Originally posted by twhitehead
I disagree. Science can potentially investigate anything and everything. In fact, anything that cannot be investigated by science, does not exist (more or less cut off by Occams razor).
Further, if the spaghetti monster is defined in certain ways, it is trivial to disprove his existence. What it is impossible to disprove is the non-existence of an unde entity is not defined it is somewhat meaningless to discuss its existence in the first place.
Depends what you mean by “thing”—if you mean any and every concept or idea(e.g. beauty) then I don’t think you can do it without some form of question-begging: e.g., either (1) by fiat excluding “beauty” from all consideration, or (2) by a priori defining beauty in such a way that it becomes amenable to objective measurement (and excluding, again by fiat) any alternative definition.
That is, I think that one can study scientifically the physiological/neurological responses associated with certain aesthetic notions or states. But I doubt that science can discover an objective criteria that (a) I would be compelled rationally to accept, and (b) would determine that my claim that my wife is beautiful is in error. That would be tantamount to suggesting that the measureable physiological/neurological responses that I have when I see my wife are either (i) inconsistent with a “true” definition of beauty, or (ii) simply erroneous responses to what is not actually beautiful—i.e., I am deluded or confused on the matter.
I would generally exclude aesthetic claims from scientific investigation in the same way as I exclude them from propositional truth claims; they are different modes of discourse.
EDIT: I do, however, agree with the position you have articulated before about any effect that the putative supernatural can have on the natural realm, is then to be treated as natural and investigated as such. That is, the whole notion of the “supernatural” becomes superfluous for investigating any aspect of the natural cosmos. (Not sure that I’ve done your argument justice here, though.)