Controvery over Positivism
Patrick Reany
understand what people mean by "positivism"!
Let's see if we can sort this out.
1) According to the doctrines of positivism, is all knowledge
"scientific knowledge"? That is, is there any knowledge outside of the
arena of science? If so, is this a doctrine of positivism proper or just
an accusation against positivism by anti-positivists?
2) What is the relation of scientific knowledge to Truth? That is, if we
say that something is "scientific knowledge" does that make it Truth?
Can science say anything about the truth or falsity of some metaphysical
notion of "deep reality" beyond just the epiphenominal (observable)
aspects of "deep reality"? What does the phrase "scientific knowledge"
mean?
3) Does "positivism" declare that metaphysics is irrelevant to all of
philosophy or just to the philosophy of science or just to the relation
of scientific knowledge to "knowing deep reality"?
4) What are all the kinds of "knowing" allowable to science? For
example, do direct observation and the induction of deterministic or
probablistic/statistical laws count as "scientific knowledge"? Are there
any others to be accounted for?
5) How many distinct versions of positivism are there in the formal
literature? How does so-called "logical positivism" distinguish itself?
6) What constitutes a complete definition of "positivism"? By whose or
what authority do you justify your definition?
7) Is scientific knowledge dependent on anthropomorphic variables and
arbitrary human invented theories, definitions, and conventions? If not,
how is that possible?
8) Can we fairly say that we "know" how the internal combustion engine
works, i.e., that we KNOW as a TRUTH how it works. Can we say the same
about how the laser works, or how fundamental particles work? Or is our
"knowledge" of how things work theory-dependent?
9) What is the definition of "science"? By whose or what authority do
you justify your definition?
10) In what ways are the following definition of "positivism" correct or
incorrect: "Positivism is a philosophy of science that removes the
importance of metaphysical questions of deep reality from the realm of
science proper and instead prefers to deal with theories that explain
phenomena, either by incorporating or not incorporating non-observables
or other freely created whimsical notions of the human mind."
11) What is the relation of an "observable" to the Truth of "deep
reality"?
Polygnotus
Positivism is alive and well. Especially in dealing with
the interpretation problem of QM. But I doubt you
will be able to sort it out here. Plus this post more resembles
a freshman philosophy exam than a discussion. I suggest
you read Carnip or Bohr on the subject. Or if you have
a singular point of contention with positivism then post that.
But you really shouldn't expect anyone to fill in your quiz
for you when you can find almost all of the answers to your
questions in a freshman philosophy text. Good Luck.
Polygnotus
"Patrick Reany" <re...@firstworld.net> wrote in message
news:3A325553...@firstworld.net...
Philip Mintz
In answer to question 8, I say that we never know how the internal
combustion engine works, because we don't know how the smallest units of
matter interact by "force". We can describe, build, operate, repair,
drive, and pollute. However, in order to understand the engine, we must
understand the molecules of fuel and air, and the force that thrusts them
against a piston. This requires understanding the building blocks of
matter, and how they exert force on each other.
The understanding that we seek is not available to or from scientists or
philosophers. The best that we can do is to give the matter much thought,
and come up with a tentative solution that serves our own purpose.
--
Philip Mintz
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Uncle Al
Patrick Reany wrote:
>
> Supposedly we're already in the "post-positivism" age, yet I still don't
> understand what people mean by "positivism"!
Check out Jacques Derrida and his sludge pile of Deconstruction.
"Positivism" is anything you wish it to mean - typical Liberal Arts
bloviation wherein truth is decided by majority vote weighted by
loudness. Alan Sokol dragged them over sharp rocks,
htp://www.physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/
> 3) Does "positivism" declare that metaphysics is irrelevant to all of
> philosophy or just to the philosophy of science or just to the relation
> of scientific knowledge to "knowing deep reality"?
Metaphysics is as important as the bible or scientific socialism. As
well documented and valid, too.
[snip]
So, how's your homework going so far?
--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
http://www.ultra.net.au/~wisby/uncleal/
(Toxic URLs! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" The Net!
Polygnotus
> Metaphysics is as important as the bible or scientific socialism. As
> well documented and valid, too.
> [snip]
I respectfully disagree. The primary ingredient of scientific
discovery is not experience or reason; it is creativity
supported by experience and reason. As Einstein said,
"Physics is a developing logical system of thinking whose
foundations cannot be obtained by extraction from past
experience according to some inductive methods, but
come only by free fantasy".
A good example of this is the work of DeBroglie. Experimentally,
his theory of wave/particle duality was considered somewhat
irrelevant in that it changed nothing about the observed data. And
many wrote it off as "metaphysics" at best. But as it turned out this
creative supposition had a revolutionary impact of the development
QT.
I would propose that the creative supposition that inspires most
great scientific breakthroughs is in fact metaphysical in nature
even if the substantiation of these suppositions is not.
Cheers- Polygnotus
James Hunter
Polygnotus wrote:
There is nothing really wrong with metaphysics, but it
might be useful if scientists actually understood it.
Hint: It's not free-fantasizing psychos.
Patrick Reany
James Hunter wrote:
>
[snip]
>
> > I would propose that the creative supposition that inspires most
> > great scientific breakthroughs is in fact metaphysical in nature
> > even if the substantiation of these suppositions is not.
>
> There is nothing really wrong with metaphysics, but it
> might be useful if scientists actually understood it.
>
> Hint: It's not free-fantasizing psychos.
Then what is it?
Patrick
James Hunter
Patrick Reany wrote:
At it's most fundamental level, it's a critique of the scientific
method.
At the next level up, it's the relationship of science to social
issues.
At the next level up it's usually technology.
At the next level up it's usually paradigm issues.
"Scientists" of course usually put the last one at the head of the
list,
which is obviously a Big Fart issue, rather than metaphysics.
James Hunter
Patrick Reany wrote:
At it's most fundamental level, it's a critique of the scientific
Polygnotus
> > > Hint: It's not free-fantasizing psychos.
> >
Just for the record I should point out that
the word fantasy (phantasie), in German, is
completely synonymous with imagination and
the aforementioned quote may be almost certainly
taken to refer to the latter- imagination which
obviously has a different connotation than
fantasy in English.
As for metaphysics, I doubt you could find
agreement on "what it is" even amongst the
people who are most concerned with it's
meaning- metaphysicist. But generally regarding
this statement-
>At it's most fundamental level, it's a critique of the scientific
method.
- I respectfully disagree. I believe it is not so much
a critique of the method itself, but of the inability
to use the method to fully describe the
nature of reality beneath the method. There are
many different schools of metaphysics but they
all pretty much propose that there is a deeper
reality than may be accessed with empirical knowledge
alone. I've yet to hear the position that the scientific
method is wrong, but that it is inherently incomplete.
Not that I'm taking this position here, I'm just pointing
out what I see as a misstatement of that position.
Personally, I don't believe that there is an "underlying
reality" that can't be accessed empirically. But our
empirical knowledge is so incomplete that we have
to occasionally rely on less tangible devices to
kick us in the right direction. One such being Einstein's
phantasie.
Cheers- Polygnotus
Logical Pike
Uncle Al <Uncl...@hate.spam.net> wrote:
>
>
> Patrick Reany wrote:
> >
> > Supposedly we're already in the "post-positivism" age, yet I still
don't
> > understand what people mean by "positivism"!
>
> Check out Jacques Derrida and his sludge pile of Deconstruction.
> "Positivism" is anything you wish it to mean - typical Liberal Arts
> bloviation wherein truth is decided by majority vote weighted by
> loudness. Alan Sokol dragged them over sharp rocks,
> htp://www.physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/
>
democratic means.) Even Kuhn had to retract some of his previous
statements.
> > 3) Does "positivism" declare that metaphysics is irrelevant to all
of
> > philosophy or just to the philosophy of science or just to the
relation
> > of scientific knowledge to "knowing deep reality"?
>
> Metaphysics is as important as the bible or scientific socialism. As
> well documented and valid, too.
> [snip]
>
Well, even contemporary science is metaphysics-laden. I doubt that
there is any way out of it. The existence of electrons and quarks and
the like are unobservables and there is much controversy about their
ontological status.
> So, how's your homework going so far?
>
> --
> Uncle Al
> http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
> http://www.ultra.net.au/~wisby/uncleal/
> (Toxic URLs! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
> "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" The Net!
>
Logical Pike
philosophy of science also. Just like the old days of Einstein, Pauli,
Bohr, Schrodinger, Heisenberg, etc.
> Hint: It's not free-fantasizing psychos.
>
>
Gerry Quinn
>understand what people mean by "positivism"!
>
Positivism is a variation on Cartesian solipsism, which tries to avoid
rebuttal on this ground by asserting that it has no metaphysics but
nevertheless goes further than solipsism. [In a not-dissimilar fashion,
Descartes attempted to aggrandise his limited philosophy by asserting
that he had proved the existence of God.]
I don't know what you mean by (capitalised) "Truth" and "deep reality" -
unless these are straw horses you are attempting to pin onto realism.
- Gerry Quinn
ca314159
Empiricists: How shall we eat ?
Theorists: Why do we eat ?
Metaphysicians: Where shall we do lunch ?
"The history of mankind can be characterized by three phases
which are: survival, science and sophistication. The first
phase can be characterized by the question, "How shall we eat?"
The second by the question, "Why do we eat?" And the third by
the question, "Where shall we do lunch?"
"
- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Patrick Reany
Gerry Quinn wrote:
First, I want to thank you for actually offering a definition! Second, I wanted to avoid
introducing any more controversial terms into the mix -- such as "realism" -- at this point.
Third, how is it possible to infer the true ontology of matter/energy/forces from a successful
theory and its successful laws? And if we make such an inference, are we not confusing
theoretical models with "deep reality," i.e., reality deeper than mere phenomena and
measurements? Fourth, is science a human invention?
Lastly, is your definition classical or as it is used in modern usage?
Patrick
Jack Martinelli
>
>
> Gerry Quinn wrote:
>
> > In article <3A325553...@firstworld.net>, Patrick Reany
<re...@firstworld.net> wrote:
> > >Supposedly we're already in the "post-positivism" age, yet I still
don't
> > >understand what people mean by "positivism"!
> First, I want to thank you for actually offering a definition! Second, I
wanted to avoid
> introducing any more controversial terms into the mix -- such as
"realism" -- at this point.
> Third, how is it possible to infer the true ontology of
matter/energy/forces from a successful
> theory and its successful laws? And if we make such an inference, are we
not confusing
> theoretical models with "deep reality," i.e., reality deeper than mere
phenomena and
> measurements? Fourth, is science a human invention?
Science is a label we apply to the activities of scientists. So the
question at a deeper level
is "what do scientists do?"
----------------
BTW, "reality" might be a label for, what Kant called, nomena, the source of
phenomena.
Nobody can say that nomena "exist" or not, since all that we observer are
phenomena.
(Don't tell anyone... I _believe_ in nonmena)
---------------
more later...
Regards
Jack Martinelli
Edward Green
>> [snip]
>> Metaphysics is as important as the bible or scientific socialism. As
>> well documented and valid, too.
>> [snip]
>
>I respectfully disagree. The primary ingredient of scientific
>discovery is not experience or reason; it is creativity
>supported by experience and reason. As Einstein said,
>"Physics is a developing logical system of thinking whose
>foundations cannot be obtained by extraction from past
>experience according to some inductive methods, but
>come only by free fantasy".
I agree.
>A good example of this is the work of DeBroglie. Experimentally,
>his theory of wave/particle duality was considered somewhat
>irrelevant in that it changed nothing about the observed data. And
>many wrote it off as "metaphysics" at best. But as it turned out this
>creative supposition had a revolutionary impact of the development QT.
Yes, I've often tried to make a similar point in the past. How we
think about things may not have any immediate impact on prediction
or on expanding envelope of predictability, but it has a large and
crucial impact on the rate of expansion -- ooh... never thought of
that analogy before. ;) If the envelope of understanding has radius
R then the characteristic objection to discussing how to think of
what we already know is "But that doesn't change R". But it _may_
change R". Even assuming our only goal is to optimize R, it's
still rational to think in some ways which leave R at least
temporarily unchanged.
This is an either-you-get-it-or-you-don't kind of trope, which
sometimes flips between states for the same commentator ;), since
as so often happens we may get lip service to a principle when
presented with the proper cover, but 180 degrees out behavior when
met in practice.
A characteristic series of moves in argument chess... like a queen's
bishops gambit... is for A to make some observation of the above
stripe and B to dismiss the observation as "metaphysics", because
it does not expand R. The implication is that no discussion of
the given type is something anybody who was coldly and rationally
interested in increasing R would ever have. But of course physicists
and physics students of all levels have such discussion all the
time; so it's more a question of _standing_. Your religion is
metaphysics, mine is coffee room discussion.
Depending where we draw the pale between physics and metaphysics
we either conclude that physicists are happily wandering outside
that pale all the time, or else the stakes are comfortably wide
enough to include a number of metaphysical camp followers.
Physics/metaphysics can be conceived as an A/~A pair, so that
wherever we draw the pale around physics what is excluded is
metaphysics. If we draw the line tightly enough we can keep almost
everything inside of the complete-model-yielding-testable-predictions
stamp, damn fine things there are, we really know if we have
something or not. But if we draw the line this tightly we have
no room to move! How do we get to the next model?
It is right, good and true that there be an inner circle of models
on the point of testable resolution, but no such inner circle can
contain the whole of a process yielding new members of the circle.
When A is tightly defined to include only good that leaves all the
bad outside in ~A, mingled with the remaining good. So it is easy
to criticize the outside based on the part infecting the whole, but
impossible to do consistently if we wish to expand the boundaries
of the camp, ever. You will find physicists with guilty looks on
their faces, fleeing the tents of the Picts, smelling of strange
herbs and native women, for the camp so circumscribed to contain only
"physics" is barren of creation.
(I would not have to rant this way, except I had been bashed
over the head for some innocent remarks about the exponential
distribution as mapped to physical processes, which led to the
inevitably "but that's metaphysics" trope, but which I contend was
clearly _near_ metaphysics... not quantum healing, but the type of
metaphysics real physicists conduct all the time, and real
physicists of the past with unknown names like Schroedinger,
Heisenberg and Born seemed to have had some truck with).
A few years ago, when I actually gave a tinker's damn, my rant
crystallized into the idea that many students of physics as
represented in the newsgroup wrote "metaphysically" all the time,
while decrying the same word, and in fact while not having a
clear grasp of what they were saying. Near metaphysics is certainly
not beyond the pale of logic, which invests a much larger perimeter.
>I would propose that the creative supposition that inspires most
>great scientific breakthroughs is in fact metaphysical in nature
>even if the substantiation of these suppositions is not.
Agreed.
Edward Green
> There is nothing really wrong with metaphysics, but it
> might be useful if scientists actually understood it.
>
> Hint: It's not free-fantasizing psychos.
Holy cow! I completely agree with you!
Edward Green
>> > > Hint: It's not free-fantasizing psychos.
>> >
>
>Just for the record I should point out that
>the word fantasy (phantasie), in German, is
>completely synonymous with imagination and
>the aforementioned quote may be almost certainly
>taken to refer to the latter- imagination which
>obviously has a different connotation than
>fantasy in English.
>
>As for metaphysics, I doubt you could find
>agreement on "what it is" even amongst the
>people who are most concerned with it's
>meaning- metaphysicist. But generally regarding
>this statement-
>
>>At it's most fundamental level, it's a critique of the scientific
>method.
>
>- I respectfully disagree. I believe it is not so much
>a critique of the method itself, but of the inability
>to use the method to fully describe the
>nature of reality beneath the method. There are
>many different schools of metaphysics but they
>all pretty much propose that there is a deeper
>reality than may be accessed with empirical knowledge
>alone.
Despite being a proponent of "metaphysics" I would not agree with
the schools that pretty much propose that.
I do not propose that there is a deeper reality than may be accessed
with empirical knowledge alone, unless you are thinking of revelation
and mystical experience. Within the scientific method, I merely
propose there is a large an crucial role for "metaphysics", and I
agreed with your comments (including the quote attributed to Einstein)
and with James Hunter's in that light. In particular I agree that
this area of the process is not "free-fantasizing psychos", though
maybe we only need substract the word "psychos".
As I said, when I actually gave a tinker's damn, I noted there was a
cultural gap between the physics and philosophy departments, whereby
free-fantasizing, particularly of the psychotic variety, was
pejoratively labeled "philosophy" and "metaphysics" by students of the
former department; perhaps because some output of the latter
departments is, in line with good and bad being mixed in the awful
society outside the pale, of the psychotic persuasion.
Unless we restrict ourselves to known derivations from known theories
we observe empirically that "metaphysical discussion" is pretty
much indispensable... unless all effort in getting from here to
there is to be by individuals in isolation, muttering to themselves
in locked rooms.
>I've yet to hear the position that the scientific
>method is wrong, but that it is inherently incomplete.
>Not that I'm taking this position here, I'm just pointing
>out what I see as a misstatement of that position.
>
>Personally, I don't believe that there is an "underlying
>reality" that can't be accessed empirically. But our
>empirical knowledge is so incomplete that we have
>to occasionally rely on less tangible devices to
>kick us in the right direction. One such being Einstein's
>phantasie.
We continue to agree.
James Hunter
Edward Green wrote:
Well that's probably because we disagree on the definition of
psycho.
James Hunter
Edward Green wrote:
That is *main* controversy in metaphysics.
There is so much builtup ready-made fame
in "science" that people like Goedel & Einstein
are sometimes mistaken for scientific genius'.
Phil Henshaw
Patrick Reany wrote:
>
> Supposedly we're already in the "post-positivism" age, yet I still don't
> understand what people mean by "positivism"!
>
> Let's see if we can sort this out.
>
> 1) According to the doctrines of positivism, is all knowledge
> "scientific knowledge"? That is, is there any knowledge outside of the
> arena of science? If so, is this a doctrine of positivism proper or just
> an accusation against positivism by anti-positivists?
God knows whatever Comte was saying in by
"The subjective principle of Positivism, that is, the subordination of
the intellect to the heart is thus fortified by an objective basis, the
immutable Necessity of the external world; and by this means Something
about unifying mankind with the one true mold of thought....
What I understand slightly is Logical Positivism. There the basis of
knowledge is the use of logic applied to evidence. How wide a net you
can cast with logic and evidence is limited to your imagination, not
whether it classifies as science. To me what it means is that
stringing a lot of conclusory language together, however nice its ring,
is suspect.
> 2) What is the relation of scientific knowledge to Truth? That is, if we
> say that something is "scientific knowledge" does that make it Truth?
> Can science say anything about the truth or falsity of some metaphysical
> notion of "deep reality" beyond just the epiphenominal (observable)
> aspects of "deep reality"? What does the phrase "scientific knowledge"
> mean?
Scientific knowledge has no meaningful relation to Truth. The nature of
Truth is an undefined, and science is a construction of definitions
based on evidence. There is certainly much to reality that science has
yet to provide useful comment on, call that 'deep reality' if you wish,
things like the eventfulness of nature, or what a fluid is.... We've
dug and dug and many things still elude us.
> 3) Does "positivism" declare that metaphysics is irrelevant to all of
> philosophy or just to the philosophy of science or just to the relation
> of scientific knowledge to "knowing deep reality"?
Any point of view taken to the extreme seems tantamount to
"metaphysics", which I take to refer to beliefs that require one to hold
what is outside the mind inside the mind. Logical Positivism would
rule that out, but if taken to the extreme would become it, and rule
itself out. Suppose we say, as in science, only a positivist approach
will resolve a positivist question.
> 4) What are all the kinds of "knowing" allowable to science? For
> example, do direct observation and the induction of deterministic or
> probablistic/statistical laws count as "scientific knowledge"? Are there
> any others to be accounted for?
There's common practice, the techniques and methods that are taught and
refined for their usefulness. No scientist can do without vision
however, and that frequently develops through intense curiosity and
emersion in observation. As I see it science is starts with induction
and follows with deduction, having a vision and then cleaning up the
mess with experiment.
> 5) How many distinct versions of positivism are there in the formal
> literature? How does so-called "logical positivism" distinguish itself?
>
> 6) What constitutes a complete definition of "positivism"? By whose or
> what authority do you justify your definition?
>
> 7) Is scientific knowledge dependent on anthropomorphic variables and
> arbitrary human invented theories, definitions, and conventions? If not,
> how is that possible?
Science is man made, disciplined by reliance on evidence and usefulness
in building a connected set of ideas and the careers of individuals.
It's possible that some other science than we presently have would arise
if the experiment were repeated. That does not make it arbitrary
though. Science may arrange it's accounting tokens for nature in
changeable ways, but the appearance is that science is exploring a real
set of pathways in nature and that all explorations would follow some of
the same ones.
> 8) Can we fairly say that we "know" how the internal combustion engine
> works, i.e., that we KNOW as a TRUTH how it works. Can we say the same
> about how the laser works, or how fundamental particles work? Or is our
> "knowledge" of how things work theory-dependent?
>
> 9) What is the definition of "science"? By whose or what authority do
> you justify your definition?
Here you're not showing much understanding of your own question.
Science itself, like the rock, tree or forest itself is a part of
nature, and remains undefined. If you ask what best characterizes the
practice of science you'd get a little further.
> 10) In what ways are the following definition of "positivism" correct or
> incorrect: "Positivism is a philosophy of science that removes the
> importance of metaphysical questions of deep reality from the realm of
> science proper and instead prefers to deal with theories that explain
> phenomena, either by incorporating or not incorporating non-observables
> or other freely created whimsical notions of the human mind."
Well, stop the sentence after "phenomena" and you'd at least have a
coherent and perhaps testable statement. Basically I think scientists
do what scientists do, and don't worry about wrapping it up in
philosophy unless they think it will help get them the grant. They
don't generally study philosophy. Science is a philosophy of practice.
> 11) What is the relation of an "observable" to the Truth of "deep
> reality"?
This is a good question. I think we come in contact with Truth, which
I would lump together with "deep reality", though open observation.
"An observable", however, is often taken to mean a recordable datum, a
measure. A measure is a one dimensional projection of a richer subject,
and looses a great deal of the reality observed. Thus, scientists
would seem to indeed be fortunate in that their discipline of
observation perhaps brings them closer to Truth than others. Their
reduction of their observations into "observables", however, leaves
everyone else quite unsatisfied and un enlightened. Thus I'd say that
science is only a potentially good vehicle of enlightenment for
scientists, and in it's present form can't help much of anyone else.
--
Phil Henshaw
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
167 W 87th St NY NY 10024 The things & images we look at,
tel: 212-579-2914 and those we look with,
e-mail: p...@idt.net connecting to what lies beyond
explorations: http://idt.net/~ph ...and remains unimaginable
Patrick Reany
Phil Henshaw wrote:
[snip]
> > 2) What is the relation of scientific knowledge to Truth? That is, if we
> > say that something is "scientific knowledge" does that make it Truth?
> > Can science say anything about the truth or falsity of some metaphysical
> > notion of "deep reality" beyond just the epiphenominal (observable)
> > aspects of "deep reality"? What does the phrase "scientific knowledge"
> > mean?
>
> Scientific knowledge has no meaningful relation to Truth. The nature of
> Truth is an undefined, and science is a construction of definitions
> based on evidence. There is certainly much to reality that science has
> yet to provide useful comment on, call that 'deep reality' if you wish,
> things like the eventfulness of nature, or what a fluid is.... We've
> dug and dug and many things still elude us.
I want to analyze your treatment of the term "science" because I cannot mesh
the various statements you have made about it. Above you say that "science is
a construction of definitions based on evidence."
[snip]
Then you say:
> Science is man made, disciplined by reliance on evidence and usefulness
> in building a connected set of ideas and the careers of individuals.
>
This seems like a definition of "science" to me. But then you say:
> Science itself, like the rock, tree or forest itself is a part of
> nature, and remains undefined.
and finally you say that:
> Science is a philosophy of practice.
Let me put it all together:
Science is man made, philosophical practice of constructing definitions,
disciplined by reliance on evidence and usefulness in building a connected set
of ideas and building the careers of individuals.
I present my own definition of "science."
Science -- an investigative division of natural philosophy -- is the search
for a patchwork of theoretical explanations of natural phenomena founded on
intersubjective "reality," and supported by covariant physical laws with
semi-freely created formalisms and models, all ultimately in conformance with
arbitrary conventions that bootstrap the discipline, and on anthropomorphic
experimental (observational) variables whose connection to intrinsic or "deep"
"reality" is pure speculation which lies outside the realm of science proper.
Patrick
Gerry Quinn
We just apply some simple realist metaphysical axioms, i.e.:
1. There is a real world.
2. Our observations correspond somewhat to the real world.
3. The world is not set up purposely so as to trap us into error.
Accepting these, we can make deductions about reality with some
confidence.
>Fourth, is science a human invention?
Yes. But its objects are not necessarily so.
>
>Lastly, is your definition classical or as it is used in modern usage?
Just my definition - I suspect any calling themselves positivists will
strongly wish to amend it!
- Gerry Quinn
Patrick Reany
Polygnotus wrote:
> This is really a sci.philosophy topic but I will say that
> Positivism is alive and well. Especially in dealing with
> the interpretation problem of QM. But I doubt you
> will be able to sort it out here. Plus this post more resembles
> a freshman philosophy exam than a discussion. I suggest
> you read Carnip or Bohr on the subject. Or if you have
> a singular point of contention with positivism then post that.
> But you really shouldn't expect anyone to fill in your quiz
> for you when you can find almost all of the answers to your
> questions in a freshman philosophy text. Good Luck.
>
> Polygnotus
>
Anyone who has followed my posts in the recent past knows that I have been
continually assaulted by posters who refuse to define their terms, especially
their philosophical terms. My post/questionaire is meant to elicit some
definitions in a context-neutral manner. That's all.
A freshman philosophy text would not necessarily define the terms the way that
posters on these NGs do define them. I must assume that you do not find these
terms controversial. Sorry, my experience is that they have definitions "all
over the place." If I can't get authoritative definitions, I'll settle for
stipulated ones. (I have my own philosophy books as a reference, thank you.)
Finally, I am much more interested in how physicists and people primarily
interested in arguing topics of physics define "positivism" than in how
philosophers define this term, though I'll include the definitions of
philosophers in the compilation I'll preparing. Nevertheless, I cannot
understand how you think that the definition of "positivism" is not directly
relevant to these two NGs I posted to.
Patrick
Marcel LeBel
Positivism was something like .." The moon doesn't exist when I am not
watching.." (Was actually said by a known physicist) Nowadays, it is more
like considering things only as what we experience of them. (Which
naturally leads to the above statement .. that without experience, things
don't exist.) The sad point is , even if nobody really believe that things
disappear when they are not watching, that they don't care about the true
nature of things. No hocus pocus here! Just a logical (not experimental)
model that supports what is actually experienced would suffice. This would
make things logically "understandable".
Or, is this too scarry for some?
Marcel,
Patrick Reany
Marcel LeBel wrote:
> Patrick,
>
> Positivism was something like .." The moon doesn't exist when I am not
> watching.." (Was actually said by a known physicist)
Or is it that "the moon as I perceive it (i.e., the perception itself) doesn't
exist when I'm not perceiving it!"
> Nowadays, it is more
> like considering things only as what we experience of them. (Which
> naturally leads to the above statement .. that without experience, things
> don't exist.)
Or is it that we invent utilitarian theoretical models which we simply treat as
formal for the sake of unification, prediction, and cognition?
> The sad point is , even if nobody really believe that things
> disappear when they are not watching, that they don't care about the true
> nature of things.
Disappearing and not existing are two different things.
How do we judge the True nature of the world unless we first have some measure
of "closeness" to Truth. In which case it seems that we would need an a priori
knowledge of Truth of the natural realm to have such a measure around when we
want to assign a "closeness to the Truth." (A bootstrapping problem.) For this
simple reason the search for Truth about the natural realm lies outside science
proper.
I use "truth" to indicate a subjective feeling about a "real" state. I use
"Truth" to indicate an elusive "completely objective and incontestable knowledge
of a real state, independent of human feelings or idiosyncratic judgments."
> No hocus pocus here!
I think that the hocus pocus occurs when people believe that they can invent
Truth because it conforms to their intuitions. Intuition has worked well to
foster formal models that "work." But no one can prove that intuitions lead to
Truth. How would one prove such a thing? Proof of something is supposed to be a
rational process, not a deference to intuition.
> Just a logical (not experimental)
> model that supports what is actually experienced would suffice. This would
> make things logically "understandable".
> Or, is this too scarry for some?
>
> Marcel,
>
Our opinions about the True nature of the world are not forbidden. They simply
lie within the realm of Natural Philosophy but outside the realm of science
proper. Science is a communal effort which can generate "truth," but "Truth" is
a personal decision not to be dogmatized by science.
Ilja Schmelzer
> > Nowadays, it is more
> > like considering things only as what we experience of them. (Which
> > naturally leads to the above statement .. that without experience, things
> > don't exist.)
>
> Or is it that we invent utilitarian theoretical models which we simply treat as
> formal for the sake of unification, prediction, and cognition?
That's not positivism but instrumentalism. Note that utilitarian
theoretical models can contain as much unproven metaphysics as you
like.
> How do we judge the True nature of the world unless we first have some measure
> of "closeness" to Truth.
We make guesses.
> But no one can prove that intuitions lead to Truth.
So what? As utilitarian theoretical models they are useful if they
work, even if we cannot prove that they always work.
Ilja
--
I. Schmelzer, <il...@ilja-schmelzer.net>, http://ilja-schmelzer.net
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
> Patrick Reany <re...@firstworld.net> writes:
> > > Nowadays, it is more
> > > like considering things only as what we experience of them. (Which
> > > naturally leads to the above statement .. that without experience, things
> > > don't exist.)
> >
> > Or is it that we invent utilitarian theoretical models which we simply treat as
> > formal for the sake of unification, prediction, and cognition?
>
> That's not positivism but instrumentalism.
Well, I did not say that my contrary viewpoint necessarily associates to any
particular recognizable philosophical label. I just happened to disagree with the
poster and wanted him to offer a rebuttal argument. (The previous poster lead; I
merely followed.)
> Note that utilitarian
> theoretical models can contain as much unproven metaphysics as you
> like.
Agreed. (But I don't know how to universally *prove* any metaphysics! About the only
thing I can think of that must exist for me is my own consciousness, for it would be
absurd to deny the existence of that. But then, such a proof is personal, not
universal.)
Ilja, please present your definitions of (modern) "positivism" and "instrumentalism."
> > How do we judge the True nature of the world unless we first have some measure
> > of "closeness" to Truth.
>
> We make guesses.
I don't think you quite answered the question, though. My question was not "how do we
attempt to get close to a True model?," but rather "how do we *verify* that a model
arrived at by guessing or by any other means is actually close to the Truth?"
> > But no one can prove that intuitions lead to Truth.
>
> So what? As utilitarian theoretical models they are useful if they
> work, even if we cannot prove that they always work.
>
> Ilja
>
The "so what" is that I argue against people using science to tell me what
metaphysical Truth is. (However, I have no problem in principle with people arguing
that they looked at some bit of science and came to the personal conclusion that some
particular model is probably True in their *opinion*.) I agree with your statement
about utilitarian models, but that is not really what I was getting at.
Patrick
Edward Green
<...>
>Finally, I am much more interested in how physicists and people primarily
>interested in arguing topics of physics define "positivism" than in how
>philosophers define this term, though I'll include the definitions of
>philosophers in the compilation I'll preparing. Nevertheless, I cannot
>understand how you think that the definition of "positivism" is not directly
>relevant to these two NGs I posted to.
In several years of sampling, I don't recall "positivism" coming
up in sci.physics. Metaphysics, ontology, epistemology, solipsism,
yes; these come up with some frequency, but I don't recall positivism.
Can you use the term in a typical argument about physics?
Edward Green
>Science -- an investigative division of natural philosophy -- is the search
>for a patchwork of theoretical explanations of natural phenomena founded on
>intersubjective "reality," and supported by covariant physical laws with
>semi-freely created formalisms and models, all ultimately in conformance with
>arbitrary conventions that bootstrap the discipline, and on anthropomorphic
>experimental (observational) variables whose connection to intrinsic or "deep"
>"reality" is pure speculation which lies outside the realm of science proper.
Sigh. I don't think including tendentious swipes at straw dogs
in your "definition" is likely to be very productive.
Patrick Reany
Edward Green wrote:
Explain.
Patrick Reany
Edward Green wrote:
I can try to. Understand, however, that there is controversy over what
"positivism" means. I see positivism as the intentional attempt to remove all
*unnecessary* a priori metaphysical assumptions regarding the physical realm from
the actual doing of science proper. I do NOT regard it as forbidding the holding
of metaphysical beliefs per se, though. I see Instrumentalism as a specific form
of positivism, but others do not. There is controversy. The issue is made
complicated by the fact that there are many versions of positivism (such as
logical positivism), and also by the fact that the anti-positivists on these NGs
often use the extremist views of a few positivists to characterize the entire
philosophical meaning of positivism. But where are the authoritative definitions
of these terms so we can all have a common usage and understanding?
Positivism has frequently come up by people who argue against the Establishment
view of physics, such as is embodied in special relativity and in QM. I believe
that the anti-Establishment people who have contested my support of Establishment
physics are motivated by the belief that Science can and should attempt to
determine absolute reality by use of the scientific method and intuition. They
become ill at the thought that Science should only introduce theoretical models
formally. The anti-Establishment people want Science to produce the incontestable
Truth about the natural realm, not mere utilitarian theories that are just as
good as any other equivalent utilitarian theories.
Thus, when I say that physics uses clock time and does not use or need
transcendent time, my opponents reply that that's just my "positivism" blathering
on. Positivism is claimed by them to be the root of all evil that took physics
off its holy course set down by Newton and Maxwell on HOW science should be done
and interpreted philosophically.
At the heart of most of the Establishment v. anti-Establishment arguments of
these NGs is the philosophical issue of positivism v. realism.
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
>>> Or is it that we invent utilitarian theoretical models which we simply treat as
>>> formal for the sake of unification, prediction, and cognition?
>>
>> That's not positivism but instrumentalism.
>
I have simply reacted seeing this description and the subject "Positivism".
>> Note that utilitarian theoretical models can contain as much
>> unproven metaphysics as you like.
> Agreed. (But I don't know how to universally *prove* any metaphysics!
Mee too. There is no need to prove them. The requirement to prove
distinguishes positivism.
> Ilja, please present your definitions of (modern) "positivism" and
> "instrumentalism."
I follow Popper. Popper defines (AFAIR) positivism as the attempt to
obtain proven (positive) knowledge starting with observation.
Its the reverse to Popper's falsificationism, were theories are
unproven guesses, and these guesses always contain metaphysics. We
test them, and these tests allow to falsify some wrong guesses.
Instrumentalism is one possibility to justify Popper's
falsificationism. We value theories which make testable predictions
and survive tests because we like to have a tool which makes
successful predictions - a useful instrument.
Popper himself prefers another justification - search for Truth. We
test theories because we prefer, for unexplained reasons, true
theories, and true theories do not fail.
>>> How do we judge the True nature of the world unless we first have some measure
>>> of "closeness" to Truth.
>> We make guesses.
>
> I don't think you quite answered the question, though. My question was not "how do we
> attempt to get close to a True model?," but rather "how do we *verify* that a model
> arrived at by guessing or by any other means is actually close to the Truth?"
In this case, your question is incorrect, because we don't verify
theories (in instrumentalism).
Ilja Schmelzer
> I can try to. Understand, however, that there is controversy over what
> "positivism" means. I see positivism as the intentional attempt to remove all
> *unnecessary* a priori metaphysical assumptions regarding the physical realm from
> the actual doing of science proper. I do NOT regard it as forbidding the holding
> of metaphysical beliefs per se, though.
I think that's rather far away from positivism. The origin of the
word is AFAIK the belief that it is possible to obtain positive,
certain knowledge via experiment.
> The issue is made complicated by the fact that there are many
> versions of positivism (such as logical positivism), and also by the
> fact that the anti-positivists on these NGs often use the extremist
> views of a few positivists to characterize the entire philosophical
> meaning of positivism.
Of course I'm anti-positivist in this situation.
> Positivism has frequently come up by people who argue against the Establishment
> view of physics, such as is embodied in special relativity and in QM. I believe
> that the anti-Establishment people who have contested my support of Establishment
> physics are motivated by the belief that Science can and should attempt to
> determine absolute reality by use of the scientific method and intuition.
Note that the use of intuition is already anti-positivistic. Instead,
positivism requires derivation from observation.
> They become ill at the thought that Science should only introduce
> theoretical models formally. The anti-Establishment people want
> Science to produce the incontestable Truth about the natural realm,
> not mere utilitarian theories that are just as good as any other
> equivalent utilitarian theories.
I think that's a misinterpretation. Of course, its hard to judge
about "the anti-establishment people" - a lot of them are quite
confused, many disagree with each other.
But the search for incontestable Truth is part of positivism, not
realism. Instead, the IMHO most serious argumentation against the
mainstream is realistic, and clearly anti-positivistic.
They believe in the existence of a world outside (a metaphysical
belief - nothing derived from observation) and that in this real world
the basic rules of common sense (classical logic, classical
probability theory) are fulfilled.
> Thus, when I say that physics uses clock time and does not use or
> need transcendent time, my opponents reply that that's just my
> "positivism" blathering on. Positivism is claimed by them to be the
> root of all evil that took physics off its holy course set down by
> Newton and Maxwell on HOW science should be done and interpreted
> philosophically.
Indeed ;-).
> At the heart of most of the Establishment v. anti-Establishment
> arguments of these NGs is the philosophical issue of positivism
> v. realism.
Yep.
Phil Henshaw
"intersubjective 'reality'"
"semi-freely created fromalisms"
"arbitrary conventions that bootstrap the discipline"
"anthropomorphic experimental (observational) variables"
"connection to intrinsic or 'deep reality' is pure speculation"
Science is hard enough to faithfully describe without such diversionary
swipes. You seem to recognize that science is not, in fact, concerned
with Truth, though scientists may be, yet you remain argumentative.
It's almost as if you were holding back a claim that there could be some
sort of rigorous construction of Truth.
I've told you what I think, that yielding your mind to close observation
(of anything that holds your interest) is a sound path to Truth. That's
for the personal voyage, however. Science is a collective activity,
and is greatly handicapped by that, while at the same time it is greatly
benefited by it. Perhaps you could say that science produces a
different kind of Truth. It does not go as deep in some ways, but it
certainly both challenges and benefits from individual insight,
accumulates over the generations and is reproducible.
I've also mentioned that there are ways of studying data, not yet a part
of science, that would extend the depth of its insights. Watching the
eventfulness of time traces draws the intellect to where the coherence
of things is located. That leads, perhaps, to a third kind of Truth,
deep personal insight aided by the development of landmarks using the
methodology of science, advancing both.
What's your interest?
Patrick Reany
Phil Henshaw wrote:
> Patrick Reany wrote:
> >
> > Edward Green wrote:
> >
> > > Patrick Reany <re...@firstworld.net> wrote:
> > >
> > > >Science -- an investigative division of natural philosophy -- is the search
> > > >for a patchwork of theoretical explanations of natural phenomena founded on
> > > >intersubjective "reality," and supported by covariant physical laws with
> > > >semi-freely created formalisms and models, all ultimately in conformance with
> > > >arbitrary conventions that bootstrap the discipline, and on anthropomorphic
> > > >experimental (observational) variables whose connection to intrinsic or "deep"
> > > >"reality" is pure speculation which lies outside the realm of science proper.
> > >
> > > Sigh. I don't think including tendentious swipes at straw dogs
> > > in your "definition" is likely to be very productive.
> >
> > Explain.
>
> "intersubjective 'reality'"
> "semi-freely created fromalisms"
> "arbitrary conventions that bootstrap the discipline"
> "anthropomorphic experimental (observational) variables"
> "connection to intrinsic or 'deep reality' is pure speculation"
>
> Science is hard enough to faithfully describe without such diversionary
> swipes. You seem to recognize that science is not, in fact, concerned
> with Truth, though scientists may be, yet you remain argumentative.
I call it the way I see, without regard to whether it is argumentative or not. How
about your won definition of science?
> It's almost as if you were holding back a claim that there could be some
> sort of rigorous construction of Truth.
Not in anything I said above and not in anything else either. We can invent models, and
then believe in those models, but we can't called those models "scientific Truth" about
the world.
> I've told you what I think, that yielding your mind to close observation
> (of anything that holds your interest) is a sound path to Truth.
So it's just your personal belief.
> That's
> for the personal voyage, however. Science is a collective activity,
> and is greatly handicapped by that, while at the same time it is greatly
> benefited by it. Perhaps you could say that science produces a
> different kind of Truth.
I would certainly say that there are many kinds of knowledge, and that scientific
knowledge is but one type of knowledge -- a particular form of "group knowledge."
> It does not go as deep in some ways, but it
> certainly both challenges and benefits from individual insight,
> accumulates over the generations and is reproducible.
>
> I've also mentioned that there are ways of studying data, not yet a part
> of science, that would extend the depth of its insights. Watching the
> eventfulness of time traces draws the intellect to where the coherence
> of things is located. That leads, perhaps, to a third kind of Truth,
> deep personal insight aided by the development of landmarks using the
> methodology of science, advancing both.
>
> What's your interest?
>
My interest is to find Truth without dogmatism. Science cannot provide any Truth for
me, and I don't want it to ever claim that it can. I'll decide what is and what isn't
Truth for myself within my own Natural Philosophy.
Patrick
Edward Green
Your definition contained catch phrases seminingly designed to poke
at those you disagree with -- like "intersubjective 'reality'",
"arbitrary conventions", "anthropomorphic ... variables", and "pure
speculation". You can't put your argument into your defintions...
not, at least, if you want to have any sort of productive discussion
with those of differing opinions. You can't even begin the
discussion, because accepting your definition is almost identical
to acceptance of your argument.
Patrick Reany
Edward Green wrote:
My definition is fine as definitions go, though everyone has the right to disagree
with it, and even to offer counter definitions. In fact, I ask no one to accept it!
But I ask those that disagree with it to be specific about their problems with it. It
is by offering specific criticisms that productive discussion can occur. But at least
this definition provides a specific starting point to the discussion. (I did not
realize when I offered my definition that it would be interpreted as being a
prerequisite of any further discussion. I'll keep this in mind for the future.)
In any case, although I think it would be very helpful to have a definition of
"science" prior to discussing "positivism," it is not necessary. We can still discuss
"positivism" while disagreeing on what "science" is. But you have the advantage over
me now, because you KNOW how I define "science," but I do not know how you define it.
Patrick
Edward Green
>The issue is made
>complicated by the fact that there are many versions of positivism (such as
>logical positivism), and also by the fact that the anti-positivists on these NGs
>often use the extremist views of a few positivists to characterize the entire
>philosophical meaning of positivism.
This last point bears repeating, not specifically about positivism,
but as a general feature of human behavior. Extremist positions are
often cited within a given set to characterize the entire set.
>But where are the authoritative definitions
>of these terms so we can all have a common usage and understanding?
I've already stated my views, but briefly: I don't find it so
interesting what a particular historical school "believed", or what
we are to understand by their name... most names carry a spread
of meanings anyway... but that we achieve a mutual understanding
of the concepts under discussion. It helps if we are using the
same words, but this cannot be achieved solely by definition.
Definition works when you have a large body of mutually understood
terms, and a few new or odd terms described in terms of them. In
philosophy the vaguely understood terms predominate so we get nowhere
by bald definition. We have to achieve mutual understanding first, by
just talking around the issues until the bell rings. Then we can
agree on terms -- if we get that far.
>At the heart of most of the Establishment v. anti-Establishment arguments of
>these NGs is the philosophical issue of positivism v. realism.
Well, forgive me if I ask you to repeat yourself, but what, in a few
lines, is your personal understanding of "positivism"?
P.S. Can you reduce your line length to <80 characters?
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
> Patrick Reany <re...@firstworld.net> writes:
> > I can try to. Understand, however, that there is controversy over what
> > "positivism" means. I see positivism as the intentional attempt to remove all
> > *unnecessary* a priori metaphysical assumptions regarding the physical realm from
> > the actual doing of science proper. I do NOT regard it as forbidding the holding
> > of metaphysical beliefs per se, though.
>
> I think that's rather far away from positivism. The origin of the
> word is AFAIK the belief that it is possible to obtain positive,
> certain knowledge via experiment.
>
> > The issue is made complicated by the fact that there are many
> > versions of positivism (such as logical positivism), and also by the
> > fact that the anti-positivists on these NGs often use the extremist
> > views of a few positivists to characterize the entire philosophical
> > meaning of positivism.
>
> Of course I'm anti-positivist in this situation.
So am I.
>
> > Positivism has frequently come up by people who argue against the Establishment
> > view of physics, such as is embodied in special relativity and in QM. I believe
> > that the anti-Establishment people who have contested my support of Establishment
> > physics are motivated by the belief that Science can and should attempt to
> > determine absolute reality by use of the scientific method and intuition.
>
> Note that the use of intuition is already anti-positivistic. Instead,
> positivism requires derivation from observation.
I don't know about this assertion. Positivism at the time of Comte seems
to very unappreciative of the fundamental role that Theory plays in
science. In that sense I accept what you say. But I don't believe that
modern positivism -- which I assume to be theory friendly -- is also
intuition unfriendly. And if history finds me wrong on this then I must
assume that positivism never survived much into the Twentieth century
past 1905. And that means that we have been in the so-called
Post-Positivism era since shortly after the general acceptance of
Special Relativity.
Let me introduce a few other definitions of "positivism" at this point:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12312c.htm
******************
Positivism is a system of philosophical and religious doctrines
elaborated by
Auguste Comte. As a philosophical system or method, Positivism denies
the
validity of metaphysical speculations, and maintains that the data of
sense
experience are the only object and the supreme criterion of human
knowledge;
as a religious system, it denies the existence of a personal God and
takes
humanity, "the great being", as the object of its veneration and cult.
We shall give a brief historical sketch of Positivism, an exposition of
its
fundamental principles, and a criticism of them.
******************
So, Positivism has a large context, much larger than a mere philosophy
of science. This only helps to confuse the issue in my opinion. We must
take care to not mix-up the moral, religious, metaphysical, and
epistemological aspects of this issue.
FROM: http://radicalacademy.com/adiphilpositivism.htm we have
******************
THE PHILOSOPHY OF POSITIVISM
The broad movement of thought which marked the second half of the
nineteenth century is called Positivism. The name is due to the fact
that
thinkers returned to the appreciation of positive facts so as to restore
the world of nature, which the Idealists had reduced to a mere
representation of the ego. The Positivists conceived of primordial
matter as a unique
reality having the power of evolving from the lower to the higher forms,
mechanically and by means of immanent energy. This evolution was even
extended to include man. Positivist philosophy consists in knowing the
fundamental laws which govern matter in its process of evolution.
The founder of Positivism was Auguste Comte; its most representative
thinkers were English; its remarkable materialistic development
occurred in Germany.
******************
From the dictionary we have:
"A theory that theology and metaphysics are earlier imperfect modes of
knowledge and that positive knowledge is based on natural phenomena and
their properties and relations as verified by the empirical sciences."
This is a fascinating definition, for it reveals "positivism" to be more
of an epistemology than a philosophy of science per se, except to say
that somehow science is able to produce positive knowledge from
empirical data.
From http://www.newrenaissance.com/positiv2.htm we have:
******************
Positivism has been a disaster for humanity, accelerating an obsession
with
measurement and fragmentation although it claimed to seek Unification.
It is one of the reasons, for example, it has been difficult for
ecological
arguments not exclusively rooted in statistics to be offered full
"legitimacy"
in the body politic. Positivism sought to replace Religion and
substitute
behaviorism, steadily eroding concepts of free will and individual
liberty. It placed Law on similar statutory grounds, denying a
meaningful
relationship to justice. It relentless promoted its own logic over
emotion, which has
no meaningful place in its system. It gave us false concepts of language
which do not square with evidence and fostered bogus connections between
the
richness of human consciousness/thought and the ad hoc, programmed
language we create for machines.
******************
I can't say that I buy any of the above hostile arguments against
positivism at this time, though I have my own arguments against it. If
positivism be considered solely as an epistemology then it should be
criticized solely on epistemological criteria. In a similar way it would
be illogical to claim that there is no God because some people who claim
that there is a God are immoral people. That's just fallacious
reasoning.
And if positivism be considered a an entire philosophy of morality,
existence, religion, and knowledge then each of these aspects should be
criticized separately.
>
> > They become ill at the thought that Science should only introduce
> > theoretical models formally. The anti-Establishment people want
> > Science to produce the incontestable Truth about the natural realm,
> > not mere utilitarian theories that are just as good as any other
> > equivalent utilitarian theories.
>
> I think that's a misinterpretation. Of course, its hard to judge
> about "the anti-establishment people" - a lot of them are quite
> confused, many disagree with each other.
Ironically, it seems that the anti-Establishment folks I mentioned above
are more "positivistic" than the Establishment itself! The twist here is
that, unlike Comte, today's "positivists" tend to very religious and
want science to affirm their religious beliefs. Unfortunately the
Establishment is too involved in contradicting religious views. And the
only solution I can see to avoid this situation is to chop-up what is
called Science today into four subdivisions of a larger enquiry known as
Natural Philosophy: Science, Cosmology, Cosmogony, and Vitogony (origin
and evolution of life).
>
> But the search for incontestable Truth is part of positivism, not
> realism. Instead, the IMHO most serious argumentation against the
> mainstream is realistic, and clearly anti-positivistic.
Please define scientific realism if your characterization below has left
anything important out.
>
> They believe in the existence of a world outside (a metaphysical
> belief - nothing derived from observation) and that in this real world
> the basic rules of common sense (classical logic, classical
> probability theory) are fulfilled.
Agreed.
>
> > Thus, when I say that physics uses clock time and does not use or
> > need transcendent time, my opponents reply that that's just my
> > "positivism" blathering on. Positivism is claimed by them to be the
> > root of all evil that took physics off its holy course set down by
> > Newton and Maxwell on HOW science should be done and interpreted
> > philosophically.
>
> Indeed ;-).
But it's not my "positivism" at issue here; it's their own "positivism"
at issue. Realists appear to me to be epistemological positivists
("objectivists"), even
though not metaphysical positivists.
>
> > At the heart of most of the Establishment v. anti-Establishment
> > arguments of these NGs is the philosophical issue of positivism
> > v. realism.
> Yep.
Or should I rather say Instrumentalism v. "religious
Positivist"-Realism. Comte's positivism seems to have had one benfecial
effect in freeing Science from the a priori religious and metaphysical
assumptions in effect in his day. The freedom thus gained by positivism
lead into two extreme viewpoints: 1) that metaphysics is irrelevant in
science, and 2) that models can provide meaning to our sense impresions
regardless of whether these models say anything True about reality.
> Ilja
--
> I. Schmelzer, <il...@ilja-schmelzer.net>, http://ilja-schmelzer.net
I'll stick to my semi-Popperian Instrumentalism.
Patrick
Patrick Reany
Edward Green wrote:
> Patrick Reany <re...@firstworld.net> wrote:
>
> >The issue is made
> >complicated by the fact that there are many versions of positivism (such as
> >logical positivism), and also by the fact that the anti-positivists on these NGs
> >often use the extremist views of a few positivists to characterize the entire
> >philosophical meaning of positivism.
>
> This last point bears repeating, not specifically about positivism,
> but as a general feature of human behavior. Extremist positions are
> often cited within a given set to characterize the entire set.
>
> >But where are the authoritative definitions
> >of these terms so we can all have a common usage and understanding?
>
> I've already stated my views, but briefly: I don't find it so
> interesting what a particular historical school "believed", or what
> we are to understand by their name... most names carry a spread
> of meanings anyway... but that we achieve a mutual understanding
> of the concepts under discussion. It helps if we are using the
> same words, but this cannot be achieved solely by definition.
>
> Definition works when you have a large body of mutually understood
> terms, and a few new or odd terms described in terms of them. In
> philosophy the vaguely understood terms predominate so we get nowhere
> by bald definition. We have to achieve mutual understanding first, by
> just talking around the issues until the bell rings. Then we can
> agree on terms -- if we get that far.
That's a good goal, and it may work well as you proposed it. In the end, though, we
need a stipulated definition if we are to use a controversial term. And part of the
reason I started this discussion about "positivism" was in the hopes of arriving at a
stipulated definition of "positivism" that at least most of us can agree to use.
> >At the heart of most of the Establishment v. anti-Establishment arguments of
> >these NGs is the philosophical issue of positivism v. realism.
>
> Well, forgive me if I ask you to repeat yourself, but what, in a few
> lines, is your personal understanding of "positivism"?
>
> P.S. Can you reduce your line length to <80 characters?
I believe I can (almost):
Positivism is a theory-unfriendly school of philosophy started by Auguste Comte
(1788-1857) and intended to find positive knowledge about the world (somehow) by
empirical means, rather than by relying on dogmatic assumptions based on religious or
philosophical authorities or traditions. A prominent nineteenth century version of
Positivism is Phenomenalism which reduced metaphysics (and scientific ontology) to
mere sense impressions. An early twentieth century form was Logical Positivism which
debunked the notion of meaningful metaphysics in science.
Positivism was replaced by various versions of Instrumentalism in the early twentieth
century as the primary philosophy of science held by scientists themselves, thanks to
the advent of SR and QM, and the philosophies of Poincare, Einstein, Bohr, Eddington,
Bridgman, and others.
I'll happily revise my characterization of "positivism" as the facts presented to me
warrant it.
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
> > Note that the use of intuition is already anti-positivistic. Instead,
> > positivism requires derivation from observation.
>
> I don't know about this assertion. Positivism at the time of Comte seems
> to very unappreciative of the fundamental role that Theory plays in
> science. In that sense I accept what you say. But I don't believe that
> modern positivism -- which I assume to be theory friendly -- is also
> intuition unfriendly.
I don't know such an animal - modern positivism. Or you accept
priority of theory and impossibility to derive theories from
observation, than you are not a positivist. Or you don't. I see no
consistent intermediate way.
> And if history finds me wrong on this then I must
> assume that positivism never survived much into the Twentieth century
> past 1905. And that means that we have been in the so-called
> Post-Positivism era since shortly after the general acceptance of
> Special Relativity.
Yep, positivism has not survived Popper's Logic of Scientific
Discovery. I have seen a statement of type "positivism is as dead as
possible for a philosophical concept".
Unfortunately it has survived in the minds of many scientists (mostly
the scientists who claim that they know how to do science and don't
need any philosophy) as a part of the historical argumentations used
in the foundations of special and general relativity as well as
quantum theory.
> Positivism is a system of philosophical and religious doctrines
> elaborated by Auguste Comte. As a philosophical system or method,
> Positivism denies the validity of metaphysical speculations, and
> maintains that the data of sense experience are the only object and
> the supreme criterion of human knowledge;
Quite fine.
> So, Positivism has a large context, much larger than a mere philosophy
> of science.
I prefer to restrict myself to philosophy of science. Once positivism
is dead in this domain, its implications in other domains may be
ignored without further discussion.
> > But the search for incontestable Truth is part of positivism, not
> > realism. Instead, the IMHO most serious argumentation against the
> > mainstream is realistic, and clearly anti-positivistic.
>
> Please define scientific realism if your characterization below has left
> anything important out.
> >
> > They believe in the existence of a world outside (a metaphysical
> > belief - nothing derived from observation) and that in this real world
> > the basic rules of common sense (classical logic, classical
> > probability theory) are fulfilled.
>
> Agreed.
I have given a definition with a formula in gr-qc/0001101, but that's
not more than a specification which rules of classical probability
theory are required.
> > > Positivism is claimed by them to be the
> > > root of all evil that took physics off its holy course set down by
> > > Newton and Maxwell on HOW science should be done and interpreted
> > > philosophically.
> >
> > Indeed ;-).
> But it's not my "positivism" at issue here; it's their own
> "positivism" at issue. Realists appear to me to be epistemological
> positivists ("objectivists"), even though not metaphysical
> positivists.
I don't understand the meaning of "epistemological positivists".
> > > At the heart of most of the Establishment v. anti-Establishment
> > > arguments of these NGs is the philosophical issue of positivism
> > > v. realism.
>
> > Yep.
> Or should I rather say Instrumentalism v. "religious
> Positivist"-Realism.
No. Realism is compatible with instrumentalism. A realist simply
believes that realistic theories are better tools for predictions
because there is some reality outside.
> Comte's positivism seems to have had one benfecial effect in freeing
> Science from the a priori religious and metaphysical assumptions in
> effect in his day.
Throwing away also the useful metaphysical assumptions.
Phil Henshaw
Patrick Reany wrote:
>
> Phil Henshaw wrote:
>
> > Patrick Reany wrote:
> > >
...clip
> >
> > Science is hard enough to faithfully describe without such diversionary
> > swipes. You seem to recognize that science is not, in fact, concerned
> > with Truth, though scientists may be, yet you remain argumentative.
>
> I call it the way I see, without regard to whether it is argumentative or not. How
> about your won definition of science?
I thought that in that post I was describing, not defining. I was
considering 'definition' in terms of producing statements within a logic
which makes them subject to proof. Science is a physical activity of
people, and as that, is not logically definable.
> > It's almost as if you were holding back a claim that there could be some
> > sort of rigorous construction of Truth.
>
> Not in anything I said above and not in anything else either. We can invent models, and
> then believe in those models, but we can't called those models "scientific Truth" about
> the world.
Sure, I've tried to make that point stick many a time, (see my
signature..)
> > I've told you what I think, that yielding your mind to close observation
> > (of anything that holds your interest) is a sound path to Truth.
> So it's just your personal belief.
Perhaps a little more than that. It's about letting go of perception,
being drawn into such true observation that you are no longer confused
by preconception and are able to see without prejudice. As always
certainty is not the result of certitude, but honesty. Honestly, of
course, all our words are full of prejudice, all our images are full of
prejudice. Biologically we can't even see in a functional way without
associating the accumulated meanings of the things we look at. Seeing
the Truth seems to have something to do with loosing your mind! :,)
...
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
> Patrick Reany <re...@firstworld.net> writes:
> > > Note that the use of intuition is already anti-positivistic. Instead,
> > > positivism requires derivation from observation.
> >
> > I don't know about this assertion. Positivism at the time of Comte seems
> > to very unappreciative of the fundamental role that Theory plays in
> > science. In that sense I accept what you say. But I don't believe that
> > modern positivism -- which I assume to be theory friendly -- is also
> > intuition unfriendly.
>
> I don't know such an animal - modern positivism. Or you accept
> priority of theory and impossibility to derive theories from
> observation, than you are not a positivist. Or you don't. I see no
> consistent intermediate way.
Definitions of terms evolve over the centuries. There emerge variations
on a
theme also.
> > And if history finds me wrong on this then I must
> > assume that positivism never survived much into the Twentieth century
> > past 1905. And that means that we have been in the so-called
> > Post-Positivism era since shortly after the general acceptance of
> > Special Relativity.
>
> Yep, positivism has not survived Popper's Logic of Scientific
> Discovery. I have seen a statement of type "positivism is as dead as
> possible for a philosophical concept".
>
> Unfortunately it has survived in the minds of many scientists (mostly
> the scientists who claim that they know how to do science and don't
> need any philosophy) as a part of the historical argumentations used
> in the foundations of special and general relativity as well as
> quantum theory.
There you have it. "Modern" positivism surviving in the minds of some
scientists. But I'll bet you that these same scientists are "theory
friendly."
So, this is a form of positivism a little different than Comte's version
of
it.
Science deals directly with "events and behaviors" and indirectly with
things
(to which models presumably associate). I associate "epistemological
truth"
with soft inductive laws of science, which are NOT certainty (they are
reliable but not absolute). "Epistemological positivists" search for
"epistemological Truths," which are certainty. "Metaphysical
positivists,"
then, believe that some theoretical models may be considered as verified
Truth
about ontological reality.
> > > > At the heart of most of the Establishment v. anti-Establishment
> > > > arguments of these NGs is the philosophical issue of positivism
> > > > v. realism.
> >
> > > Yep.
>
> > Or should I rather say Instrumentalism v. "religious
> > Positivist"-Realism.
>
> No. Realism is compatible with instrumentalism. A realist simply
> believes that realistic theories are better tools for predictions
> because there is some reality outside.
I presume that realist theories contain "realist" models which
supposedly
conform to reality. How does one know how to make a "realist" model
rather
than an unrealist" model. In other words, what objective criteria
distinguish
the two that the layman could understand.
Personally, I believe in the independent existence of an external world.
But I
also believe that physical theories are not beholding to my intuitions
of the
nature of the external world. In fact, it is conceivable that a
chimerical
theory may work better at describing physicality than any intuitive
theory a
human could conceive of. Therefore, it is more logical to me to NOT
restrict
one's viewpoint by any anthropomorphic notion of the real nature of the
external world if one is to have the maximum freedom to freely invent
theory.
And on this notion of anthropomorphic theories I want to say what my
greatest
problem is with realism. I find no necessary relationship of human
(anthropomorphic) variables of space, time, mass, pressure, force, etc
to the
external world. Yes, we have been very successful at predicting events
in
physicality by using our anthropomorphic variables, but that could be
just
luck. The problem is that, I see it, the realists use this good luck to
reaffirm their a priori belief that the world was designed to be
understood by
humans, so that humans *should* use their naive anthropomorphic
variables. But
this doctrine can never be proved, and unless someone challenges it
(uses
"falsification") we will never have a chance of contesting it
objectively.
> > Comte's positivism seems to have had one benfecial effect in freeing
> > Science from the a priori religious and metaphysical assumptions in
> > effect in his day.
>
> Throwing away also the useful metaphysical assumptions.
But also opening up the door for people after him to re-introduce freely
created "metaphysics" too.
Patrick
Patrick Reany
Phil Henshaw wrote:
[snip]
> I thought that in that post I was describing, not defining. I was
> considering 'definition' in terms of producing statements within a logic
> which makes them subject to proof. Science is a physical activity of
> people, and as that, is not logically definable.
Without a definition of "science" how does one know when one is correctly doing science? How
does one separate science from pseudoscience? How does one argue for any objectivity of
science?
> > > It's almost as if you were holding back a claim that there could be some
> > > sort of rigorous construction of Truth.
> >
> > Not in anything I said above and not in anything else either. We can invent models, and
> > then believe in those models, but we can't called those models "scientific Truth" about
> > the world.
>
> Sure, I've tried to make that point stick many a time, (see my
> signature..)
>
> > > I've told you what I think, that yielding your mind to close observation
> > > (of anything that holds your interest) is a sound path to Truth.
>
> > So it's just your personal belief.
>
> Perhaps a little more than that. It's about letting go of perception,
> being drawn into such true observation that you are no longer confused
> by preconception and are able to see without prejudice. As always
> certainty is not the result of certitude, but honesty. Honestly, of
> course, all our words are full of prejudice, all our images are full of
> prejudice. Biologically we can't even see in a functional way without
> associating the accumulated meanings of the things we look at. Seeing
> the Truth seems to have something to do with loosing your mind! :,)
>
>
This sounds mystical to me -- not rational. Mystical knowledge is perfectly fine, but it is
not scientific knowledge per se. "Mystical knowledge" is a form of "knowing beyond that which
can be proved." Mystical knowledge is exactly what I believe the "realists" are looking for,
whether they characterize it that way or not. If realists would just say that their realist
beliefs are simply beliefs within their personal natural philosophies and are not provable
from science proper [or science Popper ;-)], I would have NO problem with that!
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
> > I don't know such an animal - modern positivism. Or you accept
> > priority of theory and impossibility to derive theories from
> > observation, than you are not a positivist. Or you don't. I see no
> > consistent intermediate way.
>
> Definitions of terms evolve over the centuries. There emerge variations
> on a theme also.
Sometimes. Not always.
> > Yep, positivism has not survived Popper's Logic of Scientific
> > Discovery. I have seen a statement of type "positivism is as dead as
> > possible for a philosophical concept".
> >
> > Unfortunately it has survived in the minds of many scientists (mostly
> > the scientists who claim that they know how to do science and don't
> > need any philosophy) as a part of the historical argumentations used
> > in the foundations of special and general relativity as well as
> > quantum theory.
>
> There you have it. "Modern" positivism surviving in the minds of some
> scientists.
Its not modern positivism but inconsistent thinking.
> But I'll bet you that these same scientists are "theory
> friendly."
I think they accept Popper's concept as far as they have heard about
it (falsification of theories by experiment). This does not prevent
them from using inconsistent argumentation from old positivism.
> So, this is a form of positivism a little different than Comte's
> version of it.
This is a form of nonsense, inconsistency. Usually based on ignorance
of philosophy of science, justified by "we are scientists, we know
better what to do".
> > > But it's not my "positivism" at issue here; it's their own
> > > "positivism" at issue. Realists appear to me to be epistemological
> > > positivists ("objectivists"), even though not metaphysical
> > > positivists.
> >
> > I don't understand the meaning of "epistemological positivists".
> Science deals directly with "events and behaviors" and indirectly
> with things (to which models presumably associate). I associate
> "epistemological truth" with soft inductive laws of science, which
> are NOT certainty (they are reliable but not
> absolute). "Epistemological positivists" search for "epistemological
> Truths," which are certainty.
In this case I disagree. Observations are theory-laden, there is no
theory-independent "epistemological truth".
> > > Or should I rather say Instrumentalism v. "religious
> > > Positivist"-Realism.
> >
> > No. Realism is compatible with instrumentalism. A realist simply
> > believes that realistic theories are better tools for predictions
> > because there is some reality outside.
> I presume that realist theories contain "realist" models which
> supposedly conform to reality. How does one know how to make a
> "realist" model rather than an unrealist" model. In other words,
> what objective criteria distinguish the two that the layman could
> understand.
A realistic theory describes some reality (described by some set of
variables), some rules how it changes (by equations). Then the things
we observe are described as functions of this reality (and our own
choices, which are also part of reality).
If you want to understand the difference, compare Bohmian mechanics
(realistic) and quantum theory (which is not realistic).
The laymen can distinguish them in a simple way: a non-realistic
theory seems incomplete to him, impossible to understand. A
professional has more specific criteria for this purpose, starting
with the EPR criterion as the most famous formulation, and the
assumptions used to prove Bell's inequalities as a more formal
variant.
> Personally, I believe in the independent existence of an external
> world. But I also believe that physical theories are not beholding
> to my intuitions of the nature of the external world.
Why? If there are theories which describe everything in agreement
with intuition, Occam's razor suggests to prefer them.
> In fact, it is conceivable that a chimerical theory may work better
> at describing physicality than any intuitive theory a human could
> conceive of.
Conceivable is almost everything. But what about Occam's razor?
> Therefore, it is more logical to me to NOT restrict one's viewpoint
> by any anthropomorphic notion of the real nature of the external
> world if one is to have the maximum freedom to freely invent theory.
You don't need much freedom to invent theories. Instead, you need
restrictions.
> And on this notion of anthropomorphic theories I want to say what my
> greatest problem is with realism. I find no necessary relationship
> of human (anthropomorphic) variables of space, time, mass, pressure,
> force, etc to the external world. Yes, we have been very successful
> at predicting events in physicality by using our anthropomorphic
> variables, but that could be just luck. The problem is that, I see
> it, the realists use this good luck to reaffirm their a priori
> belief that the world was designed to be understood by humans, so
> that humans *should* use their naive anthropomorphic variables. But
> this doctrine can never be proved, and unless someone challenges it
> (uses "falsification") we will never have a chance of contesting it
> objectively.
I think this sounds quite confused. You name concepts like mass,
pressure, force which are IMHO not very anthropomorphic, instead, they
are simply notions of Newtonian mechanics. That's IMHO a cheap trick
- to put the foundations (logic, probability theory, realism,
causality) on the same level as particular theories (flat Earth,
pressure, temperature), name this conglomerate "common sense,
anthropomorphic theories" and to conclude that it all may be rejected.
I think realism may be better understood as a part of the scientific
method itself. Like logic. If you reject realism you weaken the
scientific method - you no longer search for realistic models.
> > Throwing away also the useful metaphysical assumptions.
>
> But also opening up the door for people after him to re-introduce freely
> created "metaphysics" too.
No. This door has been opened only by Popper and his defense of
metaphysics as a legitimate part of scientific theories.
James Hunter
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
The door was never actually closed to start with.
You don't think that anything with more than one neuron
would actually believe "scientists".
nyuck, nyuck, nyuck, nyuck.
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
> > I presume that realist theories contain "realist" models which
> > supposedly conform to reality. How does one know how to make a
> > "realist" model rather than an unrealist" model. In other words,
> > what objective criteria distinguish the two that the layman could
> > understand.
>
> A realistic theory describes some reality (described by some set of
> variables), some rules how it changes (by equations). Then the things
> we observe are described as functions of this reality (and our own
> choices, which are also part of reality).
Sounds like the mechanical program of the Newtonian era, which was the
scientific predominant mode of belief until the general acceptance of SR and
QM.
> If you want to understand the difference, compare Bohmian mechanics
> (realistic) and quantum theory (which is not realistic).
>
> The laymen can distinguish them in a simple way: a non-realistic
> theory seems incomplete to him, impossible to understand. A
> professional has more specific criteria for this purpose, starting
> with the EPR criterion as the most famous formulation, and the
> assumptions used to prove Bell's inequalities as a more formal
> variant.
Nevertheless, it seems to me that there is no truly objective test of what is
a "realistic" theory. Thus a "realistic" theory is just a theory that conforms
to an arbitrary set of construction rules.
> > Personally, I believe in the independent existence of an external
> > world. But I also believe that physical theories are not beholding
> > to my intuitions of the nature of the external world.
>
> Why? If there are theories which describe everything in agreement
> with intuition, Occam's razor suggests to prefer them.
I do prefer everything that works! But I don't claim Reality on the mere basis
of a workable theory. I do not belief that humans can reverse-engineer Reality
from any workable theory of science.
> > In fact, it is conceivable that a chimerical theory may work better
> > at describing physicality than any intuitive theory a human could
> > conceive of.
>
> Conceivable is almost everything. But what about Occam's razor?
Occam's razor is still very much in force, but so too is the freedom to invent
any kind of workable theory, even if it happens to be nonrealistic.
Personally, I don't care either way. It's not the kind of theory that I care
about; it's what's being claimed in the name of that theory about Reality that
I care about.
> > Therefore, it is more logical to me to NOT restrict one's viewpoint
> > by any anthropomorphic notion of the real nature of the external
> > world if one is to have the maximum freedom to freely invent theory.
>
> You don't need much freedom to invent theories. Instead, you need
> restrictions.
But not draconian restrictions.
> > And on this notion of anthropomorphic theories I want to say what my
> > greatest problem is with realism. I find no necessary relationship
> > of human (anthropomorphic) variables of space, time, mass, pressure,
> > force, etc to the external world. Yes, we have been very successful
> > at predicting events in physicality by using our anthropomorphic
> > variables, but that could be just luck. The problem is that, I see
> > it, the realists use this good luck to reaffirm their a priori
> > belief that the world was designed to be understood by humans, so
> > that humans *should* use their naive anthropomorphic variables. But
> > this doctrine can never be proved, and unless someone challenges it
> > (uses "falsification") we will never have a chance of contesting it
> > objectively.
>
> I think this sounds quite confused. You name concepts like mass,
> pressure, force which are IMHO not very anthropomorphic, instead, they
> are simply notions of Newtonian mechanics. That's IMHO a cheap trick
> - to put the foundations (logic, probability theory, realism,
> causality) on the same level as particular theories (flat Earth,
> pressure, temperature), name this conglomerate "common sense,
> anthropomorphic theories" and to conclude that it all may be rejected.
Sorry, I don't agree with your rebuttal of my argument. The variables I named
are not merely used in Newtonian physics and they are to be used, I should
think, in any general "realistic" theory of physicality. Furthermore, we do
use these variables because they have their origin psychologically in the way
that humans interact with the external world and receive sensory input from
it, and we use them simply because we think we can understand them, and thus
possibly understand the workings of the external world by use of them, IF the
external world is kind enough to conform to them -- the anthropic principle.
Galileo and Newton believed such of the relation of the world to that of
humans. It may even be true. But it is the duty of all scientist to remain
skeptical and opened minded and to not accept any restrictive philosophy of
science that is not necessary to do so. And that IS an application of Occam's
Razor.
But I don't know what you're referring to when you say "conclude that it all
may be rejected."
> I think realism may be better understood as a part of the scientific
> method itself. Like logic. If you reject realism you weaken the
> scientific method - you no longer search for realistic models.
Let's clarify one thing right now. I do *not* reject the use of realistic
theories, but you reject the use of nonrealistic theories. I'm not the one
putting the restrictions here.
> > > Throwing away also the useful metaphysical assumptions.
> >
> > But also opening up the door for people after him to re-introduce freely
> > created "metaphysics" too.
>
> No. This door has been opened only by Popper and his defense of
> metaphysics as a legitimate part of scientific theories.
Well, I don't accept that only Popper opened the door, but even if it WAS
Popper who first opened it after Comte, it was opened by someone after Comte.
Are you telling me that the supporters of the ether theory of light
propagation in the nineteenth century were not of the belief that the ether
represented a REAL thing in nature to them?
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
>> A realistic theory describes some reality (described by some set of
>> variables), some rules how it changes (by equations). Then the things
>> we observe are described as functions of this reality (and our own
>> choices, which are also part of reality).
>
> Sounds like the mechanical program of the Newtonian era,
A little bit more general than the mechanical program, but in
agreement with its most fundamental principles.
> which was the scientific predominant mode of belief until the
> general acceptance of SR and QM.
Which, indeed, was connected with a lot of positivistic nonsense.
>> If you want to understand the difference, compare Bohmian mechanics
>> (realistic) and quantum theory (which is not realistic).
>>
>> The laymen can distinguish them in a simple way: a non-realistic
>> theory seems incomplete to him, impossible to understand. A
>> professional has more specific criteria for this purpose, starting
>> with the EPR criterion as the most famous formulation, and the
>> assumptions used to prove Bell's inequalities as a more formal
>> variant.
> Nevertheless, it seems to me that there is no truly objective test
> of what is a "realistic" theory. Thus a "realistic" theory is just a
> theory that conforms to an arbitrary set of construction rules.
Of course it is a set of rules. But naming some set of rules
"arbitrary" does not make this set really arbitrary. Feel free to
name the axioms of natural numbers, group theory, logic, probability
theory "arbitrary" - that's not an argument.
>> Why? If there are theories which describe everything in agreement
>> with intuition, Occam's razor suggests to prefer them.
> I do prefer everything that works! But I don't claim Reality on the
> mere basis of a workable theory. I do not belief that humans can
> reverse-engineer Reality from any workable theory of science.
That's not the claim of realism. The claim of realism is that reality
exists, not that we can reverse-engineer it.
But, of course, a realist tries. And a realist thinks that something
is not sufficiently understood if there is not even one realistic
model. Instead, it is not problematic for a realist if there are many
realistic models and experiment does not allow to make a unique
choice.
>> Conceivable is almost everything. But what about Occam's razor?
> Occam's razor is still very much in force, but so too is the freedom
> to invent any kind of workable theory, even if it happens to be
> nonrealistic.
Nobody tries to burn relativists for being non-realists.
> Personally, I don't care either way.
You are even free not to care about science at all.
>> You don't need much freedom to invent theories. Instead, you need
>> restrictions.
>
> But not draconian restrictions.
Theories with more draconian restrictions have more predictive power.
Popper's criterion.
>> I think this sounds quite confused. You name concepts like mass,
>> pressure, force which are IMHO not very anthropomorphic, instead, they
>> are simply notions of Newtonian mechanics. That's IMHO a cheap trick
>> - to put the foundations (logic, probability theory, realism,
>> causality) on the same level as particular theories (flat Earth,
>> pressure, temperature), name this conglomerate "common sense,
>> anthropomorphic theories" and to conclude that it all may be rejected.
>
> Sorry, I don't agree with your rebuttal of my argument. The variables I named
> are not merely used in Newtonian physics and they are to be used, I should
> think, in any general "realistic" theory of physicality.
Mass??? Pressure??? Force????
In no way. We can argue a little bit about space and time, but the
definition or realism I use does not even mention them. Realism is
much more fundamental.
> Furthermore, we do use these variables because they have their
> origin psychologically in the way that humans interact with the
> external world and receive sensory input from it,
So what? It does not mean that they are necessary part of realistic
theories. You artificially enlarge the notion of realism to show that
some parts of this artificial, big realism may be rejected - so why
not realism in general.
> But it is the duty of all scientist to remain skeptical and opened
> minded and to not accept any restrictive philosophy of science that
> is not necessary to do so.
Of course I remain sceptical. But throwing away restrictive
principles is not science, it descreases the predictive power of
theories.
>> I think realism may be better understood as a part of the scientific
>> method itself. Like logic. If you reject realism you weaken the
>> scientific method - you no longer search for realistic models.
> Let's clarify one thing right now. I do *not* reject the use of
> realistic theories, but you reject the use of nonrealistic
> theories. I'm not the one putting the restrictions here.
I don't reject the use of non-realistic theories - if there is nothing
better available. But I claim that a realistic theory, if otherwise
equal, should be preferred.
>>>> Throwing away also the useful metaphysical assumptions.
>>>
>>> But also opening up the door for people after him to re-introduce freely
>>> created "metaphysics" too.
>>
>> No. This door has been opened only by Popper and his defense of
>> metaphysics as a legitimate part of scientific theories.
>
> Well, I don't accept that only Popper opened the door, but even if it WAS
> Popper who first opened it after Comte, it was opened by someone after Comte.
Someone rejecting positivism.
> Are you telling me that the supporters of the ether theory of light
> propagation in the nineteenth century were not of the belief that
> the ether represented a REAL thing in nature to them?
Why do you think so?
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
> Patrick Reany <re...@firstworld.net> writes:
> >> A realistic theory describes some reality (described by some set of
> >> variables), some rules how it changes (by equations). Then the things
> >> we observe are described as functions of this reality (and our own
> >> choices, which are also part of reality).
> >
> > Sounds like the mechanical program of the Newtonian era,
>
> A little bit more general than the mechanical program, but in
> agreement with its most fundamental principles.
>
> > which was the scientific predominant mode of belief until the
> > general acceptance of SR and QM.
>
> Which, indeed, was connected with a lot of positivistic nonsense.
And with a lot of instrumentalist sense that has endured.
> [snip]
>
> > Nevertheless, it seems to me that there is no truly objective test
> > of what is a "realistic" theory. Thus a "realistic" theory is just a
> > theory that conforms to an arbitrary set of construction rules.
>
> Of course it is a set of rules. But naming some set of rules
> "arbitrary" does not make this set really arbitrary. Feel free to
> name the axioms of natural numbers, group theory, logic, probability
> theory "arbitrary" - that's not an argument.
As pure mathematics they are indeed arbitrary. But this isn't on topic. I am
referring to construction rules for modeling physical things and how they interact.
If such a set of construction rules were to exist that virtually all scientists
would find self-evident, then perhaps there would be some cogent reason to accept
them. But this is clearly not the case. One scientist's 'obvious' model of matter
is another's 'obvious' folly.
> >> Why? If there are theories which describe everything in agreement
> >> with intuition, Occam's razor suggests to prefer them.
Indeed, Occam's razor may only 'suggest.' It is NOT a strong selection rule. It
must be applied along with many other selection rules, and how that mix gets used
by any one person is quite arbitrary.
> > I do prefer everything that works! But I don't claim Reality on the
> > mere basis of a workable theory. I do not belief that humans can
> > reverse-engineer Reality from any workable theory of science.
>
> That's not the claim of realism. The claim of realism is that reality
> exists, not that we can reverse-engineer it.
The claim that "reality exists" may have some philosophical importance to people
who like to pick at nits, but to the scientist it is pure truism, an occasion for
laughter at its pretense of having some profound empirical meaning.
> But, of course, a realist tries. And a realist thinks that something
> is not sufficiently understood if there is not even one realistic
> model.
Please define what a "realist model" is.
> Instead, it is not problematic for a realist if there are many
> realistic models and experiment does not allow to make a unique
> choice.
Nor to an instrumentalist generally.
> >> Conceivable is almost everything. But what about Occam's razor?
>
> > Occam's razor is still very much in force, but so too is the freedom
> > to invent any kind of workable theory, even if it happens to be
> > nonrealistic.
>
> Nobody tries to burn relativists for being non-realists.
Let's keep it that way.
> > Personally, I don't care either way.
>
> You are even free not to care about science at all.
>
> >> You don't need much freedom to invent theories. Instead, you need
> >> restrictions.
No, we need freedom, including the freedom to choose our own sets of restrictions.
We DO NOT need it hard coded into official science that everyone has to follow.
> > But not draconian restrictions.
>
> Theories with more draconian restrictions have more predictive power.
> Popper's criterion.
I completely disagree with position. It may be that some theories benefit from
draconian restrictions, but I see no logical necessity to agree with your position.
In fact, if restrictions be added on indefinitely, a theory could end up not being
able to predict anything at all. So, a reasoned balance must be made. Furthermore,
we all know that theories resist being eliminated from being contestants under
circumstances that Popper would have them be removed by merely evolving into a more
amenable form with respect to observation. Falsification really has no teeth. This
doesn't even account for the fact that some people retain faith in their theories
even after so-called "falsification" simply because they doubt the veracity of the
empirical "evidence." Popper had only succeeded at reducing a very complex theory
of scientific theories to an unwarranted oversimplified state -- a recurring
problem that has happened throughout the history of the philosophy of science.
> >> I think this sounds quite confused. You name concepts like mass,
> >> pressure, force which are IMHO not very anthropomorphic, instead, they
> >> are simply notions of Newtonian mechanics. That's IMHO a cheap trick
> >> - to put the foundations (logic, probability theory, realism,
> >> causality) on the same level as particular theories (flat Earth,
> >> pressure, temperature), name this conglomerate "common sense,
> >> anthropomorphic theories" and to conclude that it all may be rejected.
> >
> > Sorry, I don't agree with your rebuttal of my argument. The variables I named
> > are not merely used in Newtonian physics and they are to be used, I should
> > think, in any general "realistic" theory of physicality.
>
> Mass??? Pressure??? Force????
>
> In no way. We can argue a little bit about space and time, but the
> definition or realism I use does not even mention them. Realism is
> much more fundamental.
Your definition is idiosyncratic. (You said above that your program is a
generalization of the mechanical program, so I am quite warranted in my
assumptions.) But even at that, space or time alone is enough to completely taint
the entire system, because it is an irreducible anthropomorphic entity. The failure
of people to see this fact is the primary reason that people have so much
difficulty distinguishing between space and measured length, and between 'natural'
time and clock (measured) time. In the end, we can never remove our tainting
anthropomorphic variables and discern what is truly there, intrinsic to the world
with no hint of our own subjective conceptualizations of it.
>
> > Furthermore, we do use these variables because they have their
> > origin psychologically in the way that humans interact with the
> > external world and receive sensory input from it,
>
> So what? It does not mean that they are necessary part of realistic
> theories. You artificially enlarge the notion of realism to show that
> some parts of this artificial, big realism may be rejected - so why
> not realism in general.
You keep referring me to your definition of 'reality' found in your paper. This is
your personal view of 'realism' and I cannot speak to it on this newsgroup, which
has more more general focus. You know quite well that my concept of 'reality' is
consistent with what most people on these NGs think about it, and if they find my
representation of it lacking they can reprove me for it at any time. But it is so
damn difficult getting definitions out of anyone.
> > But it is the duty of all scientist to remain skeptical and opened
> > minded and to not accept any restrictive philosophy of science that
> > is not necessary to do so.
>
> Of course I remain sceptical. But throwing away restrictive
> principles is not science, it descreases the predictive power of
> theories.
No problem, you keep your set of restrictive principle which you champion and all
other scientists can keep their own sets that they champion. Good science will
still get done.
> >> I think realism may be better understood as a part of the scientific
> >> method itself. Like logic. If you reject realism you weaken the
> >> scientific method - you no longer search for realistic models.
>
> > Let's clarify one thing right now. I do *not* reject the use of
> > realistic theories, but you reject the use of nonrealistic
> > theories. I'm not the one putting the restrictions here.
>
> I don't reject the use of non-realistic theories - if there is nothing
> better available. But I claim that a realistic theory, if otherwise
> equal, should be preferred.
How is it that we can objectively know that 'realistic' theories are "better" than
'nonrealistic' theories?
> >>>> Throwing away also the useful metaphysical assumptions.
Beyond the metaphysics needed to bootstrap science in the first place, all other
models are purely formal. The only thing that is thrown away is the dogma.
> >>>
> >>> But also opening up the door for people after him to re-introduce freely
> >>> created "metaphysics" too.
> >>
> >> No. This door has been opened only by Popper and his defense of
> >> metaphysics as a legitimate part of scientific theories.
> >
> > Well, I don't accept that only Popper opened the door, but even if it WAS
> > Popper who first opened it after Comte, it was opened by someone after Comte.
>
> Someone rejecting positivism.
So have I, but at least positivism was clear and honest in its ill-conceived search
for empirical truth.
> > Are you telling me that the supporters of the ether theory of light
> > propagation in the nineteenth century were not of the belief that
> > the ether represented a REAL thing in nature to them?
>
> Why do you think so?
>
From what I've learned. Are you denying this is true of nineteenth century
etherists?
Patrick
Phil Henshaw
Patrick Reany wrote:
>
> Phil Henshaw wrote:
>
> [snip]
>
> > I thought that in that post I was describing, not defining. I was
> > considering 'definition' in terms of producing statements within a logic
> > which makes them subject to proof. Science is a physical activity of
> > people, and as that, is not logically definable.
>
> Without a definition of "science" how does one know when one is correctly doing science? How
> does one separate science from pseudoscience? How does one argue for any objectivity of
> science?
Well, you actually don't. The confidence one develops in various
methodologies and schools of thought is through experience, not proof.
The curious thing to me is that science serves as a guardian of what is
hoped to be an invariant universally valid descriptor of nature, while
relying on radical departure from that descriptor for advance. Science
has a homeostatic structure which relies for its vitality on non
homeostatic methods.
> > > > It's almost as if you were holding back a claim that there could be some
> > > > sort of rigorous construction of Truth.
> > >
> > > Not in anything I said above and not in anything else either. We can invent models, and
> > > then believe in those models, but we can't called those models "scientific Truth" about
> > > the world.
> >
> > Sure, I've tried to make that point stick many a time, (see my
> > signature..)
> >
> > > > I've told you what I think, that yielding your mind to close observation
> > > > (of anything that holds your interest) is a sound path to Truth.
> >
> > > So it's just your personal belief.
> >
> > Perhaps a little more than that. It's about letting go of perception,
> > being drawn into such true observation that you are no longer confused
> > by preconception and are able to see without prejudice. As always
> > certainty is not the result of certitude, but honesty. Honestly, of
> > course, all our words are full of prejudice, all our images are full of
> > prejudice. Biologically we can't even see in a functional way without
> > associating the accumulated meanings of the things we look at. Seeing
> > the Truth seems to have something to do with loosing your mind! :,)
> >
> >
>
> This sounds mystical to me -- not rational. Mystical knowledge is perfectly fine, but it is
> not scientific knowledge per se. "Mystical knowledge" is a form of "knowing beyond that which
> can be proved." Mystical knowledge is exactly what I believe the "realists" are looking for,
> whether they characterize it that way or not. If realists would just say that their realist
> beliefs are simply beliefs within their personal natural philosophies and are not provable
> from science proper [or science Popper ;-)], I would have NO problem with that!
What I was saying there concerns the hindrance of preconception.
Knowing beyond what is reducible to proof, as you suggest, includes
'mystical' knowledge, but also includes some kinds of knowing that are
definitely not. Common human understanding (what we use to get around
and succeed by) is neither definable nor mystical, for example. Common
understanding is not just 'beliefs' either, even though each one of us
do indeed fabricate our own entire understanding of things. Common
understanding evolves through experience and diverse association based
on original source material. Scientific understanding develops the same
way, in fact, all be it with much more restricted kinds of original
source material and much more disciplined methods.
What I'm suggesting in my work is applying disciplined methods to a new
kind of original source material. Yes, it is directly intended to
provide a strong enough bridge to enable science to begin to reach out
toward a few highly substantial things beyond that which can be proved.
Who says all that is true and useful can or should be provable anyway,
so long as it's reasonably demonstrable! The important thing about
science is not proof, but that it gives lasting substance to otherwise
fleeting observations.
--
Phil Henshaw
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
167 W 87th St. NY NY 10024 The things & images we look at,
Ilja Schmelzer
> > > Nevertheless, it seems to me that there is no truly objective test
> > > of what is a "realistic" theory. Thus a "realistic" theory is just a
> > > theory that conforms to an arbitrary set of construction rules.
> >
> > Of course it is a set of rules. But naming some set of rules
> > "arbitrary" does not make this set really arbitrary. Feel free to
> > name the axioms of natural numbers, group theory, logic, probability
> > theory "arbitrary" - that's not an argument.
>
> As pure mathematics they are indeed arbitrary. But this isn't on topic. I am
> referring to construction rules for modeling physical things and how they interact.
> If such a set of construction rules were to exist that virtually all scientists
> would find self-evident, then perhaps there would be some cogent reason to accept
> them. But this is clearly not the case. One scientist's 'obvious' model of matter
> is another's 'obvious' folly.
I disagree. What means classical realism is quite obvious. Its quite
obvious that the EPR notion of realism and the "realistic" assumptions
used by Bell to prove his theorem are quite the same. These
construction rules are general and natural enough.
Of course, you can try different approaches, but the result will be
similar to the situation with the Turing machine - a well-defined
notion, which may be defined in very different ways which are
equivalent. Every singular attempt to define a Turing machine seems
quite artificial (especially the Turing machine itself) but the
general notion defined in this way - the classical computer - is quite
natural.
Of course, this notion of classical realism does not fix the
particular realistic model. So, different realistic theories have
very different models of matter. This is not an argument against the
thesis that classical realism is a quite natural set of rules. (BTW,
think about the definition of classical realism "everything what may
be similated on some continuous variant of a Turing machine").
Another question is if this (simple and natural, non-arbitrary) set of
rules named realism should be used for physical theories. Its
possible to accept that classical realism is a well-defined, natural
and simple concept, but nonetheless to reject it and prefer a
non-realistic theory.
> > >> Why? If there are theories which describe everything in agreement
> > >> with intuition, Occam's razor suggests to prefer them.
> Indeed, Occam's razor may only 'suggest.' It is NOT a strong
> selection rule.
Do you want strong selections rules? They don't exist. Popper's rule
of empirical content is the strongest thing we have, but it tells
nothing strong if we have no strong inclusion. But even if we have it,
we unfortunately don't follow this rule.
> > > I do prefer everything that works! But I don't claim Reality on the
> > > mere basis of a workable theory. I do not belief that humans can
> > > reverse-engineer Reality from any workable theory of science.
> > That's not the claim of realism. The claim of realism is that reality
> > exists, not that we can reverse-engineer it.
> The claim that "reality exists" may have some philosophical
> importance to people who like to pick at nits, but to the scientist
> it is pure truism, an occasion for laughter at its pretense of
> having some profound empirical meaning.
Wrong. The claim "reality exists" translates into a property of
realistic theories which may be and has been used to prove theorems,
make predictions.
Roughly speaking Bell's theorem is "if reality exists, and if it is
Einstein-causal, then Bell's inequality holds."
This is, therefore, not a pure truism but a (very fundamental)
physical hypothesis.
> > But, of course, a realist tries. And a realist thinks that something
> > is not sufficiently understood if there is not even one realistic
> > model.
>
> Please define what a "realist model" is.
Assume we have an experiment described by observables $X$ with
the observable probability distribution $\rho_X(X,x)dX$. It depends
on a set of control parameters $x$ which describe the
experimental setup (the decisions of experimenters).
A theory is realistic if it describes such probability distributions
based on a notion of {\bf reality} -- a space $\Lambda$ (reality) with
probability distribution $\rho_\lambda(\lambda)d\lambda$ -- and a {\bf
realistic explanation} -- a function $X(x,\lambda)$ -- so that for a
test function f
\[ \int f(X)\rho_X(X,x)dX=\int f(X(x,\lambda))\rho(\lambda) d\lambda \]
> > >> You don't need much freedom to invent theories. Instead, you need
> > >> restrictions.
> No, we need freedom, including the freedom to choose our own sets of
> restrictions.
Of course. The scientist is free to do what he likes (here I agree
with Feyerabend). But the scientist will probably find nothing
without restricting himself in a very strong way. I recommend you
Rovelli (gr-qc/9903045) about this point. I disagree with his GR
philosophy, but agree with his methodological considerations.
> > > But not draconian restrictions.
> >
> > Theories with more draconian restrictions have more predictive power.
> > Popper's criterion.
> I completely disagree with position. It may be that some theories
> benefit from draconian restrictions, but I see no logical necessity
> to agree with your position. In fact, if restrictions be added on
> indefinitely, a theory could end up not being able to predict
> anything at all.
It may end up in a contradiction, if the restrictions contradict each
other. That's all. In this case we have to give up some of the
restrictions. But restriction and prediction is, from point of view
of predictive power, almost the same.
> Furthermore, we all know that theories resist being eliminated from
> being contestants under circumstances that Popper would have them be
> removed by merely evolving into a more amenable form with respect to
> observation. Falsification really has no teeth.
Falsification is a theoretical guiding principle. "Evolving into a
more amenable form" is, from logical point of view, falsification and
presentation of a new theory. (Popper's work was named "Logic of
scientific discovery", not "reality of scientific discovery".)
> Popper had only succeeded at reducing a very complex theory of
> scientific theories to an unwarranted oversimplified state -- a
> recurring problem that has happened throughout the history of the
> philosophy of science.
First, science always works with simplifications. Second, Popper's
question was a different one: the problem of induction, rejection of
positivism (certain truth obtained by elementary observations) and
their replacement by priority of theory. This was a fundamental and I
think irreversible change in philosophy of science.
Popper's point was a paradigm change - from priority of observation to
priority of theory.
> But even at that, space or time alone is enough to completely taint
> the entire system, because it is an irreducible anthropomorphic
> entity. The failure of people to see this fact is the primary reason
> that people have so much difficulty distinguishing between space and
> measured length, and between 'natural' time and clock (measured)
> time.
I don't think people have any difficulty to distinguish between space
and measured length, and between 'natural' time and clock (measured)
time. Newton has distinguished them already, every child can do it (I
don't know how translates Grimm's tale "Dornröschen" into English, but
it contains extremal time dilation with twin effect, but no child has
a problem to understand it.)
The difficulty with GR is, instead, that it mingles them, claims that
measured clock time is the only form of "true time" and denies the
existence of a clock-independent notion of time.
> In the end, we can never remove our tainting anthropomorphic
> variables and discern what is truly there, intrinsic to the world
> with no hint of our own subjective conceptualizations of it.
I think that's false. There is not much anthropomorphic in classical
set theory and, say, real numbers. Realistic theories are
mathematical theories.
> You keep referring me to your definition of 'reality' found in your paper. This is
> your personal view of 'realism' and I cannot speak to it on this newsgroup, which
> has more more general focus.
???????? My definition of realism is on-topic in sci.physics.*,
because it may be used to derive predictions in realistic theories.
> You know quite well that my concept of 'reality' is consistent with
> what most people on these NGs think about it, and if they find my
> representation of it lacking they can reprove me for it at any time.
I personally think that you don't have any consistent and well-defined
concept of reality, in a way useful to physics. Except if you think
some simple words like "there exists some reality" is a definition of
such a concept. I think it is not. Defining realism means, IMHO,
defining conditions which have to be fulfilled in realistic theories,
in a way that these conditions may be used to prove some general
theorems about realistic theorems.
In this way, I know only one definition of classical realism, the
definition I have given.
> > I don't reject the use of non-realistic theories - if there is nothing
> > better available. But I claim that a realistic theory, if otherwise
> > equal, should be preferred.
> How is it that we can objectively know that 'realistic' theories are
> "better" than 'nonrealistic' theories?
Objectively we don't know anything.
Subjectively we have seen - from the proof of Bell's inequality - that
assuming realism allows to make additional predictions. Thus,
additional predictive power.
> > > Are you telling me that the supporters of the ether theory of light
> > > propagation in the nineteenth century were not of the belief that
> > > the ether represented a REAL thing in nature to them?
> >
> > Why do you think so?
>
> From what I've learned. Are you denying this is true of nineteenth century
> etherists?
I don't care much about their beliefs. Should I?
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
>
[snip]
>
> Another question is if this (simple and natural, non-arbitrary) set of
> rules named realism should be used for physical theories. Its
> possible to accept that classical realism is a well-defined, natural
> and simple concept, but nonetheless to reject it and prefer a
> non-realistic theory.
OK. But why do you insist that your view of reality is what SHOULD be
used to formulate physical theories, rather than what can be used?
[snip]
>
> > The claim that "reality exists" may have some philosophical
> > importance to people who like to pick at nits, but to the scientist
> > it is pure truism, an occasion for laughter at its pretense of
> > having some profound empirical meaning.
>
> Wrong. The claim "reality exists" translates into a property of
> realistic theories which may be and has been used to prove theorems,
> make predictions.
"Translates" to you, perhaps. The only "reality" I care about is
experimental measurement. Everything else is a "free" creation of the
human mind, including your personal view of "deep reality."
> Roughly speaking Bell's theorem is "if reality exists, and if it is
> Einstein-causal, then Bell's inequality holds."
What ever "reality" is, it is consistent with QM, as best we can tell at
this time.
[snip]
> > Furthermore, we all know that theories resist being eliminated from
> > being contestants under circumstances that Popper would have them be
> > removed by merely evolving into a more amenable form with respect to
> > observation. Falsification really has no teeth.
>
> Falsification is a theoretical guiding principle. "Evolving into a
> more amenable form" is, from logical point of view, falsification and
> presentation of a new theory. (Popper's work was named "Logic of
> scientific discovery", not "reality of scientific discovery".)
Falsification is no "brainchild" at all. It is no more than saying that
the predictions of empirical theories must be consistent with
experiment. This certainly IS important, but it is also obvious. What I
am uncomfortable with is the name "falsification" itself. I am just as
uncomfortable with the notion of "certainly false" as I am with the
notion of "certainly true."
>
> > Popper had only succeeded at reducing a very complex theory of
> > scientific theories to an unwarranted oversimplified state -- a
> > recurring problem that has happened throughout the history of the
> > philosophy of science.
>
> First, science always works with simplifications. Second, Popper's
> question was a different one: the problem of induction, rejection of
> positivism (certain truth obtained by elementary observations) and
> their replacement by priority of theory. This was a fundamental and I
> think irreversible change in philosophy of science.
And I agree that it's a good replacement.
> Popper's point was a paradigm change - from priority of observation to
> priority of theory.
>
> > But even at that, space or time alone is enough to completely taint
> > the entire system, because it is an irreducible anthropomorphic
> > entity. The failure of people to see this fact is the primary reason
> > that people have so much difficulty distinguishing between space and
> > measured length, and between 'natural' time and clock (measured)
> > time.
>
> I don't think people have any difficulty to distinguish between space
> and measured length, and between 'natural' time and clock (measured)
> time.
You must not be reading the same posts on this NG (NGs) that I read.
This confusion is IMO the most important confusion on this NG (NGs). I
have no problem with people who understand what Einstein was really
trying to accomplish but reject what he did anyway. But I am concerned
that so many people reject Einstein's work simply because they don't
actually understand what he was doing. They don't understand the formal
nature of physical theories. They don't appreciate the fundamental role
that instrumentation has in the formulation process of a physical
theory. As a result, they just don't get Einstein, and reject him for
the wrong reasons.
> The difficulty with GR is, instead, that it mingles them, claims that
> measured clock time is the only form of "true time" and denies the
> existence of a clock-independent notion of time.
I suppose there are people who believe that GR time is somehow "true" as
you say, but this is not a concept in GR itself. I certainly don't
believe it, anyway. Relativity, being consistent with real chronometers,
has replaced "true" time with invariant, or proper, or clock, time
intervals. But I know of no logical connection between the two concepts
within GR. (Philosophically, I cannot think of any meaningful
interpretation of "true" time that does not have a well-defined Zero of
time that all clocks must be referenced to. This wasn't even done in
Newtonian physics. And I don't see what purpose it would serve.)
>
> > In the end, we can never remove our tainting anthropomorphic
> > variables and discern what is truly there, intrinsic to the world
> > with no hint of our own subjective conceptualizations of it.
>
> I think that's false. There is not much anthropomorphic in classical
> set theory and, say, real numbers. Realistic theories are
> mathematical theories.
And what is the "reality" of "number" or "set"?
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
>> Another question is if this (simple and natural, non-arbitrary) set of
>> rules named realism should be used for physical theories. Its
>> possible to accept that classical realism is a well-defined, natural
>> and simple concept, but nonetheless to reject it and prefer a
>> non-realistic theory.
>
> OK. But why do you insist that your view of reality is what SHOULD be
> used to formulate physical theories, rather than what can be used?
I do not insist. It can be used, and if it is possible to use it, it
allows to make additional predictions. Therefore, Popper's criterion
suggests to prefer it.
This consideration is a little bit uncertain, because predictions
appear only from whole theories, not from realism alone. On the other
hand, Popper's criterion is a relative clear, certain criterion (in
comparison with simplicity, beauty, explanatory power, where we may
disagree much more which theory is superiour).
>> Wrong. The claim "reality exists" translates into a property of
>> realistic theories which may be and has been used to prove theorems,
>> make predictions.
>
> "Translates" to you, perhaps.
At least I have a well-defined set of properties of theories named
"realistic theories", and these properties really allow to prove
theorems and make predictions.
You may argue that "realistic" is a sloppy or wrong name for this set
of properties, but this does not justify your ignorance of this set of
properties.
> The only "reality" I care about is experimental
> measurement. Everything else is a "free" creation of the human mind,
> including your personal view of "deep reality."
Of course. BTW, the interpretation of experimental measurements are
also a free creation of the human mind.
>> Roughly speaking Bell's theorem is "if reality exists, and if it is
>> Einstein-causal, then Bell's inequality holds."
> What ever "reality" is, it is consistent with QM, as best we can
> tell at this time.
No problem. Bohmian mechanics is a realistic theory (fulfills the
well-defined notion of realism, used in Bell's theorem) and is
consistent with QM.
>> Falsification is a theoretical guiding principle. "Evolving into a
>> more amenable form" is, from logical point of view, falsification and
>> presentation of a new theory. (Popper's work was named "Logic of
>> scientific discovery", not "reality of scientific discovery".)
> Falsification is no "brainchild" at all. It is no more than saying that
> the predictions of empirical theories must be consistent with
> experiment. This certainly IS important, but it is also obvious. What I
> am uncomfortable with is the name "falsification" itself. I am just as
> uncomfortable with the notion of "certainly false" as I am with the
> notion of "certainly true."
But there is a logical difference. Using a theory, and putting into
the theory (which becomes a large set of theories, including theories
about the seriousness of certain experimenters, the theory that I do
not dream, all this together is "a theory" only from logical point of
view) all we need, we can really falsify this theory.
The point is not "certainly false" - if we have falsified the theory,
something should be wrong in it and therefore changed. If we have not
falsified it, we don't have to modify anything.
The asymmetry between true and false follows from the structure of the
theory, that the theory makes testable predictions for future events.
A theory which doesn't (for example the theory "GR is wrong") can be
experimentally verified.
>> I don't think people have any difficulty to distinguish between
>> space and measured length, and between 'natural' time and clock
>> (measured) time.
> You must not be reading the same posts on this NG (NGs) that I read.
> This confusion is IMO the most important confusion on this NG (NGs).
I agree - but not because of the inability to distinguish clocks and
time, but because this is mingled in GR, or at least in popular
descriptions of GR.
> I have no problem with people who understand what Einstein was
> really trying to accomplish but reject what he did anyway. But I am
> concerned that so many people reject Einstein's work simply because
> they don't actually understand what he was doing.
IMHO at least some of them have a correct intuitive feeling that the
SR philosophy is wrong, but are unable to get the point. Einstein
himself has got the point: "Perhaps I did use such a philosophy
earlier, and even wrote it, but it is nonsense all the same."
>> The difficulty with GR is, instead, that it mingles them, claims
>> that measured clock time is the only form of "true time" and denies
>> the existence of a clock-independent notion of time.
> I suppose there are people who believe that GR time is somehow
> "true" as you say, but this is not a concept in GR itself.
At least it is a very influental concept in GR interpretation.
> Relativity, being consistent with real chronometers, has replaced
> "true" time with invariant, or proper, or clock, time intervals.
And here we have the philosophical confusion. You cannot replace true
time with clock time. They are completely different concepts. They
have been different (and explicitly distinguished by Newton) already
in Newton's theory.
> But I know of no logical connection between the two concepts within
> GR. (Philosophically, I cannot think of any meaningful
> interpretation of "true" time that does not have a well-defined Zero
> of time that all clocks must be referenced to.
Philosophically this is nonsense. Its you who has difficulties to
distinguish between 'natural' time and clock time.
>> I think that's false. There is not much anthropomorphic in classical
>> set theory and, say, real numbers. Realistic theories are
>> mathematical theories.
>
> And what is the "reality" of "number" or "set"?
They are denotations for real things. A realistic theory describes
real objects, therefore, gives them denotations. Of course, these
denotations are not themself "reality".
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
[snip]
> The point is not "certainly false" - if we have falsified the theory,
> something should be wrong in it and therefore changed. If we have not
> falsified it, we don't have to modify anything.
But there is a problem here. We may think that we have "falsified" a theory
on the basis of experiment, but it could be that the experiment is "wrong,"
meaning that we might have produced a false negation of a prediction. In this
case, it is not necessarily the theory that needs to be changed. The problem
with this from a logical point of view is that "falsification" has to be
taken on faith.
> >> The difficulty with GR is, instead, that it mingles them, claims
> >> that measured clock time is the only form of "true time" and denies
> >> the existence of a clock-independent notion of time.
>
> > I suppose there are people who believe that GR time is somehow
> > "true" as you say, but this is not a concept in GR itself.
>
> At least it is a very influental concept in GR interpretation.
I wish you would give an example of some important person in the field of GR
who has used the term "true" time in this manner.
> > Relativity, being consistent with real chronometers, has replaced
> > "true" time with invariant, or proper, or clock, time intervals.
>
> And here we have the philosophical confusion. You cannot replace true
> time with clock time. They are completely different concepts. They
> have been different (and explicitly distinguished by Newton) already
> in Newton's theory.
We are arguing mere semantics here. GR just has no need for a notion of
"true" time. Whether or not the two notions of time are the same or not is a
matter of arbitrary definition. Earlier, I did not mean to say, though, that
GR equates clock time with "true" time. In other words, that would not be my
own choice of stipulating the meaning of "true" time. If I were to equate
"true" time to something, it would be to so-called "absolute" time. You can
equate it to what ever you want, but so can I.
All I meant by "replaced" above was that the kind of "time" that was
fundamental in Newton's theory is no longer the kind of "time" that is
fundamental in GR.
> > But I know of no logical connection between the two concepts within
> > GR. (Philosophically, I cannot think of any meaningful
> > interpretation of "true" time that does not have a well-defined Zero
> > of time that all clocks must be referenced to.
>
> Philosophically this is nonsense. Its you who has difficulties to
> distinguish between 'natural' time and clock time.
Such is your opinion. I am entitled to my own opinion, which is all that I
was trying to give. So, why the insults? Your intense frustration is
inappropriate as the points of discussion here are still just matters of
definition. My definitions for me are just as good as yours are for you.
You're getting all upset because I'm not using certain terms in the fashion
that you want them to be used. Fine. If you want some stipulated definitions,
then stipulate them!
> >> I think that's false. There is not much anthropomorphic in classical
> >> set theory and, say, real numbers. Realistic theories are
> >> mathematical theories.
> >
> > And what is the "reality" of "number" or "set"?
>
> They are denotations for real things. A realistic theory describes
> real objects, therefore, gives them denotations. Of course, these
> denotations are not themself "reality".
I suppose you're referring to correspondence rules between theory and
physicality. But how is a particular thing in physicality delimited to be
unambiguously the referent of some theoretical thing? Until this can be done,
there is no way to absolutely assign identity and no way to begin the process
of counting. In any case, the act of forming a subset of the universe is an
arbitrary mental act and has no absolute significance. Now, I'm not arguing
that this is a basis for throwing away our Science. But I am arguing that
appeal to the false authority of mathematics is incorrect to logically
support Science, at least in the manner that you have tried to do.
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
> > The point is not "certainly false" - if we have falsified the theory,
> > something should be wrong in it and therefore changed. If we have not
> > falsified it, we don't have to modify anything.
>
> But there is a problem here. We may think that we have "falsified" a theory
> on the basis of experiment, but it could be that the experiment is "wrong,"
> meaning that we might have produced a false negation of a prediction.
From logical point of view, it is not the experiment which is wrong,
but our interpretation of the experiment. This interpretation is
(from holistic point of view) also part of the theory.
Thus, the error in this case is that we have modified the theory at
the wrong place.
> > >> The difficulty with GR is, instead, that it mingles them, claims
> > >> that measured clock time is the only form of "true time" and denies
> > >> the existence of a clock-independent notion of time.
> >
> > > I suppose there are people who believe that GR time is somehow
> > > "true" as you say, but this is not a concept in GR itself.
> >
> > At least it is a very influental concept in GR interpretation.
> I wish you would give an example of some important person in the
> field of GR who has used the term "true" time in this manner.
There is no need - its sufficient to look into my dictionary to find
via translation and back translation synonyma for "proper": ->
richtig, korrekt, echt -> right, correct, accurate, genuine, real,
true.
Essentially, already to use "time" without specification which points
out to measurement of time (say, "clock time") is confusing and
mingles the difference. But it is not simply "time", but even "proper
time".
Of course, "proper time" was a rather mileading translation of the
original German word Eigenzeit (which may be justified only with a
rather artificial "proper name" -> Eigenname).
> > > Relativity, being consistent with real chronometers, has replaced
> > > "true" time with invariant, or proper, or clock, time intervals.
> >
> > And here we have the philosophical confusion. You cannot replace true
> > time with clock time. They are completely different concepts. They
> > have been different (and explicitly distinguished by Newton) already
> > in Newton's theory.
>
> We are arguing mere semantics here.
Maybe. But these semantics confuse people.
> All I meant by "replaced" above was that the kind of "time" that was
> fundamental in Newton's theory is no longer the kind of "time" that is
> fundamental in GR.
Essentially, we have some other fields and other equations, and we
have some symmetry which does not allow us to measure "true" time.
That's all. Formally, as long as we consider only the equations, we
can write down Newton's definition as it is in the preface of a GR
book.
Is this a fundamental difference? Or is this "fundamental difference"
only a very special interpretation, which considers clock time as the
fundamental notion which "replaces" true time? An interpretation
which allows to consider solutions where no proper time coordinate
exists?
> > > Philosophically, I cannot think of any meaningful
> > > interpretation of "true" time that does not have a well-defined Zero
> > > of time that all clocks must be referenced to.
> >
> > Philosophically this is nonsense. Its you who has difficulties to
> > distinguish between 'natural' time and clock time.
>
> Such is your opinion. I am entitled to my own opinion, which is all that I
> was trying to give. So, why the insults? Your intense frustration ...
Sorry, it was not my intention to insult. You have accused others to
have difficulties in this place, so don't wonder if this comes back to
you. I'm also in no way frustrated.
But it remains to make no sense to me to assume/require that a
meaningful interpretation of "true" time has "a well-defined Zero of
time that all clocks must be referenced to". And there is no much
need for explanation, but it seems to be a well-known, common and
simple error - the positivistic thesis that all parts of reality
should be closely connected to measurements, especially the thesis
that "true time" is meaningless if we have no "true clocks".
It is simply impossible to justify this thesis based on Popper. In
the optimal case you can argue for some preference for theories which
are closer to measurement, arguing with Occam's razor. Such
argumentation is IMHO very weak and often simply wrong, but even if it
is right - a preference for a theory which is closer to experiment in
no way makes the other theory _meaningless_. A theory with
unobservable true time remains _meaningful_ even if you prefer GR.
> > > And what is the "reality" of "number" or "set"?
> >
> > They are denotations for real things. A realistic theory describes
> > real objects, therefore, gives them denotations. Of course, these
> > denotations are not themself "reality".
>
> I suppose you're referring to correspondence rules between theory and
> physicality.
No, between reality and theory about reality. And this relation is:
"If theory X is true, then reality can be described by the field phi,
... which are defined as "real" in this theory". A rather
tautological remark, the problem with it is to understand that this
really solves the problem what reality means.
What is observable is a rather different and secondary question.
> But how is a particular thing in physicality delimited to be
> unambiguously the referent of some theoretical thing? Until this can
> be done, there is no way to absolutely assign identity and no way to
> begin the process of counting.
Why do you want to make such absolute assignments?
> In any case, the act of forming a subset of the universe is an
> arbitrary mental act and has no absolute significance.
I'm not engaged in such an act.
> Now, I'm not arguing that this is a basis for throwing away our
> Science. But I am arguing that appeal to the false authority of
> mathematics is incorrect to logically support Science, at least in
> the manner that you have tried to do.
I have not made any appeal to authority of math, but argued against
the claim that realism is too anthropomorphic:
>>>> I think that's false. There is not much anthropomorphic in
>>>> classical set theory and, say, real numbers. Realistic theories
>>>> are mathematical theories.
My argument is that realistic theories are not, as often imagined,
restricted to such simple anthropomorphic things like fields in 3D,
but may contain almost arbitrary non-anthropomorphic things from quite
abstract math. For example, in Bohmian mechanics reality is described
by a position and a wave function - a function of the set of all
possible 3D universes. Not a very anthropomorphic thing. Nonetheless
without doubt a realistic theory according to my definition.
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
[snip]
> > > > Philosophically, I cannot think of any meaningful
> > > > interpretation of "true" time that does not have a well-defined Zero
> > > > of time that all clocks must be referenced to.
> > >
> > > Philosophically this is nonsense. Its you who has difficulties to
> > > distinguish between 'natural' time and clock time.
> >
> > Such is your opinion. I am entitled to my own opinion, which is all that I
> > was trying to give. So, why the insults? Your intense frustration ...
>
> Sorry, it was not my intention to insult. You have accused others to
> have difficulties in this place, so don't wonder if this comes back to
> you. I'm also in no way frustrated.
Then change your style. When I said that "I cannot think of any meaningful
interpretation of 'true' time that does not have a well-defined Zero of time that
all clocks must be referenced to," all you should have done is to offer your
opinion of how to present such a view. It is clear to anyone who is cool-headed
that I was not stating a blanket prohibition against such a notion. In fact, if I
had been making a blanket prohibition, you'd have been CLEARLY signaled to that
fact by an unambiguous statement such as: "Philosophically, it is IMPOSSIBLE to
provide a meaningful interpretation of 'true' time that does not include a
reference to a well-defined Zero." But I did NOT make such a statement.
Your mode of response is combative, and unnecessarily so. You need to allow
others to have their definitions of terms different than the definitions that you
have adopted. Maybe this will stop your intolerant attitude toward others. This
problem arose similarly in many previous similar situations we have had because
you insist that everyone adopt your personal definitions, even though you refuse
to stipulate such definitions prior to using them. If you would stipulate these
definitions from the start then at least we'd have a basis for a common
understanding.
> But it remains to make no sense to me to assume/require that a
> meaningful interpretation of "true" time has "a well-defined Zero of
> time that all clocks must be referenced to". And there is no much
> need for explanation, but it seems to be a well-known, common and
> simple error - the positivistic thesis that all parts of reality
> should be closely connected to measurements, especially the thesis
> that "true time" is meaningless if we have no "true clocks".
All this depends on one's arbitrary definition of "true time." Why can't you see
this? This is a SEMANTIC issue here.
[snip]
> My argument is that realistic theories are not, as often imagined,
> restricted to such simple anthropomorphic things like fields in 3D,
> but may contain almost arbitrary non-anthropomorphic things from quite
> abstract math.
I completely agree.
> For example, in Bohmian mechanics reality is described
> by a position and a wave function - a function of the set of all
> possible 3D universes. Not a very anthropomorphic thing.
I have no problem with this in principle.
> Nonetheless
> without doubt a realistic theory according to my definition.
Fine. So I already KNOW that you are an instrumentalist. So am I. But you have
not paid close attention to what I have been saying about anthropomorphic
variables. I don't care at all what kind of models and non-anthropomorphic
variables are used in theories -- theories are mere instruments. But what IS
important is that theory must be consistent with experiment, and it is the
experimental variables THEMSELVES that ARE anthropomorphic, and therein lies the
irreducible anthropomorphic tainting of the entire theoretical system.
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
> Then change your style. Your mode of response is combative, and
> unnecessarily so.
I will try.
> This problem arose similarly in many previous similar situations we
> have had because you insist that everyone adopt your personal
> definitions, even though you refuse to stipulate such definitions
> prior to using them. If you would stipulate these definitions from
> the start then at least we'd have a basis for a common
> understanding.
That's already more complicate. I have given the definition of
realism often enough. I don't remember if I have given it already
to the current opponent.
Moreover, I use a definition of classical realism which is standard,
used by Bell as an assumption of his famous theorem. It is common to
refer to Bell's theorem as a theorem about local realistic theories.
I also use a methodology of science - Popper's - which is standard.
> All this depends on one's arbitrary definition of "true time." Why
> can't you see this? This is a SEMANTIC issue here.
I understand very well what you think is arbitrary. But that's not
the point.
The definition of "true time" is not arbitrary. We define true time
as a parameter t, then we define the real things of the theory
(some fields f(x,t) and so on). Then we define equations.
For example, the Einstein equations in harmonic gauge.
This defines a realistic theory. Nothing in this definition is
arbitrary. Everything is well-defined.
Now, we compare this theory with observation - and find full
agreement. No problem.
Whats the problem now? We have some symmetry, and we cannot
distinguish by observation some solutions which are really different
(that means, described by the definition of the theory as different
solutions). But nothing suggests that we should be able to do this.
Especially, we cannot distinguish by observation which time coordinate
is true time. Such is life. But this does not make the theory worse.
It weakens only our possibilities to test what we want.
We also have a hard time to distinguish the theory from other
theories, say, with another gauge condition. That's also not a
problem. It doesn't make the theory worse.
> > [BM is] Nonetheless
> > without doubt a realistic theory according to my definition.
>
> Fine. So I already KNOW that you are an instrumentalist.
I'm not exactly an instrumentalist. Search of truth is also
interesting in itself for me, not only because a true theory helps to
make correct predictions.
> But what IS important is that theory must be consistent with
> experiment, and it is the experimental variables THEMSELVES that ARE
> anthropomorphic, and therein lies the irreducible anthropomorphic
> tainting of the entire theoretical system.
So, theories which restrict themself to experimental variables
restrict themself to anthropomorphic variables?
A fine argument for realism not to restrict itself to experimental
variables ;-).
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
[snip]
It is not the purpose of this thread to get focussed on any particular
scientific theory in my opinion.
> I understand very well what you think is arbitrary. But that's not
> the point.
>
> The definition of "true time" is not arbitrary. We define true time
> as a parameter t, then we define the real things of the theory
> (some fields f(x,t) and so on). Then we define equations.
> For example, the Einstein equations in harmonic gauge.
>
You again have missed my point. When I said that the use of the term "true
time" is arbitrary, I did NOT mean to say that the thing being defined by
it is arbitrary! I simply meant that, regardless of how it is defined, it
is arbitrary on your part to choose the adjective "true" to label it.
Maybe this is a mere communication problem. In other words, I would prefer
that you choose some other adjective beside "true" to refer to your notion
of time. I'm just stating a personal preference.
To me, the adjective "true" carries with it an enormous amount of
connotation, at least in my culture. And this is a great stumbling block
to unfettered thought once it is invoked to taint a definition/concept. A
similar problem occurs with the adjective "relativity" for use in the
Relativity Theory. The connotation many people have of the term
"relativity" is a stumbling block. Yes, people who even understand the
theory are free to reject it, but those that don't understand the theory
are inclined to form an opinion about the theory based on their prejudices
for or against their connotation of the term "relativity."
I think that to the average intellectual American, the adjective "true"
seems pretentious in the context that you present it. It may harm the
potential reception of your theory. Please understand that to an American,
there is an enormous difference in connotation between the two terms
"true" and "proper." The former connotes something absolute, the latter
something conventional only.
[snip]
> >
> > Fine. So I already KNOW that you are an instrumentalist.
>
> I'm not exactly an instrumentalist. Search of truth is also
> interesting in itself for me, not only because a true theory helps to
> make correct predictions.
You Popperians can't seem to decide whether or not you're actually in a
"search for truth" or not. So where is your anti-positivism now? I do NOT
search for "truth" about the Natural realm. Period.
> > But what IS important is that theory must be consistent with
> > experiment, and it is the experimental variables THEMSELVES that ARE
> > anthropomorphic, and therein lies the irreducible anthropomorphic
> > tainting of the entire theoretical system.
>
> So, theories which restrict themself to experimental variables
> restrict themself to anthropomorphic variables?
>
> A fine argument for realism not to restrict itself to experimental
> variables ;-).
A fine argument for instrumentalists not to either!
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
> I simply meant that, regardless of how it is defined, it
> is arbitrary on your part to choose the adjective "true" to label it.
Of course, any label is arbitrary in some sense.
> Maybe this is a mere communication problem. In other words, I would prefer
> that you choose some other adjective beside "true" to refer to your notion
> of time. I'm just stating a personal preference.
> To me, the adjective "true" carries with it an enormous amount of
> connotation, at least in my culture. And this is a great stumbling block
> to unfettered thought once it is invoked to taint a definition/concept.
But I use the label "true" exactly because of these connotations.
AFAIU them, of course.
> I think that to the average intellectual American, the adjective "true"
> seems pretentious in the context that you present it. It may harm the
> potential reception of your theory. Please understand that to an American,
> there is an enormous difference in connotation between the two terms
> "true" and "proper." The former connotes something absolute, the latter
> something conventional only.
I want the connotation with absolute. Its exactly the Newtonian
notion of absolute time, as different from measured time, which is
described.
> > I'm not exactly an instrumentalist. Search of truth is also
> > interesting in itself for me, not only because a true theory helps to
> > make correct predictions.
>
> You Popperians can't seem to decide whether or not you're actually in a
> "search for truth" or not.
Of course, sometimes I'm not in a search for truth, but in a search
for something to eat ;-)
> So where is your anti-positivism now?
Search for truth is in no way forbidden by anti-positivism. Its
forbidden to have a criterion for truth - so, we cannot decide if some
truth we have found is really a truth or not. We have no certainty,
and everything may be, in principle, questioned. And we do not make
the naive error of positivism that observation gives some
unquestionable truth. We have found it theory-laden and questionable
too.
But I think we nonetheless have a lot of truths.
> I do NOT search for "truth" about the Natural realm. Period.
Your choice.
Patrick Reany
Ilja Schmelzer wrote:
[snip]
> > You Popperians can't seem to decide whether or not you're actually in a
> > "search for truth" or not.
>
> Of course, sometimes I'm not in a search for truth, but in a search
> for something to eat ;-)
>
> > So where is your anti-positivism now?
>
> Search for truth is in no way forbidden by anti-positivism. Its
> forbidden to have a criterion for truth - so, we cannot decide if some
> truth we have found is really a truth or not. We have no certainty,
> and everything may be, in principle, questioned. And we do not make
> the naive error of positivism that observation gives some
> unquestionable truth. We have found it theory-laden and questionable
> too.
>
> But I think we nonetheless have a lot of truths.
So after many months of arguing with you I finally get a coherent description of
your nonstandard philosophy. No wonder you're so hard to figure out! Frankly, I
wouldn't classify you as a Popperian, positivist, instrumentalist, or realist.
I'd be inclined to classify you as a scientific mystic, because you follow a
version of scientific mysticism. You have put yourself right in the middle
between the realists and the instrumentalists.
May I suggest that you be more forthcoming with this 'philosophical position
statement' to your next adversary. ;-)
Patrick
Ilja Schmelzer
>> Search for truth is in no way forbidden by anti-positivism. Its
>> forbidden to have a criterion for truth - so, we cannot decide if some
>> truth we have found is really a truth or not. We have no certainty,
>> and everything may be, in principle, questioned. And we do not make
>> the naive error of positivism that observation gives some
>> unquestionable truth. We have found it theory-laden and questionable
>> too.
>> But I think we nonetheless have a lot of truths.
> So after many months of arguing with you I finally get a coherent
> description of your nonstandard philosophy. No wonder you're so hard
> to figure out! Frankly, I wouldn't classify you as a Popperian,
> positivist, instrumentalist, or realist. I'd be inclined to
> classify you as a scientific mystic, because you follow a version of
> scientific mysticism. You have put yourself right in the middle
> between the realists and the instrumentalists.
Reading this I'm quite sure you have not understood Popper.
> May I suggest that you be more forthcoming with this 'philosophical position
> statement' to your next adversary. ;-)
No need. Instead, I recommend you to read Popper, seems you have not
done this once you qualify this description as not Popperian.