Materialism of the Gaps?

[MattusMaximus]

One of my favorite science bloggers, Dr. Steven Novella, is going toe-to-toe with one of the Disco Institute's Fellows, Dr. Michael Egnor, concerning neuroscience. In this latest blog entry, Egnor puts on display one of the new rhetorical tactics being used by creationists - calling evolution "materialism of the gaps."

Here's a link to this entry:
http://www.theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=456

A few excerpts:

This is now a common strategy of the creationists - calling evolution “materialism of the gaps.” This further seems to me to be part of a broader strategy by them to simply turn the language of skepticism that is being applied to them back against the defenders of evolution and neuroscience.

This is one of those statements that is not even wrong - it just misses the point. Yes - there are gaps in our understanding of neuroscience and the mind. I have never denied that. There are gaps in our scientific understanding of pretty much any complex topic. At least so far, there seems to be always deeper levels of knowledge to attain. That is one of the fascinating things about science.

To put it another way - Egnor would have you believe that any scientific hypothesis is the same as a “god of the gaps” argument, but they are not. A hypothesis is testable. A”god of the gaps” argument simply inserts a final and untestable answer into a current gap in our scientific knowledge.

This whole "materialism of the gaps" angle is new to me - has anyone else ever seen this before?

It gets much more interesting. Enjoy the read!

Cheers - MM

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Sure. . I get it. The "gaps" between the gaps in our knowledge (that is, our knowledge) is indeed the basis for the theory of evolution by natural selection.

I'm picturing one of those Escher figure/ground drawings. You can call knowledge a "gap" in faith (or ignorance) just as easily as you can call ignorance a gap in knowledge.

Yeah. . that's the ticket. There's no difference between science and faith, after all!

 

[Dr H]

One of my favorite science bloggers, Dr. Steven Novella, is going toe-to-toe with one of the Disco Institute's Fellows, Dr. Michael Egnor, concerning neuroscience. In this latest blog entry, Egnor puts on display one of the new rhetorical tactics being used by creationists - calling evolution "materialism of the gaps."

Here's a link to this entry:
http://www.theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=456

This whole "materialism of the gaps" angle is new to me - has anyone else ever seen this before?

It gets much more interesting. Enjoy the read!

Cheers - MM

Thanks for the interesting link.

The whole discussion is sort of a weird inside-out version of an on-going discussion I've been having for ages on another list, with several self-proclaimed "enlightened" beings. In a nutshell, they claim to be coming from a (quasi-Buddhist) position of spiritual monism: e.g., that matter and physicality are essentially illusions, creations of the pre-existing, primal, non-corporeal mind. In fact, all of their arguments are dualistic, of the same sort of dualism as that championed by Dr. Egnor. My position in these discussions is quite close to the physicalist monism being espoused by Dr. Novella in the article you linked.

Ironically, the denouement of virtually every extended interaction in this on-again/off-again discussion is the "enlightened ones" contention that I cannot possibly understand what they are so earnestly trying to tell me because my mind is not yet ready to relinquish it's dualist perspective on life, the universe, and everything.

Big fun.

At least Mssrs. Novella and Egnor seem to be somewhat certain which of them is the monist and which of them is the dualist.

 

[blutoski]

Thanks for the interesting link.

The whole discussion is sort of a weird inside-out version of an on-going discussion I've been having for ages on another list, with several self-proclaimed "enlightened" beings. In a nutshell, they claim to be coming from a (quasi-Buddhist) position of spiritual monism: e.g., that matter and physicality are essentially illusions, creations of the pre-existing, primal, non-corporeal mind. In fact, all of their arguments are dualistic, of the same sort of dualism as that championed by Dr. Egnor. My position in these discussions is quite close to the physicalist monism being espoused by Dr. Novella in the article you linked.

Ironically, the denouement of virtually every extended interaction in this on-again/off-again discussion is the "enlightened ones" contention that I cannot possibly understand what they are so earnestly trying to tell me because my mind is not yet ready to relinquish it's dualist perspective on life, the universe, and everything.

Big fun.

At least Mssrs. Novella and Egnor seem to be somewhat certain which of them is the monist and which of them is the dualist.

Sounds a lot like docetic Gnosticism, too.

-graeme