Open mindedness

I found this to be a profoundly simple explanation of something I hadn't put much thought into before.



(Or maybe it's just more believable because of the narrator's accent.)

Perhaps he needs to be more open-minded about supernatural or non-scientific phenomena. :P

"non-scientific phenomena" is a contradiction. All phenomena that actually occur can be observed and tested, and therefore are scientific.

Quote by chemkarate

"non-scientific phenomena" is a contradiction. All phenomena that actually occur can be observed and tested, and therefore are scientific.

^^^ This. ^^^

(Gives chemkarate a big cyberhug)

And my question is, where did "non-scientific phenomena" come from? since it wasn't in the film.

He did however state that it's important to have evidence for non-scientific concepts.

Quote by kiddkasper

And my question is, where did "non-scientific phenomena" come from? since it wasn't in the film.

Was just going for the gist of what was said in the video to make a play on words.

While I agree with his definition of "open mindedness," I think some of his logic is flawed. Lots of people try to use the scientific method to quantify and qualify everything they see or experience and they try to say that because it hasn't yet been explained by science, doesn't mean it can't or won't be in the future, there for its not supernatural, its just currently unexplained. This precludes the possibility that something truely is supernatural, ie unexplainable by the natural laws that we use in science to define the natural world around us. People push for science to explain *everything,* but even science has its limitations.

o.o I hope that made sense.

Quote by NicholasJohn16

While I agree with his definition of "open mindedness," I think some of his logic is flawed. Lots of people try to use the scientific method to quantify and qualify everything they see or experience and they try to say that because it hasn't yet been explained by science, doesn't mean it can't or won't be in the future, there for its not supernatural, its just currently unexplained. This precludes the possibility that something truely is supernatural, ie unexplainable by the natural laws that we use in science to define the natural world around us. People push for science to explain *everything,* but even science has its limitations.

But surely the scientific method should be able to be used to prove that something is beyond the realm of (our current understanding of) science. Simply declaring something is supernatural or beyond the laws of nature does not make it so. Such a hypothesis needs to be tested.

I suspect the narrator would say that there is nothing supernatural. Anything that appears supernatural now is either hokum, or as yet unexplained.

There are laws in our universe. Things that we have been able to model to some degree of accuracy, in certain frames of reference. Facts that hold true time and time again. F = ma is always true (in a Newtonian frame of reference, at least). If F were to ever not equal ma, then scientists take another stab at it, and expand their model to include the new facts. (And in fact this happened with General Relativity.)

So the word "supernatural" becomes kind of an oxymoron. Nothing can exist that doesn't exist. There is nothing in our universe except what is in our universe. Sure, some things remain unexplained, but that doesn't make them supernatural. I guess we could think of the supernatural (the unexplained) as science's To Do list.

Quote by Propecius

Quote by NicholasJohn16

While I agree with his definition of "open mindedness," I think some of his logic is flawed. Lots of people try to use the scientific method to quantify and qualify everything they see or experience and they try to say that because it hasn't yet been explained by science, doesn't mean it can't or won't be in the future, there for its not supernatural, its just currently unexplained. This precludes the possibility that something truely is supernatural, ie unexplainable by the natural laws that we use in science to define the natural world around us. People push for science to explain *everything,* but even science has its limitations.

But surely the scientific method should be able to be used to prove that something is beyond the realm of (our current understanding of) science. Simply declaring something is supernatural or beyond the laws of nature does not make it so. Such a hypothesis needs to be tested.

I suspect the narrator would say that there is nothing supernatural. Anything that appears supernatural now is either hokum, or as yet unexplained.

There are laws in our universe. Things that we have been able to model to some degree of accuracy, in certain frames of reference. Facts that hold true time and time again. F = ma is always true (in a Newtonian frame of reference, at least). If F were to ever not equal ma, then scientists take another stab at it, and expand their model to include the new facts. (And in fact this happened with General Relativity.)

So the word "supernatural" becomes kind of an oxymoron. Nothing can exist that doesn't exist. There is nothing in our universe except what is in our universe. Sure, some things remain unexplained, but that doesn't make them supernatural. I guess we could think of the supernatural (the unexplained) as science's To Do list.

Yes, I agree that he'd probably say there is no such thing as 'supernatural' and that would be very closed minded of him. To a point, you are correct, but you also reassert my point. The scientific method is based on our measurable perceptions of the universe, but there are things that could/do exist outside of that universe; for example what existed before 'The Big Bang' (or whichever universe creation theory your subscribe to) or after the point of death. It would be impossible to take measurements or collect reliable data from before the Universe existed. As of yet, I've never heard of anyone returning from the great beyond with reliable data. This does not mean that either don't exist, only that their existence falls outside the realm of science.

Science is a philosophy which is predicated on a number of assumptions, that the Universe exists, that we can trust our perceptions, that the Universe follows certain Natural Laws. Those assumptions must be true for Science to be applicable. Too often, people try to apply science were it is not appropriate.

Quote by NicholasJohn16

Science is a philosophy which is predicated on a number of assumptions, that the Universe exists, that we can trust our perceptions, that the Universe follows certain Natural Laws. Those assumptions must be true for Science to be applicable. Too often, people try to apply science were it is not appropriate.

I respectfully disagree. Science is not a philosophy, it is a process, a means of learning about the universe. It is not a set of beliefs, it is a system of guessing, and then checking to see if your guess was right. Science is not on par with any belief system, because it is based not on adherence to any particular idea or set of ideas, but on skepticism of everything, including (especially) the science that has come before. The argument that a scientist believes in science in the same way a theist believes in a deity is misleading. However people may develop faith in science as their experience shows them that it is a useful system for getting closer to the truth. ("Faith" in this case is just a poor choice of words on my part. They actually develop confidence in science.)

You bring up some interesting thoughts, especially about science's assumptions. I would not say the existence of the universe is an assumption. (If it doesn't exist, none of this really matters, and we can all go back to playing STO, or rather thinking that we're playing STO.) Descartes started with cogito ergo sum, and we haven't looked back since then. (I'm exaggerating; some still challenge the Descartes' assumptions. But if you define existence as a quality which the universe possesses, you can skip this part and move on to the juicier stuff.)

That we can trust our perceptions and that there are natural laws are not assumptions. They have been tested through repeatable experimentation. Even if we can't say for sure that your experience of the color blue is the same as my experience of the color blue, we each recognize blue when we see it. And even my dog has a working knowledge of projectile motion, based on the repeatability of how a ball moves when thrown. We model the ball's path using a mathematical model (our old friend F=ma again) of gravity (and to a lesser extent aerodynamics, and other effects). We can do this (and my dog can do this) because every single time we have ever thrown a ball, it has come back to earth, following a more or less parabolic path (depending on wind).

I am curious where you think science is not appropriate. If it makes you feel better, there is some truth to the saying "science can't prove a negative." http://skepticwiki.org/index.php/%22You_Can%27t_Prove_a_Negative%22 Largely because proving something could never happen would, if you think about it, literally take forever.

There are some interesting theories that everything we experience as real is a construct, a hologram, a representation of the universe that bears little resemblance to reality (whatever that means). Our perceptions are a product of how our brains evolved in this universe. At the atomic and subatomic level, matter is mostly empty space. Yet we experience a table as a solid object. Does that make our experience of the table any less true? I don't think so. It just means we're somewhat trapped in our own limited consciousness, and our own limited brains. But we can still learn how things work within our own limited perceptions of the universe.

It's kind of like when you start playing a new computer game. You explore. Try things out. Test to see how high you can jump, how fast you can run, what this button does, how to avoid ending the game too soon. You can learn a lot without ever looking at the source code of the program, never mind the machine code. So whether our "real life" perceptions are "true" or not, we can still learn a lot, even though we're trapped in our puny human brains.

Of course, all of this is just my take on things. Obviously I love discussing this stuff. Apologies if anyone has been offended, or if I have come across as anything but a geek full of wonder.

Whew!

TL;DR - Science rocks! :)

And those two people are proof that not one is really open minded no matter how much they say they are. :P

I think that what Nick is saying basically is, Dark Matter existed before the mid 20th century, even though there was no way at that time to validate/invalidate or even suspect the concept. Souls may exist and be a quantum reality we dont as yet have the science to quantify them. Just because i cant prove god exists, wont prove that he doesnt, which is an idea that some atheist/agnostics believe.

And maybe part of what confuses the issue is our language. Here "science" is being used to mean both the scientific method, and our body of scientific knowledge--two vastly different things.

There are absolutely things that are beyond the scope of our current scientific knowledge. But does that mean they will always be? (And if so, prove it.) ;)

All I am going to say is good topic..And that I have some minor issues with science on a spiritual level :)

What I have a problem with is his explanation of open-mindedness. He claims to be open-minded, but is only open to one method of proof and belief. I think he was confusing open-mindedness with scientific proof. Many other methods of proof, logic, and reasoning exist than his particular brand of it. I don't disagree with his logic, but I do disagree that he is open-minded. The main thing from which I draw this is his want and desire to prove his friends wrong on every account as opposed to trying to understand their points-of-view. If he tried to understand them, then that would be open-mindedness.

Quote by QiqJoe

What I have a problem with is his explanation of open-mindedness. He claims to be open-minded, but is only open to one method of proof and belief. I think he was confusing open-mindedness with scientific proof. Many other methods of proof, logic, and reasoning exist than his particular brand of it. I don't disagree with his logic, but I do disagree that he is open-minded. The main thing from which I draw this is his want and desire to prove his friends wrong on every account as opposed to trying to understand their points-of-view. If he tried to understand them, then that would be open-mindedness.

**claps** Well said!!

Watching the video again, I think it's being misinterpreted. They are not saying that there's nothing out there that's unexplained. What they're saying is that people who explain something away as supernatural, rather than investigate what is really going on (or even if something really is going on), are practicing the very closed-mindedness that some of those people then turn around and pin on non-believers for not believing in their supernatural explanation. The believers sometimes "close their minds" to any other possible explanation.

My personal fear is that once we come up with a supernatural explanation of something, some people are satisfied, and stop looking for a natural explanation. If we (meaning mankind) still accepted weather gods and anthropomorphic winds as the cause of weather, we would never have developed the remarkable long-range weather forecasting and early warning systems we have today for hurricanes and tornadoes and the like.

Who's to say that scientists may not one day discover that there is some rational explanation for hauntings, ESP, horoscopes, precognition, and a slew of other apparently supernatural phenomena?

As for scientists only being open to one kind of proof, I would be interested to hear what other type(s) of proof are possible. I don't mean this as a slam against anyone, I am honestly curious. And very much enjoying the exchange of ideas!

Cheers!

I was trying to keep out of this discussion because whenever I get into this topic I tend not to make many friends, but it was just too tempting.

Just because someone doesn't believe the same things you do doesn't make them closed-minded. In the case of the moving lampshade, how was the narrator being closed-minded to his friend's theory of "ghost did it"? He found the real world cause and demonstrated it. Just because he wasn't content with the first explanation someone else provided doesn't make him closed-minded, it just makes him a good scientist.

Would you mind listing and/or describing some of these "other methods of proof, logic, and reasoning" for me?

I just have a hard time understanding why people don't like science. Science isn't something to be 'for' or 'against'. It simply is. It is a tool (or set of methodologies, for the literal minded) that we use to understand the world around us. It is true that individuals can choose to do good things or bad things with the knowledge that is gained, however this isn't a reflection on science but rather a reflection on those individuals.