Very many claims may be examined by doing just that. If I want to see for myself what the benefits of meditation are I can always try it for myself. I may then become a proponent or a rejectionist. That is not to say that meditation may be of benefit for everyone or for no-one. Perchance meditation may benefit some and not others. See?
absolutely and I agree with everything you say here. In a sense what I am saying is that this approach is valid. It is one rational approach to learning. IOW to explore something that is not currently supported by the scientific literature can be rational. In fact it is probably good for society as a whole that some inviduals are not put off by issues of coherency. Even if what they are exploring seems to contradict current science.
I notice in discussions the impression is that one should simply do some sort of coherency check and if there is little or no support, one should drop it.
The same goes for creationism as a fitting theory for the existence of life on earth. My doing a little investigation at home and even better by going out and having a serious look around at nature and geology I might well come to the conclusion that creationism doesn't quite do what it says on the tin.
Right. In a sense early scientists did a lot of what I am suggestion in relation to the orthodox religious claims.
Or not; said the fully paid up member of the flat earth society. It's the methodology of science that should be used in pursuit of understanding; truth or untruth. One doesn't have to be a scientist to discover new things or to come to conclusions about old things.
Agreed.
Give an example of something that would be cast into trash using the scientific method and then explain why trashing would be a bad thing? Is 'it just doesn't work for me' not reason enough to set something aside?
Not by using the scientific method, but using current scientific theory. Rogue waves is a good example. Sailors reported lone waves that were 10 meters in height - or somethign like that. These waves were not part of series of waves and could even come on rather calm seas. The sailors were told that they were radically exaggerating the height of the waves due to emotional distortions. Fluid scientitists and oceanographers assured them and other that the reports were false.
Then video cameras became common on the bridges of ships and damn if it didn't seems like rogue waves existed. Later satellite technology came along and, damn, you could see those damn things.
Please read me carefully here: none of this shows a problem with the scientific method. It got there, eventually. But perhaps it might not have gotten there for hundreds of years. In fact this is the case since sailors had reported these going way back.
If experiencers accepted their own experiences or, for example, ship builders did, precautions could have been taken in ship design - I mean even by Tahitians with their canoes.
Or everyone could say 'well, we don't have empirical evidence', the current scientific literature says it doesn't make sense. So let's assume those people are wrong, period.
It may be good for society as a whole to be conservative in relation to ideas - though this cuts a couple of ways, for example in relation to religion - but for individuals my argument is that it is good if they do not assume they must cast out ideas because they do not fit with current science. This includes both scientists and lay people.
We may find as we did with meditation and here with Rogue waves that what seems probably useless or impossible
may be useful (for some) and not just possible but existant.
Another excellent example relates to brain plasticity. That brains were rigid and not at all flexible what the incredibly dominant idea until the last couple of decades.
A number of laypeople and scientists ignored this AND OR explored ways of treating people - often close relatives - as if the brain was very plastic. These explorations, heavily scoffed at by the bulk of the scientific and medical community resulted in remarkable recoveries, recoveries that turned out NOT to be exceptions, but rather examples poniting to the rule that the brain is unbelievable plastic and people can relearn skills even after catastrophic brain damage.
Here again: current theory says no, this is ignored out of curiosity or desperate hope, and it turns out that current theory was wrong. Sometimes current theory turns out to be wrong. Sometimes what seems contradictory really is not. In both instances it is a good thing when people move on despite lack of support or scant anecdotal support or even outright contradiction.
It is probably good that not everyone does this, but if no one did, we would learn less. Further is has been rational to do this.
I think you are confusing incoherence with complication.
Incoherent and contradictory are probably the best words to use in this context.
I take it you're not a fan of string theory.