Logic, reason
science
and
pseudo-
The tripartite definition of knowledge states that
propositional knowledge , i.e. knowledge that p , has three
individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions:
justification, truth and belief. In short, propositional
knowledge is justified true belief. The belief condition
requires that anyone who knows that p believe that p. The
truth condition requires that any known proposition be
true. And the justification condition requires that any
known proposition be adequately justified, warranted or
evidentially supported.
Reason
The power of the mind to think, understand, and form
judgements logically.
I guess we should define logic and a few other terms also
Logic
Reasoning conducted or assessed according to strict principles
of validity. Check or prove the validity or accuracy of,
“all analytical methods should be validated in respect of
accuracy”
demonstrate or support the truth or value of.
Truth
That which is true or in accordance with fact or reality.
Fact
A thing that is known or proved to be true.
Following through the above list of definitions to reason we
need facts, which have been validated as such to show they are
true. We have seen historically how a good premise can still
present a faulty conclusion. For instance Aristotle concluded
that the testicles were weights attached to the voice box
because when a man’s testicles dropped his voice deepened.
This is obviously not the case which has been verified by
biological experimentation which has shown this factually not
to be true. We now live in a wonderful age of empiricism and
evidentialism whereby we can verify and validate facts through
experimenting. We need not play word games to end up at a
conclusion to suit a worldview. We have methods for showing
that which exists and that which need not be considered. We
have a set out the scientific method and the wonderful peer
review process, which admittedly is not infallible, but
usually when we find something which has been reviewed and
been passed and then later found to be not quite right it is
the scientific method and further peer review which weeds out
the problem. Recently Nature journal exposed less scrupulous
journals reviewing papers and exposed them which is testimony
to the more reputable and established reviewed journals.
Another example of bad peer review being exposed by science is
available here.
With regards to the verification of what can be considered
real or not I would refer you to a great video by Tracie
Harris from The Atheist Experience. It is a 3 part video but
well worth watching. In brief she takes 3 jars. One is filled
with dice, another filled with invisible, undetectable,
untestable dice(god) and the third with no dice and she ask
you to show the difference between the jar with no dice and
the jar with the “god” dice. There is none!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kvftq2ystmY
Let us now look at the other kind of journals. Intelligent
design was ruled in Ohio not to be scientific. Yet proponents
of ID still pedal their pseudo-science to an all too welcoming
audience desperate to affirm their world view of an omnipotent
creator god. Sites such www.discovery.org have taken to
creating their own circle jerk review system because they know
their papers will never pass review in the established and
respected journals. Their theories begin with a conclusion and
they work backwards to try to reason how they can fit specific
parts of our universe to fit the conclusion. This is not
science my dear readers. A scientific hypothesis must be
testable – in such a way that makes them perspective-free. To
date I have not seen any testing methods put forwards by the
ID crowd. In fact most bible bashing creationists will explain
god is not testable as he wishes his followers to follow on
faith alone. This means ID does not make it to hypothesis
level, let alone a falsifiable, repeatable theory. That is
because a faith-based account or proposal cannot be tested,
observed and replicated the same, nor can it be perspectivefree. It presupposes a deity because things are the way they
are in the universe. They prey on the gullibility of their
readers to be incredulous to our universe and lack scientific
knowledge. No different to the Zakir Naik’s of the Islamic
world of pseudo-science and other fast talking, snake oil
sellers.
Pseudo-reasoning and rhetorical ploys:
ID lacks a biological theory of life. It was willed by an
omnipotent always existing being which they cannot show
exists. This is in no way scientific, nor logical and cannot
be reasoned due to it breaking strict laws of logic and lack
of factual evidence.
Yet the creationist will ask for repeatable evidence for the
Big Bang Theory or Modern Evolutionary Theory (most do not
know the theory of evolution has not been Darwinian for around
100 years). What I find quite absurd is most creationists/ID
believers will accept many or all of sciences findings except
those which go against it’s world view. And of course the
ultimate absurdity is denying scientific facts without even
having studied them in the first place. These are fodder for
the atheist cannon’s amongst the online debate groups battling
the fight between reality and superstition daily.
In
conclusion
as
part
of
my
role
here
at
www.answers-in-reason.com I will be dissecting articles
presented by the likes of Ken Ham’s www.answersingenesis.org,
the likes of Joshua Feuerstein, Pastor Greg Locke and others
of that ilk to expose their lack of logic and use of pseudoscience of fast talking to trick their viewers and readers.
Wishing you all a wonderful godless 2016
Alan The Atheist
Special thanks to Carol Marie and Dionysus Lux
Dont
forget
to
like
our
Facebook
page: https://www.facebook.com/answersinreason/