"Dessication" means the process of drying out. When something has dried out completely it is dessicated.

You are quite right, pete from seven stars, that scientifically-minded people also come to a subject with presuppositions. Definitely! And so do politically-minded people. And culturally-minded people. Everyone comes to a subject they are interested in with a whole set of presuppositions, often with a whole set of rather strong prejudices, often with emotional prejudices of various sorts....and all of those pre-established attitudes WILL influence and often compromise their objectivity.

I've been pointing that out on this forum since the first rooster crowed here (so to speak). ;-) When I do point it out, I am greeted by howls of outrage from various people who insist that, no, THEY are completely objective...it's just the people who disagree with them who aren't!

Ha! ;-D I laugh.

I am skeptical of the naivete and prejudices of many religious people. I am also skeptical of the naivete and prejudices of many anti-religious people. They are both inclined to make sweeping and often very false assumptions about the motivations, beliefs, and intelligence of people on the other side of the debate.

I suggest that both religious people and anti-religious people and everyone else out there have the humility to admit that:

1. they don't know it all
2. they might be wrong about something
3. there is more yet to learn
4. and the other guy might be right about something

Then there would be the possibility of real communication. Growth. Change.

Without such humility there's nothing but a desolate and useless repetition of opposing views that are petrified as if locked in stone.