...the current cosmological and physical theory is in a state of extreme flux and fragmentation. — Wayfarer

No, it isn't.

No, it isn't. — Banno

Of course it is.

Ludicrous to say it's not.

appears to be the aim. — Wayfarer

Seems so as the OP stipulates a pre-1905 purview.

No, it isn't. — Banno

... Or are you playing the pre-1905 game here. Only way your comment makes anything approaching sense.

I disagree. It is both Collingwood's and Kant's understanding that you can't dispense with all underlying metaphysical assumptions. I agree with them. Science cannot proceed without them. — Clarky

Dispensing with all underlying metaphysical assumptions is not the issue though. The issue is the consequences of science proceeding from false metaphysical assumptions. So it is not a matter of removing all such assumptions, and proceeding with none, it is a matter of subjecting them all to a rigorous form of skepticism, and proceeding only from those which pass.

Any claim that physics provides an inadequate understanding of the way things work, made via the internet, is a laughable performative contradiction.

Nice pivot. But you can't fool me. :razz:

you can't fool me. :razz: — ZzzoneiroCosm

No need: you are quite adept at fooling yourself. :wink:

Any claim that physics provides an inadequate understanding of the way things work, made via the internet, is a laughable performative contradiction. — Banno

This all depends on you criteria for "adequate". Some of us seem to have far have higher standards than others.

Seems so as the OP stipulates a pre-1905 purview. — ZzzoneiroCosm

Learning how to frame a debate in just the way that the responses don't upset your own 'fundamental presuppositions' is an art form in its own right. :wink:

PS__Why do you limit this discussion to Classical Physics? Do you have an agenda? Just asking. — Gnomon

Have you read the OP? Have you read the rest of the posts on this thread? If you don't want to play by the terms of discussion I set down, you should go to another thread or start your own.

Dispensing with all underlying metaphysical assumptions is not the issue though. The issue is the consequences of science proceeding from false metaphysical assumptions. So it is not a matter of removing all such assumptions, and proceeding with none, it is a matter of subjecting them all to a rigorous form of skepticism, and proceeding only from those which pass. — Metaphysician Undercover

Seems I misunderstood what you were trying to say.

fooling yourself. — Banno

Fooling myself that you pivoted from Wayfarer's "extreme flux" and "fragmented" to your own "adequate for facilitating the transfer of digital data via the internet"?

Do tell.

Odd, but if that's what he wants to discuss... :smile:

Materialism was the view that the universe consists in bits of matter banging into each other in a void. It was rejected after Newton made such effective use of action at a distance. What is being defended here might be better called physicalism - the notion that the laws of physics are adequate to explain the way things are - than materialism.

The contentions part of this is not physicalism but reductionism, the issue of what can be explained using physics - that everything might eventually be reduced to physics. That is not presently the case - there is no adequate physical explanation as to why Putin invaded Ukraine, for example. A more salient point is that even if there were such an explanation, it is hard to see how it would be of any use in deciding what we ought do about the invasion. Issues of ethics and aesthetics would remain incorrigible in the face of physicalism.

The great discontinuities in pre-relativistic physics were the propagation of electromagnetic waves and explaining how hydrogen atoms could remain stable. We know how these problems were resolved. GIven the context, @Wayfarer might be better served by drawing attention to this rather than to dark matter or dark energy. But again, since the contention of (1) is that we can explain some things, and not that we can explain everything, it is pretty irrelevant.

Physicalism is fine within it's sphere, but inadequate to most of human endeavour.

Materialism was the view that the universe consists in bits of matter banging into each other in a void. It was rejected after Newton made such effective use of action at a distance. What is being defended here might be better called physicalism - the notion that the laws of physics are adequate to explain the way things are - than materialism. — Banno

This thread is not for discussion of the validity of materialism. You guys all know that but you’re doing it anyway.

This thread is not for discussion of the validity of materialism — Clarky

Yeah, it is.

In any case the OP is ambiguous as to whether the topic. is, what were Collingwood's assumptions? And, what ought one assume in order to defend a pre-relativistic physics. So:

1) Add to this list if it makes sense and 2) Discuss the various proposed assumptions and decide if they belong on the list. — Clarky

I've already sugested, and you agreed, that given (4) we don't need (6). (1) implies (4) since maths is just a way of setting out patterns. (1) implies (2) since given that there are patterns, there must be something that is in a pattern. Similarly, (3) is superfluous, since the scientific principles are just generalisations of the patterns we see. The choice between a discreet or continuous description seems to depend on the pattern being described.

So we end up with that there are patterns in the world, and a conservation principle.

Now I think on it, I wonder if there being patterns doesn't imply some sort of conservation principle.

Materialism: There a patterns in the world. Now there's a T-shirt. :wink: All we need now is some further spring cleaning from phenomenology to tell us that such perceived regularities say nothing about an external world but are indicative of an infinite regress of relations located within communities of shared values which hold no possibility of foundational justification. In which case we end up with Materialism:
:razz:

Cute.

But it should be Physicalism: There a patterns in the world.

...phenomenology to tell us that such perceived regularities say nothing about an external world — Tom Storm

But that's only an issue because of the error of dividing the world into the external and the internal. Drop that, recognise that the regularities are just in the world, internal and external be damned.

Indeed. A number of physicalists I've heard describe themselves as naturalists - are there any advantages or disadvantages of adopting this word?

I'm noncommittal.

But I will go back to this:

The contentions part of this is not physicalism but reductionism — Banno

and point out that more interesting than the observation of patterns is the question of what we might do about them. Physics doesn't answer ethical questions.

and point out that more interesting than the observation of patterns is the question of what we might do about them. Physics doesn't answer ethical questions. — Banno

Does this mean that a physicalist metaphysics can't easily entertain morality but a supernatural/religious metaphysics in theory can?

No. It means that metaphysics can inform ethics by setting up a framework, but that doesn't provide ethical answers. The problem is the same for religious morality.

The issue is that knowing what is the case does not tell us what to do about it. It's that one cannot get an "ought" from an "is", the naturalistic fallacy.

But all this is a side issue, and @Clarky is complaining to the management about this thread going off topic, so might leave it there.

:up:

Argumentum ad taedium

Materialism is boring.

Ergo,

Materialism is false.

Let's keep things interesting!

It was rejected after Newton made such effective use of action at a distance. — Banno

Maybe 'billiard-ball materialism' was "rejected" in England by Newtonians but not by e.g. French scientists and the philosophes or German scientists and Young Hegelians. What you call physicalism, Banno, I think of as 'model-dependent materialism' (à la Hawking & Mlodinow).

The contentions part of this is not physicalism but reductionism, the issue of what can be explained using physics - that everything might eventually be reduced to physics. That is not presently the case –

:100:

Hey, Banno, could you elucidate? Some of us po’ younguns are still gettin our learnin.

First you say

… the error of dividing the world into the internal and the external.

An appeal to some form of monism? Not physicalism, I presume.

But then we see

… one cannot get an “ought” from an “is”

Is that not dualism? You are conceding that both “ought” and “is” exist, but that a gulf lies between them that can never be bridged. Two modes of being in the same universe?

I often agree with your viewpoints. Saw this though, and scratched my head. Just to let you know, I’ve always been a physicalist. But then I never went to school for philosophy, so I never learned that was bad.

Between semesters, so I’ve been looking around for a distraction. TPF never fails to do the trick. (I guess I’ll never learn.)

For me, the question comes down to this : If all human minds ceased to exist (nuclear war, runaway global warming, pandemic, etc.), would rain still fall, rocks still erode, the Earth still orbit the Sun?

One’s answer says a lot about how we see ourselves in the world. Are we a bunch of little gods, with all of existence dependent on our continued attention? Or are we products of a greater (indifferent?) universe?

But again, since the contention of (1) is that we can explain some things, and not that we can explain everything, it is pretty irrelevant. — Banno

I don't see where you get this idea. (1) states very explicitly "We live in an ordered universe that can be understood by humans.". It does not say 'some of which can be understood'.

So we end up with that there are patterns in the world, and a conservation principle. — Banno

The conservation principle is clearly inadequate. It dismisses losses (entropy), which are clearly significant, as irrelevant.