Categories
Anti-scientific stance Epistemology

See, I think Academia

is in some serious trouble. Once people start honestly fact-checking, there is very likely to be many, if not most, researchers who are in fact guilty of Academic fraud. And THAT scares the crap out of Professors!

So Academia as a whole is scared, and rightly so. Because so dang many of them took a scientific shortcut to fame and fortune. Leaving epistemological squalor in their wake.

And it’s not a new thing. No, not by a long shot. I am a psychologist. And MANY of the seminal, ground-breaking experiments at the very heart of psychology were… faked. I learned about them as a student, and taught them myself as a professor. And they were faked–the Stanford Prison experiment, Milgram’s electric shocks, lots of it. And these were bread-and-butter staples of psych 101!

But suddenly people are (rightly) becoming very skeptical. They are (again, rightly) less impressed by credentials, soi-disant expertise, and “scientific findings,” etc. MANY famous studies just can’t be replicated–and you wonder why. Well, I guess we know why now…

And it’s NOT just psychology–that is just what I personally am most familiar with. Nutrition is another area that is more than a bit sketchy in that way. Even some medical “science” is more wish-fulfillment, hide-bound-ness, fear-mongering, and profit-seeking than fact (see: COVID “vaccines”).

The solution? Honest science. Show your work. Independent replication. Time. True peer review. These things are actually in place, it’s just that they have been bastardized, bowdlerized, and corrupted.

I trust reviewed and replicated science. Humans? Not so much…

Categories
Epistemology

This is long–my apologies.

But we need to understand that “science” is a process we use to approach truth, not a subject. It is a method.

And there truly are only two (related) ways to scientifically discredit the truth-value of a statement (Sir Karl Popper). The first is to say that it really did not happen. It does not actually exist.

So that is the first principle. Reliability. Does it really happen? Is it reliable that whenever you see X, you also see Y? And so science has many ways of dealing with this reliability issue.

But there is another issue. Is what you saw what you say it was? Is your explanation or theory of the observation valid? Maybe you can reliably produce Y. OK, but does it really mean what you say it does? And THAT is an issue of logic, argument, and persuasion.

See, science is a method that is not (ideally) at all about our strongly-held worldviews. Rather, I need to compare my theory against competing ones. It is therefore impossible to assess the validity of my argument without comparing it against competing arguments. So I better not avoid those competing arguments!

Unfortunately, that is exactly what people on the Left usually do. They most often avoid logical argument like the plague, and do not have real truth-seeking intent. Their assumptions and theories are never put under the strain of logical attack.

And that means Lefties do not have access to scientific truth. They have a religion. Again, I’m not saying there is no way to get truth from religion, but it’s certainly not science.

You can say “Well, that’s just what I believe and my belief is no less “truthy” than anyone else’s!” (Aye, but the rub is that by those lights it isn’t any MORE “truthy,” either). Going down that dark path is a denial of truth altogether. Adrift on a Godless sea, so to speak. That is the basis of post-modernism. There IS no veridical Truth, only opinion. 

But Lefties, are you sure you want to go there? Because the hammer that builds Caesar’s house can also take apart Caesar’s house!

OK, so then if that is correct (that there is no Truth, only opinion) why should I believe YOU over a dog-faced baboon or some still stranger creature? (thanks Socrates/Plato)

I mean, if all assertions are rooted in a Nietzschean will-to-power and have nothing to do with Truth (because there is none), your assertions are equally empty of truth-value and a mere ploy for power!

So that Post-Modern approach is not science. It is a species of religion. No one is saying that there is no knowledge to be had in religion, I’m just saying it isn’t science. It’s a different kind of knowledge. It lives mainly in the land of “witnessing” and “testimony” rather than mainly in experiment and logic.

Again, I’m not saying there is no truth there, nor am I saying that science is the only way of getting knowledge. I am merely saying that this is not scientific truth. Science never totally “proves” anything. There is always at least a sliver of possibility that my theory is wrong. When you hear someone who is engaging in epistemological closure (<cough> Fauci <cough>) you know that they have left science behind. A real scientist does not ever say, “the science is settled.” They know that the “tails” ever approach the horizontal axis, but NEVER touch it!

Epistemological Closure: I already know and there cannot be any more knowing! Yeah, that’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this works.

Categories
Current Events Epistemology

Here’s more COVID

damage that we are seeing: The death of trust in experts. COVIDIANS can’t tell the Truth any more than a dog-faced baboon or some still stranger creature! (thanks, Socrates–though he seems to have mostly been addressing biological reductionism–still, it attaches here)

And I agree, that current thinking is mainly a result of the university focus on a jaded and cynical Post-Modern know-nothingism (though it is almost totally un-self-conscious). Because if there IS no non-meaningless fact and ALL is a Nietzschean will to power, there is no “Truth,” even in what the “experts” are saying! THAT is Post-Modernism!

Yes, the legacy of COVID is Nietzschean. Or Nihilistic, actually.

It’s not the death of God that we are facing (as Nietzsche famously argued), it is the death of trust in experts. For many, the belief in God is very much alive! But belief in experts? Eh, it has taken a bit of a hit, lately…

Categories
Epistemology

I know Buddhism

(pantheism) is kind of trendy right now, but I think it is pretty much intellectually bankrupt.

Pantheism appears to me to be just warmed-over atheism. In pantheism, god is… everything. In everything and through everything. There is no personal god. No “God with us,” as the Bible says. It is a totally impersonal “The Force,” which is no surprise since George Lucas is… a Buddhist.

But it seems be just atheism/materialism with a “The Force” cherry on top. That cherry is in no way integral to the structure of the ideology itself—it is just garnish. The structure is the same with or without the “cherry.” So it suffers from all the same logical and evidentiary weaknesses of atheism.

Categories
Epistemology Science

If you are at

all scientifically rigorous, you reject the mask mandates. Because there is no science that supports them. Yes, they may fit with your political aims, but the actual science just doesn’t support them.

The Cochrane review’s lead author, Oxford’s Tom Jefferson, said of masks in a subsequent interview with Australian investigative journalist Maryanne Demasi, “There is just no evidence that they make any difference. Full stop.”

… In fact, 16 RCTs have tested whether masks effectively reduce the spread of viruses. Not one has found compelling evidence that they do. Two have found statistically significant evidence that masks are counterproductive—that they increase the spread of viruses—probably because masks are frequently moist or dirty, and people often touch them.

…Trying to block a virus with a mask is like trying to keep mosquitos out of your yard with a chain-link fence.

…In a way, Oreskes has provided a public service with her article, as has Scientific American in running it. The article makes clear how willing mask advocates are to sacrifice scientific objectivity on the altar of their newfound religion.

Categories
Captain Obvious Epistemology

The NY Times

lies again, and gets pasted for it for once.

The NYT is NOT a reliable source! And even if you think you can just take “the true parts,” YOU have no idea what parts are true and what parts aren’t. You have no way to differentiate between truth and falsity.

You are just reinforcing your own prejudices. Whatever strokes your ego and reifies your previously obtained, strongly-held beliefs is perceived by you to be “truth.” Just admit it.

THIS is why I am a Historical Empiricist! While that may not solve ALL the conceptual problems, that approach solves many of them. At least it is not being conceptually a Post-Modern, adrift on a Godless sea–without epistemological rudder or sail, saying that there is ONLY a Nietzschean will to power and no Truth at all…

What, the NY Times couldn’t be bothered to do this work to find out the truth? Like many individuals, if a story fits their pre-judged conclusions, they will go bleatingly along with it. It’s pretty obvious that they are NOT a trustworthy site.

Categories
Epistemology Media Flying Monkeys

Understand well,

“unverified” is code for, “This is known but we really don’t want to report it.” It doesn’t apply to things they want, no matter how dubious.

Please, don’t be a dupe and fall for it! These guys often lie to you, and right as it comes out there is simply no way to know what is true and what isn’t. So here we see the problem with lying: One then never really knows if they are telling the truth or not, so the whole thing is suspect.

It’s like saying, “There’s just a little poop in the soup–less than 1%!” So tell me, do you want a spoonful?

Years ago a Lefty buddy talked about how yes, he subscribes to the NY Times but it’s not like he believes everything they say. So I asked him just how he knows what to believe and what to reject. How does one discern between what is True and what isn’t?

He would no longer be my buddy after that…

Categories
Epic fail Epistemology

People don’t trust

experts” much, anymore.

I think the trust in actual science remains high—as is right. But the trust in scientists is predictably and rightfully low now. Because those who masqueraded as scientist were actually just political whores, selling themselves to the highest bidder who agreed with them.

Uh, that’s not science…

No wonder people don’t believe them anymore. Science doesn’t lie. But many scientists sure do!

Categories
Epistemology

It seems perfectly

obvious to me that a materialist worldview quickly deteriorates into a nonsensical infinite regress.

If ALL there is is materialist cause-and-effect, if A caused B and B caused C, etc. then we follow the chain back to the FIRST case (let’s say, A) and say, OK, I understand the train of causation, but what caused A? You can’t just stomp you foot and say, “It’s turtles all the way down!”

It’s like (Neo) Darwinian evolution: It might explain the survival of the fittest, but not the arrival of the fittest! It is intellectually shabby in the extreme to just shrug and say, “It must be turtles all the way down!”

As philosophers have long noted, there MUST be something that started all of this. There must be an “unmoved mover.” THAT must of logical necessity be something (or someone) with Free Agency–their actions were NOT caused by anything–the actions arose ex nihilo from the being itself!

It other words, it was creative. Like a symphony or a painting or a poem. It sprang from from a rational agent. Sure, I can create an AI program to look at great music and from that extrapolate to other stuff through brute force, but then that is not creative in any sense of the word. It is just complexly derivative. In fact, it can’t be otherwise!

Categories
Epistemology Liars

THIS is why

people have no trust of people in authority anymore. There have just been too many lies…

From politicians to medical personnel, who do you trust anymore? Trust in groups of people have been shattered. The ONLY thing left is faith in a personal relationship. You generally have to know a person to have trust in them. And you only know them through interactions with them.

You have to know that they are telling the truth. It’s necessary for them to be a truth-teller in order to have confidence in what they say. A fun-house mirror gives you NO confidence that your hat is on straight! So personal honesty becomes paramount. Beware of people who are unreliable mirrors!