A related concept is naturalism where all phenomena can be explained in terms of natural causes and laws, including laws yet to be discovered. However science is limited as it can only answer certain questions. For example, personal explanations as to why we have intentions, awareness, and do certain things cannot seem to be reduced to physical explanations such as the motion of electrons in our brains.
There is one important fact about modern science that needs to be mentioned. We now realize that an experiment cannot be performed without the experimenter having an effect in some way on the experimental outcome. Subject and object cannot be separated. At the measurement level the theory of relativity tells us that even so called fixed quantities like time, matter, and size all depend on the framework of the observer.
For all we know, the scientific laws may all be different tomorrow; for example the speed of light may change. We would like to develop some ideas of closeness or similarity to see if migration connections can be established. If the use of certain words or artifacts are more “similar” for two islands than for others we can perhaps suspect a emigrational connection between the two islands.