Science: The Most ‘Natural’ Thing
- Admin
- May 5, 2024
- 8 min read
Updated: May 21, 2024
Science is about nature. It’s natural, but closer to natural than our minds alone would be able to get.
It often evokes in people’s heads the idea of ‘artificial’, or ‘steps removed’ from nature or from the natural world. By extent, this can lead to the impression of it being its own, self-contained fraternity, just another equal way of knowing things to other thought modes. How wrong this is.
The fruits of science from labs, engineering, technology invisible to the naked eye, do not arise merely from chance or an idea/desire for them to exist. They are the result of verified testing of the natural world – and science can neither define nor defy what is universal, what is real. It only discovers what is real; what is natural. It pays attention to what is real. If you’re ever curious about anything at all, you’re already at the start of some science yourself.
Science is at heart, the observation and testing of nature itself. When we talk about any scientific discovery: as advanced, counterintuitive, or ‘unnatural’ as you could imagine, it’s nothing without the same scientific journey which began in nature’s most simple observations. Nature is in the driving seat. The destinations are amazing, and exist there with or without science. Science just carefully follows the directions to arrive at them.
Nature has Laws and Absolutes
Science is a tool to acquire a deep and profound understanding of nature. No, I didn’t say it ‘knows everything’, so put that to bed. But it has certainly revealed many natural laws to us at this stage – some of which are practically incontestable on a deeply fundamental level.
As much as some believers in mystical, paranormal, or magical things may not like it, there are indeed physical, incontestable laws in nature. Science does not 'create' or 'claim' these wonders, but discovers them and carefully tests the validity of them. When we say ‘incontestable laws in nature’, it means you can’t breach them – especially with an unexplained, untestable belief. That would be denial of reality.
This audiobook is a fantastic walkthrough of some of the the physical reality and laws of physics we have discovered. It also does a good job throughout, of explaining how we know the universe has constants and absolutes. “Why Does E=MC2 and Why Should We Care”.
‘Undiscovered’ isn’t always ‘True’
If someone objects to the scientific disproof of the supernatural, because they claim there are ‘energies’ or ‘forces’ or other systems which are as yet "undetected by science", this is a staggeringly ignorant claim. If something is undetected by any scientific way, then by definition it hasn't been detected at all. Even your eyes (if the thing in question is genuinely real) are one tool of science (albeit unreliable ones), because they've interacted with reality.
Anything we can call a ‘force’ or ‘energy’ is inherently discovered by science and included in physics: the natural, seen and unseen universe. To use a word like energy, 'life force', or 'chi', implies many things physically. In fact, energy is physical. Without an understanding of what energy is, however, it can’t be claimed a ‘new’ one is there.
‘Undiscovered energy’
Consider the above quote. By definition, a mystery describes something we don’t understand. A solved mystery, however, always has an explanation by definition. Solved mysteries turn out to be mathematical problems, physics problems, illusions, human biases and errors, and even discoveries in other completely unexpected fields, and endless combinations of all the above. But all are tied to reality.
A mystery implies a gap in knowledge, but does not imply magic. Without a basic knowledge-backed theory or reality-based verification, magic or other claimed ‘unknowns’ simply remain a gap in knowledge: unsolved. If solved, a 'supernatural' claim becomes natural, a 'paranormal' claim becomes normal. The point is that these words are merely placeholders for something we haven’t solved yet – and without being ‘solved’, the paranormal claim can't be an explanation. It's not knowledge.
Science happens to know what energy is – on some of its most fundamental levels of existence, and in all its states (see earlier link). Physicists understand it much more deeply than people who want the supernatural to be real, or than alien enthusiasts who think interstellar space travel is viable. Paranormal investigators should at least understand energy in physics before claiming a new type exists. Why in physics? Because again, energy is physical. This is simply the workings of the world we live in – whoever you are, whatever your beliefs.
Knowledge is a Ladder
I’ve created a (crude) diagram below to hopefully illustrate the gaps in understanding of what science is, compared to arguments such as the tired old ‘science doesn’t know everything’. It also demonstrates (again, crudely) the missing links in knowledge for those who make huge claims about the natural world, without any understanding of what they’re saying. Obviously, there are many steps in between that I can't fit onto it but it should convey the gaps in knowledge nonetheless.
You can’t climb to the highest rungs of understanding if you don’t have the first ones in place. You can’t use the highest, as yet unreachable or undiscovered rungs (‘undiscovered’ energy, waves, forces etc.), to discredit the rungs we have reached (actually known energy, waves, forces etc., fundamental laws of physics), and especially not from the perspective of the starting rungs (not understanding basic energy, waves, force etc.).
As a number 0.5 - 1, it would be extremely ignorant to make a claim within or beyond rung 4 without first understanding rungs 1 through 4. Even then, you can’t assert anything beyond rung 4 as real or true until there is sufficient reason to, because it is yet unknown. Especially as there are several possible and probable explanations based in reality in the prior rungs. Paranormal claims ignorantly breach every one of these steps.
Those who try to justify supernatural ideas with words like 'energy' (and all names for it like Qi, psychic, etc.), aura, vibrations, meridians, electromagnetic, ESP, quantum, fields, infrared, frequencies, the list goes on – these words are usually hijacked from science, but not understood. In many cases they are pre-scientific ideas born from superstition.
This below episode is a breakdown of a documentary, ‘Superhuman: The Invisible Made Visible’. It’s brimming with the unwarranted use of science-sounding concepts to appear legitimate. The episode is a comedic roast, but does highlight a lot of the main points that are being wrongly used at the same time, as they parse the gobbledygook line by line.
These terms are deeply, comprehensively understood by science. The difference with supernatural/paranormal people, is that they use them in made up ways untethered from reality, and don't understand their real terminology. It's how they bamboozle a lay audience that wants to believe them. The irony is that if a paranormal advocate understood what all these words meant, they would self-disprove the ways in which they are using them to justify their supernatural desires.
There are hundreds of this kind of ‘documentary’ above, where serious, dedicated people talk about nonsense concepts without any proof, methods, or understanding. There are some who have niche interests and passions, like say a paranormal investigator, or mediums claiming they have a profession in speaking to the dead. These people appear knowledgeable to a lay person but are missing substantial amounts of rungs 1 – 3 of the knowledge ladder, often making claims that would sit beyond step 4, but are disproved by 1-3.
A perfect quote from the above episode is that:
“They’re dedicating their career to not understanding stuff.”
This is harsh sounding, but true for so many pseudoscience proponents and practitioners, wellness influencers, pseudo therapists of all kinds, fitness fanatics, non-science-based dieticians, anti-vaxxers, conspiracists, alien enthusiasts, you name it. They don’t understand many lower steps in the ladder, but make claims way beyond their reach, which experts do actually have knowledge about. This gives the experts the authority to debunk it, but it doesn’t give the non-experts any authority to make assertions in the first place.
Of course, there will always be money in all kinds of deception, so a career in nonsense is unfortunately a common thing.
Knowledge isn’t only ‘Facts’
Knowledge doesn’t only refer to static, unchangeable facts. Knowledge includes explanatory power – in fact it requires explanation, otherwise it’s just a memorised clip without understanding. As such, in the diagram I made of the ladder of knowledge, it’s important to note that the upper levels of knowledge are not merely complicated facts disconnected from our everyday lives. They’re not just fancy words which produce fancy tricks and conveniences. They’re deep, fundamentally true observations of the world, of reality. They're systematically tested concepts, holding vast explanatory power, and themselves being explainable.
This means that most of us sat around the 0.5 to 1 level of knowledge are reliant on the upper levels, to explain what we experience, how we perceive, and what we perceive. We take most of it for granted, as conveniences in our lives. But, if we think we can claim that there’s a spirit world that people really communicate with, that ‘gym-fluencers’ know the biological benefits of various supplements and therapies while chemists and biologists do not, or that aliens are definitely among us, then quite a few rungs on that ladder are missing from our personal knowledge.
Further hindering our climbing that ladder to knowledge and understanding, our brains will fight to twist reality and preserve our beliefs and desires at all costs. It is no more credible than wishful thinking, motivated reasoning, and confirmation bias.
This short video by Julia Galef is an inspiring and incredibly insightful talk about the 'scout mindset' and motivated reasoning. Critical thinking is the best mindset for finding truth and identifying biases.
"Do you yearn to defend your own beliefs, or do you yearn to see the world as clearly as you possibly can?"
Embrace Reality
The point comes down to that the method of science is not a closed minded endeavour of intellectual snobbery and sneering elitism. It’s not another fraternity, dogma, or social standing. It’s the honest pursuit of the natural worlds’ mechanisms, secrets, wonders and puzzles, driven by curiosity and a desire for truth. Most importantly, a more reliable way to test and confirm it, rather than to assume it and believe all the many wrong answers that blind acceptance leads to in our heads.
Human beings are physical things within reality. Physics describes reality. If a human can detect something and it really exists, it’s part of physics, detectable outside of that person’s head. If a human experiences something which doesn’t exist outside of their head, it’s not reality. That doesn’t mean it’s not an experience. These things are still explainable through psychology and the fact our minds are messy and unreliable.
Example: I can stare at a house, but think of a sentient house talking with its door and blinking with its windows. Does that make it real because I thought it? Of course not. Is it possible my mind could be convinced via many subconscious mechanisms that it is real? Abso-fucking-lutely.
Does this mean I’m crazy, or can’t be rational about other things? Not at all! Many educated people think they talk to the dead. Many self-sufficient, well-meaning citizens think they have been abducted by aliens. Many successful high earners believe they can ‘manifest’ things into existence and make meaningless astrology platitudes fit to their life.
Remember what I opened this piece with: "Science is about nature. It’s natural, but closer to natural than our minds alone would be able to get." Nature is just the indifferent reality we are part of, like it or not.
So next time your mind jumps to defend a dearly held belief in whichever flavour of unproven magic, try not to let it fracture into Science vs Belief; rather, think of science as the natural way to test that belief. Otherwise, you’re not talking about truth or reality. In belief, you’re describing your own desires and inner workings of your head, which comes from a place of – and leads to – ignorance. Even blind defiance of reality.
Belief is ok to have, but useless concerning matters of truth. There’s a wondrous reality for everyone outside of our heads. Embrace it.
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