Scientific methodology

[Kyle Taggart]

Hello! I posted this here a few days ago but it seems to have vanished before I received any replies...not sure why. Trying again!  I could use some help in defending the methodology and nature of natural science as a broad discipline from some arguments made by an acquaintance at college. I hope you folks can help me: I’m a biology undergrad debating with a philosophy undergrad, and he’s making it a bit hard for me to defend the very basis of my field, a fact of which I admit I’m ashamed. He says: 
“the God of the Gaps argument does not asses that God cannot be inferred because it is not empirical as you say, but that the God explanation is a way to explain the unexplained via an explanation which will be eventually falsified. Lot's of the people who claim the God of the gap fallacy are not strict empiricists, they simply presuppose the future unveiling of materialistic explanations. Clearly it cannot be defended by saying that God is in the philosophic realm and not scientific, because, as a person would go forth in utilizing both for a specific conclusion, the objection would fall immediately, as it did with you I think. If you claim abductive reasoning you claim the validity of inference, and most of all, not empirical inference (a theory is not empirically verified in itself, given its abstract nature). If abstract inferences can be made as a consequence of scientific reasoning, it is also consistent to infer a personal agent as God as the cause of an explicandum”
I think I’m okay with most of this, but I need help mainly on one part: the argument that theories are (in themselves) non empirical and abstract. For context, my argument is that science deals only in empirical data and can only reach empirical conclusions, and so no matter how strong some case for God from science might hypothetically be, science (by its nature) can’t infer such (since God is by definition immaterial and so non empirical). How can I defend the fact that theories are empirical and not abstract? 
Now this I really need help with: 
“I agree that empiricism is maintained by positing necessary requirements for science such as reproducibility and falsifiability. While their sufficiency can be granted for a scientific inqury, it is your job to show why such conditions ought to be necessary. I completely reject these terms as necessary and I think lots of scientists implicitly do. The whole historical science inquiry is not conducted via scientific method, rather, sound reasoning which reasembles more analytic philosophy. Clearly the truthworthiness of the standard big bang model is not assessed via reproducibility. The necessity of reproducibility is a great mistake as I show in my article https://confident-faith.com/2018/07/25/answering-arons-ra-epistemic-claims-regarding-his-criterion-for-modal-evaluation/
If your definition of science does not show why such definition ought to be true, there ought to be a more fundamental principle whihc you will have to defend which will entail the necessity of the scientific method. So how do you justify the restrictedness of your definition of science?”
So far I’ve argued successfully that what science IS (how it is practiced universally) is as an empirical discipline that thrives on falsifiability, reproducibility, and testability. But now I’m confronted with this: WHY? Why must science be this way? How do I respond to the Big Bang claim, and how do I respond about the claim against historical science? I’m studying to be an evolutionary biologist, and this is shaking my worldview a bit...how DO I justify my restricted view of science? 
I also find this difficult to rebut; the discussion is on dark matter, which he claimed was non-empirical, I showed it was, and then he said this: 
“I never claimed it what not physical, that would be very disingenuous... I claimed that it is assessed on non empirical grounds. How can you deny this? If you do you have to show that: 1) dark matter was believed because of it being tested and 2) that the testing comes from direct observation and not inference (otherwise empiricism is lost).  
It's existence is assessed because of its explanatory power.”
Responding to my claim that everything science investigates is empirical, he says this: 
“I am sorry, this is just false. If you mean by empirical as potentially empirical I agree, but if so also God is potentially empirical. If by empirical you mean actually empirical the claim becomes absurd. 
To say that all scientific postulations are empirical entails that certain reductios which I will ask you do defend: show me there is empirical evidence of every single mutation that proceeded from the first single celled organism to now days. Clearly no person will believe this is possible, Evolutionism work also via inference and extrapolation, to limit it to direct observation (empricism) is a form of suicide”
I could really use help, thank you! 

[Phi for All]

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