To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (366035 ) 3/4/2003 1:25:05 PM From: Johannes Pilch Read Replies (2) | Respond to You talk of 'common sense' approaches, and 'the old scientific method'... can you define? Refutation of Bishop Berkeley More specifically: how do you decide what is 'natural', if you don't believe in the value of the observational method? And don't tell me 'it just seems natural'... because that is mere intuition and personal bias behavior on other natural things (unless you are just plain ignorant). You cannot do that with behaviors themselves. Behaviors are not original in nature that they should have behaviors that you might judge to discover them in nature. With behaviors it’s the other friggin’ way around. They do not themselves exist in nature such that we can determine their existence by their effect on nature. They are the expressions of things that actually DO exist. Even should we see some sort of nameless behavior or amorphous force having an impact on a natural object, our being in nature DEMANDS that we then seek the natural thing responsible for the behavior (this is why you cannot know God, btw). So then if you wish to find what is natural, find that which literally and physically exists with you. Things that have no physical existence are but expressions of nature – or they are religious.although I've got nothing against intuition - the scientific method relies upon testing, and repeated observation, and repeatability of results, peer review. Your personal near-mystical 'intuition' must fall by the wayside if hard observational facts contradict it.
