Quotessence
Home / Books / Extra Scientiam Nulla Salus: How Science Undermines Reason

Extra Scientiam Nulla Salus: How Science Undermines Reason

Book by Thomas Stark · 5 quotes · Science, Philosophy, Rationalism

Filter quotes by topic

Extra Scientiam Nulla Salus: How Science Undermines Reason Quotes

“Empirical evidence is not what counts. Rational proof is the only acceptable criterion of truth. If you cannot provide a sufficient reason for an argument you make, you do not have an argument. Sensory evidence is not a sufficient reason. It is not an argument. Sensory evidence is simply raw data. A million people could provide a million different ways of interpreting it, hence it’s meaningless. It has nothing to do with proof. “Evidence” concerns an appearance from which inferences may be drawn. It concerns that which is obvious to the eye. Yet what does “obvious” mean? What is obvious about sensory data? Color blind people don’t know what “blue” is. Tetrachromats, with four cone types in the eye (cone cells are responsible for color vision, while rod cells code for monochromatic vision) see color radically differently from normal people (i.e. trichromats with three cone types). People with synesthesia have drastically different sensory experiences from normal people. So, everything about the senses is mired in ambiguity, uncertainty and subjectivity. These are no organs for truth, i.e. organs that show us the truth of a thing, exactly what it is and everything about it. We see things in our dreams even though our eyes are closed. How can we see without eyes, how can we sense without sense organs? What’s for sure is that scientific empiricism and materialism won’t be furnishing any answers.”

“The whole shtick of scientism revolves around sensory evidence. How many times must it be said that there is no such thing as self-explanatory sensory evidence? All evidence must be interpreted, and the interpretation is not a perceiving activity but a judging activity. The catastrophic error that worshipers of scientism (autistic sensing types) commit is that they privilege perceiving over judging. They believe that perception is the most important thing, and that judgment must be directed to the maximum degree possible at the perception, and minimize and indeed eliminate any reference to anything that has not been perceived. For worshipers of scientism, perception comes first, and judging is secondary, determined by perceiving. That is what empiricism is all about. It claims that all knowledge comes from experience, that there are no innate ideas, and it revolves around synthetic propositions and a posteriori knowledge. Rationalism, by total contrast, asserts that knowledge comes from logical, rational deduction and that innate ideas form the only secure basis for knowledge. It deals with analytic propositions and a priori knowledge.”

“It’s time to blow scientism out of the water. It’s time for judging to replace perceiving. Every time a worshiper of scientism says, “Where is your sensory evidence?” (a perceiving requirement), they should be met with, “Where is your sufficient reason?” (a judging requirement). That will create cognitive dissonance in them. They will go into meltdown. Where is the sufficient reason that scientific matter exists? According to Big Bang theory, it did not exist prior to the Big Bang, and neither did space and time. In other words, we know that there was an epoch when all the stuff of perceiving – matter, space, time and the physical senses –did not exist. However, all of the stuff of judgment – mathematics – did exist. This is why judging is primary and perceiving secondary, rather than the other way around. Get with the program. Scientism is an entirely false worldview. That’s a fact. The sole thing it gets right is that uses mathematics, which is the true basis of reality.”

“Nostalgia is an excessive sentimentality for the past, for home. It is associated with a yearning to return to a happy and safe period in your life. The word comes from nóstos, meaning “homecoming”, and álgos, meaning “pain” or “ache”. It’s all about the “good old days”, and “the good times”. Conservatism revolves around nostalgia. All right wingers are nostalgic, and suffer from future shock and future fear. Science is about extreme nostalgia for the material atoms of the ancient Greeks. Materialism is entirely dead in the era of quantum mechanics, yet scientists go on believing in matter anyway. They are highly conservative individuals unwilling to contemplate leaving the home materialism has provided for them. The last thing they want is to end up in the Unknown Land of Mind, where thought, not matter, is core reality. That would ruin everything for the scientific materialists and empiricists.”

“Blabbering on about “evidence” exposes the bankruptcy of your capacity to present a rational argument. No rational, necessary argument has any reliance whatsoever on empirical contingency. None of the eternal truths of reason requires any human senses, or any human experiences, or any human “evidence”. In other words, the eternal truths of reason – the rational basis of existence – have zero reliance on human science.”