Science imagines the world exists without us but philosophy reflects on how we bring the world into being.

You caught a boot. — Wayfarer

We're going to need a bigger boot.

So, if it turns out that humans are exterminated by our own technological inventiveness, I think that will definitively answer to your question "no." — T Clark

But hey, it's their life, their choice, right. Besides, pollution is fun for children, innit! — baker

I think both these points go into an interesting direction. Just how do we morally balance a bunch of increases to comfort and quality of living to the predictable and predictably unpredictable long term effects?

Related to this, there is no reason to suppose that technology will increase linearly forever, or that there is not a point at which a society would conclude that more technology does more harm than good.

Personally I think that the amount of suffering that can plausibly be alleviated by technology in the near future, not least the suffering related to aging and death by disease and old age, easily justifies continued progress. Getting off this planet is also rather important if we care about the long term survival of the human species (though why exactly we should care isn't easy to answer).

But there is definitely room for an interesting discussion here, I think.

You caught a boot. — Wayfarer

Quiet a few, as was expected.

there is no reason to suppose that technology will increase linearly forever, or that there is not a point at which a society would conclude that more technology does more harm than good. — Echarmion

Given my understanding of human nature, I doubt this is possible.

the amount of suffering that can plausibly be alleviated by technology in the near future, not least the suffering related to aging and death by disease and old age, easily justifies continued progress. — Echarmion

I think there are technological processes that may end human life in the "near future." If we put a value on human life, which we both do, that puts your justification in question. It is unlikely I will be here to see what happens next, but my children may.

Civilization and agriculture started 7,000ish years ago. That started an exponential increase in human population, which is now slowing and expected to slow more. — T Clark

The info I can access has exponential growth starting not earlier than around 1200CE. Before that the curve looks pretty straight.

The info I can access has exponential growth starting not earlier than around 1200CE. Before that the curve looks pretty straight. — Banno

I found information here:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/12/151221193940.htm#:~:text=While%20the%20world's%20human%20population,was%20just%200.04%20percent%20annually.

that supports your position. It says:

Prehistoric human populations of hunter-gatherers in a region of North America grew at the same rate as farming societies in Europe, according to a new radiocarbon analysis involving researchers from the University of Wyoming and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

The findings challenge the commonly held view that the advent of agriculture 10,000-12,000 years ago accelerated human population growth. The research is reported this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"Our analysis shows that transitioning farming societies experienced the same rate of growth as contemporaneous foraging societies," says Robert Kelly, University of Wyoming professor of anthropology and co-author of the PNAS paper. "The same rate of growth measured for populations dwelling in a range of environments, and practicing a variety of subsistence strategies, suggests that the global climate and/or other biological factors -- not adaptability to local environment or subsistence practices -- regulated long-term growth of the human population for most of the past 12,000 years."

For countless ages the hot nebula whirled aimlessly through space. At length it began to take shape, the central mass threw off planets, the planets cooled, boiling seas and burning mountains heaved and tossed, from black masses of cloud hot sheets of rain deluged the barely solid crust. And now the first germ of life grew in the depths of the ocean, and developed rapidly in the fructifying warmth into vast forest trees, huge ferns springing from the damp mould, sea monsters breeding, fighting, devouring, and passing away. And from the monsters, as the play unfolded itself, Man was born, with the power of thought, the knowledge of good and evil, and the cruel thirst for worship. And Man saw that all is passing in this mad, monstrous world, that all is struggling to snatch, at any cost, a few brief moments of life before Death's inexorable decree. And Man said: `There is a hidden purpose, could we but fathom it, and the purpose is good; for we must reverence something, and in the visible world there is nothing worthy of reverence.' And Man stood aside from the struggle, resolving that God intended harmony to come out of chaos by human efforts. And when he followed the instincts which God had transmitted to him from his ancestry of beasts of prey, he called it Sin, and asked God to forgive him. But he doubted whether he could be justly forgiven, until he invented a divine Plan by which God's wrath was to have been appeased. And seeing the present was bad, he made it yet worse, that thereby the future might be better. And he gave God thanks for the strength that enabled him to forgo even the joys that were possible. And God smiled; and when he saw that Man had become perfect in renunciation and worship, he sent another sun through the sky, which crashed into Man's sun; and all returned again to nebula.

"`Yes,' he murmured, `it was a good play; I will have it performed again.'"

Such, in outline, but even more purposeless, more void of meaning, is the world which Science presents for our belief. — Bertrand Russell, A Free Man's Worship

Is it?

Science as in Sean Carroll, Carlo Rovelli or Noam Chomsky is good.

Science as in Richard Dawkins or Lawrence Krauss is still ok, but is missing quite a bit.

So, if it turns out that humans are exterminated by our own technological inventiveness, I think that will definitively answer to your question "no." — T Clark

Yeah, maybe. Then again...

There's a distinction between knowing stuff and doing stuff.

Science falls on the side of knowing stuff. Sure, what you know will be used poorly; but even in the face of that I'm not disincline to say that knowing stuff is worthwhile in that it opens up more options for what we can do, as well as allowing us to better understand the consequences for what we do.

There'd be an argument, should the world end, that we might have been better not finding out the stuff that led to our demise; that our end is payback for the hubris of science.

There'd be another argument claiming that the science is neutral, and our demise is the result of failure to progress morally and socially.

There'd be yet another argument that if we had done more science, so that we better understood our plight, we might have been able to avoid it.

Three distinct narratives. Which to choose?

Now we should apply a similar method to questions of why to do things as we've done with these questions of how to do things. — Pfhorrest

I think the problem is, what do we want?

the narrow section in the middle that those who call themselves ‘scientists’ today primarily concern themselves with — Possibility

What's that then?

As in, if you what to claim that there is good science and bad science, we might listen better if you can tell us how to differentiate them.

I don't see much here with which one might engage.

Science imagines the world exists without us — Wayfarer

Is it worth pursuing this? Do you not think science might have been written all in the first person? Why not?

Ah, cheers. so it does seem that science might have something to do with population increase.

Is it? — Wayfarer

What do you think?

I don't see much here with which one might engage. — Banno

Did you miss 2020? "Science" is a political word used to silence legitimate dissent and the actual scientific method. American science is now Lysenkoism.

American science is now Lysenkoism. — fishfry

Then it's not science.

I don't recall seeing any of that in Europe. — baker

Quite possibly not. Trump drove a certain segment of the US population insane.

But there are distinct China haters who've been promoting the idea that the Chinese made the virus and let it out. — baker

One need not be a "China hater" to hold that opinion. Although as it turns out, it was the Americans who paid for the Chinese research.

China hater = Trump lover? — baker

Or just someone who cares about the plight of the Uighurs. You know. Concentration camps, organ harvesting, and suchlike. Perhaps you've heard there's a move afoot to boycott the 2022 Chinese Olympics. Nancy Pelosi is one of the leading proponents. Not exactly a Trump lover. Care to revise your remark?

Then it's not science. — Banno

Yes ok I do take your point. I love science and hate scientism and fake, politicized science. So if I criticize the latter, I haven't actually said anything at all about the former, which is your point.

But if the word "science" has become equated in the public mind with fake, politicized science, isn't that a problem? When Fauci and Walensky tell us they're "following the science" as they lurch from one politicized lie to the next, it's cold comfort to think about Galileo and Maxwell. Which is my point, even as I understand yours.

Fauci - not sure I can see your point about his behaviour. He was obligated to do the best he could while working for a lunatic. He didn't walk away.

I do take your point. — fishfry

Cheers.

Fauci - not sure I can see your point about his behaviour. He was obligated to do the best he could while working for a lunatic. He didn't walk away. — Banno

It's Trumps fault?

Trump drove a certain segment of the US population insane. — fishfry

To wit.

It's Trumps fault? — fishfry

What?

What's he supposed to have done?

There lies a vortex, apply thrusters.

My rhetorical question about the Bertrand Russell essay - that was an influential essay, at the time, and characterises a lot of 20th century polemics about the 'scientific vision of the world'.

What? — Banno

I repeated what you said. "He was obligated to do the best he could while working for a lunatic." That's TDS. That's the literal definition. Fauci has been a hack, a political apparatchik for forty years. Wrong on AIDS, wrong on SARS, wrong in the hearts of his countrymen. He only became a saint in the mind of the Trump-hating public because of exactly the the attitude that you expressed.

What's he supposed to have done? — Banno

I gave an example in this thread. Or was it a different thread? He said we should all wear two masks. Rand Paul accused him of doing it for show. Fauci said it was "science." Few weeks later, Fauci admitted it was for show, for "optics," his word. This has been going on a long time.

I could enumerate many other political flipflops in the name of "science." And not to mention that the funding for the gain-of-function research that (most likely) escaped from a lab and caused the covid pandemic has now been traced to none other than Fauci. It's like a movie where the kindly old authority figure turns out to be the arch villain. Give it some more time. Facts are getting out and public opinion is beginning to turn. Give this all another few months. I'm willing to wait. I can't explain all this to you now any more than I could have a year ago, except that today some of this information is beginning to leak into the MSM.

The first day I heard about the wet markets back in early 2020 was in an article that mentioned "Oh by the way there's a bioweapons lab a mile away." The plot twist was obvious to me that day and to many others, whose voices were suppressed. The suppression is starting to lift and the truth is going to be known. Give it time. And click around. Try not to get blindsided by the lies and propaganda.

He said we should wear two masks? Shock! Horror! So what?

funding for the gain-of-function research that (most likely) escaped from a lab and caused the covid pandemic has now been traced to none other than Fauci — fishfry

...looks to be crap to me. But again, even if true, it would show bad management, not bad science.

Seems as you missed the point. Bad policy is leading to global warming. Science is how we know this to be the case

looks to be crap to me — Banno

If what Fauci's been doing is what you call science, then I'm against it.

https://thebulletin.org/2021/05/the-origin-of-covid-did-people-or-nature-open-pandoras-box-at-wuhan/

He said we should wear two masks? Shock! Horror! So what? — Banno

Disingenuous much? He said he did it because of the science, denied in front of Congress that it was political, then admitted that it was. You call that science? Then I'm against science. That's exactly the kind of science I'm against and now I see that you are totally for it. You don't even know what science is if you think the US response to covid has been about science.

Science with respect to the COVID-19 epidemic is not all set in stone, it's not as if there's a textbook answer to all of the unknowns about what works and what doesn't. But the villification of Anthony Fauci is another thing altogether - there were fanatics protesting in the street with signs saying to Hang Fauci or Fire Fauci because of politics, because he made Trump 'look bad' (as if that was difficult). Along with all the civil rights nonsense directed at mask wearing, as if it were a Leftist conspiracy.

Here in Australia, we also 'followed the science' - less than a thousand deaths, infections under control in every state and territory, albeit at large costs in public money. But when the Government said, stay home, wear masks, by and large everyone did, and it worked.

But the villification of Anthony Fauci is another thing altogether — Wayfarer

As has been the vilification of legitimate dissent all year long.