Scientism is the view that science alone plausibly gives us objective knowledge, and that

any philosophy or metaphysics worthy of consideration can only be that which is implicit

in science.

Scientism is a key ingredient of the work of the new atheist writers, yet the glibbed self-confidence

of its advocates notwithstanding.

There are in fact no good arguments whatsoever for

scientism and decisive arguments against it.

Okay, was that confident enough?

I don't want to be meek in my...

Okay, so there are four general problems with scientism, or so I would argue.

Okay, that's my qualification.

First, scienceism is self-defeating and can avoid being self-defeating only at the cost of becoming trivial and uninteresting.

Okay.

Second, the scientific method cannot even in principle provide us with a complete description of reality.

Third, the laws of nature in terms of which science explains phenomena cannot in principle

provide us with a complete explanation of reality.

And fourth, what is probably the main argument in favor of scientism, the argument from the

predictive and technological success of modern physics and other sciences has no force. So let's examine each of these points in order.

That gives me the outline here, at least the first four points in the outline,

which are essentially sections of the talk here, which are going to spell out each of these claims

that I just made, each of these four problems I claim that scientist has.

So starting with the first, the dilemma for scientism. So as I've said,

...