Sure it has. Modern physics depends on a number of concepts that were originally considered impossible for materialist explanations, such as any sort of "pulling" force, field effects, wave particle duality, and more recently with the refutation of local realism. Originally, materialists thought everything had to reduce to bumping billiard balls.

Math itself is necessarily immaterial, and modern science would completely collapse without mathematics.

So, it seems prima facie your claim that immaterial explanations have never been able to adequately answer any question to be incorrect. I see no problem with also proposing an immaterial soul as a scientific hypothesis, if we are able to make the claim quantifiable and empirically testable.

> Modern physics depends on a number of concepts that were originally considered impossible for materialist explanations,

It depends on a lot of things that were considered impossible, but not things that are logically incompatible with materialism.

> So, it seems prima facie your claim that immaterial explanations have never been able to adequately answer any question to be incorrect.

No, all the things you point to are material explanations.

Well, that gets to the question of how we define materialism. Broadly enough, then a nonphysical soul can also be a new materialistic cause, so we do not have a disagreement.

The fundamental issue is whether the new theory, materialistic or not, can be quantitatively and empirically tested in some way. I propose the notion of the mind as a halting oracle is such a thing. And we can call it a materialistic halting oracle so we don't violate the need for purely materialistic explanations.

https://am-nat.org/site/halting-oracles-as-intelligent-agent...

> Math itself is necessarily immaterial, and ...

No, that strikes me as false. Geometry is very material and can explain a good bunch of mathematics. Differential geometry, an important aspect of modern AI, is necessarily symbolic, but that does not exclude its materialistic applications.

If math is material, then we can destroy it. So, for instance, I could destroy the number 1. That doesn't make any sense. Even if the entire universe were destroyed, mathematics would still exist. Recreate the universe again and math would remain unchanged.

Planet youhaventseenit in the Horse Nebula is material. Can you destroy it? No! Could it be destroyed by an unfortunate event? Perhaps. But if the number 1 is just an abstract thought, then that thought can seize to exist.

> Even if the entire universe were destroyed, mathematics would still exist.

You presuppose that maths is immaterial to proof that it's immaterial. That stance cannot be argued with, because you cannot show it to be true. If thought seized to exist, there would be nothing left to argue with, so this is reductio ad absurdum either way leading to a false dychotomy. What remains is: "maths" does exist. So my stance holds as much explanatory power as yours, no more, no less, but yours is metaphysical. You idealize things you don't understand, unless you have a concrete plan of action to "Recreate the universe again".