4 ms·

Oh okay, thanks for the response. I see more where you're coming from. I don't think I'd describe what you're talking about as "scientism", it's more just a co

Oh okay, thanks for the response. I see more where you're coming from. I don't think I'd describe what you're talking about as "scientism", it's more just a confusion about what science is. There are a lot of critiques of so-called "scientism" but they focus on the assertion that there are ways of "knowing" things that are inaccessible to the scientific process. This more or less directly implies the supernatural (since we have to leave naturalism to understand it) or trolling (which is basically what postmodernism is). Part of what you're running into in this site is that there is a political dislike of education, knowledge, and science in some coding circles. Your original comment brought out a few of them.

_yb2s 2y ago
Scientism isn’t just a misunderstanding of science- but idolization and worship of it without practicing it… turning it into a sort of religion replacement, which serves some of the same psychological roles- giving them absolute confidence/faith, freedom from anxiety, etc. I sympathize with the postmodernists and religious people here… and think we’re talking about the same thing- and literally to the same people. Someone is arrogantly dismissing something they’ve spent a lot of time on as nonsense, without really understanding what it is. The “scientism-ist” says anything they don’t understand is nonsense or a lie, unless it comes from a “scientific authority.” When I hear about a religious “truth” or similar idea, I don’t dismiss it, but try to understand what it means to them, and what its functional purpose might be. Religious truths are usually literally false- but they are not really factual claims about physical reality in the first place, but methods or psychological tools that are “true” if they work for the intended purpose. If you visualize God for prayer or meditation - you get to a certain internal state… arguing about if you can find physical evidence of this God misses the point entirely. The more intelligent religious people understand this, but don’t talk about it, because doing so makes it not work anymore for the people not able to understand it in a more nuanced way. I don’t agree that what they are talking about cannot be understood scientifically in principle- but I may agree our current understanding is too primitive, and not yet able to do so in a useful way… whereas with scientism it is either already understood by an authority- or else there is nothing of value to be understood- anything new or different is just false. Scientism admits no limits to our current understanding, nor to any possibility of future discovery other than a hypocritical lip service to supporting “research funding” or whatever. On a personal level I can accept that regular obnoxious religious zealots exist and just avoid them… but it really irks me when they are telling me that they are the real scientists and I am not, when it is what I have decided my life to.

_yb2s 2y ago

Scientism isn’t just a misunderstanding of science- but idolization and worship of it without practicing it… turning it into a sort of religion replacement, which serves some of the same psychological roles- giving them absolute confidence/faith, freedom from anxiety, etc. I sympathize with the postmodernists and religious people here… and think we’re talking about the same thing- and literally to the same people. Someone is arrogantly dismissing something they’ve spent a lot of time on as nonsense, without really understanding what it is. The “scientism-ist” says anything they don’t understand is nonsense or a lie, unless it comes from a “scientific authority.” When I hear about a religious “truth” or similar idea, I don’t dismiss it, but try to understand what it means to them, and what its functional purpose might be. Religious truths are usually literally false- but they are not really factual claims about physical reality in the first place, but methods or psychological tools that are “true” if they work for the intended purpose. If you visualize God for prayer or meditation - you get to a certain internal state… arguing about if you can find physical evidence of this God misses the point entirely. The more intelligent religious people understand this, but don’t talk about it, because doing so makes it not work anymore for the people not able to understand it in a more nuanced way. I don’t agree that what they are talking about cannot be understood scientifically in principle- but I may agree our current understanding is too primitive, and not yet able to do so in a useful way… whereas with scientism it is either already understood by an authority- or else there is nothing of value to be understood- anything new or different is just false. Scientism admits no limits to our current understanding, nor to any possibility of future discovery other than a hypocritical lip service to supporting “research funding” or whatever. On a personal level I can accept that regular obnoxious religious zealots exist and just avoid them… but it really irks me when they are telling me that they are the real scientists and I am not, when it is what I have decided my life to.