I don't give a damn what Occam would approve of! You can't come up with idiotic explanations just to stay with Occam's razor or whatever...!
For heavens's sake....fellas! What the heck is the matter with you guys?! You guys are tying yourselves up in knots and building fences after fences around you with all your stuff......Occam's razor, logical fallacies, some other fallacy, whatever....! Lots of rubbish!
Reality doesn't restrict itself to your boundaries.
You don't want to accept spirit and after-life etc. because there isn't sufficient empirical evidence and because you are scornful of anything associated with religion....that is fine. I have no problem with that. But coming up with ridiculous explanations and offering Occam's razor or whatever, as a reason is utter nonsense.
Face reality guys....with all its mysteries and possibilities. Live life and experience it! We don't know... is just fine! We don't need to know everything.
Sheesh!!
15 comments
Face reality guys....with all its mysteries and possibilities. Live life and experience it! We don't know... is just fine! We don't need to know everything.
Face reality guys....with all its mysteries and possibilities. Live life and experience it! We don't know... is just fine! We don't need to know everything.
This, right here, is your problem - the old assumption that scientific understanding makes something more boring. I dunno about you, but I find the idea of an enormous natural nuclear reactor keeping us all alive way more fascinating than "oh look, there's the Sun, it's a big warm yellow thing God made".
Occam's razor, logical fallacies, some other fallacy, whatever....! Lots of rubbish!
Your inability to name any logical fallacies beyond Occam's razor, which you seem to have completely misinterpreted, suggests you can't understand what they mean. I'm not surprised, really.
@Pharaoh Bastethotep
@Pharaoh Bastethotep
"I do not get these idiots. Understanding does not diminish a true mystery at all."
They are unable to understand anything. Everything that follows from that point is utterly incomprehensible to them. They have never experienced your "true mystery" so they don't know what you are talking about.
@Pharaoh Bastethotep
@Pharaoh, Chris, and Reptilian
Totally agree with you guys on this. I've lost count of the number of times that I've had to explain to people that beauty and intrigue can be found all throughout mathematics. It's not about getting some number as a result of a long boring calculation, it's about the study of structure and relationships. But even after explaining and showing examples of mathematical beauty, people still want to believe it must be something cold and lifeless.
"We don't need to know everything."
Agreed. That's why scientists say "I don't know" when they don't know something, then they try to find out. The religious say "because god" instead. That really means "I don't know, and I'm afraid of the unknown".
I'm a scientist. I'm not afraid of the dark.
@dxdydz and The Reptilian Jew
As someone who loves both physics and biology (although I only study the latter) I see it exactly the same way. This kind of anti-intellectualism also sadly connects to the growing belief that knowledge is only worth something if it has practical applications or can be made into a product, which is a similarly short-sighted view. Sadly I fear that schools are not really good at popularizing our point of view. Mathematics and physics are hit the hardest by being stereotyped as cold and careless. Biology is fine as long as it doesn't go against personal belief (especially when it comes to evolution). The social and philosophical sciences on the other hand are seen as "soft sciences" which don't produce anything worthwhile (which is not true in the slightest). All of this leads to a very bizzare opinion of science as either heartless or worthless and I've seen both used as "arguments" against sciences on this site. It always makes me a little sad that people don't see how wonderful the world becomes once you know more about it.
@Chris
@ChrisBP747
As the MCC did with the Piranha Brothers, who - for the only time in their lives - were slit up a treat, so does Occam do to the likes of you with his Razor.
image
All we require is proof .
And unlike your 'God', at least Shimano, Campagnolo & Mavic bike components exist, Sram.
@The Reptilian Jew
Oh, actually I've encountered such people before too. My own area of expertise is evolution and genomics so the "clash against belief" part is stronger there, but there were people telling me to "finally do something worthwhile" too. Always saddens me. But yeah, everything today has to be "worthwhile" in the short run, which is insane and dumb. People often seem to think that engineering and medicine (the "practical" sciences) are somehow more important than the theoretical ones. Hopefully someday people will see that science is not just another area to be used to make money or to be disregarded as "too analytic and theoretic".
My favorite area of mathematics is analytic number theory. Most of the results there have no application yet outside of pure mathematics, so one of the frequent questions I get is "What is it used for?" I've found that when you answer with "You use [whatever] to prove more theorems or to do X in number theory." people aren't satisfied. They're always looking to hear that it will get their car better mileage, get us to Mars, help cure cancer, unclog their toilet, etc. The only answer I've found that satisfies people is how the topic relates to elliptic curves and elliptic curve cryptography, but this really doesn't contain the heat and spirit of the subject.
Things don't need to have immeadiate applications (and I'd argue that they don't even need to have real world applications), we can do math and science because it's interesting, fun, and because knowledge in itself is worth having.
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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