Quote:
Originally Posted by Lunkwill
Yes.
I am oversimplifying and being deliberately pithy given the venue.
However, there is no denying the foundation upon which science advances is objective evidence that is assembled and verified by experiment.
I would say that there is also no denying the subjectivity that underlies, rather that IS, the nature of existence. To the extent that science disregards or poo poo's this fact -- the fact that the only thing we know for sure is that we are a subject -- it is a caricature of a rational scientific method. Yes science tests for repeatability and verifiability toward an understanding of the natural world. It is not the essence of life. And when it disregards and discounts this essence, this fact under all the other facts, it loses its bearings as to what is what.
And so when you experience something and science says in effect, "Repeat it or it didn't happen, repeat it or it means nothing" ... it has lost its place, lost its rational intent. Underneath all the objects is the subject, even the subjective experience of those objects. This is more important than, say, the atomic mass of helium (or any other testable fact).
There is much discussion that Popper's falsifiability standard is oversimplified and often mis-applied. Sean Carroll has discussed this. Science is a method and a tool: not an ultimate arbiter of what reality is. So, to the extent that the scientific method struggles with matters of subjectivity, that doesn't counterfeit the experiences of subjectivity/subject but rather is a limitation of the scientific method.
Last edited by FellaGaga-52; 01-08-2025 at 08:01 AM.