Science as a belief

It's interesting how much one doesn't know of oneself until he is asked specifically and has to think about it. So the other day Khatri bhaiyya asked me why I get so flustered whenever the topic of homeopathy comes up. As it turns out, I really do get irritated but if he had not mentioned it I would never have admitted it to myself. Then I had another discussion with Jackie upon something similar and the upshot of it all is that some little things became a bit less vague.

I suppose that of all things that irritate me, the one that does it to the greatest extent is the statement, 'well, science is just another belief.' Frequently it is uttered by someone who has just had a long and winded argument and has decided to settle it all by pointing to the shaky grounds upon which we have built all are architectures. The thing that drives me nuts is that the statement is actually spot on. At its very heart science is actually just a belief with its own axioms and suffers from both an anthropological bias and severe sensory limitations. But it's a very special kind of belief. And it's this special nature of the belief which I find hard to convey to someone who has just made this statement. It's hard to make them understand that the important thing about science is not so much that it has 'made things work' but the fact that it's a humble, self-correcting, and ideally non-dogmatic, non-hierarchical system. A system which always stands incomplete and is never too shy to admit its own incompetence. A system where a rank outsider like Einstein can come along from nowhere and change our entire world view. It's hard to convey how important the act of 'allowing complete irreverence' to exist inside a 'belief system' is to its own well being. This one fact alone should actually be enough to warrant a qualified mention of 'science as a belief' because as I understand, everything else that humans believe in; from religion to economic doctrines to political ideas to homeopathy in fact- everything sort of assumes immunity from the wisdom of the common folk. They are all static and their leaders are unquestionable. So yes, Science at its very heart is just a belief but we should give credit where it's due. We should give credit to a system which, despite the initial appearance, is more equal and more hardworking than others. Or we might not and I should stop giving a damn.

There is another reason why I have more respect for Science than individual opinions and personal hunches. In fact, on a rational day, I have about as much respect for any belief, any morality as any other, including mine - which is not much. The reason is that they are all going to stop mattering or change once the individual ceases to exist, or the environment or circumstances change, or humanity finishes. These presumptuous thoughts don't really matter in the larger scheme of things. Laws of nature, on the other hand, transcend humanity - or so I feel. If there is another civilization somewhere else and if they are intelligent and curious about their surroundings and if they ask questions, I believe that they would find the exact same laws of nature as we have or will - but that's just pure belief and I agree...