Philosophy Discussion Forums

Its easy to theorise about what we know but in reality we know, bog all. The universe appears very adapt at hiding it's secrets, something in itself I find very strange. I think we are missing something extremely important in our observations because of preconceived ideas and scientific ideologies. A creative force to me does appear possible but not visible.

whynot: Well, it isn't really my intention to argue but to ask purposeful questions. I apologize for the length of my responses.

Please don't apologize for the length of the responses! It wasn't a criticism. I was just saying that I didn't have time to read your whole post yet, but thought I'd respond to the part that I had read. Better too much information than not enough!

And when I said "you could argue..." I didn't mean "argue" in a confrontational sense. I just meant "It's possible to make the case that...".

There. Glad I cleared that up. What were we talking about again? Oh yes, the Universe.

Xris: Its easy to theorise about what we know but in reality we know, bog all.

I think that's maybe a tad pessimistic! Of course it depends what you mean by "know". I could say that I don't even know there is a world out there. It could all be an halucination inside my disembodied mind. But I don't find that point of view very useful. I find it more useful to think that we know all sorts of things, but to remember that all knowledge is provisional.

Xris: The universe appears very adapt at hiding it's secrets, something in itself I find very strange.

I don't see why it would be strange that the Universe is hard to understand. I don't know of any law or principle stating that the Universe should be easy for humans to understand. Personally I find it much stranger that a bunch of upright apes have managed to understand as much as they have.

Xris: I think we are missing something extremely important in our observations because of preconceived ideas and scientific ideologies.

But these "preconceived ideas" are based simply on our experience of how things seem to work so far. What else could they be based on?

For sure, we can't neccessarily assume that the patterns in nature that we've discovered so far will be an indication of the kinds of patterns we're going to find in the future. But surely they're the only sensible starting point.

And I'm not sure I'd use the term "scientific ideology". An ideology is more of a blueprint for human moral behaviour. Science is just a method. Nothing particularly fancy about it. It's something we all do every day - spotting patterns in the way the world behaves and using them to predict the way the world is going to behave.

Paul we have knowledge but our perspective of the universe has not really changed for 80 years, maybe even longer. We constantly debate the consequences of our observations but the most intelligent are apparently doomed to maintaining the scientific dogmas they have adopted. For some to suggest that the accepted origin of the universe is other than their certainty is blasphemous. Science has become the new sacred bull in many cases.