Scientism - The Belief System of Atheists

“In essence, Scientism sees science as the absolute and only
justifiable access to the truth.” – PBS series Faith and Reason – Counting to God, by Douglas Ell, page 24

Scientism is not science.
Science is the observation, experimental investigation, and explanation
of natural phenomena. Scientism puts a box around science and says you can’t look outside the box for truth, even when you ask why the stuff in the box is there or how it came to be.

A few questions, a few great questions, ask what is outside the box. The great questions are beyond science.– p 26

 

Atheist don’t have a belief system, by definition. Atheism is simply the lack of belief in a god or gods.

 

No atheist is a true sciencist in the way you have defined it. Atheists admit there is much more than our universe and much we still don't understand. They understand that the scientific method doesn't apply to everything, like philosophy.

All atheists are saying is that to believe something you need some kind of logic or evidence to support its truth. The more extraordinary the claim, the more of this is needed. Thats it.

 

Citing a book that no other poster is likely to have? Hilarious!

Saying science is "atheist" is ridiculous, as science doesn't suggest there is no God. Science isn't a tool for addressing the supernatural. That doesn't make it "atheist".

Scientism refers to unreasonably extending the realm where science is considered the full authority. That doesn't neessarily mean atheism, either.

Yes - science can't answer every question. Science is a process of increasing human understanding of our natural universe. NOBODY would suggest "science" knows or should know everything. If THAT were true, science would be excruciatingly boring.

Let's remember that Christianity also says humans don't know everything.

 

Nice attempt to set the discussion along your own, narrowly defined, lines. Does not make what you say is true, just misleading.

 

Have you ever heard of a library? Not one in California had this book. My local library had to borrow it from Indiana! This is how far left-wing libraries are across the land. They purchase countless volumes from godless Leftists, but don't balance that with books by Christian scholars.
I'm sure you find that hilarious as well.

Nobody said "science is atheist" except you. Don't misquote others and then criticize your own words misquoting others. That's not remotely hilarious.

Now you're getting to the term discussed, viz., scientism. It is the métier of the godless left. It may not "neessarily" mean atheism, but generally atheists pursue it headlong.

 

You have little concept of naturalism. Scientists very well versed in molecular biology have demonstrated the insuperable statistics of polypeptide synthesis.
This is powerful experimental evidence, and yet naturalists - atheists - will not allow a paper to be published without going bonkers. They are censoring relentlessly. That is extremely unscientific and unintelligent, but standard operating procedure for the atheist left.

 

There is a numerous amount of literature about polypeptide synthesis. I don't see any evidence at all of censorship.
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0,38&q=polypeptide+synthesis&btnG=

f you do bad research, your ability to get funding, get research positions, and get published in journals will be reduced. Here are some ways this happens:
1: Publish research that is easily refuted in peer review or making claims that have been refuted many times before. Basically making claims that someone who had a basic knowledge of the field could easily refute. E.g. writing a paper studying the flat earth.
2: Not following the scientific method. You have to make a falsifiable hypothesis and back that up with a lot of physical evidence to test that hypothesis. If you don't want to follow the scientific method, then don't publish scientific papers.
3: Making sloppy mistakes or being outright deceptive.

 

Republicans cut library funds and thus there isn't nearly enough money available to buy books such as the one you claim. Besides, you know that book is not well read and even hard to find. Yet you cite PAGE NUMBERS from it!! What's THAT other than a plea to be believed for no detectable reason?

Science can't address anything related to the supernatural. If you want to call that "atheist", please remember that the population of active, successful, respected scientists of all eras includes individuals who absolutely do believe there is a god (or gods).

I suspect you see atheists as pursuing science "headlong" for the simple reason that atheists aren't pursuing RELIGION headlong, like you believe they "should".

In daily life/politics what we see is constant significant attempts to assault or ignore science in any form or topic. Insisting that science be respected as a significant contributor to the decisions we make isn't "scientism" - we would have to have very serious changes in our entire population in order to get to the point where we believe and respect science TOO MUCH.

 

Dear OP. Why couldn’t an atheist simply be a sceptic of all things, including science?

 

the only way you can be skeptic is to take no position.
the moment you step off of neutral you are no longer a skeptic.

you cant be in neutral and forward at the same time,
neither can you be neutral and reverse at the same time.

to be a legitimate skeptic you must be neutral, you cant believe for and you cant believe against.

they broad stroke everything to their agenda box.

Yeh atheists dont believe stars exist
atheists dont believe gravity holds them down
atheists dont believe they breathe air

Hell they dont even believe they exist,

There's the PROOF they have 'No belief system'

We do know from this that its a fact that they dont have logic and they dont have reason. If they did have logic and reason, logic and reason would dictate and force them to believe they in fact do have a vast belief system, which would also force them to believe the position 'No belief system' in 'fact' denies reality. They are also very entertaining.

 

Fair enough, we can work with that definition of “scientism”.

I think the inclusion of the word “natural” there is, while maybe technically accurate, misleading due to how people will misinterpret it in context. I’d say science is the observation, experimental investigation, and explanation of any phenomena. After all, you don’t know what the source of something is before you start studying it.

Aren’t you doing exactly what you accuse “scientism” of there, putting a box around science and saying that it is somehow limited in what it can be used for? I’d argue against both positions and state that nothing is fundamentally “beyond science”. The only limitations are in the ability of whoever is applying the science.

Also, what exactly does any of this have to do with atheism? I don’t believe in any gods and I don’t agree with “scientism”. Not only does this contradict your title but the two characteristics are entirely unrelated anyway.

 

So you didn’t know what belief means, in addition to all the other stuff you don’t know the meaning of. Lol

Atheism by definition is not a belief system. It’s the LACK of belief in a god or gods.

 

But.... the majority of scientists seem scared of the probable implications of String Theory combined with the Law of Probability and the Cyclic Model of the Universe / Multiverse.

www.CarbonBias.blogspot.ca/

I actually do believe in evolution but I think that anybody who would dogmatically limit evolution to our four dimensional space time continuum lacks basic mathematical aptitude.

Back in the 1990's I read several articles on GUT and string theory. Later on I read Stephen Hawking's Universe. in his chapter The Anthropic Principle he speculated that perhaps there were an infinite number of unsuccessful universes out there somewhere in which was no life due to the fact that electromagnetism, gravity, weak and strong nuclear force were not properly tuned for life as we know it. It seems obvious to me that another possibility is that the first intelligent life form might be composed of energy. Probably a fundamental energy such as SuperForce or Super Energetic Matter which may be the common denominator for all four forces active in our fourth space time dimensional continuum.

13.72 billion years is roughly equal to ZERO time when compared with eternity. If fundamental energy would always have existed, as I assume Dr. Hawking seems to believe due to his suspicion of their having been an infinite number of unsuccessful universes and probably Big Bang + Grand Collapses, then if evolutionary theory could be expanded to have occurred within infinite time as opposed to limiting abiogenesis and evolution to abouit 4.5 billion years than you increase the probability of evolution being possible by essentially an infinite factor! I do believe in evolution occurring, but I suspect that perhaps 99% of evolution probably occurred before our Big Bang which was probably planned and choreographed by the Life Form/life forms that would probably be composed of fundamental energy.

Is evolution more probable to have occurred within 13 billion years or within eternity?

I must admit that these ideas about invisible higher space time dimensions sure does remind me of what many people who have a brush with death report.
http://www.near-death.com/ritchie.html#a05

 

it's called a box, everyone needs to keep inside the one that is socially acceptable for their stated identity

 

So now you are an accredited psychologist? You know what "everyone" thinks and needs? And a sociologist?

Somehow doubtful and quite a claim.

 

huh?

 

This is some dumb bullsh*t. You're peeved that your religion doesn't meet the high standard of science, so you wish to disparage science. There is no "box" around science. Your beliefs in a Jewish zombie who floated into the clouds to atone for the sin of a woman fooled by a talking snake into eating forbidden magic fruit just doesn't jive with reality as we know it.

You're free to offer evidence for your religious claims, but you can't, so rather than give up your beliefs you hunker down and accuse science of "bias."

 

You make blanket statements assuming your own authority and seem to expect that they be taken as fact. Referencing psychological and sociological arguments that you do not have the gravitas or qualifications to make.

Hence the doubt about your veracity.

 

Well for 1 a lot of psychology and sociology are bullshit.

Secondly i was suggesting that Atheists can use whatever system they wish to believe what they believe. They don't have to follow any prescribed formula. Which i think was kinda Daniel's point.
My post was to point out that even atheists have boxes that their society tries to force them into. I applaud atheists who choose mot to live in that box.

 

First, not what you said. Go back and read your own post.

Second, you seem to feel entitled to hand out permission for what others are allowed to think and believe. Hint, you are not. Thinking you do is, in your words, BS.

Third, you are the one insisting that "everyone" must live in some kind of a box. Projection, pure and simple.

In other words, you continue to espouse drivel and seem offended when called on it. Too bad.

 

You can look outside the box all you want. But without math and science, it is impossible to quantify, qualify, or demonstrate anything you believe to be true. And looking outside the box is why there are so many crackpots around today. 99.99% of the time, they are simply wasting their time and promoting nonsense.

What's more, if you aren't an expert inside the box, there is no hope for you outside the box. For most people, thinking outside the box is just mental masturbation.

 

It is also impossible to provide demonstrable proof of anything in the religious agenda or myth. So who is actually thinking outside of the box?

 

Yep, it is impossible to arrive at any definitive proof of anything. The only real disappointment I have in regards to science is that research is driven so much by money - publish or perish. Because reputation is so critical to obtaining funds, no one is willing to risk looking silly. So there is a huge bias towards ideas we already accept and discovery gets lost.

For example, rogue waves have been reported by seamen for centuries. But the scientific response was generally that known wave models don't allow for these reports. So they must be wrong. THEN, rogue waves were finally detected from space and when one hit an oil platform loaded with sensors. Lo and behold, they DO exist. So why weren't they predicted? All wave models used assumed a linear model. But wave activity can be non-linear. And the non linearity finally explained how rogue waves can exist.

So this was a simple case of a bias blinding science. They ignored centuries of reports because they made a false assumption - all waves follow a linear model.

Rogue waves are huge waves, up to 90 feet high, that seem to come from nowhere; sometimes on otherwise calm seas.

 

So atheists have to fit into your box???