There are different sources of knowledge: historical, scientific, engineering, business, philosophical, theological, etc. They work best when they work together. For example, even the best business could not construct a very good bridge if they ignored engineering knowledge. This also applies to the sciences. The natural sciences need to consider knowledge from history and engineering …
Some creationists emphasize the difference in religious/metaphysical assumptions of creationism vs. evolutionism as if this explains almost all their differences. But if that were true, creationists should focus on defending their religious/metaphysical assumptions instead of criticizing evolution. Since they do spend much time criticizing evolution, they are at least implicitly saying they have enough in common with …
In broad Aristotelian terms, this is how it happened: Aristotle articulated four types of causes — material, efficient (mechanism), formal (design), and final (purpose) — with the final cause as the most important. His biology tried to find these causes but he had to speculate about final causes and his biology failed. Fast-forward to Francil …
The first and second article of the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which was written by George Mason and adopted unanimously by the Virginia Convention of Delegates on June 12, 1776, states: That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of …
For Lakatos, what we think of as a ‘theory’ may actually be a succession of slightly different theories and experimental techniques developed over time, that share some common idea, or what Lakatos called their ‘hard core’. Lakatos called such changing collections ‘Research Programmes’. (1) Here is a description of three research programmes concerned mainly with …
Nowadays there is increasing concern for a dialogue between science and “religion” – which usually means Christian religion. The implications of science for religion are discussed in serious tones and tomes. But if there is genuine dialogue, then the implications of religion for science should also be considered. However, there is a problem at this …
