The Limits of Science

[Belligerent Savant]

I don't think people in general have been paying much attention to how difficult it's become to determine the truth. And truth is vital and lack of it will destroy civilization and life as we know it. My reason for being right now is this quest, and it is frustrating to say the least. I try to be very, very careful with anything I say or post, because I'm seriously dedicated. I can be free to promote the truth because I'm not affiliated with anything that would prevent me from speaking my mind. Many others aren't so fortunate, as I have learned from my recent experiences in healthcare.

^^^^
Quite right.

[DrEvil]

I don't think people in general have been paying much attention to how difficult it's become to determine the truth. And truth is vital and lack of it will destroy civilization and life as we know it. My reason for being right now is this quest, and it is frustrating to say the least. I try to be very, very careful with anything I say or post, because I'm seriously dedicated. I can be free to promote the truth because I'm not affiliated with anything that would prevent me from speaking my mind. Many others aren't so fortunate, as I have learned from my recent experiences in healthcare.

I get where you're coming from, but I have to disagree. Truth has never been vital. Our entire civilization is built on lies and deceptions. That's one of the reasons this forum exists in the first place. Religion has been used as a tool of control for thousands of years. Demonizing our neighbors so we can go over there and take their stuff without feeling bad about it has been standard practice for just as long. Psyops, spin, narratives, perception management and a thousand other arcane practices are employed against us every day, and most of us carry on as if none of it happens because we only care when it starts to impact our immediate surroundings.

Truth is a luxury we indulge in when we can afford to, but it goes out the window as soon as we can't (or don't want to because it messes with our profit margins or beliefs).

Don't get me wrong, I want to live in a society that values truth as much as you do, but I don't think it's a requirement for civilization, or even compatible with our current system. We're allowed some small truths, offered up as sacrifice to placate the masses, but anyone who threatens with real truth is destroyed (see: Assange and a host of other jailed or dead investigate journalists). No one really wants to know how the sausage is made, because then they're made to feel responsible for how it's made instead of just eating it and enjoying the taste.

Long story short: if you want truth you probably have to overthrow our current system first, and even then you're still probably screwed, because it's all grounded in human nature.

[Belligerent Savant]

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Much of the above is largely right, except that almost all of it pertains to those with immense power and influence rather than the majority.

Unfortunately, the majority are prone to herd-like mindsets, especially in times of great tumult/confusion/fear mongering, which compounds problems for the collective.

But religion, as one example, is not by itself the problem. It's a small subset of humans manipulating core tenets to their own benefit. Same goes for science: the principles of science are sound and worth pursuing. The relative few -- but very wealthy & influential -- often corrupt science for detrimental ends.

This applies more so with politics.

But this doesn't mean, in any way, that gross manipulations and/or egregious affronts to fundamental human rights should ever go unchecked, or unchallenged; it should be rebuked as overtly as possible.

There remains much worth fighting for, and many humans out there that will refuse to participate in vile deceptions.

Passive nihilism or quiet compliance won't be options for a growing count of us.

[Grizzly]

https://twitter.com/SecretSunBlog/status/1659514673505480705?s=20
A third of scientific papers may be fraudulent.

The other two-thirds are definitely fraudulent.

[Belligerent Savant]

https://clensor.com/2023/05/19/harvard- ... t-attacks/

Harvard Scientists Caught Taking Bribes To Publish False Research About Causes of Heart Attacks

Newly released documents reveal that the sugar industry bribed high-profile and influential scientists from Harvard University, paying them to publish fake news about the primary causes of heart attacks.

The Harvard scientists false claims significantly influenced public health strategies regarding nutrition for decades, and the results are still being experienced today.

The news was disclosed in a recent special report in JAMA Internal Medicine and has shocked the research community. If the experts are taking bribes and lying about the causes of heart attacks, what else might they be lying about?

In the 1960s, there was no obligation to disclose conflicts of interest, enabling sugar industry executives to collaborate extensively with the researchers in revising and refining their paper until it met their desired standards, all without the need to acknowledge their own involvement.

‘I thought I had seen everything but this one floored me,’ said Marion Nestle of New York University, who wrote an editorial on the new findings.

Revealed: How the sugar industry paid prestigious Harvard researchers to say fat (NOT sugar) caused heart disease

By Mia De Graaf For Dailymail.com and Reuters
Updated 19:02 EDT 13 Sep 2016

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/arti ... _share-top

‘It was so blatant. And the “bribe” was so big. Funding research is ethical,’ Nestle said. Bribing researchers to produce the evidence you want is not.’

The fake research was published in a literature review in The New England Journal of Medicine in 1967.

It claimed that fat and cholesterol were the main dietary factors contributing to heart disease while disregarding evidence from the 1950s that linked sugar to heart disease as well.

According to the latest report, the review in NEJM was funded by the Sugar Research Foundation (SRF), which is now known as the Sugar Association.

[DrEvil]

^^Exactly!

Truth is a luxury we indulge in when we can afford to, but it goes out the window as soon as we can't (or don't want to because it messes with our profit margins or beliefs).

Truth is secondary, a nice bonus when it doesn't cost us anything, not something people strive for, even when we say we do. We mostly just mean "a 'truth' that makes me comfortable". We want just enough to not kill ourselves (knives are sharp, fire burns, water drowns, etc.) and maintain our internal model, or in AI parlance, our hallucination of the world we live in, because even our subjective experience of the world is a lie. It's not actual reality. Colors don't exist, sound doesn't exist, it's all figments of our imagination.

You wrote:

But religion, as one example, is not by itself the problem. It's a small subset of humans manipulating core tenets to their own benefit.

It kinda is a problem if you're looking for truth. The majority of people still believe in things that have absolutely no evidence to support them. Even a lot of atheists and agnostics fall back on the notion that we humans are somehow special, that we have some spark/soul that makes us unique, when the truth, as far as the available evidence suggests at least, is that we're just complicated biological machines with some pretty good pattern matching algorithms, here through sheer dumb luck, and that there are no higher beings and the universe doesn't give a flying fuck about us. Our existence is meaningless on a very fundamental level. We're not special, but a very large number of people can't accept that, so we lie to ourselves about our very nature.

Right now you can go and have a conversation with ChatGPT that is more stimulating and interesting than many conversations you've had with people over the years (you know, morons), but we're special, and it is just a machine.

I'm not saying everyone should become a nihilist, but if we want a society that truly values truth then we have to start throwing out some of the things everyone takes for granted that aren't true, and I think that is a hell of a lot more things than most people care to admit, because they're pretty foundational to the society we live in.

[Harvey]

Careful with that royal 'we'. Religions have kept all kinds of very specialised and valuable knowledge alive - as much as some have destroyed knowledge - for tens of thousands of years. Science may yet irretrievably destroy the conditions for, and therefore the possibility of knowledge - in just a few short centuries. We'll see.

Who else have civilized the world, and built the cities, if not the nobles and kings of Paganism? Who else have set in order the harbors and rivers? And who else have taught the hidden wisdom? To whom else has the Deity revealed itself, given oracles, and told about the future, if not the famous men among the Pagans? The Pagans have made known all this. They have discovered the art of healing the soul; they have also made known the art of healing the body. They have filled the earth with settled forms of government, and with wisdom, which is the highest good. Without Paganism the world would be empty and miserable.

Ṣābian polymath, Thābit ibn Qurra, ninth century.

[drstrangelove]

The majority of people still believe in things that have absolutely no evidence to support them.

belief is good. the problem is people knowing things that have absolutely no evidence to support them. the problem with your view is it's become quite clear that people have a need for certitude towards things that cannot be known. the ones who have rejected religion have mostly turned to science to fill that void. which is either dangerous or useless. useless because the only answer science can offer is nihilism, which isn't an answer or at best harmful. dangerous because any other answer it could give, it gives as false knowledge as it's trying to know things that can't be known, or perhaps more importantly shouldn't be known.

science is a method for discovering things in the world that we accept as knowledge because it is useful for us to do so as it helps us function in our environment.

religion is a method for accepting thing beyond the world that we cannot know, like what happens when we die, so we can accept that we will die, because it is useful for us to do so as it helps us function in our environment.

both are good things and were created to serve human needs.

[Harvey]

And both are evil to the degree that they are administered to serve power alone. What Dr Evil is really against isn't religion, he doesn't understand what religion is or what it does. His enemy is power itself.

[drstrangelove]

yes, evil is the institutionalization of things created to served human needs.

[DrEvil]

And both are evil to the degree that they are administered to serve power alone. What Dr Evil is really against isn't religion, he doesn't understand what religion is or what it does. His enemy is power itself.

Religion is simple. We didn't understand the world around us, but we did understand that everyone dies, so we built a framework of ideas to help us cope with the lack of knowledge of the world and the absolute knowledge of death. It's probably wired into our genes by now, but it still doesn't make any of it true. It's fairy tales we tell ourselves to handle life, and I don't have a problem with that. It's when some asshole comes along and says "the fairy told me that I'm in charge and you should all do as I say" I get riled up, so yes, you're probably right that my main issue is power.

Or as Carlin put it: God loves you, and he needs money.

[drstrangelove]

yes, you have an issue with the institutionalization of religion, as do i the issue we face at the moment is the institutionalization of science however.

[Harvey]

Apt.

[stickdog99]

[DrEvil]

yes, you have an issue with the institutionalization of religion, as do i the issue we face at the moment is the institutionalization of science however.

Yes. Power corrupts etc., doesn't really matter what area of life it happens in - people can suck whether they're wearing vestments or lab coats. But I will maintain that, on a general basis, science beats religion simply because it gives us tangible results, like the ability to have this argument across oceans in near real-time. Our current standard of living didn't come about through faith alone.

I also think that if more people acknowledged the possibility that this one life is what we get they might expend a little more energy towards making it a good one.