Subj : Bible 1 To : FRANK MASINGILL From : DAVE OLDRIDGE Date : Mon Oct 23 2000 02:11 pm FM> DO> Again, you are confusing yourself. But I suppose I should FM> DO> expect this from someone who thinks that science is about FM> DO> proving everything from beiginning to end. FM> FM> That seems to be an accurate display of your "scientific" FM> FM> approach. From afar, you have analyzed my entire thought from FM> FM> beginning to end and stamped your conclusion, "science." I'll FM> FM> tell you what science is NOT about. It is not about forming FM> FM> conclusions about the design of the world and its forms UNTIL FM> FM> everything is proven from beginning to end. Scientists know FM> FM> this and modernity actually is GAINING in the kind of humility FM> FM> suitable to man. FM> DO> Science is what scientists do. And proclaiming something a FM> DO> lot of them are doing as "not science" is not exactly a FM> DO> demonstration of humility. FM> And you will not be able to reference ONE place in which I FM> departed from humility in this respect. You do the minute you declare evolution to be non-scientific. Sorry if you don't like that, but that's the way I see it. FM> FM> You may or may not recall how glibly 100 years ago the public FM> FM> was parroting "scientific phrases" with regard to Freud's FM> FM> truly admirable discoveries of the unconscious as though Freud FM> FM> had dumped an enormous body of "finished" knowledge upon the FM> FM> world. FM> DO> Still, if you do not believe you have an "unconscious mind" I FM> DO> believe I can introduce you to it. FM> Who said "unconsciousness" was not a valid concept??? I FM> didn't. Not only that, but LONG before Freud and Jung, Man had and FM> was aware of unconsciousness. It fills entire tomes of their work. No kidding!?! FM> In fact, a great many things we glibly place in the "unconsciouss" FM> were fully conscious in polytheistic, man under the cosmogonic FM> myths. It's also an important element in man's CONSCIOUS life FM> today, even for some of the mentally ill. How SANE is it to bleat FM> out phrases like "freedom from want, freedom from war, freedom from FM> fear" and the like or to make a treaty of peace with Japan FM> stipulating that they should never in perpetuity have a military. FM> But that's PRECISELY what we did. FM> FM> Today, a large body of mental illness that once was treated FM> FM> with psychoanalysis is now treated only with medicine. The FM> FM> record of FM> DO> And correctly so. Freud's insight was not the cure-all that FM> DO> he though it was. FM> Now you have stated my point. Science marches on and at no FM> juncture is it to be worshiped as the arrival of man at a utopia. FM> Of course, it is probably inevitable that in the public press, FM> symbols of transcendence will be used. Sagan, scientist that he was FM> could still talk about "a corner of the universe" as though ANYBODY FM> knew where a "corner" could be when the dimensions aren't there. Aren't you simply reifying his metaphor? FM> DO> The trouble with most of the postmodern thinking I see is that FM> DO> it's really just warmed-over animism. That DOES have its FM> DO> place but that place is in a different world-view from that of FM> DO> science. The REAL myth here is that science is the only way FM> DO> of looking at things. Perhaps that is true for SOME things, FM> DO> but I can assure you that my grammar correction algorithm in FM> DO> Word just goes nuts when I feed it a fresh poem. I still look FM> DO> at what it has to say, but poetry is not prose and the grammar FM> DO> algorithm is not very good at poetry. Well science cannot FM> DO> tell us everything either. Concepts like beauty, love, FM> DO> worship and so on are not in that scientific dimension really. FM> DO> Oh, we might find some statistical treatments of people's FM> DO> OPINIONS on these subjects. FM> DO> But to declare a whole body of scientific knowledge, based on FM> DO> observable data to be non-scientific is, quite simply, to err. FM> That is quite true. Who do you think has done that? Do you FM> think science is TOTALLY limited to "observable" data? I'm asking FM> the blunt question of whether you would assert that we are the cause FM> of ourselves? Is consciousness TOTALLY under our control? Do you FM> know that and can you prove that? Just a few things to ponder. Science cannot ever be totally limited to observable data. It is rooted in assumptions. The assumptions are the quite reasonable ú [ Continued In Next Message... ] --- Platinum Xpress/Win/Wildcat5! v3.0pr3 * Origin: FONiX Info Systems * Berkshire UK * +44 1344 641625 (2:252/171) .