Evolution News continues its incisive analysis of the true agenda of 'Cosmos': the "...promotion of scientism and materialism, and especially the Copernican Principle..." http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/06/cosmos_finale_t086591.html ["Cosmos Finale Takes One Last Shot at the "Delusion that We Have Some Privileged Position in the Universe""]
"I know the single big point that the creators of Cosmos wanted to communicate: That humankind and planet Earth occupy no special, privileged, inherently meaningful place in the universe. Besides being dubious as science, that is a morally corrosive message to teach young people, the show's primary intended audience, at a time when we're morally challenged enough already."
Mr. Klinghoffer may *know* this, but I didn't see that as the underlying thread in the Cosmos episodes. It's popular TV...more of a starting point to encourage kids to learn more about science than a philosophical treatise I wouldn't read too much into it.
Dubious as science? Well, there's no solid proof one way or the other yet. More like the default hypothesis...ready to be modified based on data from future experiments. Morally corrosive? I'm having trouble understanding how science can corrode morals. Morals are a set of personal standards. They're yours, for better or worse. Science attempts to understand the world around us by using measurement, experiment and logic. They seem to be two completely different arenas.
"It's popular TV...more of a starting point to encourage kids to learn more about science than a philosophical treatise I wouldn't read too much into it."
>> All science begins with philosophy, which is exactly Klinghoffer's point. It seems you agree with him.
"Dubious as science? Well, there's no solid proof one way or the other yet."
>> I disagree. If we dispense with all models, and simply take in the observational evidence, Earth is at the center of the universe.
If we explain this as a consequence of an everywhere-expanding, FLRW universe, there should be no concentric galaxy shell distribution, and no Axis of Evil.
"More like the default hypothesis...ready to be modified based on data from future experiments."
>> Except it ins't ready to be modified even based on present, and past, experiments, precisely because it is a philosophical/metaphysical assumption, not a scientific datum.
Hence, it is for all the marbles, and will not be surrendered based on something as relatively unimportant as mere contrary observations.
"I'm having trouble understanding how science can corrode morals." >> Depends on what you mean by the word "science". If you mean bare observations, of course bare observations cannot corrode morals.
The notion that we are an insignificant speck floating in a vast cosmos that self assembles from nothing that is really something.....
That's, admittedly, not in any way science, but it is, certainly, morally corrosive, primarily because it is so dramatically obvious that it is not a truthful statement of reality.
Evolution News continues its incisive analysis of the true agenda of 'Cosmos': the "...promotion of scientism and materialism, and especially the Copernican Principle..." http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/06/cosmos_finale_t086591.html
ReplyDelete["Cosmos Finale Takes One Last Shot at the "Delusion that We Have Some Privileged Position in the Universe""]
"I know the single big point that the creators of Cosmos wanted to communicate: That humankind and planet Earth occupy no special, privileged, inherently meaningful place in the universe. Besides being dubious as science, that is a morally corrosive message to teach young people, the show's primary intended audience, at a time when we're morally challenged enough already."
ReplyDeleteMr. Klinghoffer may *know* this, but I didn't see that as the underlying thread in the Cosmos episodes. It's popular TV...more of a starting point to encourage kids to learn more about science than a philosophical treatise I wouldn't read too much into it.
Dubious as science? Well, there's no solid proof one way or the other yet. More like the default hypothesis...ready to be modified based on data from future experiments. Morally corrosive? I'm having trouble understanding how science can corrode morals. Morals are a set of personal standards. They're yours, for better or worse. Science attempts to understand the world around us by using measurement, experiment and logic. They seem to be two completely different arenas.
"It's popular TV...more of a starting point to encourage kids to learn more about science than a philosophical treatise I wouldn't read too much into it."
ReplyDelete>> All science begins with philosophy, which is exactly Klinghoffer's point. It seems you agree with him.
"Dubious as science? Well, there's no solid proof one way or the other yet."
>> I disagree. If we dispense with all models, and simply take in the observational evidence, Earth is at the center of the universe.
If we explain this as a consequence of an everywhere-expanding, FLRW universe, there should be no concentric galaxy shell distribution, and no Axis of Evil.
"More like the default hypothesis...ready to be modified based on data from future experiments."
>> Except it ins't ready to be modified even based on present, and past, experiments, precisely because it is a philosophical/metaphysical assumption, not a scientific datum.
Hence, it is for all the marbles, and will not be surrendered based on something as relatively unimportant as mere contrary observations.
"I'm having trouble understanding how science can corrode morals."
>> Depends on what you mean by the word "science". If you mean bare observations, of course bare observations cannot corrode morals.
The notion that we are an insignificant speck floating in a vast cosmos that self assembles from nothing that is really something.....
That's, admittedly, not in any way science, but it is, certainly, morally corrosive, primarily because it is so dramatically obvious that it is not a truthful statement of reality.