Infinite Progress
  • Agent Smith
    9.5k
    Everyone's, I'm 100% certain, familiar with the good ol' weapon in a skeptic's arsenal, The Infinite Regress which is that if a claim needs a justification then so do the claims that appear as premises in that justification and then also the premises which themselves are claims in the justifcation for the justification ad infinitum.

    What about things in the opposite ("forward" instead of "backward") direction? If I prove a proposition p, p must entail a further proposition q, q then implies a different proposition r, so on and so forth, again ad infinitum. This is, in my universe, The Infinite Progress.

    A penny for your pensées!
    Agent Smith Options
  • 180 Proof
    16.2k
    I found in this book a persuave argument for 'open-ended development': The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beginning_of_Infinity

    Whether or not that is "progress" is, perhaps, debatable. Consider also John Gray's contrarian polemic The Silence of Animals: On Progress and Other Modern Myths.
    180 Proof Options
  • Agent Smith
    9.5k
    Danke 180 Proof.

    Causal component of the PSR: Everything has a cause

    To my surprise there's no principle that goes everything has an effect. I drew a Venn diagram and instead of following the rule to first shade in the ALL statement (all things have causes, vide supra), I tried to draw in the X (some things have no effect - try pushing a wall, nothing happens) and intriguingly, I have to put the X on the circumference of the circle that represents cause but inside the circle that's for things which basically means there's the possibility that some things have no cause.

    Is there a "last domino" in the chain of reasoning i.e. do we reach a proposition z such that it doesn't entail anything at all? Post-Agrippa's trilemma, nothing follows, not even this nor your logical reply to this ... ad infinitum.
    Agent Smith Options
  • 180 Proof
    16.2k
    Causal component of the PSR: Everything has a cause — Agent Smith
    Two problems: (1) quantum fluctuations, which are the most abundannt entities / events in nature are a-casual (re: uncertainty principle) and (2) "the PSR" must lack "a cause", otherwise it's an infinite regress / vicious circe.
    180 Proof Options
  • Agent Smith
    9.5k
    ↪180 Proof


    (1) No comment! Assume true
    (2) Ok

    Ergo, analogously and contrary to skepticism, some propositions need no proof (acausal) and the infinite regress argument is flawed in the same way!

    The causal arm of the PSR (everything requires a cause) mirrors its logical arm (every claim requires proof). If one is false, the other could be as well, oui?
    Agent Smith Options
  • 180 Proof
    16.2k
    ↪Agent Smith
    Every judgment has a cause. However, (according to our best, more precise, completely unfalsified physical theory QFT) the vast vast majority of events in nature do not have causes. "PSR" may be about us, but it's not about entities more-fundamental-than-us (e.g. the universe).
    180 Proof Options
  • Agent Smith
    9.5k
    ↪180 Proof
    Ok!
    Agent Smith Options
  • Yohan
    679
    As I see it, only bad arguments lead to infinite regress.
    Contradiction and infinite regress are the two things I look for to test if an argument is grounded in reality.
    Yohan Options
  • Agent Smith
    9.5k
    Contradiction — Yohan

    Most interesting. — Ms. Marple
    Agent Smith Options
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