Belief in Science and Belief in Nothing?

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Faith in modern science might be faith
* that there is no corruption or ideas bias in its workings,
* that its present ideas are always the most reliable and likely to be true, and changing them is only for the cleverclogses not for the likes of us,
* that it's always right against any conflicting evidence of other types,
* that its opinion is enough grounds to discount and put mental health labels on everyone with a paranormal experience.

There is a term "scientism" for this way of thinking. It's flawed by the word confusion that results when you try to turn the "-ism" ending to "-ist."

One caveat I'd throw to the OP:

In a perfect world human beings would refrain from loading whatever they put their stock in with their own subjective dogmatisms. Unfortunately whatever ways of seeing the world get to be popular get steeped in all kinds of things that have nothing to do with their actual backings.

N'other words - throw the bathwater out, keep the babies.

So what.

There is no scientific basis for an external entity not bound by physics. Incomplete knowledge is no reason to abandon rational inquiry.

Belief in science is not belief in any particular fact. And if you are promoting skepticism, that is what science is all about.

"Science is what happens when skepticism meets curiousity." -- Anonymous

"Mad Science" is what happens in science when concern for the consequences is lacking.

Religionists impose dogmatic beliefs.

Sadly this is all too often true. Even with those in “science”.

Both should be concerned with the search for truth. The religionist may be hindered by denominational requirements, traditions, peer expectations, financial investment, or training.

The scientist may be hindered by departmental requirements, traditions, peer expectations, grant money, or training.

I have found much of value in the search for truth when I shed myself of the influence of the self-appointed gatekeepers of both religion and science.

The definition of a dogmatic belief is one that has no empirical evidence to support it, yet should not be doubted or questioned. A scientific belief, on the other hand, invites skepticism, even when all available empirical evidence supports it.

Thus, the quote should read "Scientists search for knowledge and invite skeptical inquiry, while religionists impose dogmatic beliefs and persecute those who doubt."

In other words, "To Science, doubt is a virtue. To religion, doubt is a sin."

I don't quite understand the meaning of your responses. I have an Honors degree in Math and Physics, and even I concede that natural law and principles of physics is insuffice to draw conclusions about challenging problems such as the ultimate origin of anything. I do not believe in a biblical God per se, but you cannot wantonly discard the hypothesis that there is indeed some form of controlling force that is not chained by physical law that circumscribes our universe and sets limits onto it. If you were to claim that scientific laws and inquiry insofar that they can be empirically probed, are suffice alone to explain rational universal phenomenon, you run the risk of committing an ex post facto fallacy as even physical constants can be construed as 'existing.'

I can wantonly discard any hypothesis that is unfalsifiable. I cannot abandon the search for naturalistic explanations for the origin of everything, at least not at this early stage in our inquiry. There are already several plausible naturalistic explanations. Yours is the classic "god of the gaps" fallacy, even if you don't hold a literal belief in a god. All known physical laws can be mathematically derived from the simple assumption of point-of-view invariance, no entity establishing these laws is required.

Fine point. But did you purposely put that smiley in my quote?

Perhaps the whole conception of existence can be ascribed to something else rather than a god or goddess? Would it be a reasonable hypothesis to claim that there is a driving force beyond even the realm of scientific inquiry?

Edit: What do you mean by your interpretation of an entity? If you mean the universe as a whole and a pantheistic understanding of it, then the existence of that 'entity' has long since been established.

Beliefs shape the very perceptions that shape our beliefs. To the extent that you believe you understand the world you limit the possibility of understanding to ways of seeing that conform to your established views. You are then bound to misconstrue, minimize, or conveniently disregard anything that does not fit with the views you favor in order to maintain them. In other words, attention is bound by beliefs to fabricate perception in a way that accords with them. Thus knowledge [held apart from its particular application] becomes ignorance.

A tremendous amount of energy is expended in the maintenance of an intercessory mode of perception. It is actually quite painful to fixate beliefs in the face of ceaseless change and unknown possibilities, so many retreat to an illusion of sameness and predictability. Nevertheless, it may some day happen that everything you think you know fails, and terror, a cool breeze from the void, quietly insists that you leave behind the stale, false security of the known.

On the other hand, beliefs are indispensable as the cognitive pivots without which thought would be pointless and incoherent. You have to believe something, sometimes. It makes a difference whether you hold the appropriate set of beliefs according to the circumstances. It makes a difference whether you see a psychic surgeon or a real surgeon, to remove a tumor, for instance. If you do not believe anything, then how do you choose?

To be at ease with not-knowing does not impede curiosity or conflict with a scientific mode of inquiry. If you would be free from beliefs, then learn to hold them lightly, in accordance with their use, and set them aside when they are no longer needed.

I think people need at least a coherent structure to take their next step forward or at least a step out to evaluate another conduit to see what it yields, each step forward being a partial replacement of one belief set for another. If it's too drastic a change a person finds themselves disoriented and occasionally they find themselves losing their societal adjustment.

As for dogmatism that's the other extreme where people catch a particular line of reasoning, feel it's sufficient, and throw everything they have into it. I thought this was an interesting article on today's prima facie:
http://theethicalskeptic.com/2015/11/15 ... -any-more/

We do need coherent belief structures in order to communicate, and for countless other things I suppose, but we already have that going on. There is no risk of losing access to that under normal circumstances, so it seems like something of a non-issue to me. The freedom from belief I [imagined I was] was alluding to is the freedom to access multiple properly irreconcilable perspectives without needing to absolutize one and compatibilize or marginalize the rest, as we tend to do. This means the freedom to swap one belief structure for another as the situation or curiosity demands. It means the ability [which might just be a willingness, or courage even] to explore strange new belief systems sincerely without fear of breaking the old ones. For whatever beliefs you set aside when they aren't doing anything important, you don't have to reach very far to pick them back up again.

The problem with science and skepticism is that most people understand the latter as freedom to disregard known evidence to make room for whatever they want to believe, and to attack established theories with a wealth of fallacies, which you can't criticize, because then they'll accuse you of wanting to suppress inquiry, thereby likening you to a religious preacher and making you look like a hypocrite for denying you're one.

Science is self-correcting, while religion is self-justifying.

That's why scientific beliefs of even a hundred years ago have been discarded and replaced with newer, more accurate, and more provable theories; and why religious beliefs are still drawn from the same old pit of sludge that they've been drawn from since the first scoundrel met the first fool.