The trap of dogmatic skepticism

[James R]

Magical Realist:

Wow....you lie so much now that it's almost become too easy to expose you.

Perhaps you will recall the two recent, specific, friendly warnings I gave you about making unsupported allegations.

In post #81, I wrote: "Don't make accusations you can't begin to support. If you're going to accuse me of lying, bring the evidence of my lies. You're on very thin ice. Watch your step."

You ignored my good advice, there, told several more lies and then, in post #93, directly accused me of "flat out" lying, again without providing any evidence of any lie from me.

In post #94, I noted: ".... once again, you have made an allegation that I have told a lie, which you can't begin to support. But you have no shame, because troll." The implication there was probably too subtle for you. I was suggesting that you might want to consider stopping your trolling and your false accusations.

Not unexpectedly, neither piece of advice made any impact on you. Three strikes and you're out.

So, now you have 2 weeks to think things through, again. With all those warning points you've accumulated, better think carefully. You'll probably have to wait for some to expire again before the next round of blatant trolling, won't you? Otherwise, it could be bye bye to this forum from you, permanently. And neither of us wants that, do we? Is 77 accumulated warnings starting to get through to you at all? Clearly, although you play the village idiot, it looks like you can control yourself well enough not to actually get yourself booted from the forum permanently. At least, so far. I assume you'll want to try to keep repeating the pattern. Remember what I said, though: when you do leave permanently, it will be a surprise to you. Your leaving, ultimately, will be due to your choices, so it's not inevitable - just looking very likely. Maybe you can do better that this, but based on past performance, I suspect you won't.

Which means all 5 agree in their accounts exactly as I said. If I was referring to Fravor, which I wasn't, that would've made six.

You shouldn't tell lies. As I told you at least twice, Fravor disputes the claims from your 5 radar guys that Men in Black removed the radar data. It's right there in that article you keep linking to. Surely you read it? Why tell a lie that is so easily exposed? That's not good trolling.

Once again you are clearly lying.

You should not make accusations you cannot support. In this case, your accusation is refuted by easily-accessible facts that anybody here can verify for themselves. This isn't clever trolling, Magical Realist.

Or else lacking in reading comprehension.

Says the troll who is unable/unwilling to respond to just about any substantial objection to his claims. Insults aren't a substitute for honesty and integrity, Magical Realist. Maybe give honesty a try. You'll feel better about yourself, I promise.

I'm not going out of my way to repost something you are childishly claiming I never posted. I simply refer you to post #83. Apologies? I doubt it.

Post #83 does not contain the lost radar data. If you are claiming you posted that somewhere, this ain't it. I say you don't have the lost data and you haven't seen it. Try calling me a liar about that. I dare you.

LOL Doesn't sound like I'm the one getting riled.

You were right to be nervous. Were you worried that you were overextending yourself with this particular round of trolling? You were right. You crossed the line. You're getting sloppy.

You know, you could avoid the stress if you just posted honestly. Maybe give that a try when you come back. Just a suggestion.

There is currently more video and photo and eyewitness evidence for ghosts, bigfoot, and uaps than there is for black holes or the Big Bang.

It sounds like astronomy might not be within the compass of your particular expertise. If you had to make a list of "evidence for black holes" or "evidence for the Big Bang", would you even know where to start? I don't get the impression you would. Maybe get the other guy who used your account for a while to post about the Big Bang. He seemed to know a little science. The troll who runs the account most of the time doesn't seem to have the first clue about how science is done.

Now, I'd better address the actual claim you've made, because I tend be be honest and so address points that come up, rather than ignoring them like you do.

I don't for one moment think you have actually made any effort at all to try to estimate the likely numbers of photos or videos that might possibly include evidence for the big bang or black holes, let alone for ghosts, bigfoot or alien spaceships. Therefore, I think you are just making shit up, with your claim here. If not, I'll be most interested to hear about your methodology for making the required tallies. (This is the last we'll hear about this from you. I'm right, aren't I?)

But let's suppose that, by some miracle, you're not telling lies about having somehow tallied up the total numbers of photos and videos, and you have legitimately found that there are more videos that mention ghosts than ones that mention the big bang, say. What follows?

Are you going to assert that a mere quantity of photos, videos or anecdotes about a claim increases the likelihood that the claim is true? Suppose I count up the number of posts on social media, and the number of videos and the like, that claim that Biden stole the 2020 election (i.e. that Trump really won and the election wasn't legitimate). Suppose there are more of those than ones that say the election result was correct. Then what? Is this a popularity contest? Is the truth to be decided on the basis of the number of clamouring voices in the rabble?

As a troll, you pretend not to recognise that quality often matters as much - or more than - quantity. A mountain of poor and low-quality "evidence" is nothing compared to a small pile of high quality evidence, carefully collected and collated.

So just going by empirically confirming data, believing in those is more scientific than believing in the latter.

Unfortunately, you slipped up. You used the word confirming.

But you're just pretending that some evidence or other has confirmed the existence of ghosts, or bigfoot, or alien spaceships, aren't you? Because, in actual fact, you know that there is no consensus on whether any of those things are real. More than that: the expert consensus is that there is no compelling evidence for such things.

None of that stops people on the fringes believing that such things are real, course. But you're smarter than that. You don't believe it any more, do you? You just pretend like you do, and act the clown.

 

[James R]

The term "Dogmatic skeptic" is an oxymoron.

Of course it is.

I'm glad you looked it up and we're now in agreement.

 

[Pinball1970]

There is currently more video and photo and eyewitness evidence for ghosts, bigfoot, and uaps than there is for black holes or the Big Bang. So just going by empirically confirming data, believing in those is more scientific than believing in the latter.

MR is taking a break but I must reply to this. There is solid scientific evidence for the big bang. We can be certain that there was a rapid expansion of a very hot dense region of space, possibly infinite region, 13.8 Gya.
Same with black holes, first indirectly, then via the Event Horizon project. Webb since then.

Unless I was under a rock at the time, no such confirmation has occurred with ghosts or Bigfoot.
I am fine that people have picked up images and videos that are not identified. Not identifying something in an image does not equal anything sinister, alien or supernatural.
Since those things have never ever been confirmed, we reserve the right to assume the sightings are natural till they are confirmed.
Possible solutions to UAPs? astronomical, meteorological, satellites, rockets and other military devices, civilian aircraft, drones, balloons, kites, birds, Chinese lanterns, hoaxes, mirages, optical illusions and hallucinations.
We call this approach Occam's razor, why jump to a conclusion involving something never confirmed, when a much simpler well documented explanation is in your hands.

 

[exchemist]

I'm glad you looked it up and we're now in agreement.

It may be worth recalling what oxymoron means. It is, literally, sharp stupid. In other words a seemingly silly contradiction that in fact conveys a point. It is thus not a synonym for self-contradictory.

 

[Pinball1970]

It may be worth recalling what oxymoron means. It is, literally, sharp stupid. In other words a seemingly silly contradiction that in fact conveys a point. It is thus not a synonym for self-contradictory.

That is exactly what I thought it meant, a contradiction. I stand corrected.

 

[Yazata]

I encounter many posters all the time whom I would consider dogmatic skeptics.

The notion of "dogmatic skepticism" is an oxymoron.

Can you provide any kind of convincing argument that it's an 'oxymoron'?

It seems quite apt to me, and clearly applicable to a number of participants on Sciforums.

The entire philosophy of Skepticism, as a movement, is to avoid being swayed by dogmatism. Skeptics want to believe in true things for good reasons and to reject false things that other people believe for bad reasons.

Certainly what MR wrote contradicts our militant "skeptics" self-image of themselves. (They perceive themselves as the intellectual knights in shining armor, tireless warriors against stupidity and bullshit.) But is that self-image really accurate?

The problem as I see it is that these "skeptics" seem to believe that they already know going in which are the "true things" and which are the "false things" ("woo"), prior to any discussion. They already seem to believe that they have reality more or less figured out.

So in effect, the whole purpose for their movement is to attack, ridicule and hopefully to silence anyone who takes seriously the real possibility of whatever they don't believe in and dismiss as 'false things'. Hence, the dogmatism aspect, the desire to enforce one's own set of beliefs on others.

 

[James R]

Yazata,

Can you provide any kind of convincing argument that it's an 'oxymoron'?

You mean something you are going to find convincing? I don't know. I'm thinking probably not, given that you seem to have chosen to side with the trolls on this sort of thing.

It seems quite apt to me, and clearly applicable to a number of participants on Sciforums.

You think? Then please enumerate which of the skeptical positions I have publicised on this forum you consider to be "dogmatic", and explain why.

Before you start, let's refresh out memories on what 'dogmatic' means. The word is derived from 'dogma', which, grabbing the nearest dictionary definition, is defined as:

1. A religious doctrine that is proclaimed true without proof.
2. A doctrine or code of beliefs accepted as authoritative. [again, a lack of justification seems to be implied]

Hence 'dogmatic':
1. Characterised by assertion of unproved or unprovable principles.
2. Of or pertaining to or characteristic of a doctrine or code of beliefs accepted as authoritative.
3. Relating to or involving dogma
From a couple of other sources, I also find:

'dogmatic':
4. inclined to lay down principles as undeniably true.
5. given to or characterised by the expression of opinions very strongly or positive as if they were facts. [my emphasis]

Yet another source puts it less formally:
"If you are dogmatic, you are certain that you are right and everyone else is wrong."

The dictionary definition that I've found that most closely approximates my own use of the term is this one:
"If you say that someone is dogmatic, you are critical of them because they are convinced that they are right, and refuse to consider that other opinions might also be justified."

That's a double-barrelled definition. For something to be dogmatic it must involve two elements:
(a) The person expressing the opinion must be convinced that their opinion is correct; and
(b) The person expressing the opinion must refuse to consider that their opinion could be wrong and that somebody else's opinion might be justified.

In regards to (b), I would say that merely paying lip service to the existence of other opinions cannot save somebody from the accusation of being dogmatic. To avoid the accusation, one must be open minded enough to give careful consideration to other opinions.

Bear in mind that a person who is dogmatic must have a dogma, which I would define not merely as a code of beliefs that they regard as authoritative, but one that, in addition, they assume is true and correct without suitable justification. The definitions above do not fully capture this last element that I, personally, would require to consider 'code of beliefs' a 'dogma'. By the way, there's another clue right there. A 'dogma' is not merely a set of beliefs. It is a code of beliefs - a system of beliefs that usually has some sort of self-consistency, but which cannot be justified objectively. The idea is that you have to become a 'believer' in the code or belief system first, before you decide that it is 'authoritative', 'undeniable' and functionally equivalent to a set of 'facts'.

Probably, at some point in the near future, you're going to try to argue that Science is a dogma, because it consists of a 'code of beliefs' accepted as authoritative. That would be a version of the tired old "Science is a religion, too!" line. It's a mistake. The "authority" of science is a pragmatic one. It is not predicated on having a religious-style faith in the unproven/unprovable. We have confidence in science because it "works", provably. Besides, every scientific claim and 'law' is provisional. Every one of them is amenable to possible disproof at some future time. Science operates on the assumption that anything we think we know could turn out to be wrong. That's the opposite of dogma.

So, with all that in mind, please explain your conception of 'dogmatic skepticism' to me. Feel free to reference my own positions, as stated on this forum, to support your case, if you wish.

Certainly what MR wrote contradicts our militant "skeptics" self-image of themselves.

It contradicts the notion of what being a skeptic entails, by definition. Since you describe yourself as a skeptic, I'll leave it to you to define skepticism and try to differentiate between the admirable and justified skeptic you believe yourself to be from the "militant skeptics" you seek to criticise.

You might like to tell me why you consider me to be one of the "militant" ones, too. Go at it. I suspect, though, that your objection will amount to little more than you don't like skeptics who express their opinions in a forthright manner, because you personally have a soft spot for the woo peddlars and because you are inclined to think there might be some truth to some of their dogma. We "militant skeptics" should pander to the delicate and fragile sensibilities of those who have cherished dogmas that you sympathise with. Am I right? A free pass to the trolls, but hold your fellow skeptics to a higher standard? Or are we "militant" types not allowed to share your own lofty skeptical pedestal?

(They perceive themselves as the intellectual knights in shining armor, tireless warriors against stupidity and bullshit.) But is that self-image really accurate?

It's a tough job, but somebody has to do it. Especially in the current American climate, critical thinkers find themselves awash in a vast sea of unreason, deliberate lies and claims to "alternative facts". Somebody has to speak up for rationality and clear thinking.

 

[James R]

The problem as I see it is that these "skeptics" seem to believe that they already know going in which are the "true things" and which are the "false things" ("woo"), prior to any discussion.

I call this Yazata's Big Lie. The bit about "prior to any discussion" is just plain bullshit - a repeated lie knowingly and deliberately told.

They already seem to believe that they have reality more or less figured out.

Pragmatically, to make our way in the world, we all have little choice but to act as if we have reality "more or less figured out", in many ways. Sure, hypothetically we could all be completely deluded about the 'real' reality. If we're all brains in jars, or there's only you and all the rest of us are concoctions of your singular mind, then we've all got a lot of our assumptions about 'reality' fundamentally wrong. But this is a problem that is unsolvable. We can never hope to know the 'true' nature of reality. We can only ever confront the reality that presents itself to our senses.

Science has always been pragmatic about this stuff. Science seeks to describe the world as it appears, to the best of our ability. We seek to match our models to what we can perceive and measure. If there's "supernatural" stuff that can't be measured (which would include the guys running any brains-in-vats lab, if we're part of that sort of thing), science doesn't much care. It's untestable. Unfalsifiable. An interesting problem for the philosophers, but not something that seems to have any impact on our experience of "reality".

On the other hand, science does pay attention to new stuff that might have impacts on the "reality" we can perceive and measure. So, science pays attention to UFO reports, because it's conceivable that alien spaceships are real, even though we haven't seen any so far. Science pays some attention to claims of ESP, because who knows? Maybe someday we'll find some evidence for that. Science pays a little attention to ghost reports, but so far has turned up nothing unexpected. And so on and so forth.

So in effect, the whole purpose for their movement is to attack, ridicule and hopefully to silence anyone who takes seriously the real possibility of whatever they don't believe in and dismiss as 'false things'.

There's nothing wrong with "attacking" dubious claims. It's what science does as a matter of course. The beauty of science is that it has robust self-correction mechanisms built right into its methods. Any scientist with a new hypothesis expects that their hypothesis will be put through the wringer and subjected to the most robust "attacks" other scientists can come up with, before it is accepted as a verified addition to the corpus of scientific knowledge. As Feynman said, scientists should be careful, before anything else, to make sure they aren't fooling themselves, because, as he noted, yourself is always the easiest person to fool. If you don't apply skepticism to your own beliefs, you can be confident that - sooner or later - somebody else will come along who will.

You mention ridicule. It's actually fine to ridicule things that are ridiculous. The idea that we should baby people who hold ridiculous beliefs for bad reasons, and who then try to publicise those beliefs to seek converts to a dubious dogma, is counterproductive, unless your aim is to try to bring down the "reality-based establishment" or something.

You also mention silencing people. But where is that happening? Is there, or is there not, a plethora of dedicated organisations, internet sites, publications, media, etc. that promulgates the woo endlessly? Some people make careers and earn big money conning the gullible into believing in various dogmas that have no basis in reality. I'm sorry, but I just don't see anybody being silenced - apart from the occasional fraudster whose especially egregious lies and/or cons are uncovered by the very kinds of critical thinkers you're working to try to bring down.

Hence, the dogmatism aspect, the desire to enforce one's own set of beliefs on others.

Where's the enforcement? What are you talking about?

 

[Yazata]

MR is taking a break but I must reply to this. There is solid scientific evidence for the big bang.

Reading that, I wonder what work the words "solid" and "scientific" are doing there. Are they just honorifics that serve to make some evidence seem cooler than other evidence? Or is it something more substantial?

We can be certain that there was a rapid expansion of a very hot dense region of space, possibly infinite region, 13.8 Gya.

'Certain' as in 'not subject to question or doubt'?

I don't actively doubt the reality of the big bang, but I don't accord it 100% certainty either.

It's based upon various observations (red-shifts, cosmic microwave background radiation etc.), along with various items of theory. The point being that nobody has actually observed the big bang, scientifically or otherwise. Instead they have inferred it. And inferences are only as strong as their premises, none of which is 100% certain or indoubitable in this case.

Unless I was under a rock at the time, no such confirmation has occurred with ghosts or Bigfoot.

I'd wager that there is a vastly larger body of observation reports for ghosts than for the big bang. Certainly for unexplained apparitions, if we don't jump to conclusions as to what they were.

Of course, little of that body of observation reports would seem to qualify as "scientific", which does suggest to me that the word 'scientific' is serving as a generalized epistemological honorific, since little of this has anything to do with the actual contents of physics, biology, geology or whatever science it might be.

I am fine that people have picked up images and videos that are not identified. Not identifying something in an image does not equal anything sinister, alien or supernatural.

True. But if the images seem to display what appear to be anomalous characteristics, then one can start to draw inferences that whatever the images depict might arguably have actually possessed anomalous characteristics. Not with any degree of certainty, but with a certain amount of plausibility.

Since those things have never ever been confirmed, we reserve the right to assume the sightings are natural till they are confirmed.

I have no objection to that, so long as one acknowledges that it is an assumption and not an item of knowledge.

Possible solutions to UAPs? astronomical, meteorological, satellites, rockets and other military devices, civilian aircraft, drones, balloons, kites, birds, Chinese lanterns, hoaxes, mirages, optical illusions and hallucinations.

Perhaps. Though it might be difficult to shoehorn one of those in, in such a way that it accounts for all aspects of a complex anomalous case. (Behaviors described by multiple expert eyewitnesses, radar, photography etc.) It probably does suffice for many of the less problematic cases. Hence the triage process I referred to earlier, to separate out the more challenging cases.

We call this approach Occam's razor, why jump to a conclusion involving something never confirmed, when a much simpler well documented explanation is in your hands.

Of couse the goal there is to find the (simplest? Least ontologically extravagant?) hypothesis that actually fits the data. We can't start dismissing data because it doesn't fit whatever hypothesis we happen to be most comfortable with.

 

[James R]

If I may...

Reading that, I wonder what work the words "solid" and "scientific" are doing there. Are they just honorifics that serve to make some evidence seem cooler than other evidence? Or is it something more substantial?

The word 'scientific' is there to distinguish evidence collected using scientific methods from other possible kinds of alleged evidence. For instance, the scientific consensus that there was a big bang does not rest on any 'evidence' from supposed eyewitnesses or on mere anecdotal or mythical stories handed down from past generations.

The word 'solid', as a qualifier to 'scientific evidence' means that the totality of the evidence is generally considered by experts in the relevant fields to be of very high quality. The implication is that the alleged evidence has been subjected to a range of scientific checks and balances, that are designed to exclude low quality (or 'insubstantial') evidence while retaining high quality or 'solid' evidence.

'Certain' as in 'not subject to question or doubt'?

Everything in science is subject to questioning and doubt. See where I explained the provisional nature of all scientific theories, just a post or two above, for instance.

I don't actively doubt the reality of the big bang, but I don't accord it 100% certainty either.

Nobody does. But all the solid scientific evidence points towards the conclusion that it happened.

It's based upon various observations (red-shifts, cosmic microwave background radiation etc.), along with various items of theory.

The observational data is consistent with certain theoretical models. What happens, in practice, is that some models predict a big bang and others (e.g. the 'steady state' theory that was popular for a while) do not. The collection of all relevant observations made so far have been found to overwhelmingly accord with the predictions made by the big bang theories; they do not accord with the predictions made by the steady state theory. For a while there, the steady state theory was considered a viable model that should be taken seriously. Eventually, the observations were sufficient to falsify that theory.

The point being that nobody has actually observed the big bang, scientifically or otherwise. Instead they have inferred it.

The observation that there was a big bang is different from the observation that the sky is blue (to pick an example more or less at random). The later is directly observable with unaided human senses. The former is a conclusion that relies on a consensus built from multiple lines of indirect observational data. In both cases, however, the science is in the degree to which the predictions of a particular theoretical model match what the observations tell us.

Merely noticing that the sky is blue is not (yet) doing science, although that observation is indispensable for getting the scientific ball rolling. Mostly, the science comes during the attempt to explain what makes the sky blue.

And inferences are only as strong as their premises, none of which is 100% certain or indoubitable in this case.

Hence the 'solid' qualifier to the words 'scientific evidence'. What is being said is that the inferences, in the case of the big bang, are very strong. They are inferences that, these days, science makes with high confidence. It was not always that way. Scientific ideas tend to start as mere tentative hypotheses, put forward hopefully but in the realistic expectation that disappointment is likely.

I'd wager that there is a vastly larger body of observation reports for ghosts than for the big bang.

Like Magical Realist, I think you're mincing words there, to some extent. Which way the pendulum swings will depend, to a large degree, on what you want to count as an "observational report". If, for instance, you refuse to count non-contemporaneous observations as evidence for the big bang, then there will be precisely zero observational reports of the big bang. At the other end of the scale, it can be argued that all astronomical observations so far seem to be consistent with a big bang, and there are an awful lot of those observations.

What we probably want here is some middle ground. But then we need to have an argument about what it means for an observation to support a theory. What sorts of observations count as support, and what sorts do not? Have you given any thought to such matters?

Certainly for unexplained apparitions, if we don't jump to conclusions as to what they were.

Your use of the word 'apparition' is already putting your thumb on the scales.

Of course, little of that body of observation reports would seem to qualify as "scientific", which does suggest to me that the word 'scientific' is serving as a generalized epistemological honorific, since little of this has anything to do with the actual contents of physics, biology, geology or whatever science it might be.

Huh? You're going to argue that physics, biology and geology are not 'scientific'? How?

 

[James R]

(continued...)

But if the images seem to display what appear to be anomalous characteristics, then one can start to draw inferences that whatever the images depict might arguably have actually possessed anomalous characteristics. Not with any degree of certainty, but with a certain amount of plausibility.

The idea that a particular image might be depicting something with 'anomalous characteristics' is not an inference; it's a hypothesis. Presumably, certain features of the image are supposed to lend weight to the likelihood of the hypothesis being true. If so, then those elements need to be weighed against the predictions of competing hypotheses - in this case, all the hypotheses that say that the image does not depict an actual 'anomalous' thing.

It's not clear whether you're talking about a cursory initial examination of an image here, or inferences that can be justifiably made following detailed analysis of the image. Sure, it's fine to put an image to one side after an initial glance, with the thought that the image looks unusual or unexpected in some way and therefore seems to be worthy of further attention. But at this stage, in the case where you're unable to identify the elements in the image (i.e. what it's an image of), there's no justification for claiming that whatever the thing in the picture is, it must have 'anomalous' characteristics. All you can say, initially, is that something in the image has managed to capture your attention, because you can't identify it as a known thing, yet. The image is 'anomalous' (out of the ordinary), but you can say very little about whatever it's an image of, because by your own admission you haven't reached any conclusions about that yet.

Perhaps. Though it might be difficult to shoehorn one of those in, in such a way that it accounts for all aspects of a complex anomalous case.

There is regularly an assumption that multiple observations must all have just one common explanation. In practice, it turns out that multiple observations often have multiple, separate, different, explanations.

A very common error among UFO enthusiasts, for instance, is to assume that if eyewitness A reports seeing a light in the sky at location X and eyewitness B photographs a light in the sky at location Y and A's report concerns events that happened around the same time (a vague criterion) that B took his photograph and the geographic locations of A and B are not too widely separated (another vague criterion) then A and B must have observed the same thing. Clearly, though, this is not a conclusion that a rational person ought to jump to, without further supporting evidence.

I'd wager that some UFO cases seem more puzzling than they actually are because of this common assumption that multiple sightings occurring close enough to one another in time and geography (whatever that means!) most likely represent sightings of a single object or phenomenon, when as a matter of fact they do not.

Pilot A, looking down from his aeroplane, spots a mysteriously-looking thing near the water below. Then it 'disappears' (is lost to pilot A's view, which could happen for many reasons). Then, 30 seconds later, Pilot B, in a different aeroplane flying 20,000 feet above A's plane, spots a mysterious-looking thing in the distance, which he judges to be near his own altitude. If the reports of the two pilots are all we have, clearly it would be wrong to conclude, without more evidence, that the thing pilot A saw suddenly flew up 20,000 feet in 30 seconds, demonstrating immense and 'impossible-seeming' acceleration, to be spotted by pilot B. It remains an open possibility that A and B saw two different things, until and unless this is refuted by suitable additional evidence.

Of couse the goal there is to find the (simplest? Least ontologically extravagant?) hypothesis that actually fits the data. We can't start dismissing data because it doesn't fit whatever hypothesis we happen to be most comfortable with.

Carefully cherry picking the data tends to be something that the True Believers do far more often than any skeptics. Very often, the True Believers have their hearts set on a particular hypothesis from the start and they will ignore evidence that tends to falsify the pet hypothesis. In many instances, they will also quickly draw unwarranted inferences from the available data.

 

[Pinball1970]

Reading that, I wonder what work the words "solid" and "scientific" are doing there. Are they just honorifics that serve to make some evidence seem cooler than other evidence? Or is it something more substantial?

It looks like James has got here first and I read his opening but no further so apologies if there are repeats. No tricks or coolness intended with "solid" or "Scientific." What i meant by those words here meant methods and level of certainty.
Einsteins theory yielded an expanding model even though he did not believe it himself.
Observations then started to support it in the 1920s.
Subsequent observations during the last one hundred years, using state of the art instrumentation by 1000s of scientific teams globally, have confirmed the BB and features of it.
For instance some of Euclid's scientific data has just been released this month. It continues. There is consensus that there was a BB.
If you went to court and gave evidence it would not be scientific, it would be what you saw and heard in real time. Both are evidence but only the forensic guy who comes after you would be giving scientific evidence.

 

[Pinball1970]

The point being that nobody has actually observed the big bang, scientifically or otherwise. Instead they have inferred i

This confuses me. No one has ever observed a magnetic field, a neutrino or Evolution directly.
That is not how science works.
We know Evolution is a fact, it is a mountain of facts and theory of Evolution explains those facts but we cannot use a time machine to go and look at dinosaurs running around in real time.
BB Cosmology is a combination of theory and 100 years of observation. There are features of gravity that are not explained and that is where the community hang their hat on different models or just say, "I don't know yet."
If you ask a cosmologist if there was a BB you would be hard pressed to find one who said no. Hoyle is long dead.

 

[Pinball1970]

Of couse the goal there is to find the (simplest? Least ontologically extravagant?) hypothesis that actually fits the data. We can't start dismissing data because it doesn't fit whatever hypothesis we happen to be most comfortable with.

I think we are in agreement from reading the rest of your reply. My Occam's razor comment was a reference to sightings that have already been explained by some of those things I listed.

Very limited knowledge on actual sightings besides documentaries from the 1980s, with very compelling testimony from pilots.
The video footage looked crazy, lights and crafts moving at incredible speeds.
However, only recently I have been watching some analysis of some of these sightings. I will give you a reference once I have been in touch with my colleague who is a sciforum member.
He is an enthusiast of 50 years and is educating me on aircraft and aerial phenomena. I posted some of his Arora images recently.

 

[Magical Realist]

Great article on how dogmatic skeptics hide behind science in their dismissals of uap evidence. Confirms everything I've said to a T...

Scientifically exploring UAP in the age of scientism

As you sit down this morning, eager to dive into my newest column, I’ll be at the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies’ (SCU) international Anomalous Aerospace Phenomena Conference (AAPC) in

www.rdrnews.com

 

[James R]

Oh, you're back. Still making the same mistake about "dogmatic skeptics", even after a two week break in which you could have thought it through. Oh well.

Also, it appears that your link has a pay wall that kicks in after a small number of views. Are you a subscriber?

 

[Pinball1970]

Great article on how dogmatic skeptics hide behind science in their dismissals of uap evidence. Confirms everything I've said to a T...

Scientifically exploring UAP in the age of scientism

As you sit down this morning, eager to dive into my newest column, I’ll be at the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies’ (SCU) international Anomalous Aerospace Phenomena Conference (AAPC) in

www.rdrnews.com

Dude you get this so wrong.

Do you realise how truly amazing it would be to make contact with an intelligent civilization, signal or craft?
All the science guys would be going nuts.
Like finding even primitive life elsewhere, microbes.
Again the science community would go absolutely nuts.
10 billion on JWST and one of its science goals is to find exoplanets capable of sustaining life, or signs of life chemistry in the atmospheres of these worlds.

THAT is why this has to be properly, robustly, no doubts and discard data that is explained by natural means AND.......be skeptical!

 

[Pinball1970]

This is how science works regarding science and the importance of skepticism, the method.

From 7.15 but the whole interview is great.
A fantastic mind.

 

[Magical Realist]

Do you realise how truly amazing it would be to make contact with an intelligent civilization, signal or craft?
All the science guys would be going nuts.

Many of them have been and are going nuts. There was astronomer Allen J Hynek who was converted from skeptic to believer in his decades of studies of ufos as well as reknowned physicist James McDonald. And as the article went over, there are scientific research groups now taking uaps quite seriously and examining evidence for them to actually learn about the phenomenon instead of dismissing it out of hand. But the dogmatic skeptics remain persistent and unconvinced even after all these compelling recent encounters with the military are presented. Mick West and his followers. The Skeptical Inquirer guys. And just mainstream scientists in general who HAVE to dismiss uaps/ufos because it continues to be mocked and ignored as "woo" and would destroy their careers and peer status if they became associated with it.

10 billion on JWST and one of its science goals is to find exoplanets capable of sustaining life, or signs of life chemistry in the atmospheres of these worlds.

It is truly tragic and ironic that there are such well-funded programs to find pond scum on some distant planets while the mounting evidence for actual contact with non-human intelligences here on Earth sits right under our noses. If the real science guys were really so excited by this prospect, they'd be involved in it more just as the US military has gotten itself more involved and serious about it. Instead, and as evidenced in the uap threads in this forum, there remains huge resistance and denialism that struggles and contorts itself nine ways from Sunday to reduce the whole uap phenomenon to little more than wayward weather balloons, multiple radar glitches, or some fancy never-before-seen drones, ignoring outright all the repeated eyewitness accounts of these things performing maneuvers beyond any human technology. Although I have seen some glimmer of hope for honest consideration among science guys like you and Vat, James R continues to lead his little pack of stubborn naysayers setting the tone for the very topic of uaps/ufos as nothing more than superstitious bunk. The question is this, are you willing to forgo the ingroup rewards of continuing to remain a loyal dogmatic skeptic here, or will you risk ridicule and insults and even being banned like I have, venture out and think for yourself, and examine the evidence with a truly unbiased and agnostic mind like Yazata has? The choice is yours. Come to the dark side Pinball!

 

[Yazata]

Great article on how dogmatic skeptics hide behind science in their dismissals of uap evidence. Confirms everything I've said to a T...

Scientifically exploring UAP in the age of scientism

As you sit down this morning, eager to dive into my newest column, I’ll be at the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies’ (SCU) international Anomalous Aerospace Phenomena Conference (AAPC) in

www.rdrnews.com

The opinion piece you linked to was quite good in my opinion. (Probably because I agree with most of it.)

A scientific approach to investigating UAP is crucial...

However, the science of UAP can also be a game of “Gotcha.” Skeptics often wield “science” as a weapon to dismiss UAP sightings or accounts as mere earthly phenomena without sufficient scientific evidence. Yet, evidence — defined by the Cambridge Dictionary as “facts, information, documents, etc. that give reason to believe that something is true” — is plentiful in historical records and recent studies, challenging the skeptics’ dismissive stance.

The difficulty there will be in quantifying the quality of evidence and in deciding what quantity/quality level constitutes "sufficient evidence". That's typically going to be a very individual matter, since the 'sufficiency' here typically means 'sufficient to persuade me'. And since that in turn is a personal/subjective matter, it will usually be a function of what our beliefs were going in. It will take a lot more to persuade somebody to accept the reality of something whose existence he/she doesn't already accept (for me, ghosts) than it will to persuade somebody of the reality of something that they already accept and perhaps expect.

In other words, our worldview going in will inevitably bias our perception of the "sufficiency" of any evidence that challenges those preexisting assumptions. In some cases the bar is set impossibly high, such that all possibility of error must first be eliminated, before we are willing to even entertain the possibility that what we are faced with might conceivably be something challenging. There will be tremendous resistance even to exploring the possibility hypothetically, until the impossible conditions are met.

While science involves systematically studying the natural world through observation, experimentation, and analysis, scientism is the belief — or new religion — that science is the ultimate authority on all aspects of life and reality. This misplaced belief leads to dismissing UAP as unreal if no scientific explanation is available. Such an approach contradicts genuine scientific inquiry, which should remain open to exploring all possibilities. Authentic scientific inquiry embraces uncertainty and the unknown, which is essential for unraveling mysteries like UAP.

It's an interesting question whether a suitably advanced science would be capable, even in principle, of eventually answering all questions. I'm inclined to think 'no'. That's why I'm interested in the nature, ontology and epistemology of logic, mathematics and the so-called "laws" of physics. Science is very good at describing and correlating various perceived regularities in our empirical sense experience. But it seems (to me anyway, others are free to disagree) that science is getting out of its depth when it is asked to justify its own most basic assumptions.

But that doesn't seem to me to apply to the most extraordinary UAP reports. They are mysteries of a lesser nature I guess. So even if we assume that the reports of anomalous aerospace performance (thousands of Gs accelerations, no aerodynamic shocks or turbulence) are accurate (we don't know that, but can entertain it as a possibility without all the rude "skeptical" dismissiveness) the possibility certainly remains that more advanced physics and engineering could explain them. That means that even if no scientific explanation is available to us, today, it doesn't imply that a scientific explanation isn't out there somewhere, waiting to be found. It's a problem of a different nature than that of providing ultimate foundations.

nsNS