The other article in Sunstone that I wanted to address was Dennis Potter's. (Note that these pdfs typically are only up for a month - so don't be surprised if it doesn't work) It's an interesting essay, trying to analyze the whole DNA debate between critics and apologists. Blake Ostler had an interesting letter in this very issue. (I had linked to that early last week, but the pdf has been taken down) While I think Dennis raises some interesting and often important points, there are also some places I'd probably quibble.
First up is Dennis' digression into scientific realism. For the record I don't think one need be a scientific realist to argue that DNA evidence either does or doesn't pose a problem for the Book of Mormon. Indeed, contra Dennis, I honestly don't see the connection at all. I think that scientific empiricists who see reference as tied to phenomena and not "things" wouldn't change the debate at all. Neither would instrumentalism or even the more complex sense of truth that one sees in philosophers like Heidegger. I should also say that scientific realism says little about whether scientific statements correspond to "the way the world is." Rather scientific realism says we are converging on such statements and that science is always progressing in a positive way along this direction. I think all scientific realists would accept robust fallibilism towards scientific theories.
What Dennis really wants to get at is whether knowledge claims in science are trustworthy and should hold a higher epistemological status than most other knowledge claims - especially relative to DNA evidence and the Book of Mormon. Now I actually do think this. But I think this is quite a different issue than scientific realism. Further even in science not all arguments are equal. So contrary to simply appealing to a fixed value to scientific statements, each statement has to be judged in the context of the evidence supporting it. For instance claims about gravity for regular matter seems epistemologically much stronger than say more speculative claims regarding cognitive science. Both are science, but they have differing values.
It seems to me that the realism issue is a bit of a red herring.
The second issue, which Dennis calls logical realism, is the issue of whether assertions in one context can be meaningfully translated into a different context. That is, the problem of translating statements. I think Dennis is right about this. The problem is that the language of the Book of Mormon simply isn't a scientific language. So translating from the one language to the other is fraught with problem (by either side) and tends to be highly speculative with likely some terms being untranslatable. This has long been the criticism of LDS apologists: that critics assume the Book of Mormon can be easily, and unequivocally translated into scientific language. I think Blake Ostler is right in that the real debate is over how to read the Book of Mormon and consider references. The fact that there are so many reasonable and supported readings seems to undermine any argument that rests upon an unequivocal reading.
Now Dennis' appeal to scientific realism is really more the question of whether we use words purely to refer in a correspondence way. That is if language lacks metaphor and figurative nature. Yet even in American culture (which is far less metaphoric than near eastern cultures) we use a tremendous amount of metaphor. Translating language to a kind of quasi-scientific set of purely referring propositions is difficult. Even without metaphor language is ambiguous. Add in metaphor and things get messy quickly. I'm not sure this is really an issue of correspondence though but rather just the fact that natural languages aren't an ideal referring language in a one to one relationship with reality the way perhaps Aristotle dreamt of.
Dennis' solution is a "materialist philosophy of language" that focuses in on language use more than finding words in a one to one relationship with reality. Unfortunately it appears to me that Dennis is almost arguing by use not the use in the Book of Mormon but by average readers. There is some validity for this since critics of the Book of Mormon on DNA do appeal to "average readers" to understand how the Book of Mormon refers. However it seems the fundamental problem is not the problem of translation (as I think Dennis is treating it) but rather just the fact readers don't determine the meaning of a text. Reader response interpretations are interesting, but not necessarily terribly helpful for the kind of questions that I think people want to ask. That's not to deny Dennis' point, just its relevance.
Dennis argues that there is no way to determine if DNA evidence contradicts or is compatible with the Book of Mormon. I'm just not convinced that is so. While I think the translation issue is somewhat speculative and ambiguous I do think we can at least arrive at a range of readings that probably translate the text into scientific language. While we may end up with a situation where we can't determine an answer (due to conflicting readings) it may well be that all readings end up with a case of compatible or not compatible. While we must be fallible about our interpretations, I think Dennis is arguing that the problem is greater than I see.
Allow an analogy. My context and the context of anyone reading this are quite different. Arguably there will be a translation problem. The potential for radical misreadings is always present. Yet we typically still manage to communicate to some degree. Further when people with no background in science talk about events, most scientists can typically translate them into a sufficiently scientific language so as to understand what they are referring to. To make an analogy, a person with no background in auto-mechanics can tell the mechanic about their car problems and it is quite possible that the mechanic will understand them. Translation sometimes is problematic. We've all probably explained a car problem that leaves the mechanic scratching their head. But what is interesting is how often we are successful.
Some discourses are difficult to translate. Dennis brings up Genesis. Typically these discourses are hard to translate because we have at best only fragmentary contexts. That makes translation very speculative. But is the DNA issue one of those? The underlying issue is what populations were present, how the mixing took place, and how labels refer. There are many ways to read the text - some compatible with science and some incompatible with science. My own position would be that if we are attempting to falsify the text, we can't merely pick the readings incompatible with science. Rather, we have to take the strongest case, which would be the readings compatible with science.
The links have changed. Blake Ostler's letter is available here.
My opinion is that this essay was, unfortunately, a bit disappointing. Potter's working with some interesting ideas, but this statement of them comes perilously close to being what Vogel criticized in the last article you discussed, Clark: we have different readings of the text and different assumptions, so we can throw away the evidence.
Many of the points of question and doubt with respect to the DNA evidence will probably erode as new techniques which provide different kinds of data are developed. No collection of evidence will ever be able to evaluate the hypothesis that Lehi and company came from a subgroup at Jerusalem that was culturally and biologically utterly distinct from the surrounding society and that has been completely purged from the Jewish population. But if we resist such an extreme construction, we have to accept that anthropological, archaeological, and biological evidence will eventually allow an answer to the question of whether people in any particular place might possibly be the Lamanites. The current position, in which it's plausible to reasonably believe either perspective, probably can't last forever -- and indeed may not last another generation.
Let's put this another way. If a tribe in Mesoamerica had turned up which had the Cohen genetic signature at a high rate, would we still want to reject DNA evidence as really not a meaningful view of the Book of Mormon? Or do Mormons adopt this position only because the current state of the evidence is negative but not yet decisive?
If a tribe in Mesoamerica had turned up which had the Cohen genetic signature at a high rate, would we still want to reject DNA evidence as really not a meaningful view of the Book of Mormon?
I certainly would, and there are very good reasons to do so. Scientific validation of religious practices and beliefs are nice, they give a warm fuzzy feeling to the believer, but they should not shape the religious belief or practice.
A perfect example is the Word of Wisdom. Mormons are fond citing the health benefits of the Word of Wisdom as use it as a reason for living the Word of Wisdom. The problem is that the health benefits of living the Word of Wisdom are somewhat cloudy. Moderate alcohol drinking seems to be neutral or even somewhat beneficial to health. Coffee/Tea drinking is pretty much the same. Then you get things like eating wheat which is usually beneficial to people, but for persons like me with diabetes, eating lots of wheat has detrimental effects (corn seems to be healthier for me, so I guess I'm more ox than man (D and C 89:17)).
The point of all of this is if you based Word of Wisdom living on science then you would be justified in drinking wine and coffee. Since the Word of Wisdom still is doctrine one must conclude that although science is nice, it should not influence religious beliefs or practices.
David, I think the WoW and the historicity of the Book of Mormon are fundamentally noncomparable issues. We live the WoW because we think it's a commandment and because it's a communal norm. You're right to say that scientific issues are beside the point. If Potter had applied his ideas to the WoW revelation text instead of the Book of Mormon, I would probably have no concerns at all.
But Book of Mormon historicity is a claim that has both a religious dimension and an empirical one. The claim that a real-world tribe of Lehites lived in the Americas and wrote a book about their experience of God that was miraculously translated can be taken in different ways. It can be treated as a purely spiritual claim in which the actual existence of Lehites is tangential to what we really care about, which is the text. Only on this account does your WoW comparison work, in my view. Or it can be treated as a religious claim built on the historical-scientific claim that Lehites actually existed. That historical-scientific claim is somewhat underspecified (where did they exist? how many were there? what, exactly, did they look like?) but not entirely devoid of potential empirical content, given the right technological developments.
In effect, to extend the idea that "although science is nice, it should not influence religious beliefs or practices," we would have to conclude that we don't care whether there were empirical Lehites or not. I'm willing to make that step, but I've found that Dennis Potter, in particular, and many other Mormons, in general, are not.
Roasted Tomatoes,
Your distinctions don't hold in my opinion.
You say that Book of Mormon historicity makes religious and empirical claims, while the Word of Wisdom text doesn't. The WoW does make very strong empirical and religious claims: And all saints who remember to keep and do these sayings, walking in obedience to the commandments, shall receive health in their navel and marrow to their bones; And shall find wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures. Seems to make both types of claims.
You also say that WoW is different because it is a commandment. Well obedience to a commandment is nothing but acting in accordance with religious beliefs. Both the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon and obedience to the WoW both have as their basis religious belief. Since they have the same basis then the criteria used to judge them should be the same, which was the original point of making the comparison.
I'd have to agree with RT. I think the WoW issues are more related to the meaning. We're asked to do it and I don't see a whole lot of obvious evidence that it makes any testable claims. Even if coffee and tea were completely beneficial with no side effects we're still asked not to partake. I see it as fundamentally a covenant issue. Further the history of the WoW in the 19th century tends to affect how we view it.
Certainly there are some cross over issues. And I don't mind people who look for evidence of the health benefits of the WoW - so long as they don't go off the deep end as we find in books like A Marvelous Work and a Wonder.
The Book of Mormon is different since it makes historic claims that appear to be testable. Yes, one could always argue that its historicity wouldn't matter and it could function religiously the same if it were fiction. I don't buy that for a moment myself.
I'd add that the scientific or at least scholarly inquiry with respect to both the Book of Mormon and the Bible changes how we read those texts. As it should. So there is a definite hermeneutical affect and that in turn changes religious practice. (As it should, in my opinion)
The more I thought about the more I have concluded that there can be no scientific test of the Book of Mormon at all. The reason is that in science one does not talk about God, angels, or visions. They are simply not allowed in any way, for any reason, in scientific discourse. Yet, one cannot talk about the genesis of the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith without invoking all of them. As believers we cannot have it both ways. Either the Book of Mormon is scientifically testable and we throw out the first vision, Moroni, Urim and Thummim, etc. or we keep those and accept the fact that science has nothing to say about the Book of Mormon.
As an example think of what would have happened if Albert Einstein presented the theory of relativity just as it is now except that he also said that he found it on some gold plates and that the "E" and "m" in "E = mc2" are both created ex nihilo from God. What would have happened? Well after sending Albert to therapy scientists would have taken out the parts about God, gold plates, and ex nihilo and given the world the scientific theory of relativity. And they would be right in doing so. Albert would rightly claim that the new theory of relativity is not correct because many important parts were excised. Scientists would rightly claim that the new theory is scientific and ignore Albert. In fact the only scientific thing to say about Albert is that he was either delusional or not telling the truth.
My point is this, if you are going to seek for scientific validation of the Book of Mormon you can't in good faith (pun intended) say certain parts are open to validation scientifically (like DNA, horses, chiasmus etc) and others involving gold plates, visions, and heavenly messengers are not. It's simply not fair to science to a priori say investigate some things, but not other things. Any decent scientist would balk at the restrictions and refuse to investigate the Book of Mormon.
I realize that the obvious retort to all of this is that I am making an all or nothing argument. I fully concede that I am. I am saying that because once you start a scientific investigation you have to permanently assume up front that Joseph Smith was either crazy or a liar. I am not willing to assume either of those.
I'm not sure I really count history or even anthropology as science. But it seems to me that if we found some ruins talking about Nephites, with quasi-Hebrew artifacts that would be fairly compelling evidence for the Book of Mormon. Now I don't expect to find that, for several reasons. So I'm not sure I can agree with you here.
I just realized that I may have given the mistaken impression that scientists can't or shouldn't investigate Book of Mormon claims. They can do whatever they want. As believers it is just irrelevant. Since a believer will discount scientific evidence that goes against beliefs, an honest believer should also discount scientific evidence that affirms his/her beliefs.
But it seems to me that if we found some ruins talking about Nephites, with quasi-Hebrew artifacts that would be fairly compelling evidence for the Book of Mormon. An honest scientist would simply conclude that people of Hebrew origin lived in America. It would in no way affirm that Joseph Smith was right, because remember in a scientific investigation he is a priori either loony tunes or an incredibly lucky liar.
But should a believer discount scientific evidence that goes against their beliefs?
I suppose this goes to the meaning of faith. Is faith essentially irrational ala the Kierkegaard mold or is faith tied to evidence? I clearly favor the later.
I'd disagree with you on the Book of Mormon issue about finding evidence for Nephites having no evidential weight to the text of the Book of Mormon.
David: It seems to me that your take on the interaction between scientific evidence and believers is way too simplistic. First the believer ought to take a careful look at how reliable the scientific evidence may and what the implications of accepting a particular theory of such evidence may be. I agree with Kevin Christensen that there is no such thing as bare scientific evidence -- there is only imbedded evidence or evidence that has meaning within a theory-construct. So the believer will also see if having a believer's construct will alter the way we assess the evidence and the possibilities that such a believer's view may open for more adequate theories which account for the believing stance. So sometimes evidence ought to persuade the believer to reassess beliefs and see if the belief structure itself is called into question (an external rather than an internal question). I imagine that many have changed their view of Genesis in light of the evidence from geology, biology and so forth (and it seems to me that it is incumbent on us to do so to account for the evidence). I can also conceive of evidence that falsifies beliefs. E.g., the belief that Christ will come in power and glory to rule and reign at a specifically prophesised point in time can be falsified if he doesn't show up as predicted. The notion that the earth was created out of nothing 6,000 years ago is falfied by evidence of geology and animals that lived millions of years ago on the earth.
It also seems that your stance that if I accept science I must throw out visions (a la Vogel) assumes that all that exists must be accessible to our five senses -- yet that is both spiritually and scientifically false. While faith does not require scientific validation to arise, faith may have eyes to see what non-believers don't -- both spiritually and scientifically. There are pretty good arguments that the advancement of science required faith in the natural order of things endengered by a certain view of Christianity and certainly within Mormonism.
One of the things that makes science as exciting as it is is the search for common ground that allows for meaningful tests of quite different perspectives. If two frameworks can develop similar enough understandings of what is at stake, then really meaningful empirical information can be generated that will tend to change the direction of future scientific development. But this can only happen when people within the two competing perspectives work together long enough to figure out where the points of common a priori understanding are. In the context of Book of Mormon studies, this will involve people from a critical perspective eventually taking limited-geography ideas more seriously, while it will probably also involve advocates of limited geographies eventually staking a claim to specific regions or cities. Once we reach that point, then empirical evidence on the ground will start to count in a comparable way for both sides. As it is, the evidence is at best probabilistic and suggestive.
By the way, even spiritual things can eventually be falsified. I believe that my efforts at a faithful life will lead me to be happy in the next world. If I show up there and find myself tortured by red, long-tailed demons with pitchforks, then my faith will have been disconfirmed by evidence, no?
Hi there, it's me, the guy from the bottom of the dogpile.
Clark,
But should a believer discount scientific evidence that goes against their beliefs? Yes, and discounting scientific evidence is a common thing. Scientists discount evidence all the time, so if they can do it, why can't we? Not all studies are taken seriously, some are dismissed out right, methodologies are questioned, entire research careers are questioned, some evidence is discounted for no other reason than that it would kill too many sacred cows among scientists.
Is faith essentially irrational ala the Kierkegaard mold or is faith tied to evidence? No, there can be rational belief based on subjective evidence (Moroni 10:4-5). There can also be faith based on unscientific rational thought (Aquinas etc.). The dichotomy between scientifically informed rationalism and Kierkegaard is false.
Still at the bottom of the dogpile, whew, did everyone use Dial this morning?
evidence ought to persuade the believer to reassess beliefs and see if the belief structure itself is called into question Fine, there are no things like visions, gold plates, and God. Science dictates this up front. Please reassess your beliefs after considering those scientific facts. (speaking as a scientist here, not as a believer)
that all that exists must be accessible to our five senses -- yet that is both spiritually and scientifically false I agree with you on the spiritual part, I disagree on the scientific part. Once you leave the realm of empirical data you leave science. I don't really think that is even arguable. You can twist and turn the definition of what science is and does to accommodate your personal desires, but you haven't changed how science operates.
faith may have eyes to see what non-believers don't -- both spiritually and scientifically Yes, but the faithful would not be doing science as it is currently practiced.
There are pretty good arguments that the advancement of science required faith in the natural order of things I never said that scientists don't have faith in their own methods and assumptions. Scientists take things on faith (sans empirical evidence) all the time. However, that doesn't impact my argument at all. In a sense they do take it on faith that at least for scientific purposes there is no God, angels, demons, visions etc. If you want to argue that science and believers have mutually incompatible faiths then I can buy that.
RT,
By the way, even spiritual things can eventually be falsified No argument from me that spiritual things can be falsified. In fact the Mormon doctrine of continuous revelation implies that some things which are taught as doctrine will at a later time be shown to be false, inaccurate, incomplete etc. However, this is not dictated by science, but by further revelation.
One of the things that makes science as exciting as it is is the search for common ground that allows for meaningful tests of quite different perspectives. I guess I learned my science differently from you. I may have gotten a bad scientific education. This is entirely possible having been educated at California public schools and BYU (a double whammy if I ever saw one). Science is exciting because it is supposed to find objective truths. If people want to talk about common ground and different perspectives then fine, but the point of science is to find objective truth, which implies that only one of the perspective will be shown to be true and the common ground will be annihilated. That is assuming that people aren't arguing the same theory without knowing it. The only case I can recall for this happening was Heisenberg and Schroedinger having what seemed like different formulations for quantum mechanics which were eventually shown to be mathematically equivalent.
As it is, the evidence is at best probabilistic and suggestive. If you want to inform your faith based on things which by your own admission are merely probabilistic and suggestive (i.e. tentative, possibly wrong) then by all means do so. I would prefer to go with something a little surer.
DC: It is pretty clear that by "science" we understand different things. You seem to equate science with "positivism," or the view that only that which is verifiable empirically can be accepted as having meaning. What I mean by science is the scientific method as one means of searching for what works. I see no reason why a Latter-day Saint couldn't employ the scientific method as one means (among others) for searching for truth. However, I agree with you that if science is understood as positivism we have very good reason to reject it (basically those reasons I argued with Vogel earlier on this site). However, even then science goes well beyond our senses. The pure mathematics of phyical theories based solely on mathematics, for instance, isn't based at all what we learn from our senses and virtually every branch of science goes beyond merely what is delivered by our senses whenever we place what we know in the context of a theory (as we always inevitably do).
Yes it is pretty clear that by "science" we do mean different things. You are arguing for a more expansive view of science than I am. The problem with the more expansive view is that it is not how science is currently practiced today. You simply cannot allow as explanatory principles in science that which cannot be empirically tested.
I am not arguing for positivism. I am not a positivist. I am fully aware of what positivism says is meaningful, and I disagree with it. I am simply looking at how science is practiced and has been practiced for the past century; I am not trying to look at what is meaningul. Please point out in common scientific practice how God, angels, etc. are invoked as explanatory principles and I will most definitely change my mind. Please point out a scientific paper where an appeal to scripture is accepted as a valid point.
Science does not go well beyond the senses. The example you cite is actually fairly instructive in this matter:
The pure mathematics of phyical theories based solely on mathematics, for instance, isn't based at all what we learn from our senses
Actually it is. Any new physical theory must successfully explain everything that Newtonian mechanics, quantum mechanics, and both relativity theories does or it will be rejected. It must take into account ALL empirical data which led to the creation of these other theories. If string theory did not reduce to Newtonian mechanics for large objects moving at slow speeds it would properly be rejected. So it is very much based solely in empirical data. Now these theories do make predictions that we cannot currently test. These are predictions pending emprical testing and are thus speculative and tentative. Any scientist would agree to that. They will only become theory and not speculation when they have been emprically tested. Any theory that a scientist produces which is a priori incapable of testing will be rejected as unscientific. This is why God, angels, etc. are banished from science, because a priori you can't test them.
I think this is a fair account of how science is practiced. Now I do know that many people want to expand the definition of science. In fact I think there are some psychological reasons that many Mormons want to do so, mainly so that they can go around talking about scientific and historical evidence of the Book or Mormon. This is so that they are not seen as a bunch of illiterate polygamous hicks living in the flyover country known as Utah (not my characterization, but that of others). A second reason is to attempt to satisfy intellectual yearnings that are not yet available to them and which would be better satisfied elsewhere for now. I am sympathetic to these reasons, especially the second. However, before you try and change the definition of science you must change scientific practices. If you don't, you haven't accomplished anything.
David, like Blake, I don't think what you describe is science but is more positivism. Even positivistic conceptions of science haven't been taken that seriously for quite a few decades. I don't think this is so much as "expanding the definition of science" as you suggest, as it is arguing that the definition of science has to line up with the historic record.
While I've urged caution in uncritically appealing to Kuhn, it does seem to me that he introduced a process of historicism into philosophy of science that has been very influential. I tend to think that this undermines the ideal view of science you suggest.
I unfortunately don't have time to debate the grounds of science - and don't think philosophers of science agree upon them anyway. But what you suggest just seems wrong.
I'd also add in the issue of Mormon materialism and seriously question your assertion that "God, angels, etc. are banished from science, because a priori you can't test them." While I think that is metaphysically true of many religions I certainly don't think that true of Mormonism.
Just to add, you might like this post by Hugo Hobling. That's a pseudonym. He's actually a very well respected philosopher of science. Be aware, while he writes very interesting stuff, he's also more than a little testy. I'd probably not comment on his posts.
Just to add, in case there is perhaps some confusion between us. I think I'd agree with most of what you say as a practical matter of the evidence and scientific attidue right now. But I've been talking more theoretically about how the scientific community would react in the future with other evidence. I'm not anticipating such evidence to arise any time soon.
I think I'd agree with most of what you say as a practical matter of the evidence and scientific attitude right now. That's been my whole point, look at what scientists are saying and doing today. It doesn't matter what science may have been or what it might become later. If one wants to argue that it should go in a certain direction, that's fine, but that's a separate argument.
As to Mormon materialism that does put Mormons more in line with scientific attitudes, but it doesn't solve the testability problem. God, angels, etc. are uncontrollable and unmeasurable variables. To put it bluntly, you can't ask God for a urine sample, even in Mormon theology.
I read the Hobling post and I did arrive at one conclusion. The term "philosophy of science" is about as meaningless as "philosophy of religion". I say that because what do Mormons, Catholics, Buddhists, Hindus, and Muslims have in common to philosophize about? Likewise, how much do physicists and sociologists share in the way of methods and theory? His argument that one needs to take into account social as well as physical sciences under one all encompassing banner is difficult to digest.
Thanks for clearing that up. I think we're talking apples and oranges. I'm speaking about science in general while you are speaking of the attitude of the scientific community right now.
With regards to angels and so forth. I agree there are testability issues, but no worse than with other agents. I was more just arguing about whether there is an a priori issue regarding them. To me the fundamental issue isn't metaphysical or even physical, it is practical.
To me the fundamental issue isn't metaphysical or even physical, it is practical. Once again, we are in agreement. That was the point of the off hand comment about the urine sample (ducks while lightning passes over head). There is nothing physically preventing God from engaging in that act, it's just never going to happen. From a testability perspective if something can never be tested it doesn't matter whether the barriers are practical, physical, or metaphysical. By a practical barrier I don't mean that it costs too much or takes too long (or some variation on that theme), just that although physically possible, it will never happen.
DC: I agree that our knowledge of angels isn't based on scientific methodology -- but it seems to me that a person can comfortably live in both worlds (science and religion) by recognizing that science is limited in what it can address (it cannot address e.g., the depth of my love for my wife, or whether there are truly minds and what they may be or what the nature of subjective experience is -- or how a free action is possible). William James's essay on The Dilemma of Determinism is particularly enlightening in this regard it seems to me. I don't view psychology as a real science because its subject matter doesn't seem to me to be subject amenable to scientific method (and I'm a psychology and neuropsychology major). Neuroscience is fine, but we are not able to predict behavior and the vast majority of human experience just isn't amenable to the scientific method -- but that doesn't mean that it isn't useful where it can be applied.
but it seems to me that a person can comfortably live in both worlds (science and religion) by recognizing that science is limited in what it can address I agree 100%. The disagreement is in where we demarcate that which science can address and that which science cannot address. However, since we are at least clear about where everyone stands it is a somewhat satisfying end to the discussion.
The question of whether psychology is a science is an old one. I've actually moved from being anti-psychology as science to accepting more of it. I still think there's a lot done under the rubric that I'd have a hard time calling science. But I'm much more favorable now than I was 10 years ago. I had a debate with Brandon over social science and while I'm even more negatively composed towards social science than psychology, I'd have to confess that at least elements meet my personal criteria. I've gotten interested in cognitive science of late as well and while there is a lot there rather speculative and not really scientific, it seems there is a lot that is quite scientific.
I just wanted to thank everyone for the discussion. I have tried very hard today to understand all of the points which disagreed with me and the result was this post. I am sure that I got everything wrong in the post, but I'd like to think that I have become more sympathetic to the positions contrary to mine.
I've closed comments in order to avoid spam since I don't check this older blog as much anymore.
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