Can they explain the origin of the universe? — Gregory

Who is "they"? Is there someone you think can explain the origin of the universe? You?

It seems odd for you to quote Russell, of all people, while apparently maintaining the inadequacies of science.

Thanks for the conversation — Gregory

I hope you found it helpful.

A good mind believes in miracles — Gregory

A better mind explains them.


(How long are we playing this game for?)

Truth is neither subjective nor objective, but just how things are. As such it doesn't give a fuck about what you or I believe, faithfully or otherwise.

You don't seem to have a burning desire to know truth. — Gregory

I've noticed that for some folk the desire to know the truth burns so hot that, perhaps in order to quench the burning, they grasp firmly to falsehood.

If reason is controlled by will, even yet truth controls both.

What if you found a real contradiction at the heart of all you believe. — Gregory

At the very least, give your faith pause and reconsider. Before the child dies.

An odd post. Not at all sure why you linked my post to the law of excluded middle, and why that insulin ought be respected for being ancient and venerable rather than effective. Nor did I tell you that "physic(sic.) equations should be allowed to be rewinded back 14 *billion* years", whatever that might mean. We do have a clear conception of "billion". I do not claim to know all the forces acting on the universe, now or previously. Reason, intuition and will are quite distinct things.

But whatever you are smoking, can I have a toke?

Faith is subjecting a belief to its consequences. — Hanover

Can you provide an example? — Tom Storm

Elizabeth Rose Struhs.

"Members of her small and tightly-knit religious group were present when the diabetic eight-year-old died, singing and praying to God to heal her" while withholding her insulin. In this case the consequence of their belief was the death of a child and 14 folk being convicted of manslaughter.

It'd be interesting to hear what others think of 's approach.

Energy and matter are equivalent. — T Clark

Sure. True but irrelevant. Choose whatever conservation principle you want. The issue is that there are parts of science that are logically unfalsifiable - they embed one quantification in another so that accepting a basic statement does not show them to be false. And sure, as is so keen to have the AI point out, folk might be convinced that it's not true despite it not being logically falsifiable. Now I am claiming that determinism sits in much the same place logically, but is weaker than conservation laws in that it doesn't support and is not needed by physics. Whereas the conservation laws are metaphysical and true and helpful, determinism is metaphysical and potentially false and not helpful.

I disagree with your claim that determinism is methodologically necessary. Saying "things have cases" is not the same as saying that physics is deterministic. Anscombe's article addresses this from a philosophical perspective while the Flavio Del Santo and Nicolas Gisin article addresses the issue from a physical point of view. But if you have an argument for determinism being necessary to physical method, present it and we can consider it. Otherwise it just looks like the medieval prejudice that every event has a cause - a classic bit of bad metaphysics that is almost certainly wrong.

You take pleasure in disrupting discussions and annoying people, generally without adding anything substantive to the discussion. — T Clark

Better that you ignore my posts and don't respond, then; or even dob me in to the mods.

very nice.

Faith is not subjecting a belief to doubt despite the facts.

So, one reason why I agree with T Clark that determinism is a metaphysical thesis... — Pierre-Normand

Sure, but what I was objecting to was the suggestion that true metaphysical statements cannot be facts:

Whether or not the world is deterministic is a matter of metaphysics, not a matter of fact. — T Clark

I took this as implying that metaphysical statements are not factual, not issues of truth or falsehood. In contrast, I think it might be false that physics is deterministic.


I might have used a Galton Box in the place of the quantum example. I agree classical physics has the same issues.

I give up. :shade:

Rather, that the ambiguity you point to is the very thing at issue, and provides a reason for not making use of "proposition". That is, whether the number of planets is the same as Le nombre de planètes depends on quite what one is doing.

What you said here does not seem to be related to the point being made. It seems you have not understood the argument, perhaps becasue you lack the background. And i don't have the time to provide it.

See here.

I think the move from the causal closure of the physical domain to the general thesis of determinism is invalid — Pierre-Normand

Ok. I'd go perhaps a step further and suggest that even the physical domain is not causally closed, in that some physical events do not have an explicit cause - that an individual electron moving through a double slit goes to the right and not the left, by way of an example.

But further, I'd treat acts of volition as a seperate conversation, after the approach of Mary Midgley. Saying that our acts of volition are determined is confusing seperate ways of talking - like fish and bicycles.

That's not what is being suggested. For Popper, it's the logical structure of certain sentences that makes them variously falsifiable, provable or in Watkins terms "haunted universe statements".

...that kind of idea would make ANYTHING unfalsifiable... — flannel jesus

Well, no. I'm not too happy about going in to the logic of such statements here - it should be background knowledge. See https://www.academia.edu/3843328/Watkins0002

Perhaps we should leave such issues of modality, intriguing as they are, to one side - of start a new thread. Better here to relate this conversation back to the topic of determinacy.

I take it as pretty clear that determinacy is not amongst the metaphysical doctrines that underpin physics.

But I think there are many here would disagree.

What do you say?

Nor can you disprove it - if you came across a perpetual motion machine that seemed to be breaking the conservation law, you might hypothesis that it is somehow drawing energy frome elswhere in the universe... — Banno

The Watkins article Confirmable and influential Metaphysics sets out in Popperian terms the logic behind conservation laws not being falsifiable. Their logical structure disallows both falsification and verification.

Propositions are next on Quine's hit list.

(41) The proposition that 9 > 7 = the proposition that 9 > 7
goes over into the falsehood:
The proposition that the number of the planets > 7 = the proposition that 9 > 7
under substitution according to (24). Existential generalization of (41) yields a result comparable to (29)-(31) and (40). — p. 157

The response I gave above what that once we take into account that (24) is not a necessary truth, that 9 is not the number of planets in every possible world, we can see why the substitution fails for this particular case. It's a bit harder to see how this might work in the case of propositions. Partly that's becasue what a proposition is, is somewhat ambiguous, and what a proposition is is central to the argument. It's clear, for example, that

The utterance that the number of the planets > 7 = the utterance that 9 > 7

is false, as is

The sentence "the number of the planets > 7" = the sentence "9 > 7"

Now a proposition is supposedly different to an utterance or a sentence, in that it is what the sentence stands for or refers to, and not the sentence itself, so that for instance the sentence in English and the sentence in French may differ, while the proposition each expresses remains constant. So we might ask if it true that

The number of the planets > 7 = Le nombre de planètes > 7

I'm not sure there is any one answer to this.

As a result of such considerations I tend to use sentence rather than proposition.

The law of conservation of energy is not metaphysics. It’s physics. — T Clark

That's what I'm questioning here. Conservation of energy is neither falsifiable nor provable, and so not empirical, and yet still a part of physics. So are you happy that parts of physics are not empirical?

That you find such questions irritating is not a fault of mine, I'm just asking questions. No need to be rude.

If metaphysical principles amount to the background of our empirical enquiries, then that works, fitting Watkins' view. Your question - are symmetry laws, or metaphysical principles in general, necessary or contingent - is very interesting. Noether's theorem shows (speaking very roughly) that if we have symmetry, we thereby have conservation. There's something Hegelian about it, and so to my eye seems to be more about how we say something rather then what it is that is said. That is, conservation laws, and by implication metaphysical principles in general, are not brute facts so much as a consequence of our framing of physics. If that is right then conservation laws would be necessary for physics in much the same way that moving only on column or file is necessary for the rook in chess.

I find it so heartening, how Australian billionaire families are so convivial.

Trump-ets... as in diminutive trumps.

I rather like that despite the vast sums he is expending he gets next to no votes. A demonstration of Australian Realism...

Murdoch spends his money far more effectively.

Cheers.

If not subjective nor psychological, then what? — Joshs

Again, perhaps it's about what we do, how we act as members of a community.

Frege never provided an explicit theory or definition of sense. Frege only demonstrated his semantic category of sense (i.e. modes of presentation) through examples. — sime

Perhaps there was good reason for this - that sense might be shown but not stated, if in being state it ceases to be intensional, becoming extensional.

Bit of a noisy mess in here, eh?

Did you somehow misread me? — Pierre-Normand

Probably. Still not sure if for you conservation rules count as facts, or if they are empirical.

It's true, but never a fact — tim wood

Really? It's not a fact that 2+2=4? I'm not keen on that use. I just use "fact" for statements that are true. And facts are not all necessary - it's a fact that the cat is on the chair but might not have been.

Nothing could be more strongly proven to be false, than the law of conservation of energy. — Metaphysician Undercover

Ok. No one seems to have noticed this ground-breaking revelation.

I know you've read my diatribes on metaphysics before — T Clark

They haven't stuck in my memory. So for you conservation of energy is not a fact, and not true?

Oh, I see, that bit where some folk restrict facts to observations. So it's not a fact that 2+2=4, or that the bishop stays on her own colour in chess.

For you, are conservation laws facts?

You can't prove that energy is conserved in every case, since not every case is available for you to check. Nor can you disprove it - if you came across a perpetual motion machine that seemed to be breaking the conservation law, you might hypothesis that it is somehow drawing energy frome elswhere in the universe...

SO, is conservation of energy a fact, or a bit of metaphysics?

, :grin:

So metaphysics is not about facts...

I'm not sure about that tbh. — flannel jesus

Good, 'cause he doesn't understand physics.

For alternate views, see
Physics without determinism: Alternative interpretations of classical physics

Has physics ever been deterministic?

Causality and Determination

Causality, Determination and such stuff.

And riding a bike is not an "intuition".

Maybe even think of it this way: you know how to do plus or quus in the way you know how to ride a bike, not in the way you know that Sydney is in Australia.

That you cannot state what you do to ride a bike does not imply that you cannot ride a bike.

:smile:

There's no fact regarding which rules — frank

if a fact is something we discover. Not if a fact can be something we do. You know how to do plus, as opposed to quus. If you want, you might say that it is a fact that you do 2 plus 2 and not 2 quus 2.

And if you don't know which you are doing, then there's perhaps not much more to be said here, since I, and others, do understand what it is to follow plus and quus and to choose which to enact.

And yet we enact rules.

Where does "fact" fit here? What is a "fact"? And how does being or not being a "fact" fit in to enacting a rule?

If a fact is something we discover, find out abut, then it would be odd to think of what we might choose to do as being a fact... odd, for example, for you to say that you discovered that you had responded to my post. You didn't discover that response, it's just what you did. Sure, it's a fact you responded, but that's after the act. See the difference in direction of fit here? Following a rule is changing how things are to fit how you want them to be. Setting out a fact is changing what you say so that it matches how things are.

:wink:

This shows a misunderstanding of Kripke's point. — frank

I doubt it.

There's just no fact regarding what rules you've been following up till now. — frank

Sure, if what you mean is that the rule cannot be stated. But that is irrelevant, since the rule can be enacted.

Perhaps you need to take a closer look at the PLA.

Added: I'll fill that in a bit, rather than leave the implied but unintended offence. Kripke has his own idiosyncratic version of the private language argument. it is not generally accepted as what Wittgenstein argued for.

Seems we pretty much agree, except that I don't think calling this an "intuition" is at all helpful, since it hints at private mental phenomena. It's not about intuition, it's about action - following a rule is something we do, not a "special sense".

But then I reject such a phenomenological approach.

If the name changes but she is still the very same person, then a name cannot be an essential property — J

indeed, because a name is not a property...

(Though I don't really see why 'is called Elizabeth by everyone who knows her' can't be a property. How is it different from 'has red hair'?) — J

Property or predicate? How does the use of each differ? Extensionally, a name picks out an individual, and a predicate is a group (set, class...) of individuals. What is a property?

Supose we took a sample from Elizabeth's body and found that she could not have been the daughter of Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon... Who did we take the sample from? I think that as you specify your example with greater precession, you will find that the antinomy dissipates. Further, if it does not dissipate, then that very fact shows that you have not yet clearly stipulated what you are saying.

The Private Language argument indicates that there's no way for you to know what rules you've been following up till now. Check out Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language by Saul Kripke. — frank

There's just nothing you can point to and say, "See, this is the rule I've been following for the use of this phrase." — frank

Funny that this came up here just after I had used it in another thread.

Kripke misunderstood Wittgenstein's answer, found in PI §201

What this shews is that there is a way of grasping a rule which is not an interpretation, but which is exhibited in what we call "obeying the rule" and "going against it" in actual cases.

It's what we do that is of import. If Kripke were correct, you would not know how to count, yet you do know what it is to count, and by twos and threes as well as by ones. You understand what it is to carry on in the same way, and while you cannot say what this is, you cna show it by counting. This is the import behind the now cliched appeal: "Don't look to meaning, look to use".

If we’re talking about Wittgenstein on rule-following here, then there is no intelligible meaning without rules, criteria, forms of life. — Joshs

Don't look for an abstract thing called "the meaning". Look instead at what one is doing as a participant in the various activities that make up our daily lives. Then at least you will have a better idea of what Wittgenstein said.

his name is not anything like an essential property. — J

Well yes it is, becasue we make it so.

That's what Kripke did in positing possible world semantics as a way to give meaning to modal utterances. When you ask "What if Elizabeth had not had Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon (such an English name...) as her mother", you are thereby asking about Elizabeth... becasue you make it so.

And of course her name might have been Kate. In which case she would still be the very same person.

A name is not a property at all. That's why properties are represented as f,g,h and individuals as a,b,c... and names as "a","b","c"... Why? Becasue this is how the game is played; why does hitting the ball to the boundary count as a four? Why do to five cards of the same suit count as a flush? Becasue it's what we do. "What this shews is that there is a way of grasping a rule which is not an interpretation, but which is exhibited in what we call "obeying the rule" and "going against it" in actual cases."

The point may have been missed, so I'll restate it. "Independent determination" is irrelevant; what counts is that the folk in the conversation are talking about the same thing, to their own satisfaction. That is what it is to have effectively named an individual.

I read Kripke as talking about an entirely different, ontological independence. — J

Kripke didn't understand Wittgenstein. That's why he felt obligated to write his other book, a book that was important for being so wrong.

Or maybe, given all the evidence presented here, there is no causal relation between dream and kick.

We are enamoured of causality, a figment of our rationalisations. We supose that if only we find the cause, all will be well. We rely on causes to explain the way things are, but when pushed we can't clearly explain what causes are. Most especially in the case of disturbances of the mind, which is what both nocturnal kicking and dreaming are.