Axiom

 

- Shit, it´s Bigfoot! Nobody will believe us!!
- Don´t worry, human, I´m a purely naturalist entity...

Richard Carrier on the attack again. I suppose I should have held this over until "Materialist Monday" (LOL), but here goes. 

Main thesis: naturalism (materialism) is not a dogma or prior axiom, but the empirical *result* of centuries of science. So *today*, we can say with a high degree of confidence that ontological naturalism is true. Nor is it unfalsifiable. The baseline of any scientific proposition is whether or not it´s based on publicly available data (regardless of their alleged ontological status). And no such data has ever been proven to be supernatural. And yes, the naturalism of science really is ontological, not just "methodological". As I long argued myself. "But Huston, science is scientism". 

Here are the pertinent paragraphs: 

>>>Dawes then rightly argues that this means scientists and historians are really, for all their hemming and hawing, actually de facto metaphysical naturalists. They aren’t really just “methodological” naturalists; saying they are is more of a soft way to avoid having to anger their believing peers; or for believers working at secular universities to avoid getting fired for being a kook or denounced as atheists by their believing peers. 

(...)

>>>Hence, “It follows that if” their arguments “were generally accepted as sound arguments, the existence of spiritual beings would become part of our science.” Ergo, the only reason such entities haven’t become part of our science is that there aren’t sound arguments for them. 

>>>I would suggest this is a harsher thing to admit to, uncomfortable for any ardent believer, and awkward even for the secularist—for admitting it would offend too many friends and peers, and plunge them into endless arguments with what are really, honestly, cranks; an exercise most professionals would rightly prefer to avoid as a waste of their time. 

>>>So to avoid this blowup, they invent nonsense about “Oh, don’t worry, I’m just a methodological naturalist.” Just to quiet the kooks down.

Personally, I might be just a tad bit kookish myself, so make of this material what you wish. 

Naturalism is not an axiom of the sciences, but a conclusion of them