. And thus, just because science has explained everything so far, it doesn't mean that what will be next can be explained by science.

I would say that he is putting extreem limits on the sceintific method and that he is relying on something that has no track record at all, as well as the fact that naturslism doesn't work on absolout certainties at all and only makes actual conclusions once evidence has actualy come to light. As well as the fact we have thought of many things in human history as being "impossible", but ended up being explained via natural processes.

But I would like to see how everyone here deconstructs these arguments and perhaps explain about how this logic is flawed in a bit more deapth than I can. To summerise the points; How would you argue about how the notion that asuming naturalism will find out the answers to the origins of the universe is just as bad as presuming that god did it (translation; that it was magic)? And how would you suggest that naturalism can explain such things with natural evidence, even if it doesn't adress anything that is supernatural and untestable?

This should prove amusing!

 

[RichardMNixon]

First, buy a double-headed coin, flip it 10 times, then offer him 10:1 odds if he places a monetary bet on tails. He seems to be suggesting "Science might get it right and religion might get it right, it's just luck that science has gotten it right every time and religion never has." Baloney. Even saying it that explicitly makes it sound absurd, religion will never tell us anything about the natural world.

"Naturalism of the gaps" is similarly nonsensical. "Naturalism" isn't an explanation the way "goddidit" is. We don't object to offering an explanation, we object to offering an explanation with no merit other than "well you don't have anything better," or "prove me wrong!!1!" We want to find a naturalistic explanation for the Big Bang, yes, but that explanation will be built upon evidence and a lot more concrete than "nature did it! Prove me wrong, god!"

Claiming the Big Bang is supernatural is the "Begging the Question" fallacy. Just because we don't understand something, or even can't understand it, doesn't mean it isn't "natural," and certainly doesn't mean a conscious entity had anything to do with it.

 

[Nightmare060]

First, buy a double-headed coin, flip it 10 times, then offer him 10:1 odds if he places a monetary bet on tails. He seems to be suggesting "Science might get it right and religion might get it right, it's just luck that science has gotten it right every time and religion never has." Baloney. Even saying it that explicitly makes it sound absurd, religion will never tell us anything about the natural world.

"Naturalism of the gaps" is similarly nonsensical. "Naturalism" isn't an explanation the way "goddidit" is. We don't object to offering an explanation, we object to offering an explanation with no merit other than "well you don't have anything better," or "prove me wrong!!1!" We want to find a naturalistic explanation for the Big Bang, yes, but that explanation will be built upon evidence and a lot more concrete than "nature did it! Prove me wrong, god!"

Claiming the Big Bang is supernatural is the "Begging the Question" fallacy. Just because we don't understand something, or even can't understand it, doesn't mean it isn't "natural," and certainly doesn't mean a conscious entity had anything to do with it.

Well put! I would also add that the probability argument is bogus because science refines on what we know and explores more possabilities, going with what there is the most evidence for. Supernatural explinations are answers without backing and have no procees. Science does. And thus showing something to be reasonably true is far higher with science than with a supernatural explination.

And the problem is supernatural will ALWAYS be outside of science and not be a reasonable explination, because it by defanition defies all procresses. Once something has a process and can be tested, refuted and refined based on direct evidence, it is science! Science isn't any 1 way of doing experiments, it's essentialy the rules to how to conduct an acurate experiment to work out any flaws in the methodology.

If alchemy was validated through the scientific method tomorow, it would become a science it's self.

 

[SchrodingersFinch]

"We can't explain X therefore there must be some natural mechanism behind" is a fallacy, and I would never use it in a debate. But you could make the inductive argument: "every 'mystery' that has been solved turned out to have a natural explanation, therefore, it's likely that X will also have a natural explanation".

If he disagrees with the premise you can ask for an example where the explanation turned out to be supernatural, shifting the burden of proof to your opponent. The second option is to disagree with the inductive reasoning.

The example of flipping a coin, however, isn't valid. In the case of flipping a coin we know the mechanism behind it. Therefore, we know that the probability is always 50%. But when we are looking for an explanation, the phenomenon is always different. The only way to assign any meaningful probability for finding a natural explanation is through statistics. And the statistics say: natural 100%, supernatural 0%.

He might argue that we can't apply the scientific method to the origin of the universe. I disagree with this, but even if it's true, it in no way leads to god.

He frequently keeps pointing out that because scientific naturalism can only work with physical properties within our universe, we cannot test anything outside our universe, and thus naturalism can't explain what caused the universe to "Begin", so the only explination can be a supernatural, metaphysical, timeless, changless, all powerfull and (for some reason) personal being.

Well what can we test "outside" the universe? Causality? Logic? These are based on our observations in the universe. If he believes they work similarly or even exist elsewhere he must demonstrate it. Otherwise he can't make any arguments about what's beyond the universe.

 

[Gunboat Diplomat]

This is something that has made me repeatedly facepalm in my debates with a theist freind over skype (the same guy who the "shark jesus" meme seems to have started from).

He frequently keeps pointing out that because scientific naturalism can only work with physical properties within our universe, we cannot test anything outside our universe, and thus naturalism can't explain what caused the universe to "Begin", so the only explination can be a supernatural, metaphysical, timeless, changless, all powerfull and (for some reason) personal being.

This makes no sense on so many different levels...

The Universe is literally defined as "everything." To say that something is "outside" the Universe is nonsensical and missing the point. Something may be outside the known universe but that's a very different statement: it's an acknowledgement of our ignorance. When he says "physical properties" what he really means is observable. If something is not observable then in what manner can it be said to exist? If it is observable then we'd call it a part of our universe...

Even if the Universe had a beginning (the Big Bang is not necessarily that), it is pure supposition that it can't be explained by some underlying structure that can be discerned from future observations...

In what manner can "a supernatural, metaphysical, timeless, changless, all powerfull and personal being" be considered an explanation?

All he has made are bare assertions based on nothing but his desired conclusions. He is rationalizing his position to himself which explains why none of it makes any sense...

As you can guess, he is an avid parroter of william lain craigs arguments, albiet in a but more deapth and cohierance that the man himself tends to go into. He also frequently suggests that when I say we will probobly learn most about the "cause" through science because of it's track record, he throws the term "Naturalism of the gaps" notion at me, suggesting that if he assumes god, then I asume naturalism as the "cause" of the universe. He also throws out a probability argument usualy used against anacdotal evidence. That if you flip a coin 100 times and get heads every time, it doesn't mean that is is more likely that you will get heads again. And thus, just because science has explained everything so far, it doesn't mean that what will be next can be explained by science.

Is anyone else getting tired of arguments from false symmetry? It's cargo cult philosophy. Blindly inverting an argument doesn't preserve the argument's validity!

We rely on methodological naturalism not out of philosophy but out of practicality. There's nothing we can do with a "God gone done it" explanation. Methodological naturalism relates unknowns to knowns, allowing us to test and extend our theories. It ensures that whatever explanations we come up with will necessarily be, in some sense, true. If we want our explanations to be useful, we have little choice but to assume naturalism...

His coin tosses are a flawed analogy. If that were to actually happen to him, it's unlikely he'd assert what he's claiming. What's more likely is that he'd think there was a trick going on! That's because the Gambler's fallacy is predicated on independent trials. In the case of coin tosses, we know the mechanism of coin tosses and can conclude, separately from actual tosses, that the trials will be independent. That's why if the tosses were to show a lack of independence then we'd expect to find a different mechanism for the tosses (i.e. that there's a trick behind the tosses...).

Because of the nature of... methodological naturalism, any explanations made with it are useful. We leverage this utility to examine other claims with the same naturalism and this begets more explanations with even more utility. This cycles continues and creates its good "track record..."

Supernatural claims do none of these things. Besides, what does it even mean for something to be "supernatural?" I maintain that this is a useful word but that's another topic for another thread...

 

[TheFlyingBastard]

They don't have evidence of God.
We have evidence of natural processes.

We win.

 

[simonecuttlefish]

He frequently keeps pointing out that because scientific naturalism can only work with physical properties within our universe, we cannot test anything outside our universe, and thus naturalism can't explain what caused the universe to "Begin", so the only explination can be a supernatural, metaphysical, timeless, changless, all powerfull and (for some reason) personal being.

What they are saying, is that ignorance proves God. They are also missing the point that "goddidit" proves exactly nothing, not even itself.

Demons 'used' to cause disease, but now they don't? It took a long time to work out germ theory, but it works quite well these days, because people kept looking for reasons, not accepting total fallacy/fairytale as fact.

How did the universe/multiverse/whatever come into being? Still working on that one. But the point is we have not simply given up and walked away from trying to find out. In fact we are still working out how to frame the question properly, but we are still working on it.

goddidit is the ultimate epic fail.

Belief in a 'God' is like belief in 'The Great Magic Idiot Donkey in the Sky', who only exists because people choose to be in denial of their intellect. If the Christian God can exist, then so can all the rest.

In order to preserve their fantasy constructs, they are in fact forcing themselves to be ........
calculatingly, consciously, determinedly, emphatically, freely, knowingly, meaningfully, premeditatively, prepensely, purposely, purposively, resolutely, studiously, voluntarily, willfully, and

MALICIOUSLY RETARDED!

Congratulate them on that. Even a little child can ask questions.

 

[Deleted member 619]

Check out TWAT's channel, where he has spent some serious effort kicking Kalamity Craig around.

 

[OmegaMale]

Hi everyone, new to the forum. I'm a math and philosophy teacher from Finland, just started studying physics.

His coin tosses are a flawed analogy. If that were to actually happen to him, it's unlikely he'd assert what he's claiming. What's more likely is that he'd think there was a trick going on! That's because the Gambler's fallacy is predicated on independent trials. In the case of coin tosses, we know the mechanism of coin tosses and can conclude, separately from actual tosses, that the trials will be independent. That's why if the tosses were to show a lack of independence then we'd expect to find a different mechanism for the tosses (i.e. that there's a trick behind the tosses...).

This! Extremely well put. Your theist friend makes the facepalm inducing fallacy that the scientific only produces correct results by chance. This would be like saying that science only seeks to explain individual phenomena in some ad hoc sense and completely ignores the fact that the scientific method attempts to establish parsimonious models applicable to a wide range of situations in an efficient way.

Also, with regards to the explanatory power of god... well, there obviously isn't any, although this always seems to escape our theist friends... The way I like to put it is this: An omnipotent god can be used to explain anything (in an ad hoc sense) and precisely for that reason can ultimately explain nothing.

A good (I think) way to see this is that a god could equally "explain" an observation A and also it's negation A'. If I'm driving my car and explain getting to my destination without the car breaking down by "goddidit", I could also explain getting a flat tire by "goddidit". But how can this be an explanation in any meaningful sense?

 

[Story]

Coin Toss

A better analogy for the coin toss would be this:

You have a coin. You don't know what's on the other side of the coin. The only method you have to try and find out what's on the other side is by throwing it (work with me). You throw the coin once, you see the same image of a embedded head. You throw it 5 more times, you get the same image. You throw it 100 times, you get the same image.

At that point, is it fair to assume that the coin has the image of the embedded head on both sides? Whether or not it did?

You might think this analogy is unfair because we know a coin has two different images printed on both sides, but I'm only demonstrating here that we're not dealing with what is exactly true or false, but what is most fair to assume.

At this point, even if the coin did have a tail side, to assume what that other side would be or what it would look like would be far more presumptuous than to go with your tested reasoning that it was the same.

In the end it may just be a coin with the same image embedded on both sides.

 

[Gunboat Diplomat]

Also, with regards to the explanatory power of god... well, there obviously isn't any, although this always seems to escape our theist friends... The way I like to put it is this: An omnipotent god can be used to explain anything (in an ad hoc sense) and precisely for that reason can ultimately explain nothing.

A good (I think) way to see this is that a god could equally "explain" an observation A and also it's negation A'. If I'm driving my car and explain getting to my destination without the car breaking down by "goddidit", I could also explain getting a flat tire by "goddidit". But how can this be an explanation in any meaningful sense?

This is a very good point and I'm saddened by how not compelling this is to theists. In my experience, they seem to think the universality of the "God gone done it" explanation is alright because it's true. Their reasons for thinking it's true will vary from "I just know it is" to random ad hoc explanations...

I very much like your A and not A demonstration. I have a similar example where you observe that "God did it" explains any question before it's even asked! Isn't it a little suspicious that you already know the answer to an unknown question? I use this to show how vacuous an explanation it is but I prefer your argument. It goes straight for the logical jugular...

 

[OmegaMale]

I have a similar example where you observe that "God did it" explains any question before it's even asked!

This is a very good way to put it also, never thought of it that way. I think it's a good argument to use against creationists who always tend to go for the 'only god can explain it' line of reasoning (using the term very loosely here ). We need to start giving them a hard time for using the word 'explain' in such a vacuous way.

 

[jericomovie]

Hey everyone.

This is something that has made me repeatedly facepalm in my debates with a theist freind over skype (the same guy who the "shark jesus" meme seems to have started from).

He frequently keeps pointing out that because scientific naturalism can only work with physical properties within our universe, we cannot test anything outside our universe, and thus naturalism can't explain what caused the universe to "Begin", so the only explination can be a supernatural, metaphysical, timeless, changless, all powerfull and (for some reason) personal being.

As you can guess, he is an avid parroter of william lain craigs arguments, albiet in a but more deapth and cohierance that the man himself tends to go into. He also frequently suggests that when I say we will probobly learn most about the "cause" through science because of it's track record, he throws the term "Naturalism of the gaps" notion at me, suggesting that if he assumes god, then I asume naturalism as the "cause" of the universe. He also throws out a probability argument usualy used against anacdotal evidence. That if you flip a coin 100 times and get heads every time, it doesn't mean that is is more likely that you will get heads again. And thus, just because science has explained everything so far, it doesn't mean that what will be next can be explained by science.

I would say that he is putting extreem limits on the sceintific method and that he is relying on something that has no track record at all, as well as the fact that naturslism doesn't work on absolout certainties at all and only makes actual conclusions once evidence has actualy come to light. As well as the fact we have thought of many things in human history as being "impossible", but ended up being explained via natural processes.

But I would like to see how everyone here deconstructs these arguments and perhaps explain about how this logic is flawed in a bit more deapth than I can. To summerise the points; How would you argue about how the notion that asuming naturalism will find out the answers to the origins of the universe is just as bad as presuming that god did it (translation; that it was magic)? And how would you suggest that naturalism can explain such things with natural evidence, even if it doesn't adress anything that is supernatural and untestable?

This should prove amusing!

I obviously can't speak for your friend, but there is something to be said about the limitations of empirical data. When considering phenomena that is not material, we have an epistemological problem that empirical data, categorically, cannot solve.

The discussion, here, normally supposes that, if material nature has an origin, it might be naive to assume it will be empirically explainable (empirical data begins at time of origin, not "before", thus could not account for cause). It's true that the "goddidit" argument could work for anything, but this is not unique. indeed, we could suppose a material explanation for everything, ad hoc, as well. However, if indeed material nature had a beginning, we are working in a different category of epistemology, and need to consider a means to knowledge that is complimentary to empirical data.

I would not, contrary to some of my theist friends, suggest that we begin with an omnipotent being as a hypothesis. This is getting ahead of ourselves. In fact, it is getting as far "ahead of ourselves" as theoretically possible (consider "omnipotence" in the ultimate sense). If truly we are to expect to learn about any compliment to material nature, it will not happen by starting to ascribe attributes before we even begin inquiry. Importantly though, inquiry of this kind would be abstract.

 

[OmegaMale]

I obviously can't speak for your friend, but there is something to be said about the limitations of empirical data. When considering phenomena that is not material, we have an epistemological problem that empirical data, categorically, cannot solve.

I would like to ask what you mean by "phenomena that are not material". I assume you mean things we cannot observe directly, such as phenomena in the sub-atomic scale.

Here I would like to point out that 'matter' and 'material' as such seem to be troublesome concepts in light of modern physics. By this I mean that it seems to be events rather than matter which is the primary 'stuff' of physics. According to this view, matter, particles, electrons etc. are just convenient ways of arranging events and observations into bundles. So by an electron one would only mean a set of observable events unexpicable without the existence of an electron. Note that I am not saying that electrons don't really exist, as the simplest way to explain the events we associate with electrons is to assume that something causing those events (the electron) actually exists (Occam's razor).

Hopefully this didn't nmiss the mark completely. My intention was just to make the point that the notion of "non-material phenomena" can lead to some confusion unless we analyse it further.

It's true that the "goddidit" argument could work for anything, but this is not unique. indeed, we could suppose a material explanation for everything, ad hoc, as well.

This did occur to me when wiriting my earlier post. While there is some truth to that, the point still stands that for an explanation to really be an explanation in a meaningful sense it has to be in some way 'naturalistic'. More importantly, I would like to emphasize the connection between 'explanatory power' and 'predictive power'. Granted, one could invent 'naturalistic' (i.e. not supernatural) ad hoc explanations as well, but they can be assessed through empirical testing. A true explanation in the scientific sense is therefore one which can predict future events and observations, not just explain them after the fact.

 

[jericomovie]

I would like to ask what you mean by "phenomena that are not material". I assume you mean things we cannot observe directly, such as phenomena in the sub-atomic scale.

Phenomena that are not material are anything irrevocably beyond empirical study. I agree the conversation ought to be concerned with sub-atomic events at this point. The important thing, perhaps, is to acknowledge that the new turn in particle physics is one that forces us to rethink things, and plenty of us have come to conclusions quickly, to spite the gap. However, of all that I have heard, the only explanation that seems to honor parsimony is Wolfram's account of the apparent randomness at the quantum level. Wolfram provides a model that rejects indederminism at the quantum level, explaining that the observed "randomness" at the quantum level is the result of a finite, computational sophistication of the observer, and he provides other, controlled examples of this with cellular automata. The problem people seem to have with it, though, is that his ideas are very unorthodox (revolutionary), in spite of their proven explanatory power (having rediscovered the Einstein equations, for example, in terms of cellular automata).

This did occur to me when wiriting my earlier post. While there is some truth to that, the point still stands that for an explanation to really be an explanation in a meaningful sense it has to be in some way 'naturalistic'. More importantly, I would like to emphasize the connection between 'explanatory power' and 'predictive power'. Granted, one could invent 'naturalistic' (i.e. not supernatural) ad hoc explanations as well, but they can be assessed through empirical testing. A true explanation in the scientific sense is therefore one which can predict future events and observations, not just explain them after the fact.

The explanatory power of empirical data is only going to be informative of material phenomena. There is an argument for an immaterial nature that is complementary to this one, namely, that is necessary to account for causality. To inquire of the immaterial counterpart, though, requires an abstract conversation, divorced of empiricism, even particle physics, and some people are scared to do that.

 

[OmegaMale]

Phenomena that are not material are anything irrevocably beyond empirical study.
[---]
The explanatory power of empirical data is only going to be informative of material phenomena. There is an argument for an immaterial nature that is complementary to this one, namely, that is necessary to account for causality. To inquire of the immaterial counterpart, though, requires an abstract conversation, divorced of empiricism, even particle physics, and some people are scared to do that.

Ok, I basically agree but also find it a bit tautological. I think that in any meaningful discussion of what we mean by 'explaining' we would have to accept causality as a given.

I'm of course waxing a bit Wittgensteinian here in arguing that whenever one is "accounting for causality" one can only do so within some perhaps implicitly accepted causal framework. Maybe I am just thick but I totally fail to grasp the idea of 'explaining' or 'accounting for' causality without some kind of causality already in place.

 

[jericomovie]

Phenomena that are not material are anything irrevocably beyond empirical study.
[---]
The explanatory power of empirical data is only going to be informative of material phenomena. There is an argument for an immaterial nature that is complementary to this one, namely, that is necessary to account for causality. To inquire of the immaterial counterpart, though, requires an abstract conversation, divorced of empiricism, even particle physics, and some people are scared to do that.

Ok, I basically agree but also find it a bit tautological. I think that in any meaningful discussion of what we mean by 'explaining' we would have to accept causality as a given.

I'm of course waxing a bit Wittgensteinian here in arguing that whenever one is "accounting for causality" one can only do so within some perhaps implicitly accepted causal framework. Maybe I am just thick but I totally fail to grasp the idea of 'explaining' or 'accounting for' causality without some kind of causality already in place.

Such is not a tautology. One needn't assume physical causality (such as, the antibiotic "caused" the bacterium to weaken and die) is the same as, say, rational causality (such as, a premise that "causes" a conclusion to be false).

If we assume lawfulness in reason, we can still speak about physical causality without accepting physical causality as a given.

 

[OmegaMale]

Such is not a tautology. One needn't assume physical causality (such as, the antibiotic "caused" the bacterium to weaken and die) is the same as, say, rational causality (such as, a premise that "causes" a conclusion to be false).

If we assume lawfulness in reason, we can still speak about physical causality without accepting physical causality as a given.

Maybe I should have been more clear about the tautology bit. I see it as tautological to say "The explanatory power of empirical data is only going to be informative of material phenomena." Of course emprical data is only applicable to material phenomena, otherwise the phenomenon wouldn't be material. What else could we mean by the notion of a material phenomenon than something that has a material explanation (or cause)?

As for the kind of 'rational' or 'logical causality' you mention, I see no point in using the word causality in this context, as the inference rules of logic are tautologies and as such don't explain anything.

 

[jericomovie]

[
As for the kind of 'rational' or 'logical causality' you mention, I see no point in using the word causality in this context, as the inference rules of logic are tautologies and as such don't explain anything.

Not logical causality. Rational causality. Reason speaks to a string of inferences, logic speaks to rules of inference.

 

[OmegaMale]

Not logical causality. Rational causality. Reason speaks to a string of inferences, logic speaks to rules of inference.

But wouldn't you still need to have the rules of inference in place in order to have the strings of inferences that "reason speaks to" (whatever that means) in the first place? How could one construct strings of inferences without having rules for connecting the inferences (logic)? Thus I think the distinction you draw between 'rational' and 'logical' causation is superficial.

In any case, I think that the feasibility of some 'rational causality' is beside the point here. My question still stands: What else could we mean by the notion of a material phenomenon than something that has a material explanation (or cause)?

I see no solution to this apart from adopting some form of dualism, and then the usual arguments against dualism would apply: How could a material phenomenon have an immaterial cause?