What Science Can't Prove
I've often heard that science is capable of proving anything. Is this really true? Does science have no limits to it's deductive abilities? Sadly, there are some limits to what science and the scientific method can do. Let's take a look at a few of them.
Mathematics and Logic
Science can't prove mathematics or logic. These are presumptions to the scientific method. Science presumes them to be true and has not proven them to be true.
Don't agree? Try to prove these. Take away logic and mathematics and try to prove them. Try to prove logic to be true without using logic.
The Metaphysical
Science can't prove the metaphysical. One of the more talked about metaphysical elements is the supernatural. Science deals with nature. The supernatural is outside of nature and therefore outside the abilities of science to take a look at.
The Scientific Method
Science can't prove the scientific method itself. It presumes it. How can something use it's own process to prove it's own process? It can't. To even try is circular reasoning.
Why does any of this matter?
This is a question worth asking and the answer is simple. If we are to have a good understanding of what's going on we need to know the limitations of something. To wrap our minds around something we need to know some of the ins and outs. To hear something scientific and believe it we need to know what it's based on.
Comments
#1 Good thoughts
Matt - I can't agree more with what you've written. I've been awed by science since I was a little kid (and maybe one day I'll go back and get that physics degree I always thought about). But we have to understand the limits of what science can and cannot do. Science is great at finding facts and helping us understand the physical universe. But 'facts' are not the same as 'truth' and science cannot find 'truth'. Many people either don't understand that or don't want to.
#2 Science is in reference to beliefs
Don't forget that science is in reference to beliefs. For example, the big bang model is based on the belief that there aren't and have never been any special places (over a given area) in the universe.
For the big bang model this belief defiles the boundary points (or lack thereof).
This is something we can't test and can't prove. Yet, it's just taken as a given. It's a belief that directly shapes the output of our science and what is taught to people.
Notice this is not a fact. But, it does have the title Cosmological Principle. Seems factual, doesn't it? I don't mean to debate it. I think it's just good to know the context of such things.
#3 You started with a strawman
Matt, With all due respect, you start with a strawman of your own design and then tee it up and take aim. You state the non-sequitur "I've often heard that science is capable of proving anything" and then move forward to discredit it without any basis other than desire to prove it wrong. But no one who understands the scientific method would ever state what you stated so it is indeed a strawman.
The scientific method is about using logical processes to determine what is more likely to be true and what it less likely to be true, not about determining absolute truth (that is for philosophy, but I digress. :-)
It used to be heresy to say that the Earth was not the center of the universe, but science using logic and mathematics has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is not. The scientific method is just like programming which is something you claim expertise in. You start with what you know and build from there always adding to your knowledge based upon what you've learned thus far.
And then you state that without logic and mathematics you can't prove anything; that's like saying without light you can't see anything so that proves the world around oneself does not exist!
Here's a challenge for you? If you so firmly believe that logic and mathematics are unnecessary or invalid, then I call upon to you prove your faith in that premise. Find the tallest building you can find wherever it is you live and jump off of it. I mean logic and math would tell you that would be the height of stupidity, no pun intended, but you've already disavowed logic and math, right?
#4 A few thoughts
Mike, I think you may have gotten my intent a little wrong. When it comes to logic and math my point is not to say that we shouldn't use them or that they are bad to use. I use them all the time happily. It's just knowing that they are a presumption that matters. I regularly talk to people that think that science can prove anything. Not that it has but that it's capable of proving anything. These aren't science junkies. They are your everyday average person who took science classes in grade school. I don't debate that people who know science can see the presumptions and know the limitations of the scientific method. But, there are a lot of average people that don't. And yet, they still make science assumptions based on false knowledge.
I'm not trying to disavow logic and math. Just trying to put the scientific method in it's proper place and realize where logic and math enter into it's use.
Is the earth the center of the universe. The honest answer is that we don't know. It's an assumption to say that it is or isn't. We aren't capable of viewing the entire universe. There are even a number of different theories on the universe itself and the nature of it's makeup. One theory even says that if you went in one direction long enough (though it's impossible to do) that you would loop around to the other side of the universe. Is there a center to the universe and what's at the center if it exists is something we don't know. Yeah, I can be a skeptic but we often make claims as truth (not in the philosophical sense) that are really beyond us. And, I don't like that because it's a bit arrogant in our abilities and lacks in humility to what we know and can see.
These errors on our part, especially with the everyday person, leads them down philosophical tracks in their search for truth they might not likely go down if they had an honest picture of what we know, what we don't, what we are capable of knowing, and how our worldviews affect the assumptions and conclusion. I know because I've seen it.
Does that make more sense?
#5 Scientific proof
I believe that science can prove some things to my satisfaction. I have no trouble with the explanations of inertia for instance. The problems come when science claims to disprove one thing by proving another.
Claim: There is no intelligent life "out there".
Science: There are a billion planets that can support life
Result: Nothing. Yet science fans tend to presume that there is life without evidence of it - only the possibility.
Claim: God created everything with a word.
Science: Big bang.
Result: Again, nothing. Some believe that the big bang precludes God but others say "Where did the material come from for the big bang? It had to come from somewhere! God spoke and bang it was there - no conflict."
Furthermore, our observation skills are well honed but we put faith in our instruments that is not, IMO, well deserved. Carbon dating has been questioned. The belief that layers of the earth show age are ripped apart by fossilized trees running through 20 layers.
I don't claim science is useless or that we would be better without it, but we MUST be wary when hearing things and 'consider the source' if it is based on questionable things. Remind me, does flouride in the water cause cancer this year or not? :) Science makes a lot of assumptions - some are harmless and others are not.
#6 Great Observations
You've made some great observations.
I would take this a step further. When it comes to faith in instruments that is more of a scientists having faith in instruments. For your average person who stops learning much about science after high school the faith is in the scientists and what they say.
This is a problem because so often we take what they say as truth or fact and don't look at their worldview which affects their assumptions, presumptions, and ultimately the very conclusions they are telling us. We take what they say out of it's context.
I consider science to be very useful. I just try to know how to put it in it's place and understand the limitations of what I'm faced with.
Thanks for your thoughts.
#7 John Nash proved there are problems that can not be solved
His work on countable infinities lead him to the theorem that proves not all problems have solutions.
And whilst some readers may say oh well that is just math. I assure it is not only math. Problems are problems they are all mathematical even if it is a choice between dating Julie and Jane.
#8 Re:
Science is arrogant enough to believe it can split the truth in half and find a further truth and also explain the processes of that truth.
#9 Good Post
I'm currently reading "Reason for God" by Timothy Keller
Timothy Keller addresses similar issues.
Grace and Peace.
#10 Whether we're Scientists or
Whether we're Scientists or Creationists, its still only the ultimate truth which we all seek, whether its how things works or how things are.
I do believe science is capable of finding true facts but not the total truth. How far and when will its work be done, whether on the universal scale or the sub atomic scale the work is infinite. Science is arrogant enough to believe it can split the truth in half and find a further truth and also explain the processes of that truth. Point is there's no cut off point for science, it'll continue to dig infinitly.
The science problem is it needs to know everything and every process involved otherwise the initial processes found are just teasers of the true facts. This leads science into strange subject matters that possibly dont really exist, but science still needs to know how the subject matter works even though it may not exist and sometimes these science equasions and subject matters become factual, factual in the sense that if they did not exist then science would not have found them..
#11 Not Quite
I have to disagree with you here.
First, Scientists and Creationists are two different things. Creationists are people who believe in the creation story of the bible. Scientists are are those who practice science. These two groups are not mutually exclusive. One is based on a belief system and the other on the practice of a process. In cases these two overlap. Scientists can be creationists.
But, that's not what this topic is about at all. This has nothing to do with any particular religion. It's about the scientific processes.
Now, a problem facing science does have to do with belief systems. Many areas scientists are trying to go into are areas where we have little or no knowledge on the supporting material we need to draw their conclusions. So, to fill in those gaps they are making assumptions and presumptions which they use to draw up theories.
But, the general public isn't aware of these assumptions or presumptions. They aren't taught and in many forums talking about these is attached... sadly.
Many of these assumptions and presumptions are based on naturalism and materialism. These are belief systems about the universe that go against (contradict) the belief systems of Christians, Muslims, Jews, and many others. But, they are all belief systems (including materialism and naturalism). They all contain mass things we can't test or prove.
But, to draw conclusions on lifes most intriguing questions (like why are we here and where did we come from) we have to make assumptions. Scientists do. We just don't talk about them enough. They have become a topic that's off limits... just like politics at a bar.
#12 beautiful
i love it! you put more succinctly what i have been tryign to articulate to people for a while, is that belief, is chosen,
then later rationalized. not the other way around.
science is as much a religion as any religion out there.
religion as defined by a set of beliefs.
beautiful thank you!
Charles.
#13 Science proof and evidence
Just a couple of observations;
The empirical method of induction utilized through the scientific method has, indeed, yielded a vast wealth of valuable results for humanity. Science and technology are, for example, beyond value estimation in the medical field.
However, there are places that the scientific method simply cannot go. Science cannot test history. Science cannot prove that John Hancock signed the Constitution, or that Alexander the Great lived and conquered.
Further, science cannot test mental events such as intuition, or psychological hypothetical constructs such as ambition, greed, guilt, or fear. There are sixteen schools of psychotherapy which have not been proven scientifically to be the panacea psychologists long for.
Dr. Stephen Hawkings, world renown mathematician has admitted that science cannot go beyond the first moment of the big-bang, and there is the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.
Additionally, if the supernatural does exist, science cannot be the method with which to test it. In that science cannot prove the supernatural exists, concurrently according to the Principle of Falsifiability, the supernatural cannot be falsified and refuted. We could not even imagine what this would look like from a naturalist position.
Take this in reference to the philosophical proof that one cannot prove an absolute negation, and the inductive method appears clearly inadequate to either confirm or deny any propositions concerning metaphysics. Thus, at best, the naturalist can only lay claim to a metaphysical agnosticism.
The great philosopher Bertrand Russell wrote a scathing diatribe against induction that is well worth checking out.
Something to think about...