Re: FW: responses to "scientifically humble" YEC

Craig Rusbult (rusbult@vms2.macc.wisc.edu)
Tue, 27 Jul 1999 19:26:42 -0500

Thanks for the quotations, James:

>Methodological naturalism becomes metaphysical
>naturalism only when the limitations of science are taken to be
>limitations upon reality.

Phil (1992) sums up my views (and yours, probably) fairly well.
But Phil (1995) thinks the distinction is collapsing, and SHOULD:

>The key question raised by the qualifier methodological is this:
>What is being limited-science or reality. .....
>When ... the distinction between methodological and metaphysical
>naturalism tends to collapse.

I don't agree with this, even though what Phil discusses is
real. This is the challenge, analyzing the complex interactions
between the logical and the psychological/sociological. In our
culture, there are important mutual interactions. But I still
think (as described in Section 2A of my overviews) that making
a clear distinction between methodological and metaphysical is
logically possible, and is (in many ways) beneficial.

Craig