How do you know if you have fallen prey to the cult of 'Scientism'? Answer this question: Can you differentiate between the collective human understanding of 'how' things work in our material world, and the 'why' of how they came to be that way. (or even why it does what it does at all.) Those are two very different questions, that scientists, (who are rarely great philosophers,) often get mixed up. It is wise to remember that 'science' can be as abused for the sake of religious or anti-religious preconceptions as equally as the Bible can be, on both sides of a debate.
This becomes readily obvious when you investigate the unquestioned assumption that most Atheist-leaning scientists tenaciously hold on to as their 'modus operandi'. One way to state this foundational belief is: "Only statements that are verifiable through a scientific method can be held as truth, or objectively knowable."
Now anyone, who has taken a moment to study Epistemology, [the study of how rational thought might determine truth,] should immediately notice the logical fallacy of the above statement. And hopefully those with some common sense might spot it also. The foregoing statement is not only 'possibly' false, but it is necessarily false. Why? Well, if you think about it, note that the statement itself can not be determined to be true or false by anything even remotely considered a 'scientific method'. The statement itself is outside the reach of the standard definition of the scientific method. [Observable, repeatable, testable things.] Therefore, if the statement is true, then the statement must be false, and if the statement is false, then it can not be true. Therefore it is necessarily false, not just possibly false.
Now you might think I am belaboring a point that is inconsequential to politics in America. However it is critical. If you want to arrive at some level of objective, rational, and trustworthy truth, you have to be able to question EVERYTHING, not just your pastor down the street, or the conspiracy theorist at the book store, but also the PhD scientist at your university. You have to be able to question everybody's ideas equally. Take NOTHING on blind faith.
Also take note, that 'faith' and 'rational thought' are not, by nature, irreconcilable, nor opposites of each other. When you sit down on a chair, you are acting in faith that the chair will hold you up. You don't even have a PhD level Structural engineer check it out and 'certify,' that particular chair first. It might be the first time you've seen that chair ever, but you will sit in it. And you know at some point in your life, a chair will break, and you'll end up on your butt really hard. Yet is is likely that you are currently sitting on a chair reading this. Oh, you of great faith!! [but not blind faith.]
Most Americans that have, unwittingly, been victims of 'Scientism' tend to claim that we do not need 'God' to explain the origins of life, the universe, and gravity. They often say that "we have a reasonable explanation of origins." I say: "What do you actually mean by 'reasonable'?" It is possible to chat with most any biologist, geologist, or physicist, and after 3 or 4 questions, it will become apparent that some of their most basic reasoning is unwittingly based on blind faith. In fact, I've been there... done that. I actually enjoy being more of a skeptic than Michael Shermer. (Whom I respect in many ways.)
For example, I was sitting in Modern Physics class at Idaho State university back in the mid-90's, and the professor was describing how 'mathematically' we know that time only flows in one direction and will not randomly reverse itself because of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics. Now I had just taken Thermodynamics from the Engineering department, so I was fascinated.
I listened intently as he described how we know that time will not flow backwards because the statistical probability that his dropped piece of chalk will randomly come back together again into his hand in one piece exactly as it was before he dropped it is less than the inverse of the theoretical age of the universe many times over. He said that all matter and energy is constantly flowing from a state of order to disorder, and that even with the Quantum nature of atomic particles, and Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, we can still know, from the statistical laws that govern all processes in the universe, that the 'chance' that his chalk pieces will 'vibrate' themselves back into the mere shape of a chalk stick in his hand is so small, that even theoretical physicists admit, it is ZERO.
This statement intrigued me because I suspected that my professor was an ardent believer in undirected, materialistic evolution of not only the universe, but also all life on earth. So after class, I humbly asked him a simple question: "Do you, Mr Professor, think there might be any implication for the theory of evolution based on the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and the statistical probabilities involved in the direction of time?" He though for a few seconds, and after the look of shock that a student actually asked an intelligent question left his face, he gave me the following answer:
[and I paraphrase, obviously, from memory...]
"Ah, yes, young man.... that is easily explained. The earth is not a 'closed system,' but an 'open system', and the earth is constantly receiving energy from the our star, the Sun. And as such, entropy (disorder) is increasing in proportion to the theoretically decreasing entropy on earth during evolution. [a.k.a. net order increasing here on earth, hence 'evolution.'] Therefore, the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics can be conserved as the 'disordering' of the sun compensates for the 'ordering' of things on the planet."
So I said, "Ah, yes, that arrangement does, in fact, satisfy our current situation here on earth, such that we are not currently violating the 2nd Law of thermodynamics. However, a description of what exists currently is not the same as explaining how it came to be thus. In fact, in my studies of thermodynamics, we studied things that proportionally increase entropy outside of themselves, such that they can decrease entropy in a localized area. Remember that the definition of 'work' in thermodynamics is the reduction of entropy in one place at the expense of increased entropy in another place. Therefore the situation that you describe between the earth and the sun, is in fact the very, fundamental, definition of an Engine. Am I correct?"
My professor thought for a moment, and it appeared that he was now thinking in a new place where his brain had never been allowed to go before. But to his credit, he allowed himself to think in a new vein. He then said, "In fact, you are correct!"
So I said, "Ok, if that is the definition of an engine, can you describe any engines that you know have come into existence, by accident, for no reason whatsoever?"
Now he really started to think. You could almost see the smoke coming from his ears. (ok, not really, but it was fun...) And after a few long silent moments, with a few other lingering students listening in on this, he said, "Well, yes!!!, there is us. You know, animals, people, plants, and other living things! All of those are engines, and they came into existence by accident!"
Now, I hope you can figure out already what my reply was, but this is what I said: "Hmmm, that is interesting, because we started this line of reasoning with a question about the truthfulness of the theory of evolution itself. And you just answered my question by assuming the truth of the very thing we are questioning the truth of. Mr. Professor, is that not using the classic fallacy of circular reasoning to prove your point?"
At this, he started to get red faced, and he stammered for a little bit until he blurted the following: (for real, not making this up,) "Well, you should just talk to this next professor teaching this next class, because he just believes that we are all just 'standing waves'!!" And he proceeded to stomp out of the class room, and left me standing there, dumbfounded that my professor would not face the truth. Now, to his credit, he was still in front of a few left over students of his, and he had to save face. And I want to make clear that he was, and is, and very intelligent man, and that he was a good teacher, and he was a good man that volunteered his time to help coach young kids into loving science. So I have respect for the man to this day. But it was painfully obvious that he had blind faith... in something.
So, what lessons, can we take from this actual encounter? Well, we can not conclude that I am smart. I'm really just a simpleton who is wandering through this life we find ourselves in, the same as everyone else. I have no special access to any knowledge that is not common to ALL men and women, regardless of what era or place they are born into. [I might have fancy words, but those alone do not get anyone any closer to ultimate truth.] But, we can conclude that all of us human beings are prone to some very interesting, groundless assumptions, without possibly even being aware that we are doing so.
That is why Epistemology is so foundational to every line of human reasoning. And it is why the 'Socratic-method' is so very critical to any truth seeking individual. Any student of the Gospels will (hopefully) note that Jesus, very often, answers questions posed to him with very penetrating questions of his own. Jesus was the master Teacher. He knew that, with human beings, "a person convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still." So Jesus gently asked his inquisitors questions that got them to discover the truth for themselves from a direction they had hitherto ignored for whatever reason. Because almost every question that people threw at him were based on an assumption that he first had to get them to question, before he could lead them closer to the truth. Whatever you think of Jesus, he did have an outsized impact on human history.
In all discussions, political or otherwise, first we need to come to some common ground on how to go about discovering what is true, in order to take a profitable journey together. One of those is what fundamental assumptions are we willing to question?
For further reading, I recommend:
A great history of geology from National Geographic of an fascinating area I get to drive through from time to time....
National Geographic: Formed by MegaFloods, This Place Fooled Scientists for Decades.
I love this article from The Atlantic that is very transparent about how messy and very 'human' the actual practice of Science is.
The Nastiest Feud in Science
And below is a wonderful excerpt from the article to whet your appetite:
"The impact theory provided an elegant solution to a prehistoric puzzle, and its steady march from hypothesis to fact offered a heartwarming story about the integrity of the scientific method. “This is nearly as close to a certainty as one can get in science,” a planetary-science professor told Time magazine in an article on the crater’s discovery. In the years since, impacters say they have come even closer to total certainty. “I would argue that the hypothesis has reached the level of the evolution hypothesis,” says Sean Gulick, a research professor at the University of Texas at Austin who studies the Chicxulub crater. “We have it nailed down, the case is closed,” Buck Sharpton, a geologist and scientist emeritus at the Lunar and Planetary Institute, has said.But Keller doesn’t buy any of it. “It’s like a fairy tale: ‘Big rock from sky hits the dinosaurs, and boom they go.’ And it has all the aspects of a really nice story,” she said. “It’s just not true.”
And some lessons from current science scandals: (circa 2018)
Lessons from the Wansink Science Scandal
For some further 'out-of-the-box' reading, I recommend the follow options:
[the first one is by the most honest Atheists I've heard of yet... besides Nietzche anyway...]
http://www.amazon.com/Seeking-God-Science-Atheist-Intelligent/dp/1551118637
and
http://www.amazon.com/Signature-Cell-Evidence-Intelligent-Design/dp/0061472794/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1316718639&sr=8-1
and I highly, highly recommend this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Genetic-Entropy-Mystery-Genome-Sanford/dp/0981631606/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1316718700&sr=1-1
Note: In my humble opinion, history will prove out most of the assertions made by Dr. Sanford in that book. [The central thesis is that mutations and natural selection are great for re-shuffling the existing biological information resulting in variation within a kind, however those mechanisms are insufficient for new biological innovation.] In fact, the top scientists in that field are moving in that direction already, even if they dare not admit it:
https://royalsociety.org/science-events-and-lectures/2016/11/evolutionary-biology/
full explanation of the importance of that meeting is here:
https://www.evolutionnews.org/2016/12/why_the_royal_s/