Scientific Empiricism

[essentialsaltes]

It does now though, doesn't it?

It's not really clear. The Julian calendar is not in use. Depending where you live in the world, you might use a Gregorian calendar with years denoted in AD, CE, AM, AH...

 

[Zosimus]

Then you understand that it is not free iron, but bound in a complex.

I refer you to http://www.christianforums.com/threads/scientific-empiricism.7902171/page-3#post-68466866

In that post I said: "Someone gets sick, and they are blooded to remove extra iron..."

I did not say free iron. I said extra iron. In no post did I say "free iron."

So before you launch a quixotic quest to correct someone, you might want to determine what that person really said.

Slowly but surely you are learning.

Back at you, bub.

 

[sfs]

Just as the ICPU cannot be called snail mail, so too the discoveries of people before the 1800s cannot properly be classified as scientific discoveries.

"Scientific" and "scientist" are English words, and they mean what competent speakers of English use them to mean. Competent speakers of English (including those with relevant expertise, like philosophers of science and historians of science) routinely use them to refer to events and people in the 18th century. You may wish to dictate linguistic usage, but your wish is ineffectual and your argument is spurious

 

[AV1611VET]

It's not really clear.

Let's make it clear, shall we?

The terms anno Domini (AD or A.D.) and before Christ (BC or B.C.) are used to label or number years in the Julian and Gregorian calendars.

SOURCE

Clear enough?

 

[Zosimus]

"Scientific" and "scientist" are English words, and they mean what competent speakers of English use them to mean. Competent speakers of English (including those with relevant expertise, like philosophers of science and historians of science) routinely use them to refer to events and people in the 18th century. You may wish to dictate linguistic usage, but your wish is ineffectual and your argument is spurious

Scientist is, indeed, an English word, and it was coined in 1834. You claim that "competent speakers of English...routinely use [this word] to refer to events and people in the 18th century." However, you used the phrase "...those with relevant expertise, like philosophers of science..." Unfortunately like means similar to. Since the proper phrase is such as, it would be a stretch to include you among those competent speakers of English.

I freely admit that numerous people use like incorrectly, just as numerous people use the word scientist incorrectly when referring to people who are obviously not scientists. However, until someone can submit a persuasive logical argument for classifying non-scientists as scientists, I remain unmoved. Perhaps you think your argumentum ad populum should count, but I don't normally consider logical fallacies persuasive logical arguments.

 

[sfs]

Scientist is, indeed, an English word, and it was coined in 1834. You claim that "competent speakers of English...routinely use [this word] to refer to events and people in the 18th century." However, you used the phrase "...those with relevant expertise, like philosophers of science..." Unfortunately like means similar to. Since the proper phrase is such as, it would be a stretch to include you among those competent speakers of English.

By this reasoning, Robert Louis Stevenson, Jane Austen, Henry Fowler (author of Modern English Usage) and Wilson Follett (author of Modern American Usage) were also not competent speakers of English, since they all either use that construction or endorse its use. That's a pretty good class of lowlifes, and I'm happy to join their company.

I freely admit that numerous people use like incorrectly, just as numerous people use the word scientist incorrectly when referring to people who are obviously not scientists. However, until someone can submit a persuasive logical argument for classifying non-scientists as scientists, I remain unmoved. Perhaps you think your argumentum ad populum should count, but I don't normally consider logical fallacies persuasive logical arguments.

You are confused. A definition is not a logical argument, and definitions are not in general the result of logical arguments; thus appealing to actual use cannot be a logical fallacy when determining a definition. Has a single dictionary or style guide endorsed your restrictive definition of "scientific"?

 

[Zosimus]

By this reasoning, Robert Louis Stevenson, Jane Austen, Henry Fowler (author of Modern English Usage) and Wilson Follett (author of Modern American Usage) were also not competent speakers of English, since they all either use that construction or endorse its use. That's a pretty good class of lowlifes, and I'm happy to join their company.

E. E. Cummings also routinely violated the standard rules of English, especially those of capitalization. If you are so anxious to be lumped with your favorite writers, why not embrace his style?

You are confused. A definition is not a logical argument, and definitions are not in general the result of logical arguments; thus appealing to actual use cannot be a logical fallacy when determining a definition. Has a single dictionary or style guide endorsed your restrictive definition of "scientific"?

This is another straw man argument. I have never offered any definition of "scientific" (restrictive or otherwise). I have simply indicated that there were no scientists before 1834. How anyone can disagree with this obvious statement is, depending on my mood, either infuriating or laughable.

Even if we assume that natural philosophers could be considered the forerunners of modern scientists (doubtful), this explanation immediately runs afoul of multiple problems. Since the so-called "scientific revolution" is often considered to have been started when Nicholas Copernicus published On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres in 1542-3, one would expect that Copernicus must have been a natural philosopher. Except, of course, that he wasn't. The next supposed actor in this scientific revolution is, of course, Galileo Galilei. We would expect him to have been a natural philosopher too, except, of course, that he wasn't. The final actor in this so-called revolution was Sir Isaac Newton. Thankfully we can at least say that he was a natural philosopher. Two out of three isn't bad, I suppose.

Of course all of this overlooks the important feature that all had in common: They were all mathematicians. Of course, no one nowadays alleges that all mathematicians are scientists – and rightfully so. I am simply wondering what logical basis you have for your historical revisionism.

Even if you consider that science and empiricism are the same, then you cannot date science earlier than John Locke, who is credited with founding empiricism in 1689.

 

[MissRowy]

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