[moatilliatta]

The problem with philosophy is that it tends to be based pretty much entirely on human intuitions about what's logical and reasonable and makes sense. But if there's one thing that we learn from actually doing science it's that nature doesn't necessarily confirm to those intuitions. It's unlikely that any philosopher would have ever thought up anything as exotic as quantum mechanics because it runs so contrary to human common sense.

Only by leaving the armchair from time to time and going into the lab or getting out into the field is our thinking kept honest. The answers to the questions you're addressing are more likely to found in the journals of biochemistry or paelentology than they are in any ancient Greek text.

[Rurudyne]

"The problem with philosophy is that it tends to be based pretty much entirely on human intuitions about what's logical and reasonable and makes sense. But if there's one thing that we learn from actually doing science it's that nature doesn't necessarily confirm to those intuitions. It's unlikely that any philosopher would have ever thought up anything as exotic as quantum mechanics because it runs so contrary to human common sense.

Only by leaving the armchair from time to time and going into the lab or getting out into the field is our thinking kept honest. The answers to the questions you're addressing are more likely to found in the journals of biochemistry or paelentology than they are in any ancient Greek text."

A very valid point. But this is now and that was then. The origins of modern science and the scientific method were what I was trying to get at. Not to say "it all about Christians" but rather to point out how a difference in world view can produce different results. It is the Holy and rational God of the Bible who created a world that could be construed according to a scientific method; but, it was rational men living in an irrational world who first desired to construe their world in a rational way ... actually in defiance of their world view.

In some respect I see this happening now in our day. Men are turning their backs on reason in favor of things like "experience" because they cannot accept a rational world. Just for comparison, the Onion ran a recent spoof called "Intelligent Falling" ... my response was a New Age Theory of Gravity: "Now, if this pet rock KNEW it was really God then it wouldn't HAVE to fall. Or it could fall at a rate of it's choosing!"

Peace!