Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Argumentative religious people often seem to comment that science requires 
> faith. Argumentative non-religious people say that's nonsense, since there 
> is evidence.  I contend that there are at least two things most scientists 
> take on faith, without supporting evidence:

> 1) That reality works substantially in accordance with measurements.

  Science doesn't claim to know the truth (unlike many religions). Science is,
more or less by definition, the study of what can be observed and measured.

  It's based on reason and logic. There's no reson to believe that reality
doesn't work in accordance to measurements. When something is measured in
different ways and all these measures give consistent (ie. non-contradictory)
results, and there's no evidence to show that what is being measured is not
reality, there's no logical reason to believe it isn't reality.

  One could argue that one doesn't have to *believe* something is reality
if all evidence seems to show that it is. It's not a question of faith.
It's just a question of reason.

  Maybe you could argue that science makes the *assumption* that measurements
correspond to reality, but as long as there's no evidence of the contrary,
there's no reason to think otherwise. Someone could argue this *is* faith.
However, it's a kind of "faith" that is based on reason, not on wishful
thinking.

> 2) Humans aren't special.
> 2A) Humans aren't at the center of the universe, in spite of everything
>      moving away from us.
> 2B) Humans aren't the first intelligent life forms, in spite
>      of the Fermi paradox.

  Well, hypotheses are not necessarily taken for fact in science. It's
hypothesized that humans aren't the first intelligent life form in the
Universe. However, it's just that: A hypothesis. The negative of the
hypothesis (ie. we are the first) is impossible to prove (to such an extent
that it would become a theory). For example the cosmological horizon makes
it physically impossible to prove it (if current understanding of astrophysics
is even remotely correct). Only the positive could be proven, if we can find
older intelligent life inside the observable Universe.

  One could also hypothesize the opposite: If there exists intelligent life
in the Universe, then some of that life had to be the first. We could as
well be that first.

> 2D) There is no advanced or supernatural entity(ies) guiding evolution, etc,
>      such that humans come out on top. (E.g., the meteor strike that wiped
>      out the dinosaurs was accidental.)

  It's not so much belief as much as observing the evidence: As long as
there is no evidence, there's no reason to believe otherwise.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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