Humanity’s irreducible truth cannot be proven by scientific methods.

Evidence

This is the highest truth we stand for. And it is true. But it is “true” in a way that is distinct from the “truth” of, say, the correlation of secondhand smoke exposure with respiratory infections in children. Our truth cannot really be “proved” by any existing scientific methods. It cannot be “pinned down,” exactly. It is too big for that! In fact, it is precisely the nature of this truth—that our humanity cannot be reduced to numbers, or even to language—that makes it impossible to put forward in a way that will “compel assent”! This truth is infinite, because it is the truth of our infinitude. — The Friends of Attention, Attensity!, 176

Categorization

• QUESTION: The claim that a central truth is deliberately unprovable sits in tension with the reading purpose of testing the bet factually — worth chasing whether the author can hold both.
• DEEPTHINKING: The identification of human infinitude with unprovability, and the explicit contrast with an evidence-grade claim, is a genuinely subtle anti-positivist move worth sitting with.
• XREF: connects to: Science cannot answer the fundamental questions of human existence. — Scientific knowledge does not question the existence of God; Human sciences cannot answer the philosophical question of Being. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 199; Science has failed to adequately answer how human consciousness developed or what it actually is. — No, Science Can’t Answer the Biggest Questions of Life and Existence (+6 more)
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Science cannot answer the fundamental questions of human existence. — Scientific knowledge does not question the existence of God; Human sciences cannot answer the philosophical question of Being. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 199; Science has failed to adequately answer how human consciousness developed or what it actually is. — No, Science Can’t Answer the Biggest Questions of Life and Existence (+6 more)