KSVelArc

“The point is that if the knowledge that provides the categories we use to describe our observations is defective, the observation statements that presuppose those categories are similarly defective.”
― Alan F. Chalmers, What Is This Thing Called Science?

“In the Modern Age, there are still those who refuse to contradict a single word of the Bible, even though the Bible contradicts itself.”
― Jonathan Clements, Darwin's Notebook: The Life, Times, and Discoveries of Charles Robert Darwin

“The theory that religion is a force for peace, often heard among the religious right and its allies today, does not fit the facts of history.”
― Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined

“Imagine a skilled botanist accompanied by someone like myself who is largely ignorant of botany taking part in a field trip into the Australian bush, with the objective of collecting observable facts about the native flora. It is undoubtedly the case that the botanist will be capable of collecting facts that are far more numerous and discerning than those I am able to observe and formulate, and the reason is clear. The botanist has a more elaborate conceptual scheme to exploit than myself, and that is because he or she knows more botany than I do. A knowledge of botany is a prerequisite for the formulation of the observation statements that might constitute its factual basis.
Thus, the recording of observable facts requires more than the reception of the stimuli, in the form of light rays, that impinge on the eye. It requires the knowledge of the appropriate conceptual scheme and how to apply it.”
― Alan F. Chalmers, What Is This Thing Called Science?