If you haven’t already had enough of the Science vs Philosophy debates…
I have a little more for you.
Lawrence Krauss is at it again.
Getting to your question of morality, for example, science provides the basis for moral decisions, which are sensible only if they are based on reason, which is itself based on empirical evidence. Without some knowledge of the consequences of actions, which must be based on empirical evidence, then I think “reason” alone is impotent. If I don’t know what my actions will produce, then I cannot make a sensible decision about whether they are moral or not. Ultimately, I think our understanding of neurobiology and evolutionary biology and psychology will reduce our understanding of morality to some well-defined biological constructs.
And Massimo Pigliucci is having none of it.
He, like Harris before, confuses an understanding of the mechanisms of X with the epistemic status (true, not true, undecidable, etc.) of X. To see the point simply, imagine if a neuroscientist told you that he wanted to scan your brain while you were trying to demonstrate the Pythagorean theorem. Said neuroscientist would be able to tell you all sorts of fascinating biological facts about which parts of your brain were involved in the task, how much of each neuropeptide you were using while carrying it out, etc. What he would have absolutely nothing to say about is whether you got the proof right. You’d need a mathematician for that.
I’m inclined to agree with Massimo, as per usual, but I’m going to give Krauss credit for engaging in the conversation. I do think it’s important to discuss these issues.