-23 upvotes, 3 direct replies (showing 3)
Be careful, or they'll swarm in like bees and downvote reason to oblivion.
Never forget, physicalism rejects Popperian falsifiability, and by extension the scientific method. Never accept their arguments that they are scientific, they are circular arguments and hand waving.
Edit: don't agree? Prove to me that you accept falsifiability and I'll change my mind about you.
Comment by reddituserperson1122 at 24/02/2025 at 14:18 UTC
6 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Popper would definitely disagree with you.
Comment by sajberhippien at 24/02/2025 at 13:57 UTC
21 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Obviously everyone, including hardline materialists, will have certain axiomatic beliefs that are unfalsifiable. It's rare for even the most silly r/atheist poster to outright deny that there are unfalsifiable beliefs necessary to hold for a materialistic worldview.
That doesn't mean they reject the scientific method, unless you are saying that literally everyone ever rejects the scientific method. The scientific method is a useful method to investigate a subset of claims, once one accepts certain base beliefs that are themselves outside the perview of science.
Comment by pab_guy at 24/02/2025 at 16:03 UTC
4 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Physicalism is a belief, not a theory. A theory would posit a mechanism. The belief of physicalists is that a mechanism will be discovered.
Some physicalists might contend that if we solve all the small problems, and still don't have an answer for the hard problem, then physicalism would be falsified.
But physicalism itself is so poorly defined that I'm not sure it matters... it's fairly meaningless to begin with.