Plantinga is mostly concerned, as a philosopher, with philosophy of science. I think it figures that actual research scientists don’t have the same concerns about methodological naturalism, because it is what they use to do their jobs and they understand the value in practice. Personally, I’m going to weigh the insights of actual research scientists over the insights of philosophers when the topic is the agreed on methodology for research science.
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The funny thing is this topic has opened up a lot more questions for me than it has answered. In particular there are experiments one can do that are falsifiable and repeatable but don’t involve or require methodological naturalism. Are these considered science or pseudoscience, and most importantly, why?
Interestingly, this thread has convinced me that methodological Naturalism, while assumed in the work I do and the work of most other scientists, isn’t necessarily required to perform or understand science. Who gets the authority to say whether certain work should be considered science?
People can publish papers and have a scientific career while holding all sorts of beliefs about the world (and science itself) that aren’t necessarily supported by science.
Like what do you have in mind?
I think the contention from the beginning isnt’ that it’s necessary, just that it’s the agreed on methodology and part of the agreed on criteria for designating something science. That’s all just based on consensus, not some ontological reality of what science is. Science is a construct.
Of course, because life and humanity encompass so many more dimensions than then ones scientific claims can speak to.
In other words his concern is for the definition of science.
This was a noteworthy passage:
“Methodological naturalism has been redefined over the past couple of centuries as a way to distinguish science from nonscience; now it is often used to cut the scientific wheat from the religious chaff. As I am not a philosopher, I cannot adequately comment on the usefulness of methodological naturalism as a demarcation criterion.”
Was this really peer reviewed?
No there aren’t.
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But you will look and see like when someone claims to have invented a perpetual motion machine
Is this when science demonstrates non-deterministic events?
Einstein’s Only Rejected Paper
- “Peer review was first institutionalized by the Royal Society of London in 1665. It’s basically a good idea. Disinterested experts in a field assess a scholarly paper before announcing that it is worthy of publication in a respected journal. Peer review encourages quality and helps authors to sharpen their work. But it is not essential to quality. Plato’s Republic, Euclid’s Elements, and Darwin’s On the Origin of the Species had no peer review.”
- “The assumption that today’s peer-reviewed paper has been vetted by experts and therefore has been awarded a blue ribbon for excellence is far from the truth. Peer review often does not do its job. Consequently, today’s collection of scholarly literature is exploding in quantity and deteriorating in quality.”
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No I don’t.
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Keener’s joke about a ‘pier’ review had me second guessing my spelling of ‘peer’. So I googled the term, and stumbled upon this curious definition:
“Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work”
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The journal of the ASA is Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith . It is a peer-reviewed quarterly journal that publishes scholarly articles on issues of science and faith and book reviews of seminal books published in these areas. About the ASA - American Scientific Affiliation
Science is both a process and, by popular usage, an authoritative body of information. The process results in the cumulative addition and correction to that authoritative body of information.
As much as we perceive “science” to be a completely logical and methodical process, it is not. Lesslie Newbigin points out the following (in this rather lengthy quote):
“The authority of this tradition is maintained by the community of scientists as a whole. This community is held together by the free acceptance by its members of the authority of the tradition. Attempts to organize science from a single center, such as those made at certain times in Russia, have failed and are bound to fail. The authority of the tradition is maintained by the free assent of its members. But it is, nonetheless, a powerful authority. It is exercised in practice by those who determine which articles will be accepted for publication in scientific journals and which rejected, and by those who determine appointments to teaching and research posts in universities and other institutions. There is no appeal within the scientific community against this authority, and any appeal outside falls on deaf ears. Polanyi in various writings has given a number of examples of theories put forward with a considerable body of evidence to support them but which have been rejected without examination or discussion by the scientific community. Among the many examples given I quote just one. In 1947 Lord Rayleigh, a distinguished member of the Royal Society, published an account of an experiment which demonstrated that a hydrogen atom impinging on a metal wire releases energies ranging up to a hundred electron volts. If this were true, it would have enormous implications for physics. But the article was ignored. No one attempted to repeat the experiment or to discuss it. It was simply implausible within the existing frame of understanding. And, says Polanyi, scientists were right to ignore it. If every experiment which purported to show novel results was followed up by detailed examination and debate, science would evaporate into futility. Great numbers of articles offered to scientific journals are rejected without discussion simply because they fall outside the accepted tradition. Without this careful protection of the tradition, science could not develop. Yet if the tradition did not make room for radical innovation, science would stagnate. The point to be made seems to be twofold: first, innovation can only be responsibly accepted from those who are already masters of the tradition, skilled practitioners of whom it could be said both that the tradition dwells fully in them and that they dwell fully in the tradition; and second, that one alleged new fact, or even a number of new facts, does not suffice to discredit an established paradigm. That can only happen when a new and more compelling paradigm is offered, a vision of reality which commends itself by its beauty, rationality, and comprehensiveness.” (The Gospel in a Pluralized Society)
In other words, it is more than “methodological diligence” that furthers the scientific body of knowledge. At some level, it requires a kind of inspiration.
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Clicketty-click-click … so it begins to dawn on me: a proponent of “Sola Scriptura” and a competent producer of “scientific” work would be somewhat of a really rare species of animal, no? especially if–in terms used by Keith Mathison in his 2001 book: The Shape of Sola Scriptura–the proponent were a Tradition I or Tradition 0 Protestant or a Tradition II Roman Catholic. [Source: The Shape of Sola Scriptura ]
“For those topics on which there is no consensus and further study and analysis is needed, ASA members are dedicated to promoting ethically and methodologically sound research and dialogue.”
Emphasis not needed 
Rare indeed, endangered, but not extinct.
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and scrolly-scrolly-scroll found an interesting article outlining Augustine’s view of Sola Sciptura:
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Hang on a minute… did you just say “matter”? Are not energy and matter listed as individual items because they represent different things?
Something seems off there. Anyway, moving along…
What is energy? How do we know it exists?
Couldnt one say energy is something of a…hmm…well when i lookup a definition of energy, its a property that can be transferred to a physical body or system.
So heres the dilemma for me… that suggests i can observe the effects of energy through the natural world.
If the natural world doesnt exist, then how does one define energy? What is storing it and where is it being stored? How did it get there in the first place? (Not a problem for those who believe in deity, but for those who do not???)
Quite honestly im sick of hearing this tripe…its used as a means of discrediting academic work that is reviewed by other academics within similar or same field all the flaming time…its a stupid counter claim.
I wish we could instead use a little brain power and discuss theconkusions directly…that is theright way to determine whether or not the conclusions of research are valid or not. Validity isnt based on unanimous or even majority agreement. I think us humans tend to assign credibility to the majority though. That leaves us with the dilemma of influence…we believe because of general concensus of those who we “hang out” with!
I dont hang out with those who share my beliefs…havent done in 20years…why do some go against the norm
Not different things, different states. E=mc^2. The bombs dropped at the end of WWII represent a few pounds of matter unlocked into energy.
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