Two Limitations Of Science

Science has inherent limitations, though scientists like Dawkins and Harris seem reluctant to acknowledge the ramifications of this truth!  Two particular limitations of science that I will address here are inductive reasoning and reliance on the senses.  These twin epistemological factors render science incapable of delivering us absolute certainty regarding, in specific, any claim about the future behavior of causal relationships and whether or not our observations about science conform to the objective external world.

Belief in scientific claims relies on induction--the expectation that things that happened a certain way in the past will happen the same way in the future (for instance, in scientific experiments).  But just because the sun has risen each morning of my life does not mean that it will rise tomorrow during the time I would call "morning".  Just because I have fallen to the ground every time I have jumped in the past doesn't mean the same will hold true in the future.  Just because putting gas in my car has made it run in the past doesn't mean gas will have the same effect in the future.  The problem of induction mean science is disqualified from legitimacy when it comes to any search for absolute certainty about how the natural world operates.  The best a philosophy about science can amount to is a kind of probabilism that is always left open to possible revision.

Now I come to my second observation.  Using and documenting the scientific method inseparably relies on the senses.  My senses, as I've explored elsewhere [1], cannot be verified, only used.  This means that any information my senses feed me (except that I am perceiving certain things and that I am contacting something external to me) is totally questionable when it comes to veracity.  In other words, for example, even if I discover extremely overwhelming evidence for a particular theory in physics, I have no idea if any of the accompanying scientific laws or expectations have anything to do with objective reality.  Logical and mathematical truths are true by pure necessity and apply to all possible worlds, but scientific "laws" (I use quotations marks because nothing in science is absolutely certain, unlike in logic) do not possess this property.  I could wake up one morning to find gravity altered and particle behavior drastically different, for instance.  Nothing about the future of scientific observations is absolutely certain.

In light of these points, do I not appreciate the products of science?  I do appreciate them!  Am I willing to use scientific evidence to support claims of mine?  Sometimes!  But I never rely on science to dictate my worldview, as I allow logic, the only self-evident authority, to do that instead.  If reason (I am using reason as a word synonymous with logic in this case) proves something, no amount of scientific evidence can legitimately threaten that logical truth.  Scientific predictions cannot escape relying on induction and the senses--and thus science cannot offer the high degree of certainty some may seek from it.

(By the way, this marks my 200th post!  I really appreciate all the comments, reads, and support I have received so far!)


[1].  http://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/04/the-reliability-of-senses.html