Great work! :clap: I watched it from here, but why is it unavailable on Youtube?

Edit: it was unavailable when I first looked, now seems OK.

Thanks! Hm that's weird. It should be available on YouTube. If you watched it here you actually watched an embedded YouTube video. Searching "Hirnstoff" on YouTube should work as well.

It is entirely possible that the evident success of science, broadly if quietly acknowledged in modern society, is part of the problem. Maybe you're not the only one to whom it has occurred to model their approach to knowledge acquisition on science. Consider that what distinguishes science from ordinary informal reasoning is the positing of invisible entities and hidden forces; what we see in the world is the effect of these invisible armies at work. That suggests two solutions: yours, get people to do their science better; mine, get them to stop doing science at all. In favor of my approach, they're already demonstrably competent at doing jobs and planning birthday parties and judging produce, but real science is actually pretty hard. — Srap Tasmaner

I take your point that most people are not likely to be able to do adequate science; the sciences (like the arts) are specialist activities that take years to master, but I also think that science is basically just common sense writ large.

In a discussion what really counts as evidence boils down to what can be empirically confirmed and/or is in accordance with common experience, where the latter does not require detailed studies, but just good observation, open-mindedness and intellectual honesty. That's why politics, economics and religion are mostly not worth arguing over, and I think this applies to some areas of philosophy as well.

As I said later, it was available on revisiting Youtube. I was beginning to imagine all kinds of conspiracies. :wink:

science is basically just common sense writ large. — Janus

I know what you're getting at, and I said something similar earlier -- that science is common sense made systematic -- but it's really not, and that's clear for reasons in what you quoted: science produces results that have an air of paradox about them, that tables are not solid, that the air is billions of invisible things, that the earth goes around the sun. It all has to do not with how science makes inferences so much as the theoretical frameworks it produces within which those inferences are made. (See the classic Feynman interview.) And those frameworks posit objects that are not the medium-sized dry goods of our everyday worldview.

I allowed myself the "made systematic" comment because I believe ordinary reasoning is the start and it sustains the scientific enterprise, but one of the first things that happens is that the concept of evidence becomes terribly subtle, and again that's because of the theoretical frameworks.

Where it's not subtle but just complicated is in law, which very nearly is just common sense writ large, or ought to be. (Philosophers don't think nearly enough about law.)

fixed some typos

I know what you're getting at, and I said something similar earlier -- that science is common sense made systematic -- but it's not really not, and that's clear for reasons in what you quoted: science produces results that have an air of paradox about them, that tables are not solid, that the air is billions of invisible things, that the earth goes around the sun. — Srap Tasmaner

Right, but I would say that the idea that things are not necessarily what they seem is itself an example of common sense. By saying that science is common sense writ large, what I was referring to was the methodology, not the content; the methodology of common sense investigation being initial observation, prediction and experiment (or further observation to see if the predicted results do obtain).

I think scientific theory however arcane and counter-intuitive it might seem to us, is based on this principle; that a successful theory should fit and explain the observed facts and that its predicted outcomes should be observed.

Where it's not subtle but just complicated is in law, which very nearly is just common sense writ large, or ought to be. (Philosophers don't think nearly enough about law.) — Srap Tasmaner

I'm intrigued by this; are you referring to natural law?

Right, but I would say that the idea that things are not necessarily what they seem is itself an example of common sense. — Janus

But the difference is that in ordinary reasoning there being entirely new kinds of entities, and those invisible to boot, or entities not being what we thought at all but capable of entirely different behavior -- that's not on the table.

When we talk about evidence in every day life or in a court of law, we're asking what have the sorts of things we're familiar with been up to? And what they've been up to is selected from the sorts of things we know they generally do get up to.

By saying that science is common sense writ large, what I was referring to was the methodology, not the content — Janus

And my objection here is that it's not that simple: the content includes the theoretical framework, and what's more since Galileo that framework will be mathematical.

the methodology of common sense investigation being initial observation, prediction and experiment (or further observation to see if the predicted results do obtain) — Janus

Well @Isaac will tell you a lot of that predicting is done "on your behalf", so to speak, by systems in your brain -- it's System 1, not even within your awareness. But besides that -- while I like this story about how science works, it's a bit of a fairy-tale.

are you referring to natural law? — Janus

Goodness no, just ordinary criminal and civil law, common law, that sort of thing. This is also an institution where people gather evidence, reach conclusions, hopefully find the truth, etc.

I don't want to drag this out, as much fun as it is.

My "challenge", if that's the word, to @Hirnstoff was this: how much does the program of improving discussion on the internet depend upon some particular epistemology or some particular view of science? Or depend on accepting those views?

I happen to hold different views. So what? We're having an enjoyable conversation. Why does everyone want to convert me? Am I the only one that finds that a little odd given the topic of our discussion? @Dawnstorm tried to point out that just saying "tools" instead of "beliefs" wasn't going to get you there. We have since then been arguing over my divergent views of the tools. Why are we doing that?

Here's the classic Feynman interview I referred to above.

I've seen this interview taken as evidence (!) that science is bollocks -- here's a Nobel prize winner and he can't answer a simple question, blah blah blah.

science produces results that have an air of paradox about them, that tables are not solid, that the air is billions of invisible things, that the earth goes around the sun — Srap Tasmaner

That is only the case, because our natural perception is limited. Our hands can't distinguish individual atoms, therefore we only perceive the sum counter force. The mechanism by which we come to the conclusion that a table is solid, is still based on evidence. We just can't perceive the whole picture without the help of technology like electron microscopes.

My "challenge", if that's the word, to Hirnstoff was this: how much does the program of improving discussion on the internet depend upon some particular epistemology or some particular view of science? Or depend on accepting those views? — Srap Tasmaner

Ultimately, if we can't agree upon the basic fact that an objective truth is reachable by means of observation, then yes, we can't collaberate. However I don't think that this philosophical debate is a good representation of a conversation with an average Joe that thinks the earth is flat. Most people, at least in my mind, accept science as a good way to reach an objective truth about things.

I happen to hold different views. So what? We're having an enjoyable conversation. Why does everyone want to convert me? Am I the only one that finds that a little odd given the topic of our discussion? Dawnstorm tried to point out that just saying "tools" instead of "beliefs" wasn't going to get you there. We have since then been arguing over my divergent views of the tools. Why are we doing that? — Srap Tasmaner

I'm trying to "convert" you, because this is a debate and we disagree about a fundamental aspect of our existence. But I thought that this disagreement was solvable, because I can still easily integrate each example you proposed into my existing philosophical framework. If you want to argue that my attempt to improve online discourse, will inevitably lead to fundamental disagreements like this, I disagree, because I don't think that this is how most people think about the world and their pursuit of truth.

And just to clarify: My goal is not to make everyone a sophisticated critical thinker. I think some people can be helped more or less towards an improved and more sophisticated pursuit of truth. However most will only take away a simple "be nice!" or "don't insult", and that's fine. There has to be a pragmatic cut-off somewhere, which leaves the philosopher in me unsatisfied, but ultimately allows me to move on and focus on the goal I set myself.

Most people, at least in my mind, accept science as a good way to reach an objective truth about things. — Hirnstoff

In the sense you mean, it might be most, but it's not all, certainly not where I live: just glance at Wikipedia's summary of views on evolution.

There is much smaller group -- smaller, that is, than those who deny science for religious or conspiratorial reasons -- that includes, I should think, most working scientists and philosophers, a group that would also disagree, because reaching "objective truth" is not what science does. There is, in science, no Great Book of Truth; there is the Great Book of the Not Yet Disproven with a multivolume appendix, the Great Book of the Hard-to-say.

This is no minor quibble. It leads directly to televised hearings where climate-science-denying Senators buttonhole scientists with questions like, "But you can't prove that we're seeing anything more than natural variation, or that burning fossil fuels is changing the climate, can you?" to which the response is always, "No, I can't prove that, Senator, because that's not how science works, you fucking moron." (That last part sotto voce.)

If you want to argue that my attempt to improve online discourse, will inevitably lead to fundamental disagreements like this, I disagree, because I don't think that this is how most people think about the world and their pursuit of truth. — Hirnstoff

And I'm with you there. I'm not saying that you're going to end up debating the nature of science all the time instead of whatever else you want to do. But I am saying that because your views on the nature of science are detachable from the project, they ought to be detached. I say that in part because I disagree with those views; but also because I think there are approaches more likely to be more successful; and also because if you insist on fitting what everyone says into your framework,

I can still easily integrate each example you proposed into my existing philosophical framework — Hirnstoff

you're undercutting your own goals, you're failing to engage with people by finding common ground, you're treating your own view as the default, as the needed common ground, and it's not. Most of the objection to your approach is going to be garden variety religious or conspiratorial (big pharma created the coronavirus). I make an interesting test case because I object to almost everything you say despite being an outright science cheerleader.

Yet here we are. I hope you're still enjoying the discussion and I hope you find something worth thinking about in the views I've expressed. We do have common ground: it's just hard to see, and it's definitely not what you think it is, since in this case what you think it is is what we're debating.

because reaching "objective truth" is not what science does. There is, in science, no Great Book of Truth; there is the Great Book of the Not Yet Disproven with a multivolume appendix, the Great Book of the Hard-to-say. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes I completely agree. Objective truth is an ever elusive goal noone can reach. I just didn't want to expand the conversation in that direction at first. I think there is a "virtual" objective truth out there that we can come closer and closer to reaching, but never fully reach. However this common goal is vitally important for every scientist and philosopher, otherwise we simply have nothing to argue about.

But I am saying that because your views on the nature of science are detachable from the project, they ought to be detached — Srap Tasmaner

I don't think they are detachable, but I think that's pretty much clear by now.

you're failing to engage with people by finding common ground, you're treating your own view as the default, as the needed common ground, and it's not — Srap Tasmaner

Well yes. Everyone has a default they have to defend and this is mine.

I hope you're still enjoying the discussion and I hope you find something worth thinking about in the views I've expressed. — Srap Tasmaner

Oh absolutely. This is a very interesting and enjoyable conversation and you definitely got my brain working on all cylinders, otherwise I wouldn't have invested the time to respond.

it's just hard to see, and it's definitely not what you think it is, since in this case what you think it is is what we're debating. — Srap Tasmaner

Maybe one last attempt to find out if I can understand your position. If you don't think this will lead to anything valuable, that's completely fine, but here we go:
As I've stated before, I think that every pursuit of truth is ultimately scientific, just more or less sophisticated. You on the other hand described the method of using "ordinary informal reasoning" as an alternative, right? I think this calls back to what you said at the very beginning : 'rather than "this is how Science does it" I'd lean on a folksier "that makes sense doesn't it?" approach'. If I now imagine trying to convince my friend that the earth isn't flat, I'd assume that he isn't much of a scientist, so a "folksier" approach seems to be more promising. While I would start by arguing for the scientific method and how this seems to be the best way to get us to the truth about things and then follow it up by scientific evidence that the earth is actually an oblate spheroid, you would approach this conversation how exactly? How would you try to convince my friend? How would your approach differ from mine?

The technology discourages thought. The expression of anything which comes to mind is permitted and instantaneous, and even encouraged, especially in reaction. It promotes emotional responses and declarations of unexplained and perhaps unexplainable opinions.

Changing this would require discipline, though, and discipline is something which we lack, and is also discouraged.

trying to convince my friend that the earth isn't flat — Hirnstoff

Excellent question!

First there are gorgeous videos. That's probably where I would start with my kids, or anyone's kids, if they just didn't yet know what the earth is like. We can now just look and see; we don't have to guess or theorize or calculate anything.

It's funny -- my first thought was to come up with a really practical, hands-on sort of game, where you have cut-outs of the continents and look up how long it takes to ship something from A to B, or how long it takes to fly from A to B, and have him figure out for himself that there's no way to arrange the continents on a flat surface and have the stuff that's near near and the stuff that's far far. I spent a long time writing about this, before it occurred to me to just look for video. That's really odd!

So how much resistance is he putting up? Off to google "argument that the earth is flat".

Oh! I missed my chance to say that this is another paradoxical result of science. The earth after all is big enough that locally it is at least awfully flat-ish. In our day-to-day lives we do behave as if the earth is flat and the sun goes around it, unless we are traveling great distances. You don't take the curvature of the earth into consideration when laying out a badminton court.

And I still think getting to look at video from above the Earth -- thank you, science! -- meets all the requirements of common sense. I love that an Apollo astronaut commented to Mission Control, "Just confirming that the Earth is round." I don't think I knew that.

People who today believe the earth is flat are people who've never been told otherwise or serious conspiracy loonies. Are the latter the target audience for your work? It's a pretty special case.

First there are gorgeous videos. That's probably where I would start with my kids, or anyone's kids, if they just didn't yet know what the earth is like. We can now just look and see; we don't have to guess or theorize or calculate anything. — Srap Tasmaner

My approach would be pretty much the same and I'd say that such a video would just be a form of scientific evidence. When I'm saying "scientific", I'm not talking about going deep into theory or mathematics. A simple observation or in your case a recording is something I'd also use to convince my friend.

It's clear to me now, that we aren't disagreeing about the approach at all. I just include your approach within the scope of science.

People who today believe the earth is flat are people who've never been told otherwise or serious conspiracy loonies. Are the latter the target audience for your work? It's a pretty special case. — Srap Tasmaner

To be honest, I'm not sure what I want to do yet. I'll just go step by step for now and make videos on topics I care about. And for the time being that's somehow helping to foster conversations on the internet like the one we're having.

Cool. I am definitely going to distinguish between, I guess, careful observation, or technology-assisted observation and the heavy-duty theoretical framework stuff. Science does both, but only science does the latter.

I'm so glad you posted again, because it occurred to me there's a problem in my second post: there's the small sort of paradox, like the earth seeming flat and turning out to be round, and much bigger paradoxes like there being invisible forces that are "responsible" for what goes on around us. The first type don't result from positing new sorts of entities, don't require a fundamentally different framework, but the others do. (Again, the Feynman interview is crystal clear about this.)

I'm just reserving the word "science" for a more theoretical approach than you are. All science ends up there, but a lot of the work is just careful observation and careful inference.

I'm not sure how to deal with a committed flat-earth nut beyond arranging for him to talk to astronauts who've seen it.

(And I have a real soft spot for the video of Buzz Aldrin slugging that moon-landing-hoaxer.)

But the difference is that in ordinary reasoning there being entirely new kinds of entities, and those invisible to boot, or entities not being what we thought at all but capable of entirely different behavior -- that's not on the table. — Srap Tasmaner

I disagree; I think invisible entities have always been prominent features of human thought; probably because the phenomenon of movement, which is everywhere in nature, cannot be explained in terms of anything visible.

This is probably why some form of animism seems to be an almost universal feature of so-called "primitive" worldviews. I would venture to say that for per-scientific thinkers some form of animism or other just is common sense.

And my objection here is that it's not that simple: the content includes the theoretical framework, and what's more since Galileo that framework will be mathematical. — Srap Tasmaner

This may be true of physics; and perhaps even chemistry. But they do not constitute the whole of science, and they are certainly not independent of observation.

Well Isaac will tell you a lot of that predicting is done "on your behalf", so to speak, by systems in your brain -- it's System 1, not even within your awareness. But besides that -- while I like this story about how science works, it's a bit of a fairy-tale. — Srap Tasmaner

Assuming for the sake of argument that Issac is correct; how would he have found that out if not by observation, etc.? I'm curious about why you say the view is a "fairytale". How do you imagine science is done, and if you have an example of some different procedure than observation, hypothesis, prediction and further observation it would help if you could detail it. I'm quite willing to be convinced to another view if it is compelling.

Why does everyone want to convert me? — Srap Tasmaner

I'm not wanting to "convert" you, just find out just how and why our views differ, which is far from clear at the moment.

I disagree; I think invisible entities have always been prominent features of human thought; probably because the phenomenon of movement, which is everywhere in nature, cannot be explained in terms of anything visible. — Janus

I like just-so-stories. I could tell a different one, but what would be the point of that? Inherited religions are just that -- inherited. Aside from those, in the modern world, the positing of hidden forces and previously unknown types of entities is the province of science. I quite literally cannot imagine what you would have in mind as an exception.

This may be true of physics; and perhaps even chemistry. But they do not constitute the whole of science, and they are certainly not independent of observation. — Janus

Not following you here.

Assuming for the sake of argument that Issac is correct; how would he have found that out if not by observation, etc.? — Janus

Everyone makes observations. Everyone can make careful observations. Why does everyone think that means you're doing science?

How do you imagine science is done, and if you have an example of some different procedure than observation, hypothesis, prediction and further observation it would help if you could detail it. — Janus

Observation can be difficult, and expensive, may require technology you don't have yet; coming up with a hypothesis that will actually tell you something, and designing an experiment that does actually test exactly that hypothesis, can be tricky; results still tend to be messy enough to require a lot of analysis before you can even be sure whether the outcome you got was what you predicted or not; but even supposing you go through all that -- where's the theory?

The model you describe is, I think, more or less the one we all learned in school, and it's a nice starting point, captures some of the core values of a scientific process -- but it leaves out theory. Theory is the whole point. It's the intended result of all this work and it's the framework within which you do the work.

Okay here's a tiny example, because you want an example, and it's not even physics. I remember reading this a few years ago during the reproducibility crisis, which as you probably know hit social psychology particularly hard.

As someone who has been doing research for nearly twenty years, I now can’t help but wonder if the topics I chose to study are in fact real and robust. Have I been chasing puffs of smoke for all these years?

I have spent nearly a decade working on the concept of ego depletion, including work that is critical of the model used to explain the phenomenon. I have been rewarded for this work, and I am convinced that the main reason I get any invitations to speak at colloquia and brown-bags these days is because of this work. The problem is that ego depletion might not even be a thing. By now, many people are aware that a massive replication attempt of the basic ego depletion effect involving over 2,000 participants found nothing, nada, zip. Only three of the 24 participating labs found a significant effect, but even then, one of these found a significant result in the wrong direction! — Michael Inzlicht

The whole piece is worth a look. It's heart-breaking. And it's all about the theory, the posits of that theory, the explanatory framework, and the explanations that framework spits out. No one doing science is ever just doing observation-hypothesis-prediction-observation.

No one doing science is ever just doing observation-hypothesis-prediction-observation. — Srap Tasmaner

The psychiatrist Meehl called it in 1967 (for studies on humans).

It would require considerable ingenuity to concoct experimental manipulations, except the most minimal and trivial (such as a very slight modification in the word order of instructions given a subject) where one could have confidence that the manipulation would be utterly without effect upon the subject's motivational level, attention, arousal, fear of failure, achievement drive, desire to please the experimenter, distraction, social fear, etc., etc. So that, for example, while there is no very "interesting" psychological theory that links hunger drive with color-naming ability, I myself would confidently predict a significant difference in color-naming ability between persons tested after a full meal and persons who had not eaten for 10 hours, provided the sample size were sufficiently large and the color-naming measurements sufficiently reliable, since one of the effects of the increased hunger drive is heightened "arousal," and anything which heightens arousal would be expected to affect a perceptual-cognitive performance like color-naming...

Suffice it to say that there are very good reasons for expecting at least some slight influence of almost any experimental manipulation which would differ sufficiently in its form and content from the manipulation imposed upon a control group to be included in an experiment in the first place. In what follows I shall therefore assume that the point-null hypothesis H0 is, in psychology, [quasi-] always false...

It is not unusual that (e) this ad hoc challenging of auxiliary hypotheses is repeated in the course of a series of related experiments, in which the auxiliary hypothesis involved in Experiment 1 (and challenged ad hoc in order to avoid the latter's modus tollens impact on the theory) becomes the focus of interest in Experiment 2, which in turn utilizes further plausible but easily challenged auxiliary hypotheses, and so forth. In this fashion a zealous and clever investigator can slowly wend his way through a tenuous nomological network, performing a long series of related experiments which appear to the uncritical reader as a fine example of "an integrated research program," without ever ,once refuting or corroborating so much as a single strand of the network

(Edit: for why Meehl thinks this doesn't work on physical theories, their point null hypotheses are actually predictions from theory; you'd do a hypothesis test to see if there was significant deviation from F=ma in the lab in physics, you'd do a hypothesis test to see if there was significant deviation from "no effect" regardless of mechanism in human sciences - constructs in physical sciences don't have the same kind of measurement issues as the ones in human sciences either, eg; mass is mass, hesitation is multifaceted)

My son excitedly brought me this video by Sabine Hossenfelder:

In Lost in Math, I explain why I have become very worried about what is happening in the foundations of physics. What is happening? you ask. Well, nothing. We have not made progress for forty years.

(Here's a nice review with quotes.)

Recently, there's also David Lindley's The Dream Universe: How Fundamental Physics Lost Its Way. (Curiously I read somewhere that Hossenfelder suggests physicists start collaborating with philosophers, and evidently Lindley frames his critique in terms of a resurgent Platonism. Maybe one day philosophers will start getting jobs again!)

I don't follow this stuff at all, but I know enough to know that since the beginning string theory has faced criticism that it's not even physics.

To my point in this exchange, it's clear that theory is a substantial piece of any story about how science is done.

Inherited religions are just that -- inherited. Aside from those, in the modern world, the positing of hidden forces and previously unknown types of entities is the province of science. I quite literally cannot imagine what you would have in mind as an exception. — Srap Tasmaner

The positing of hidden forces is to explain observed phenomena, no? It seems that humans have always imagined hidden forces to explain observed phenomena. The difference I see with modern scientific positing is that it consists in logically and/or mathematically constructed hypotheses, and the predictions which follow from these models are deliberately tested. If predicted results are consistently observed then hypotheses becomes established theories.

So modern science is based more on rigorous logic and math than ancient worldviews were, but that should not be surprising, considering that logic and math have been developed and refined over millennia.

I don't see modern science, logic and math, as having lost, or outgrown, their roots in commonsense, in observation, prediction and testing, though. I'm wondering whether you do, and if so why, and how you understand that purported difference.

Science is inherited too, insofar as people are trained to master the accepted body of theory, every aspect of which is not, obviously, personally tested by each scientist.

This may be true of physics; and perhaps even chemistry. But they do not constitute the whole of science, and they are certainly not independent of observation. — Janus


Not following you here. — Srap Tasmaner

OK, that was hastily, and thus poorly, expressed. What I meant was that, as far as my understanding goes, physics and perhaps to a lesser extent chemistry, is more mathematically grounded than geology, biology, evolutionary theory, genetics and even the most arcane science is not independent of observation, prediction and experiment. I'm keen to be shown a more accurate and comprehensive view than that, if you have one you would care to explain. So far you just seem to be throwing out hints.

I agree with you that modern science is more theory-based; or at least more rigorously theory based, but I see that as a result of a couple hundred years of observation, prediction and testing, as well as some attendant mathematical modeling, which has lead to established theories.

So, I am agreeing with you about mathematical modeling being important in modern science (more in some sciences than others), but I see that modeling as an elaboration of common sense, the math being accepted because it is observed to work, and this, for me, is "common sense writ large".

I admit I could have all this wrong; I'm not so strong on maths, but I'm keen to learn new insights.

It seems that humans have always imagined hidden forces to explain observed phenomena. — Janus

Yeah? Look at the quote you're responding to. If you step outside your house on a nice day and suddenly a tree limb cracks and crashes to the ground, you think it would be perfectly normal, just common sense, to spin out some tale about invisible gremlins collecting wood for their home, or about a tree-pruning force that must have swept through your yard and snapped that limb, or ...

That would be perfectly ordinary. That's what you're claiming.

Of course there is a connection between how we ordinarily go about our business and how we do science. But there is also clearly a difference between how we generally talk about what sorts of things there are and how they behave, on the one hand, and what scientific theories say. To deny that difference is to misrepresent both.

Watch the Feynman interview.

If you're really gung-ho, read Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man.

Yeah? Look at the quote you're responding to. If you step outside your house on a nice day and suddenly a tree limb cracks and crashes to the ground, you think it would be perfectly normal, just common sense, to spin out some tale about invisible gremlins collecting wood for their home, or about a tree-pruning force that must have swept through your yard and snapped that limb, or ...

That would be perfectly ordinary. That's what you're claiming. — Srap Tasmaner

No, that's not what I'm claiming at all. The common sense invisible entities posited to explain phenomena in any culture must be commonly accepted entities within the culture; some arbitrary bit of individual reasoning, or more aptly with regard to your silly examples, story-telling, doesn't qualify as common sense, obviously.

Of course what is commonly accepted may change more or less gradually. In any case I'm still not at all clear as to what claims, claims that you seem to think contrary to what I've been saying, you actually want to argue.

My main point, to reiterate, has been that the very act of positing invisible entities, of whatever kind, is a feature of all cultures, and is thus itself commonsensical.

My main point, to reiterate, has been that the very act of positing invisible entities, of whatever kind, is a feature of all cultures, and is thus itself commonsensical. — Janus

Okay, it's clear now we've misunderstood each other in a couple ways, mostly my fault. Apologies.

I never intended "common sense" to be something like "what most people believe", and certainly not "what most people have ever believed throughout all of human history".

In fact, in the essay I've been relying on, Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man, Sellars actually stipulates that there are two images based on two different approaches to understanding man's place in the world: the correlational (the manifest image, my "ordinary everyday reasoning") and the stipulational (the scientific image). It's not an empirical distinction. I kinda pretended it was for purposes of this discussion because (a) I didn't want to try to rehearse Sellars's entire argument, and (b) in the modern world I thought the distinction between how people get along in daily life -- driving, working, buying groceries -- and creating complex theoretical frameworks that posit new types of entities to explain what goes on in the world -- I thought that distinction would be clear enough.

I should have recognized there was a problem when you mentioned animism. When I said there was a different just-so story I could tell, but then didn't, it was Sellars's story about something a bit like animism: this is the original form of the manifest image. This original manifest image treats everything in the world as a person. He's careful to say this is not a matter of postulating a spirit that lives in the mountain, but that being a mountain is one of the ways of being a person, and as a person you can do things like get angry and make grumbly noises and throw shit. This is still a worldview that only includes sensible objects, it's just that they're all persons.

He does not discuss religion at all except to include it in the manifest image, and here again I took a shortcut, because the manifest image is not exactly ordinary reasoning about medium-sized dry goods, but an elaboration and refinement of that, and an attempt to hold it together in the face of science.

Why doesn't he talk about religion? We are accustomed these days to talk sometimes of science and religion as competing theoretical frameworks, or in some cases as exactly the same framework with exactly one more theoretical posit, a supreme being. Or we tell stories about man's attempt to understand the world going from superstition to religion to science: all are explanatory frameworks, all have theoretical posits, but when we get to science we have a procedure for testing and a criterion of falsifiability. On this view, the new-atheist approach of treating religion as a competitor in the same market, at least insofar as it offers supernatural rather than natural explanations of phenomena, is perfectly reasonable.

And indeed it's a little messy mapping this onto Sellars's distinction:

the contrast I have in mind is not that between an unscientific conception of man-in-the-world and a scientific one, but between that conception which limits itself to what correlational techniques can tell us about perceptible and introspectible events and that which postulates imperceptible objects and events for the purpose of explaining correlations among perceptibles. — PSIM

So religion, if not animism, goes on the postulational side, right? We say things like, the Greeks explained the behavior of the oceans by having an ocean-god, the behavior of the skies by having a sky-god, volcanoes get a volcano-god, and so on. In the same way that science posits gravity to explain why apples fall to the earth, the Greeks posited Aeolus to explain the winds. Same thing.

The other link I keep posting, is an excerpt from an interview with Richard Feynman. The point of that reference is two-fold: (1) the use he makes of "framework" as part of my argument that without theory it's not science; (2) what he says at the very end:

But I really can't do a good job, any job, of explaining magnetic force in terms of something else that you're more familiar with, because I don't understand it in terms of anything else that you're more familiar with.

The Greek gods -- those are persons, clearly, famously, like us, with emotions and everything. In the stories they're even perceptible, you can talk to them and fight with them. The god of Abraham is a person. Whether these categories hold perfectly is not quite the point. Religious concepts are elaborated and refined like anything else, and we may end up with descriptions that don't quite fit the person category, at least not the one we use now, all that well.

But still, maybe we're talking about persons, but we're still postulating those persons, right? And this is the point of the Feynman thing: the posits of science are not something you already have elsewhere in the framework, but different kinds of entities. If I open a door that swings away from me and it thumps to a stop after a opening a little and there's an "Ow!" sound from the other side, it's, to use your phrase, common sense that I've just whacked someone with the door. You might think of that as a theory you have quickly whipped up that includes a postulated person, and I'm not going to deny you that. Go ahead. Cognitive science tells stories like that too. But what you're not doing is positing a new kind of entity. You're gathering some evidence and doing some deducing, or your brain is, whatever. But that's not all science is.

And I can already hear you saying "that's exactly what it is", so please stop and think about how theoretical frameworks work, what is involved a positing a new type of entity, and so on. Maybe you could find another source besides me to explain how science works. Maybe you can come back and tell me I'm all wrong. We've probably already reached the limits of my understanding here, so I'd be happy to stipulate that I have no more to offer by way of further explanation.

Compare my door example to the discovery of Neptune: one involves postulating a person at the moment not visible to you because he is occluded by a solid object; the other involves the prediction of the existence of an as-yet unobserved planet based on mathematics, within a framework that includes gravity as described by Newton's equations. In a sense, the deduction is careful or systematic common sense, just math and inference, but the framework is not common sense, it's Newtonian physics.

A much better way would be to identify with our way of thinking instead of our knowledge. Critical thinking skills are becoming more and more crucial in this age of informational floods. And these "tools" with which we can analyse the value of new information should be the centerpiece of our identity. — Hirnstoff

The "way of thinking" that emerges in the un-self-censored anonymity of internet forums is what I call the "Either-Or" attitude, which denies any middle position between opinions, and allows for no common ground in discussions. Hence, innocent exchanges of information (opinions) quickly turn into emotional diatribes or win-lose debates. This recent trend reflects a coarsening of culture in the modern era. Yet it's not due to a difference in human nature, but to rapid changes in technology., which have allowed societies to fragment into a variety of interest groups. Mega-Cities, and the Net-connected-world, are becoming un-civilized and dis-connected. If the Us-vs-Them trend continues, we may experience a return to "nature, red in tooth and claw".

However, the "better way" may have less to do with critical thinking, and more with un-critical feeling (lack of self-censorship). Many people think that they "speak Truth" when they express their feelings directly. Perhaps in ancient tribal societies, when everybody knew their neighbors, and subscribed to the same beliefs, such openness was acceptable. Minor disagreements could be settled with brief bickering, or occasionally with empty-handed violence. But, in today's multi-cultural societies, with lethal weapons at hand, it's often better for all to "hold your tongue" in order to avoid open conflict. And young children have to be taught that lesson, when they blurt-out unfiltered feelings that are socially unacceptable.

Before the internet era, civil discourse was possible due to established rules of polite society. But on the net, we are no longer neighbors, and our philosophical differences are often wide. So, in the interest of facilitating social intercourse, while keeping the peace, we need to re-establish commonly accepted guidelines for interpersonal exchanges. And my modest contribution (my "tool") to a Golden Ruled society, is the "BothAnd Philosophy". It's an attitude adjustment, not a critical analysis. :smile:

Etiquette, that's the ticket : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etiquette

Netiquette : https://www.verywellmind.com/ten-rules-of-netiquette-22285

BothAnd Philosophy : So in order to understand the whole truth of our existence, we need to look at both sides of every polarized worldview. In the non-fiction world, we don’t always have to choose either Good or Evil, but we can look for a moderate position near the Golden Mean, the sweet spot I call "BothAnd".
http://bothandblog5.enformationism.info/page6.html

Also: Grice's maxims.

I think we both identify the same problems and mechanisms that can lead to the downfall of modern civilization as we know it and I agree that simply sharpening your critical thinking skills won't cut it. It can only be part of the solution. I chose this topic for my first video, because I see it as a significant first step towards more civil discourse online. However I don't have any illusions, that it will or can be adopted by a major part of mankind.

And I completely agree that Etiquette has to be another big part of the solution. I'm actually working on my next video right now in which I talk exactly about that: I hope to convey how it's possible for everyone to converse in a well-mannered and polite, but still productive and honest way.

BothAnd Philosophy : So in order to understand the whole truth of our existence, we need to look at both sides of every polarized worldview. In the non-fiction world, we don’t always have to choose either Good or Evil, but we can look for a moderate position near the Golden Mean, the sweet spot I call "BothAnd".
http://bothandblog5.enformationism.info/page6.html — Gnomon

I have read your blog post and found it very interesting. Thanks!

And I completely agree that Etiquette has to be another big part of the solution. — Hirnstoff

As long as by this one doesn't mean, 'thou shalt not offend.' Offense is the inescapable nature of the negative essence of philosophy.

As long as by this one doesn't mean, 'thou shalt not offend.' Offense is the inescapable nature of the negative essence of philosophy. — JerseyFlight

Depends what you mean by "offend". Offending with arguments and ideas is indeed not only inescapable, but should be appreciated. I know that there's a growing number of people out there who seem incapable of handling such "offense". However I personally wouldn't even call it that. It's just a disagreement, the resolvement of which can lead to valuable progress.

On the other hand I think people should refrain from ad-hominems of all sorts. It simply doesn't help anyone in a debate. But I think that's just common sense, or at least I hope it is.