Aiming to maximally annoy Bettina (Bettina wrote:And I just hope in the year 2006 I don't hear the words "Faith" and "Science" in the same sentence.
), I thought I'd start a thread about science and faith.What is the essence of science? And what's the essence of faith? And how do they relate to each other?
My own thoughts:
I've seen a lot of definitions for science, and I think actually the best is the one I got in 7th grade. Science is a method--observation, deduction, hypothesis, and experiment. Lather, rinse and repeat. It's a good basis for universal knowledge on topics where the underlying principle "what has always happened will continue to happen" is warranted.
Science is one of several valid tools for obtaining knowledge. I can think of a couple others: logic, intuition, and revelation. Some quick definitions: By logic, I mean valid deductions or strong inductions from other known facts. By intuition, I mean instinctive or subconscious thought processes which you can't examine because they aren't available to you; feelings. By revelation, I mean learning information from an authoritative source.
My approach to knowledge is a "toolkit" approach: use the right tool for the topic or problem. Different subjects yield to different tools for different reasons.
Science yields probabilistically reasonable knowledge and works best on unchanging systems of universal laws which can be approached bit-by-bit through decoupled experiments. Physics is ideal for science because the elements and fundamental equations are (by and large) simple and unchanging, and the exceptions can be found bit by bit. Sociology is less ideal because people are capricious, complex, and changeable--so your conclusions through scientific study come out shaky and uncertaion. Mathematics is bad to study through science because although its laws are unchanging, its nature is so complex and infinite you can't really learn anything interesting through experiment. An equation might very well work a thousand times and fail everywhere else--math is like that. Human relationships are categorically bad to study through science as they fail in every category: they are complex, unpredictable, changeable, and hard to experiment on.
Logic provides completely secure (or sometimes probabilistically secure) knowledge in systems with known or solid axioms. It helps a whole lot if the axioms are simple... It's ideal for studying math because they axioms are secure. It's also pretty good for studying computer software from source (for example, tracking down bugs) because your axioms are also pretty secure (by comparison, science is good for studying computer software by behavior). Logic is really bad--like, virtually worthless--for studying systems where your axioms are even the tiniest bit unsecure. Science approaches problems bit by bit, so even if you don't have the whole picture, you have some little pieces you can trust. Logic, on the other hand, is an all-or-nothing affair. An axiom caves, and the whole thing does; there's no "close". And unfortunately, most of the real world involves topics with insecure axioms.
Revelation is good for topics where you have a reliable, authoritative source. It's the best tool for studying human beings. If I want to know what my husband likes for dinner, intuition will probably fail me (he may have quirks that defy my hunches), logic is completely useless, and science will take a long time. But asking him works great! Revelation's also good for topics that take a long time to independantly verify: what's going on in New York (check the paper) or how chemistry works (do I really want to figure it out from first principles? Nah, I'll check the textbook). Your revelation is only as good as your authority (so it works best where you have an absolutely authoritative source, so for such questions as "what's your favorite color?"), and relies on accurate comprehension of what the authority says.
Intuition is best for topics with which you have a past familiarity or reason to believe you have a psychological compatibility with. Sometimes it's all you've got when you can't use the other tools, and it's a springboard for the others. It works well for shared human experience--deciding what sort of music will sound good to your audience, or judging what a particular sort of person will do. It works terribly for complicated or unfamiliar things, and has the major flaw that it's by no means secure knowledge and always a guess.
All methods of obtaining knowledge are secure under certain circumstances and insecure under others. I trust my scientifically derived laws of Descent physics; I don't trust what intuition would tell me. I trust my intuitive sense that if I fly around that corner I'll die; I can't access the problem through logic. I trust my logical deduction that if I'm holding three smart missiles, the other guy can't have any (unless they've duped); I don't have access to revelation. I trust the revelation that the other guy's joystick is messed up when he tells me; I can't scientifically study the problem because it's a distant one-time occurance.
So for me, science is a method, and one of several valid methods for discovering truth.
As a side comment, one of the things I've seen people put into a definition of science is one of subject matter. Some people say science is the study of the natural world. I disagree with this. I think science is a method that you could turn to any topic--with varying degrees of success. I'm definitely doing science when I study Descent or Nethack physics, and that isn't the natural world. And you can try on other topics: I once saw a study to determine if people in hospitals who were prayed for (without their knowledge) recovered better. That's attempting to study religion with science, and if you get something conclusive and repeatable... that works.
Switching gears, faith...
Faith has a couple of different definitions. Two interest me here: the everyday sense, and the Christian sense.
In the everyday sense, I would say faith is the opposite of skeptecism. It sometimes has the bad reputation of "believing something on no evidence." I'd say rather it's "deciding the evidence you have is sufficient." In this sense, faith and skeptecism are both intelliectual virtues and vices which need to be held in balance: the hard-core skeptic believes nothing, however obvious and well-justfied. The wide-eyed faithful believes anything, however dubious. There are some people who make an intellectual virtue out of skeptecism, but that really depends on your epistemological goals. If you want to absolutely minimize false belief, that works, but if you want some balance between false belief and true belief, you're going to have to have some balance of faith and skeptecism. I think the best habit is to have faith in what seems reasonably warranted for the purpose you want to use the knowledge for, but be willing to change your mind. You tell me in a friendly game that you're joystick's broken, I'll believe you--the evidence of the revelation is sufficient for the application. On the other hand, if for some reason I had a lot of money or maybe a descent carreer riding on your broken joystick, I'd weigh heavier on the skeptic end, and probably ask for pictures and secondary witnesses.
Closely related (so closely I'm not sure it isn't another side of the same thing) is the Christian sense of faith. I'd define this as "Continued belief in what you know to be true, despite emotional opposition or the passage of time." Faith in this sense is opposed by irrational doubt, ignoring things that are not "present" to you, or... you know, I'm not sure what the force is. Lothar calls it "forgetfulness". It's the same force that makes me stay up late even though I *know* I'll regret it the next day--ignoring things I know to be true which I don't want to be true or which I'm not experiencing right this minute. Faith in this sense is an out-and-out intellectual virtue, and the more of it you've got, the better.
I've also heard faith defined as "Acting on what you believe." This has elements of the two other definitions--it's deciding the evidence you have is sufficient not only to warrant belief but to warrant action. It's also continuing to believe in it despite possibly scary consequences. It's in this sense that my boss might say, "I have faith in you to represent us at this meeting"--the evidence he has of my talent and nature is sufficient to warrant that; it's something he's willing to believe even when he isn't present to see it.
Some biblical examples of faith -
People who came to Jesus to ask for healing and believed he could heal them were often praised for their faith. This combines the elements of action and justified belief in the face of risk.
The disciples--having just witnessed Jesus feeding thousands of people with bread from nothing--later bickered among themselves worrying they wouldn't get lunch, and were chided for their lack of faith. They would have been justified in the belief that Jesus could provide for them, but they did not continue the belief with the passage of time, or (erroneously) didn't think the evidence of having seen thousands of people fed by Jesus warranted the belief that he could provide for them.
Or a classic example... Peter both seeing Jesus walking on water and having been called by Jesus, and now walking on the water himself... looks at the waves and begins to sink. And is chided for his lack of faith. This is justified belief being overcome by emotion!
So, what do I think the relationship is between science and faith?
I would say science is one of several tools for generating evidence. Faith is an intellectual characteristic that governs how you use evidence. Therefore, I would say science and faith are both essential pieces of rational thought. Where it applies, science founds faith.
Also, since the question is easy to miscast as, "what is the relationship between science and religion?", I'll answer that one too. I'd say science is a tool that can be used to study religious questions. It's not the best tool because the spiritual is inaccessible and impossible to quantify, and God is a free and unpredictable agent. But you can use it to help with some questions, such as the nature of subjective religious experience, or the impact of prayer on the world.
Woot, I haven't written a long post like that in a while. I know half of you won't read it, but that's okay, I like to read what you have to say. Um... discuss.
