In any case all I was looking for was a counter-argument to the argument that the more objective view is the less limited, more comprehensively informed view. — Janus

But isn't that what I have been addressing?

Agreement, yes. Much better than "shared subjectivity", whatever that might be - a contradiction, on the face of it. We phrases our propositions so as to maximise agreement. We can agree that from where I stand the knife is on the right, but from where you stand it is on the left.

By phrasing statements so that they are true from anywhere, we can maximise agreement. That's not a bad way to think about objectivity. — Banno

It seems odd to accuse me of avoiding a topic on which I created a whole thread... https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/10249/intersubjectivity/p1

...in which you participated.

The notion of a scientific method is fraught. What we have is a reasoned, social approach that engages with the world. — Banno

Yes, I only arrived at this in recent times.

The question is which is the more objective, the more informed, view in relation to the question as to whether the Earth is stationary relative to the Solar System; the view from the Earth or the view from nowhere in particular, i.e.the view from anywhere not confined to the particular. limited view(s) from Earth? — Janus

Here, seeing as how you are incapable of doing your own research...

How General Relativity Complicates What We Know About Earth's Orbit

So it is not wrong to say that the Sun orbits the Earth. It just leads to much more complicated equations that give you no good intuition for the behavior of gravity.

Sometimes this forum is like dealing with toddlers...

Fred D'Agostino convinced me of it. I've an unpublished monograph of his, called "After Method" somewhere...

Here, seeing as how you are incapable of doing your own research...

How General Relativity Complicates What We Know About Earth's Orbit

So it is not wrong to say that the Sun orbits the Earth. It just leads to much more complicated equations that give you no good intuition for the behavior of gravity.


Sometimes this forum is like dealing with toddlers.. — Banno

:roll:

You're the toddler Banno, when it comes to reading and responding to what your discussants have actually said. I didn't say it was wrong, simpliciter, to say the Earth orbits the Sun; I already acknowledged that is right from the point of view of Earth.

From a point of view outside the Solar system, looking at it as a whole, would you say it is more correct to say the Earth and the other planets orbit the Sun or that the Sun orbits the Earth? Does the Sun or the Earth form the centre of gravity of the Solar System?

From a point of view outside the Solar system, looking at it as a whole, would you say it is more correct to say the Earth and the other planets orbit the Sun or that the Sun orbits the Earth? Does the Sun or the Earth form the centre of gravity of the Solar System? — Janus

I've referred you to the physical science, which shows that your question is silly.

How General Relativity Complicates What We Know About Earth's Orbit

End of discussion.

So it is not wrong to say that the Sun orbits the Earth. It just leads to much more complicated equations that give you no good intuition for the behavior of gravity. — Banno

This supports what I have been saying and my question about which, the Sun or the Earth, is the better candidate for being considered to be the center of gravity of the Solar System? The Sun of course, it being the more massive, in fact constituting most of the total mass of the solar system.

We’ve been having some fun recently with Sun-centered and Earth-centered coordinate systems, as related to a provocative claim by certain serious scientists, most recently Berkeley professor Richard Muller. They claim that in general relativity (Einstein’s theory of gravity, the same fantastic mathematical invention which predicted black holes and gravitational waves and gravitational lensing) the statement that “The Sun Orbits the Earth” is just as true as the statement that “The Earth Orbits the Sun”… or that perhaps both statements are equally meaningless.

But, uh… sorry. All this fun with coordinates was beside the point. The truth, falsehood, or meaninglessness of “the Earth orbits the Sun” will not be answered with a choice of coordinates. Coordinates are labels. In this context, they are simply ways of labeling points in space and time. Changing how you label a system changes only how you describe that system; it does not change anything physically meaningful about that system. So rather than focusing on coordinates and how they can make things appear, we should spend some time thinking about which things do not depend on our choice of coordinates.

And so our question really needs to be this: does the statement “The Earth Orbits the Sun (and not the other way round)” have coordinate-independent meaning, and if so, is it true?

From here.

Read on further and educate yourself.

And:
Technically, what is going on is that the Earth, Sun and all the planets are orbiting around the center of mass of the solar system. This is actually how planets orbiting other stars are often detected, by searching for the motion of the stars they orbit that is caused by the fact that the star is orbiting the center of mass of the system, causing it to wobble on the sky.

The center of mass of our solar system very close to the Sun itself, but not exactly at the Sun's center (it is actually a little bit outside the radius of the Sun). However, since almost all of the mass within the solar system is contained in the Sun, its motion is only a slight wobble in comparison to the motion of the planets. Therefore, assuming that the Sun is stationary and the planets revolve around its center is a good enough approximation for most purposes.

From here

From your first “here”....

“....if you do it correctly, you will always get the same answer no matter which coordinates you use....”

.....and from Einstein 1905.....

“....If, relative to K, K′ is a uniformly moving co-ordinate system devoid of rotation, then natural phenomena run their course with respect to K′ according to exactly the same general laws as with respect to K....”

.....and from Blagojević 2002.....

“.....Newton's laws hold in their simplest form only in a family of reference frames, called inertial frames. The laws of mechanics have the same form in all inertial frames....”

......put together seemingly demonstrate that we are indeed in our own inertial reference frames, insofar as the simplest physical laws being used correctly are why the answers will always be the same no matter where on Earth (K) you’re standing (K’).

When I get back from my ~SOL trip to Never-neverland, on the other hand, then we can talk about why you’re old and gray and I’m still pretty. But if you don’t care about that because it ain’t gonna happen, we can discuss why you’re 3 x 10-6sec old’r’n me after my trip to London on a Big Jet Plane, which does happen, but good luck measuring THAT on your trusty Timex.
————

All y’all self-implied adults.....sit back, put up your swollen ankles and enjoy yet another shot of Geritol.

THE TODDLERS HAVE SPOKEN!!!!!!

THE TODDLERS HAVE SPOKEN!!!!!! — Mww

Yeah, let's see if the two-year-olds can validate the reality of an inertial frame of reference. Doesn't this require the reality of a straight line? Hahaha, the joke is on us.

Hahaha, the joke is on us. — Metaphysician Undercover

Ok, fine. I thought about it for awhile, but I can’t come up with a clever comeback for your clever comeback.

The idea of “real” or “reality” comes up frequently on the forum, often in relation to quantum mechanics. It has struck me the concept is not usually defined explicitly or carefully. To me the way it is used often seems wrong-headed. I have spent a lot of time thinking about the concepts of “being” and “existence.” I think “reality” is related to those ideas, but not the same thing. Here are some definitions of "real" from sources on the web. — T Clark

"Real" to me is the sum of everything. Nothing that isn't real can or will ever occur, be imagined, considered, thought, felt, observed or be physical as an object in the universe. Time is real. All the products of time are real.

All subjects are real and their individual feelings, secrets, thoughts, passions and emotions are real whether expressed or kept to themselves. Everything private is real. Everything shared and communicated between us is also real - every sound, every smile, every interaction between subjects that has or ever will take place. Everything yet unknown to us or already lost to us that is or was real is real regardless of whether we are currently aware of it or can observe it in this moment.

Everything the future holds is real as is that of the past and present. All information to ever occur is real. All manners in which energy and matter can or will be arranged for all of time is real. Possibility and probability are real.

In what way, what form, all of these things are real - well that varies. Some are real for a brief instantaneous moment while others are real for the entire span of space-time, and everything in-between. None less real than the rest. As is the potential variability of all existing things. Change itself is real.

All that is real is not available to us in this moment, nor in a lifetime nor a hundred lifetimes. Everything that is real will never be comprehended fully by me or you or anyone else, only ever approximated as a broad and vague general appreciation from the smallest consideration to one's of the most epic magnitude.

Have I forgotten something in the set of what is real? Almost certainly.

Have I forgotten something in the set of what is real? Almost certainly. — Benj96

I don't have a problem with any of things you identify as real, but different people have different ideas. Some philosophical approaches deny there is any reality. Hence this discussion.

but different people have different ideas — T Clark

As is entirely their right to do so. I for one am always interested in what others make of it all. I'm always encountering new perspectives and takes on the subject to indulge in.

Some philosophical approaches deny there is any reality. — T Clark

You mean what is usually called an idealist? Roughly the view that there are only ideas and nothing else. But those who take these positions say ideas are real.

Then you have Goodman's "irrealism", roughly the view that what there is, are "versions", theories and descriptions we have of the world, which vary depending on the person's version, a chemist would have a different version than a plumber, most of the time. But the posits made by each respective person's version are real.

Now if you have in mind anti-realism, I can't say much, the very little I know about them don't make much sense to me.

Point being, very few people are just going to say "the things I argue for/believe in are not real", it's a very strange statement to make.

Point being, very few people are just going to say "the things I argue for/believe in are not real", it's a very strange statement to make. — Manuel

I was motivated to start this discussion by recent threads that questioned whether quantum mechanics undermines the idea of reality.

Ah. One of those threads. That's a matter of taking physics way, way outside of its purview.

But, that's pertinent for that thread, not this one. Thanks for the clarification.

That's a matter of taking physics way, way outside of its purview. — Manuel

Agreed.

That's a matter of taking physics way, way outside of its purview. — Manuel

Quite right. How does an idea become undermined?

Spending waaaay too much time in a lab, or you try to get attention by putting forth a fancy argument.

I dunno. It's very strange.

Oh, Easy as that? Who’da thunk it. How come it’s never been done, then? Didn’t think ideas could be undermined. The objects of ideas, maybe, but.....oh well.

So be it.

LOL, funny and well said! It looks as if the "adults" have run away to their sandboxes.

Yeah, well, you know....times for fun, times for serious, a la Andy Rooney.

a la Andy Rooney. — Mww

I'd completely forgotten about him; takes me back to childhood when he was on TV here in Horstraya. :cool:

Just checking in. 413 posts and still no consensus on what "real" means.

You are a disappointing bunch. :sad:

You're a butthead, so we're even.

The absence of consensus doesn't prove that the answer wasn't provided.

On the first page.

↪jgill

You're a butthead, so we're even. — frank

Sorry if I awoke you too abruptly from your nap. :cool:

Real is considered the manifestation of energies into objects, the objects of the physical world and indeed the physical world itself.

Real is that which is the object of human inquiry.

Real is that which is the object of human inquiry. — Daniel

Many here on the forum and elsewhere would disagree.