Bradley Monton on Methodological Naturalism

If science really is permanently committed to methodological naturalism – the philosophical position that restricts all explanations in science to naturalistic explanations -  it follows that the aim of science is not generating true theories. Instead, the aim of science would be something like: generating the best theories that can be formulated subject to the restriction that the theories are naturalistic. More and more evidence could come in suggesting that a supernatural being exists, but scientific theories wouldn’t be allowed to acknowledge that possibility.

 

(Source: colorado.edu)

Bradley Monton is an atheist and professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado in Boulder, who specialises in the philosophy of science, particularly the philosophy of physics. He is the author of several papers looking at the intersection of the philosophy of science with public debates surrounding the issue of what should or should not be taught in science classrooms. He has a keen interest in arguments for or against the existence of God that rely on science.

See his blog here.

Bradley is the author of a book entitled Seeking God in Science: An Atheist Defends Intelligent Design