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From: friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen)
Newsgroups: net.sci,net.philosophy,net.nlang
Subject: Re: Metaphysicians
Message-ID: <1068@psivax.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 18-Mar-86 15:30:18 EST
Article-I.D.: psivax.1068
Posted: Tue Mar 18 15:30:18 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 21-Mar-86 05:33:38 EST
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Reply-To: friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen)
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In article <143@spar.UUCP> ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis) writes:
>
>     I don't think the meaning of `metaphysics' has changed much since
>     the time when it meant `the study of the nature of being and reality'.

	And as such it is a branch of *philosophy*, and is quite
distinct from parapsychology.
>
>     What has changed is the fossilization of our `scientific' society,
>     which largely brands anything not fitting into its 19th century cause
>     and effect worldview as incomprehensible, even heretical. To such
>     folk, `What Is' has been fixed for all time by the scientific method;

	Maybe this is the popular misconception of what science is,
but the real thing is antithetical to anything being "fixed for all
time". The basis of the scientific method is *modifying* theories and
hypotheses to fit new data as it comes in. Anyone dedicated to this
principle cannot conssider any conceptual model fixed.

>     consequently, if metaphysics is not ordinary science, then it must be
>     antiscience, and therefore no better from occultism.

	Or it could be philosophy, there are more things in the world
than just science and pseudoscience.
>
>     Science, having defeated Religion, is now the ultimate arbiter of such
>     matters. Like those in times past brainwashed by Religion, the modern
>     day Scientismists CANNOT EVEN THINK incorrect thoughts, except in
>     terms of extreme charicatures: "If you shirk logical analysis and
>     verifiable evidence, you will become like Jerry Falwell!

	Defeated religion!?!? Science and religion do not even deal
with the same issues and questions! Why should the belief that
observation supercedes a priori assumptions(the scientific method) have
any impact on religious faith?
>     
>     Does spirit `exist'? Does virtue `exist'? How about universals? Or
>     mind? Whatever can `ethics' mean? From the conventional scientific view,
>     these are nonsense questions. They are neither verifiable nor
>     falsifiable in any traditional scientific sense. Obviously, such
>     questions are the result of delusion!

	No, they are not nonsense questions, they are simply not
*scientific* questions, there is a difference. Part of the reason that
they philosophical not scientific is that the answers depend on the
definitions used. With one set of definitions any of these have one
answer and a different under a different set of definitions.
-- 

				Sarima (Stanley Friesen)

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