Well... it is anti-scientific for starters — TheWillowOfDarkness
It's also terrible with respect to interactions betweens humans. Since it is an essentialist position, it has us thinking we know the "nature" people without taking a moment to consider them and their relationship to our theories and actions. — TheWillowOfDarkness
What exactly does the "entire universe" mean here? If we are talking bout the observed universe or the measured universe which relates to the observed universe, then the answer is clear: we say GR or QM applies to the entirety of that realm because, for that realm (i.e. the observed and measured), the theory fits. The topology of the (observed) universe does express gravity. This doesn't mean the universe always express this. There may be instances of the universe which behave differently. (as we discovered in the shift from Newtonian mechanics to GR to QM).If it's anti-scientific, then why do scientists posit such things? If you don't think they do, then go ask a physicists if GR or QM applies to the entire universe. Go ask a biologist if evolution applies to all life. The topology of the universe itself is said to be determined by gravity, for Plato's sake. — Marchesk
Well, there must be something about humans which differentiates us from duckbill platypuses or peat moss. That people have gotten all worked up about what exactly that is and done terrible things doesn't change the fact that we're not dogs.
Furthermore, you're posing a false dichotomy between Kant and science - the Critique of Pure Reason is not creationism or religious dogma. Kant was an empirical realist, he wasn't trying to undermine science. — Wayfarer
I wonder if scientific realism requires universals or tropes to be part of the world. Does the issue ultimately go back to how we are able to make sense of the flux of experience? — Marchesk
I think the idea universals have to be part of the world is correlationism working its way through a back door. What are we saying if we suggest that states of the world need "universals" to be? Well, we are saying that for a given state to exist, there must be this "universal" idea which its presence is dependent on. Instead of addressing particulars (states of existence) on their own terms, we are back trying to construct them out of ideas and experience (the "universal" we propose to be their origin).
The dependency of the world (states of existence) on the "mind" has snuck back into our philosophy. We are, once again, considering states of the world to be defined by the "universal" ideas we have in our minds, rather than considering them are there own unique moments of existence. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Conceptualism (also called psychologism and mentalism, depending on the sorts of objects under discussion): This is the view that there do exist numbers — or properties, or propositions, or whatever — but that they do not exist independently of us; instead, they are mental objects; in particular, the claim is usually that they are something like ideas in our heads. — Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Platonism in Metaphysics)
If everything is a thought I'm not sure you run into the same problems. There is no platonic realm needed to explain where redness etc. is, it is just a mental realm. — invizzy
Why do we need to account for the concepts? Can't we dismiss them as false if we reject platonism? We can have false concepts right? — invizzy
I don't think there is much of a problem with universals if we accept a version of 'conceptualism': — invizzy
I am a little confused as to the difference between nominalism and conceptualism. — Marchesk
here is no access to the real world, you see. — invizzy
But presumably there is a cause; perhaps light reflecting, cones firing, the lack of tinted spectacles or water in the way, — invizzy
Do you agree that everything you can think of is mediated by a thought? That is not 'real' access, surely? — invizzy
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