The modern world became familiar with standards of objectivity and rationality due to science. The norm for correct evaluation is the approach that a scientist would take. Deviations such as subjectivity or lack of logic are viewed as flawed or invalid.

Scientists attempt to extend knowledge into unknown areas. All abilities of the mind and technology are taxed to their limits in scientific research. Taxing the abilities develops and defines them along lines which produce knowledge and truth.

Students of science find that supporting and proving their opinions is a lot more difficult than they expected it to be. In fact, each scientists holds numerous opinions for which there seems to be little agreement.

Over time, a scientist becomes a specialists having knowledge and opinions which no one else has. Convincing others is a difficult task. The task refines and develops the quality of the scientist's evidence and conclusions.

The over-all result is that science refines the constructivity of mental activity. One might then expect science to perfect itself, but the opposite is true. The demands are so high that failures and corruptions seem to be promoted instead of overcome.

The point here is that the successes in science show what constructive mental activity is supposed to be. Science provides an objective measure of right-from-wrong in mental standards. If it's right, you get results; if not, you don't.

So bring it on, Sam; let's tabulate the results. We'll start with the concept of objectivity. Science starts with the assumption that there is a set of realities outside of minds and human influences. It is called objective reality. objective means originating outside of the minds in question.

Science proves that there is such an objective set of realities. The proof is in the fact that numerous independent studies get related results. Without an objective source of reality being studied, there would be no consistent relationships between each scientist's results.

The study of objective reality in science shows that an unbiased evaluation is needed to determine what objective reality is. Unbiased means no subjective alteration of reality from its form in its objective source.

But this only applies to the evaluation of objective reality. It does not say there is no validity to subjective concerns or realities. Tailoring and using objective reality involve valid, subjective influences over it.

Commenters around the periphery of science have a tendency to refer to science as "empirical" and thereby superior to beliefs. By empirical they mean based upon observation (not experience, as the ancients used the term) which is assumed to be superior to the abstract evaluations of religion. Actual scientists never use the word empirical, because it makes no distinction between subjective opinion and objective measurement. One of the most serious challenges of science is to objectivize measurements, which is a preoccupying concern of scientists. So they avoid mixing the subjective with the objective as results when using the term empirical.

Astrology is an example of empirical observations. The position of stars supposedly influences human events. The problem is that it mixes observations with subjectivity. Objectivity is more illusive than generally assumed.

Medical doctors learn to think in opposite ways form scientists. They are taught to not question anything. They must reproduce the technology exactly as told, or it is malpractice. A scientist must question everything. Expanding knowledge requires climbing out of mind ruts and viewing something in ways it has not been viewed before. Mind ruts have subjective biases which wall off new knowledge from understanding.

Here's how mind ruts work. When I was trying to solve a problem with electronic amplifiers, I tested every imaginable alternative, but none seemed to work. After giving up, I decided to evaluate a circuit which could not work, because it would burn out the transistors. I could force it to work through careful selection of components and evaluate the result. I eventually found an easy way to make it work, and it turned out to be the answer to the problem. A year later, I was looking through an old notebook and saw a sketch of the same circuit. It was one of the first circuits I tried in working with electronics. A note near it said, "works pretty good." I didn't know it wasn't supposed to work when I started working with electronics. Only after becoming familiar with electronics did I "learn" that it would be an impossible circuit to use. That's what mind ruts are.

For this reason, exploratory research is an evaluation of absurdities. Somewhere among the absurdities is the truth which extends knowledge into unknown areas. This applies to the exploratory research, not the conclusions. The absurdities must become nonabsurd before they become conclusions.

Rationality builds upon objective reality adding complexity to it. It also tests objective reality by evaluating the complexities related to it.

Reason is the process of making relationships between realities. The process shows whether relationships are consistent or conflicting. Consistent relationships are the desired result.

What is meant by desired result? It means a universe of realities have consistent relationships between them creating complexities. The complexities are based on laws. Laws are influences which permeate through numerous less basic realities.

The purpose of reason is to get the realities inside the mind to look similar to realities outside the mind. Comparisons between realities are made to determine if relationships are consistent.

Objectivity and rationality are quite interdependent. The challenges are most visible in the study of evolution, where objectivity and subjectivity are mixed together unlike anywhere else.

Darwin had the unenviable task of sorting out the truth from the falsehood, or the objectivity from the subjectivity. He could not have been expected to get a perfect result. Here's an example. Apparently, Darwin was of the assumption that if natural selection directs evolution, then God does not. Even nowdays, uninformed persons and scientists alike often assume that natural selection is pitted against God as the source of biology. But that assumption is another subjective mind rut. Numerous religious believers assume that both God and natural selection are involved in evolution. There is no valid scientific basis for excluding God from evolution. It would be like excluding a driver from an automobile. If an automobile works, that does not mean no one drives it.

In fact, there are points of evolution which appear to require supernatural influences. Since "bad" mutations outnumber "good" mutations by a large factor, and thousands of genes are connected on the same chromosomes, how do the numerous bad mutations get separated from the few good mutations which are on the same chromosome? Maybe they are not on the same chromosome, but one mutation per chromosome per individual per generation seems to be too few. Perhaps before there were synthetic chemicals, mutations were that rare.

There are also too many coincidences in evolution. Rubber trees are the most obvious example. It is extremely unlikely that a tree would produce rubber; and the transportation industry cannot yet function on a synthetic substitute. That's too much luck to attribute it to the big bang. There is also too much luck in cotton, which is incomparable to other fabrics, as well as too much luck in antibiotics and other drugs which have biological origins. It seems that plants are used as a chemical factory to solve problems which human chemists cannot solve.

Statistical probabilities are a conditional source of evidence for objective reality, and they go off the graph for these coincidences. Probabilities of randomness also go off the scale for the figure shown with this art that proves.