Participants: Clifford Goldstein
Series Code: CFTF
Program Code: CFTF000003
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00:20 Hi.
00:21 Clifford Goldstein here 00:23 and I want to welcome you to "Contending for the Faith." 00:27 The talk that I want to do now is called 00:29 the science of knowledge and its part of a series 00:33 I'm doing called faith and science. 00:36 And when we look at questions of science in our modern age 00:40 and how these questions relate to issues of faith. 00:45 They're quite often faith and science are in harmony. 00:50 There are times 00:51 when they are absolutely opposed to each other 00:55 that is if the science is right, 00:59 the particular issue of faith here 01:01 has to be wrong and vice versa. 01:06 Now the question then is not only which is right 01:10 but how do we know which one is right. 01:13 And how can we know that we know which one is right. 01:18 Can we really know it? Okay. 01:20 These things I admit can get rather complicated. 01:25 Nevertheless considering the importance of the issues, 01:30 it certainly well worth our time to try the best 01:34 that we can to work through them, 01:36 at least to the degree we can as human beings 01:40 with a greatly limited in our knowledge. 01:45 Now to begin, I want to look at an article 01:50 that ran in the 2013 edition in the Economist Magazine. 01:56 The Economist is a British, 01:58 is a very-- very well respected magazine, 02:02 and as you can discern by its name, 02:03 it deals with the economic things 02:05 but it deals with politics, foreign affairs, culture. 02:09 It's a very respected magazine and very, very, well done. 02:15 Anyway I was reading from an October 13, 2013 issue. 02:21 And the title of the article was 02:24 "How Science Goes Wrong." 02:28 What? 02:29 Science, how does science go wrong. 02:33 Isn't science kind of the ultimate 02:35 standard bearer of truth? 02:37 How does this go wrong? 02:39 I mean, haven't we been told all our lives 02:42 that science is wealthy way to get truth. 02:45 When something is scientific or proven by science 02:50 or comes with all the imprimatur of science. 02:53 Doesn't that sort of have all the authority 02:56 that makes it unchallengeable? 02:59 When science speaks what plea they speak out against it. 03:04 It's been for a long time 03:06 at least in contemporary society, 03:09 contemporary culture, 03:10 a sign of a lack of knowledge of sophistication 03:14 to dare to challenge the findings of science. 03:19 Well, it's fastening because recently a book 03:21 came out called "Mind and Cosmos." 03:25 Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian 03:28 Conception of Nature Is Almost Certainly False. 03:33 The problem however was the author 03:35 was not some dumb hick Bible thumping creationist 03:39 as folks who believe in the Bible 03:41 and the biblical account of origins are often depicted. 03:45 Instead, he is one of the most 03:46 respected intellectuals alive today 03:50 and so those who took umbrage at him 03:53 are daring to challenge the greatest 03:56 and greatest science couldn't easily get off, 03:59 you know, writing off the author Thomas Nagel 04:02 as some illiterate yahoo who didn't get it. 04:06 Nagel, I've read most of his books. 04:08 He's one of smartest, 04:10 deepest thinkers writing today, okay. 04:13 So what was interesting just to see how condescending 04:17 many of the attacks were on him? 04:20 Well, this was just an example 04:22 how the poor man doesn't understand the real issues, 04:25 that kind of things. 04:27 It's out of his ignorance of the facts 04:29 that he would dare to questions 04:31 something as scientifically sound 04:33 and established as the Neo-Darwinian 04:36 Conception of how we got here. 04:40 Anyway, 04:41 I'd like to maybe some day come back to Thomas Nagel 04:44 and his challenge to a purely materialist world view 04:48 which is at the heart 04:49 of the Neo-Darwinian view of origins. 04:53 And I think the point is we have been led to believe 04:55 that science is kind of a higher form of truth 04:58 or more certain kind of truth than anything else. 05:01 And I think sometimes we can have good believing-- 05:04 reasons for believing that. 05:06 Though what's important to realize, 05:08 and this is something 05:09 that I want to comeback to one day 05:12 that you can have very good reasons, 05:15 very sound reasons 05:17 for believing in things that are wrong. 05:21 Man, I can do a whole project, the whole program on that. 05:24 Stay tuned, I think I will one day. 05:27 Anyway, the point is we have an article 05:30 in a well respected magazine 05:33 talking about how science goes wrong. 05:36 And I think it's something we need to look at. 05:39 Now the jest of the article 05:41 is not science going wrong morally. 05:43 You know, we can split the atom to make a nuclear bomb 05:47 or we can make medicine that kind of thing. 05:50 That's a whole different matter. 05:51 No, the question of the article deals with is how the practice, 05:56 the result, the methods of science 06:00 that are being done shoddily. 06:04 Let me read you a quote from the Economist. 06:07 Listen to this, they were doing some studies on science, 06:12 you know, looking at how science was done. 06:15 See, "Too many of the findings that fill the academic ether 06:18 are the result of shoddy experiments 06:21 or poor analysis. 06:23 A rule of thumb among biotechnology 06:26 venture-capitalists 06:28 is that half of the published research cannot be replicated. 06:32 And even that may be optimistic. 06:35 Last year researchers at one biotech firm, 06:38 Amgen, found they could reproduce 06:41 just 6 of 53 landmark studies in cancer research. 06:47 Earlier, a group at Bayer, 06:50 a drug company, managed to repeat 06:52 just a quarter of 67 similar important papers. 06:58 A leading computer scientist frets 07:01 that three-quarters of papers in his subfield are bunk." 07:06 I mean this to me is incredible, 07:09 at least I would seen that people 07:11 who buy the popular view of science 07:13 as well kind of an exact science 07:16 should be stunned by this, should be stunned by this. 07:19 You know, it's done by a means 07:21 that we're all told it has to be truth. 07:23 I mean, what they're saying one study after another, 07:26 they could be replicated on and on and on. 07:30 So for many people however, 07:32 if you study the philosophy and history of science, 07:37 you look at things quite differently, 07:40 I wasn't surprised at all. 07:42 Even though it was still an amazing article, 07:45 even to me who has been open to these things for a while. 07:49 Let me read you another quote. This was amazing. 07:52 That's why I'd like to be one of these people. 07:54 "In 2000-10 roughly 80,000 patients 08:00 took part in clinical trials based on research 08:04 that was later retracted 08:06 because of mistakes or improprieties." 08:09 Come on. 08:10 That's 80,000 people taking part in clinical trials 08:15 based on mistakes or improprieties. 08:18 I wonder how it made those, 08:19 some of those 80,000 guinea pigs feel. 08:22 The article went on to talk about the reasons 08:25 for many of the problems in science. 08:27 And what are they? 08:29 Okay, they're competing for scarce resources 08:34 and there is as a powerful tendency to exaggerate, 08:37 the article said that exaggeration, 08:39 they talked about exaggeration and cherry-picking of results. 08:44 In science, exaggerating, cherry-picking. 08:49 How do those ideas stood in 08:50 with the image of scientists in a lab 08:53 doing everything rationally, logically, scientifically? 09:00 Also, isn't it something that-- 09:03 isn't it something that peer review, 09:05 we've often hear the word peer review. 09:08 Well, it's peer reviewed, 09:10 well, therefore don't question it. 09:13 It's peer reviewed. 09:14 Well, I mean, that what more do you need. 09:16 Well, look at what this says. Listen to this quote. 09:19 Okay, quote, this is again from The Economist. 09:22 "The hallowed process of peer review 09:25 is not all it is cracked up to be, either. 09:28 When a prominent..." 09:29 Listen to me this, this is amazing. 09:31 "When a prominent medical journal 09:33 ran research past other experts in the field, 09:36 it found that most of the reviewers 09:39 failed to spot mistakes 09:41 it had deliberately inserted into the papers, 09:45 even after being told they were being tested." 09:48 Can you believe this? 09:50 They purposely put mistakes in and they missed it completely. 09:54 This is peer review. 09:56 Oh, my goodness, I could spend an awful 09:58 lot of time on this today if I wanted to, 10:01 but I got different fish to fry today. 10:04 Anyway, I'm bringing all this up. 10:06 It's not to dirt science but it's to point out something 10:10 that people tend to forget. 10:13 Okay, and they tend to forget that in most cases 10:17 scientists stick to study the world out there 10:21 objective reality, the things in itself, 10:24 stars and rocks and birds and all that. 10:28 Who is doing the studying, okay? 10:33 Of course it's human beings, 10:37 fallible, bigoted, subjective human beings. 10:42 Science like art and like sports 10:45 and like bridge building 10:47 and computer programming and music is a human process. 10:51 It's something that humans do. 10:53 And thus it comes with all the inevitable 10:56 and inbuilt problems 10:58 that humans by the very nature of how we construct 11:01 or constructed bring to whatever we do. 11:05 And that includes our scientific study 11:08 of objective reality. 11:11 You know, if you ever study the philosophy of science. 11:16 This truth about the limits 11:17 of what humans can do comes home quickly. 11:21 Now some might ask what is the philosophy of science? 11:25 You know, we tend to think of them as the opposite, 11:27 you know, philosophy is this kind of other worldly musings 11:32 about metaphysics and first principles, 11:34 while science is kind of this nitty-gritty 11:37 getting your fingers and hands dirty 11:40 study of reality. 11:42 Well, I suppose there is some truth to this, 11:45 but it's very small almost to the point 11:48 of being meaningless. 11:49 The fact is that science, 11:52 yes, science proceeds on philosophical assumptions. 11:58 You can't separate science from philosophy. 12:02 Indeed, in a sense science is a form of philosophy. 12:09 Now I read a lot of philosophy of science 12:13 and I'm reading these books. 12:14 And then one day it suddenly hit me 12:17 as I'm reading these books. 12:19 It suddenly hit me that really all I'm reading 12:22 is I'm studying epistemology. 12:26 Now that's a fancy world. 12:28 What is epistemology? 12:30 I mean, we've heard of biology and theology and immunology 12:36 and astronomy and so forth. 12:40 And their names pretty much say what they're dealing with. 12:44 But what is epistemology? 12:47 Well, it's the study of episteme 12:51 which is from the Greek word that means knowledge. 12:56 Now we have to be very careful here. 13:01 Epistemology is not the study of what we know. 13:07 It's not the study of things like red blood cells 13:10 or how the cells feed our brain 13:12 or that the earth rotates on its axis. 13:15 Or that two plus two equals four. 13:18 No, it's much broader than that. 13:21 Instead epistemology is the study 13:25 of how do we come to know the things 13:28 that we know or say to it that we know. 13:32 It's not the, you know, it's-- when we say that it's not-- 13:37 it's the study of things like how we know what we know. 13:40 How do we know that the blood cells, 13:43 what blood cells do? 13:44 How we do know that the earth rotates on its axis? 13:48 How do know that two plus two is equals four? 13:51 Or when I say that I know that Jesus is coming back? 13:56 How do I know that? 13:58 Or when I say that I know that I have a toothache? 14:01 How do I know that? 14:03 One thing is for sure how I know I have a toothache 14:07 is quite different from how I know 14:09 that Jesus is coming back. 14:11 And that's quite different from how I know 14:13 that two plus two that equals four. 14:16 And how I know, you know, and how I know 14:18 that is different from how I know 14:20 that the earth rotates on its axis. 14:24 In each case, I am using the same verb know. 14:30 And I mean pretty much the same thing in every case. 14:34 And that my use of the verb means 14:35 that I'm sure of something that it is correct. 14:40 But in each case I know these things 14:43 in very, very, radically different ways. 14:47 The methods, the reasons, the causes, the steps, 14:50 the procedure, the justifications 14:53 that we use to know something, 14:56 very greatly in these different areas. 15:00 And see the crucial question in epistemology then 15:04 is how accurate are these different ways 15:07 that we come to know what we know. 15:09 Or come to know what we think we know 15:12 because sometimes things we think we know, 15:14 we don't really know 15:15 because they turn out to be wrong. 15:18 How do we know what we think we know is correct. 15:22 This becomes especially important 15:24 because we come to know things in radically different ways. 15:29 And the million-- 15:30 it's the million dollar question 15:32 that people have been wrestling with 15:34 since all through known history. 15:37 Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, 15:43 There is nothing new under the sun. 15:47 Think about this for a minute. 15:51 How do I know, how do I know that I have toothache, okay. 15:56 Well, I feel pain in my tooth, 15:58 that's about as immediate sensation as I can have. 16:02 But you know there's something very interesting here too. 16:06 Some would say that this is a form of knowledge 16:08 that I cannot possibly be wrong about. 16:10 I could be wrong about the reasons 16:12 why I have a toothache, too much candy 16:16 or a filling fell out or I have a chipped tooth 16:18 when I fell down last week. 16:20 I can really be wrong about my understanding 16:24 but I can't be wrong about having a toothache. 16:28 Again I could be wrong about the reasons why 16:30 or I guess I suppose I could be dreaming 16:33 or I suppose some evil demon could be deceiving me 16:37 in some way or another. 16:39 But how could I be wrong about the pain in my tooth, 16:43 whatever the immediate cause is. 16:46 I don't see how? 16:48 That is something we could be pretty sure of. 16:51 But you know that's kind of ironic 16:54 because of all the ways 16:55 we come to know truth and come to know things. 16:58 I mean, aren't feelings about the least trustworthy. 17:02 How often we are told not to trust our feelings? 17:06 I mean, feelings can be very, very deceptive, right? 17:10 How often if you had a gut instinct 17:13 your feelings would lead you astray even at the moment 17:17 when you were absolutely sure. 17:20 You were sure that your gut feeling was right. 17:23 I mean, I tell you one thing I'm glad at the men and women 17:26 who fly jet liners don't make most of their decisions 17:29 based on gut feelings. 17:32 Also, can we use our feelings other ways too? 17:36 I mean, I feel this table. 17:39 I can feel this table and it sure feels solid for me. 17:45 I mean, it sure feel-- my nerve endings touched the table 17:49 and send the message to my brain that, 17:51 that table is hard and solid, okay. 17:55 And, yet, but reality 17:57 what do we know the reality about that table? 18:00 Well, we know what has science taught us? 18:03 Science taught us that this table is mostly empty space. 18:07 The atoms that make up a part are tiny entities 18:10 and I've no idea what they really are down there 18:13 that surrounded by electrons 18:15 and they got this wide space between them. 18:18 Somebody once described that they said of something like 18:20 you had a spec of dust on the floor 18:23 and you put it in Westminster Abbey. 18:25 That's how much empty space is here. 18:27 And, yet, my feelings tell me that it solid, it's hard. 18:33 And, yet, how can I be wrong 18:35 when I say that I have a toothache. 18:37 And I came to know it because I can feel it. 18:40 In fact that would be the only, that would be the only way 18:43 I could know I have a toothache. 18:45 How can anybody else come to the knowledge 18:47 not that they have a cavity or they have my chip tooth 18:50 but they had a chip tooth they can know it only 18:53 because they felt the pain themselves. 18:55 That's one way, okay. 18:58 On the other hand, how do I know 19:02 that two plus two equals four? 19:06 I say that I know two plus two equals four. 19:10 And I can say that I know that I have a toothache. 19:14 Again I'm using the same verb know. 19:19 To mean the same basic thing. 19:21 But I have knowledge about those things 19:24 in completely different ways. 19:26 Clearly, how I know I have a toothache 19:29 is not how I know that two plus two equals four. 19:33 I don't feel that two plus two equals four. 19:37 I don't put my hand on the math equation 19:39 and all I can feel it. 19:41 Two plus two equals four. 19:43 And it sends signals to my brain and tells me that. 19:48 Yet I know two plus two equals four. 19:52 Just assuredly as I know I have a toothache. 19:56 And, yet, it's true, 19:58 I know them in radically different ways. 20:01 The equation that comes from a rational understanding 20:05 of what the number two stands for? 20:07 And what the plus sign stands for? 20:09 And what the equal sign stands for? 20:12 And what the number four stands for? 20:14 There's a certain rational and logical formula 20:18 and a logical relationship between the two 20:21 and the plus and the equals and the four. 20:24 And that causes me to say two plus two equals four. 20:28 Fair enough, okay. 20:30 That's basically how we come to knowledge, 20:33 get that knowledge, 20:34 but it's a whole different root thing, 20:35 you know, you have a toothache. 20:38 What else can I say? What else do we know? 20:41 I could say I know that the earth 20:43 is rotating on its axis. 20:45 But how do I know the earth is rotating on its axis. 20:49 I mean, it sure doesn't feel it's rotating on its axis. 20:54 And if I wanted to I could throw something up 20:56 I can do an experiment right now 20:58 or could challenge it. 20:59 I can throw a rock up in the air 21:02 and if I throw it straight up, 21:03 if the earth were rotating 21:05 wouldn't the rock go one way or another way. 21:07 Instead it falls straight down. 21:10 So how do I know the earth was rotating on its axis? 21:14 Yet, I say I know that it is, 21:17 the same way I know I have a toothache, 21:19 the same way I know two plus two equals four. 21:23 It was funny there was a philosophical 21:24 Ludwig Wittgenstein and somebody went 21:26 and said to him was mocking the ancients. 21:29 Those stupid ancients were actually thinking 21:31 the earth stood still 21:33 and the sun moved across the sky. 21:36 And Wittgenstein said, he said, well, 21:39 "I wonder what it would look like 21:40 if the sun really were moving across the sky." 21:44 Of course the point is it would look exactly the same. 21:47 But anyway how many of you listening right now, 21:50 you know, that the earth is rotating on its axis. 21:53 You know it? You're sure of it. 21:56 But you don't know what how you know 21:58 you have a toothache or a backache, do you? 22:01 Or in my case I got a broken finger ache, 22:03 'cause I got to broke my finger. 22:05 Or do you know what rationally. 22:07 The way you know two plus two equals four. 22:10 I mean, there's nothing deducted that must nothing 22:13 that follows at the earth must rotate on its axis. 22:17 God could have created the world somewhere else. 22:20 But you say, 22:21 you know that the earth is rotating on its axis. 22:25 How do you know that? 22:27 Well, that's even another kind of knowledge. 22:31 This is the type of knowledge that is revealed to you, 22:35 told to you by other sources. 22:37 And, please, how reliable is that. 22:41 I mean, come on, have you not been told things by others 22:44 that have turned out to be utterly, utterly wrong. 22:48 How much wrong information is out there? 22:51 How many people believe things, 22:54 wrong things that have been told to them? 22:56 And, yet, think about it too. 22:58 There's an awful lot we know because it's been told to us. 23:02 Where were you born? 23:04 How do you know that you have been born 23:05 where you were told you were born? 23:07 I was born in Albany, New York. 23:10 I mean, I was aware of my birth 23:11 but it doesn't do me a whole lot of good, 23:13 at least as far as epistemology goes, 23:16 I know I was born there because I've been told 23:19 and I have pretty good reasons 23:20 to believe those who told me that. 23:24 But this leads to something else. 23:27 Maybe people told you in the past things were right. 23:31 Maybe they told you those things were right. 23:34 They tell you this new thing and every time you get 23:36 or maybe somebody told you something 23:37 and every time they told you it was right, okay. 23:40 Thus you have valid reasons for thinking each time 23:43 this person told you something it was right, okay. 23:48 And maybe you do. 23:49 But maybe just because the source 23:51 was right the first time 23:53 or the first 50 times or the first 50,000 times. 23:57 Does it mean the source is gonna be the right 23:59 the next time it gives you information. 24:02 You know, we can get into all things like 24:04 odds and statistics 24:05 and someone told you something, correct 100 times in a row. 24:09 Then you would have reasons to believe 24:11 and to trust him for the 101st time, 24:14 instead if he told you something 24:15 once you have believes and the trust, 24:17 we can get into all that. 24:19 The point is there's still a chance 24:21 of what they told you being wrong. 24:26 Thus the question is, the question in all of this is. 24:31 How reliable are the means 24:34 that we come to the various ways 24:37 we know something. 24:39 And this comes back to what I said earlier. 24:43 I said, when you study science, 24:46 you were studying a form of epistemology. 24:50 It's a very distinct means of synching 24:52 to come to knowledge. 24:54 And if some would argue, it's not a really very reliable 24:59 means of coming to knowledge. 25:01 And we're gonna look at that more in our next-- 25:03 we're gonna look at that more in our next talk. 25:06 But as we close, 25:08 I want you to look at one more question about 25:12 when we look at epistemology and we look at science. 25:15 How reliable it can be because again 25:17 we look at those studies in the beginning. 25:20 They got all the scientific method, all these things 25:24 and look at all the mistakes that they made. 25:27 But see epistemology though presents a very big problem. 25:33 Let say I want to study my epistemology. 25:35 I want to come to know 25:36 how it is I know the things I know. 25:40 But that leads to a big problem. 25:44 How do we study epistemology itself? 25:49 How do we study the methods of knowledge 25:53 when they are the very things 25:54 we are using to study to begin with? 25:57 The methods of knowledge. 25:58 These are the things we're questioning. 26:01 We can study biology, we can study physiology, 26:05 astronomy, theology using various methods of, 26:10 methods of epistemological tools. 26:13 Reason, logic, our senses, revelation, 26:16 things revealed by God or humans or revealed to us 26:20 by someone else and that's all fine. 26:24 But how do we study these tools themselves. 26:28 When the tools themselves are the very things 26:30 that we are questioning. 26:32 How do we study the very things 26:34 that we are using to conduct the study itself? 26:38 If you are using reason to study reason, 26:41 you are kind of going in a circle, right. 26:44 And if you are using your senses 26:45 to study your senses then you are going in a circle. 26:49 How can you trust your senses to teach you about your senses 26:54 especially when your senses are the very things 26:56 you are questioning in the first place? 27:00 And I guess this all boils down. 27:04 I think in many ways, I think 27:07 when we look at science we have to remember 27:10 we are looking at a fallible human endeavor. 27:16 We're looking at fallible subjective 27:19 human beings with prejudices, 27:23 with their own ideas, with their own agendas. 27:28 And I think what we looked at 27:29 in the beginning shows this that 27:31 because science is a form that we said of epistemology, 27:36 it's a form of know-- 27:39 it's a way of trying to learn about the world 27:44 and it can be a very, very fruitful way 27:48 but it also can be a way filled with a lot of pitfalls. 27:52 And I think I think I can so relate 27:55 to the words of the Apostle Paul. 27:59 Because even though he was talking 28:00 specifically about faith. 28:03 It's broader than that. 28:06 He said, "For we see through a glass, darkly." 28:11 That's his way of saying we are limited in what we know 28:14 and that includes science as well. |
Revised 2015-01-08