TagliatelliMonster
Veteran Member
I wish you are right. But, let us be realistic. Whenever someone believes/trusts another person blindly (that is... more than himself) concerning an idea (he accepted), scientific or else, he would be a believer by faith not by mind.
Here's the thing....
The trust put in the scientific process, is not "blind".
Yous said:
"We have faith in a theory because it has been put to the test by observation and found to work."
It has been put to the test by whom?!
Standard procedure in the scientific process. Theories, by definition, are hypothesis that have been "promoted" due to them being well-tested and well-evidenced.
Theories are, by definition, the best explanations that best fit the evidence in any given field or scope.
It's how science works.
Secondly, by the technological implementations. Thus the practical applications of the theory.
Technology that is literally underpinned by said theories.
Like how GPS only works because it keeps into account the relativistic effects of orbiting the planet at high speed. If one doesn't calibrate the internal clocks to make them run at slightly different speed then those on earth, to account for the relativistic effects as Einstein's equations describe, then GPS is off by several miles.
If you don't build a nuclear reactor according to how atomic theory says atoms work, then it won't be generating workable energy.
If you don't build a nuke according to how atomic theory says atoms work, then it won't explode.
Science is extremely results based, in that sense.
If this has been done by you, in one way or another (even indirectly by using 'your' logical reasoning, for example), your belief would be based on reason, not faith.
Every time you successfully use your GPS to get from point A to point B, you have successfully tested Einstein's theory of relativity.
If your home gets power from a nuclear plant, then every time you successfully boot your computer or switch your TV on, you successfully have tested atomic theory.
The statement that people accept science on faith is only true if those people have no clue what science is about, how it's done, how we know it works,... and are just all round scientifically illiterate in every single sense of the word. And then still accept whatever a scientist says merely because (s)he views them as an authority. I would agree that such people would be accepting science on very bad and irrational reasons.
The thing is, though, I know of nobody like that.
Even the biggest science denying creationists has some rudimentary knowledge of science is done. They compartmentalize off course and engage in serious mental gymnastics to keep their beliefs intact. But one can easily see whenever the topic does not concern a science that they perceive as a threat to their beliefs, that in that case they have a pretty rational view and understand that the conclusions of the scientific process can be trusted to a fair degree.
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