Doctrinaire rationalism in public policy
Posted by Joseph Knippenberg
This WaPo article calls attention to this new public policy lobby which will aggressively promote science and secularism. Theyve issued this declaration.
12:13 PM / November 18, 2006
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Well, good luck to them! Heres hoping they develop a sense of humor, at least, along the way.
Meh, I used to be a member of CSICOPS. I bailed out when I realized that, just under the surface, they were ragingly anti-religious and overtly Leftist...indeed, routinely putting forth nonsense that was not grounded in a scientific understanding of the human condition. There is nothing sadder that irrational "rationalists."
Exactly - why use science to figure stuff out when you can just look it up in the Bible! So what if its a little light on global warming fixes?
Your post suggests that their approach is ... wrong? Promoting science is something every competent state and local government does every schoolday. Thats bad? Should we instead form an organization to advocate blinding ourselves with the creationist myths of an uneducated society two millenia ago? Would that be praiseworthy?
Teaching a dogmatic version of science in the place of 2,000 year old myths wouldnt be much better. True science is always tentative and remains open to falsification. If it is taught in that fashion then, yes, it is superior to other ways of thinking for most questions (but not all...science has little to say about the hierarchy of values). If it is taught as absolute truth and a replacement for religion (as CSICOPS would have it), then it is no better than religion, and perhaps worse.