an Article of S. Peppin :
Science rests on a fundamental belief.
The « belief » is the view that reality is governed by consistent laws that we (humans) can discover. Anything that appears to contradict these laws (eg a « miracle ») is assumed to be either a mistaken observation or delusion on the part of the observer, or a new phenomenon that can eventually be explained by refining the laws.
This belief, while comforting, is unsupportable.
There may in fact be real phenomena occurring that are non-repeatable, subjective, and that do not obey human-constructed « laws. » Science, by its very nature, cannot study such phenomena.
When faced with reports of such things, scientists have two choices : (i) deny the existence of the phenomenon (delusion etc) or (ii) admit the severe limitations of science on knowledge of the nature of reality.
The current scientific paradigm chooses the former option. It is comforting to think that humans can in principle « understand » all aspects of reality. It takes much more courage to accept that human knowledge is fundamentally limited, and that there are aspects of reality that we will never understand. Hence it is actually science that is the opium of the people, not religion !
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