> By the way, "science cannot explain it, so it doesn't
> exist" is hardly a clever, novel argument, given that
> people have been making that very argument ever since
> science asserted that the world was composed of four
> elements.
I find this characterization quite odd. Historically "science can not explain it, therefore it must be magic/god/supernatural" has been used since the Scientific Revolution and is still being used. In fact, this "god of the gaps" has been used in this thread to explain everything from the Big Bang to dark matter to why we have birds.
I have never heard anyone argue "science cannot explain it, so it doesn't exist." Where are you hearing this? What is the "it" in question? Some observable phenomenon? Some thing? Isn't science simply the pursuit of models for how things work for which we lack explanation now? That we have science means the answer is yes.
> Actually the world is full of many things
> science cannot explain, such as, for instance, action
> at a distance, which used to be called supernatural
> until people decided to change their definition.
I am having deja vu. You seem to want to draw a line today and put all the objects and phenomenon which lack an established theory into a pile and mark them permanently outside the realm of science ("this stuff right here, *this* is what god did!"), despite the fact that people have been doing that for centuries and continue to make their piles smaller and smaller. This approach didn't work out so well when the pile had thunderstorms and eclipses so I am not sure why you would cling to when it just has [for example] quantum gravity and abiogenesis. I am not a betting man but it would probably be safe to bet that physics/astronomy and biology/geology, respectively, are likely to come up with explanations some day.
I don't as a practice call attention to people's superstitions until they try and convince me that something is inherently missing from the Scientific Method and their superstition happens to be the thing that fills in the gap and the whole science thing won't ever figure it out. The SM has been working quite well modeling the universe so I would say it is a keeper.
Matt
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