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Catttt Posted 10 years ago
Vocabulary
not engaging with them on their own terms
Does the highlighted sentence mean "scientists do not examine their opponents' beliefs in their original contexts" ? and does "their" refer to "opponents’ beliefs"?
Context:
Consequently, when scientists attempt, with the best will in the world, to undertake the task of reconciling science and religion, or rational and postmodernist discourse, or scientific knowledge and artistic invention, they fail to convince and often end up by dismissing their opponents’ beliefs altogether, explaining them ‘scientifically’ but not engaging with them on their own terms, regarding their arguments as not ‘real’ but ultimately irrational and unscholarly. And that’s the point, one wants to say.
Context:
Consequently, when scientists attempt, with the best will in the world, to undertake the task of reconciling science and religion, or rational and postmodernist discourse, or scientific knowledge and artistic invention, they fail to convince and often end up by dismissing their opponents’ beliefs altogether, explaining them ‘scientifically’ but not engaging with them on their own terms, regarding their arguments as not ‘real’ but ultimately irrational and unscholarly. And that’s the point, one wants to say.
Top answer
red apple but not engaging with them on their own terms ~ but not talking to them (= the opponents of the scientists) in ways that they (= the opponents of the scientists) understand intuitively as part of their own belief system CJ
- red apple but not engaging with them on their own terms ~ but not talking to them (= the opponents of the scientists) in ways that they (= the opponents of the scientists) understand intuitively as part of their own belief system CJ
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1 Answers
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red applebut not engaging with them on their own terms~ but not talking to them (= the opponents of the scientists) in ways that they (= the opponents of the scientists) understand intuitively as part of their own belief system
CJ
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