What a jerk that guy was — Changeling

Agreed.

6 months without a banning is pretty good going... — Changeling

You forgot about all the secret bannings. They banned T Clark and he had to sneak back on.

But reality has the characteristic of consistency. — Bird-Up

I agree, at least, that materialists in 1905 believed that.

Those seem like rephrasings of the original point; an elaboration of how humans go about understanding, not new characteristics on their own. — Bird-Up

I don't think saying that the universe is comprehensible is the same as saying there are universal laws or that it behaves in a mathematical way.

Isn't there supposed to be an infinite number of points between any two points? Why would you state it as "at least one"? It seems like the incoherency of this idea, demonstrates the falsity of the proposition "The universe is continuous". A number of your stated "absolute presuppositions" can be demonstrated to be false. — Metaphysician Undercover

The way I said it was awkward and potentially misleading. Your formulation is probably better. Kant himself wrote "All phenomena, then, are continuous quantities" which is probably even better.

So I wondered why it is included. Again, it seems to me that given obedience to physical laws, causation is unnecessary; a hangover from Aristotle. — Banno

I think the point of Russell's essay was that, even though there are scientific laws, the idea of causation is unnecessary. I guess great minds think alike, because I agree with that.

As I acknowledge, we have only observed a very limited part of the universe, but I disagree in that we have (so far) found the universe to be comprehensible to us, so I don't see that as an assumption. — Janus

Isn't science people trying to understand the universe? Why would we do that if we didn't think the universe is comprehendible? Even if it might not be, I think we have to act as if it is just to proceed. I think that's a lot of what an absolute presupposition is - acting as if something is true even though it isn't proven and can't be proven.

Maybe; I'm not sure. If we can't think of any other serious possibilities, maybe not, so I guess it comes down to whether we consider god and/or universal mind to be serious possibilities. — Janus

I'll fall back on my premise of a materialistic/physicalist point of view. That would exclude God or a universal mind.

Right, but the fact is we know we can express the laws mathematically and make very precise predictions which always seem to be observed, so whatever the explanation is, I think we can safely say that we know that we can express (at least some) of the laws (I would prefer to say invariances) of nature mathematically. — Janus

Agreed.

ME: I think this is more speculative, but it is bolstered by the apparent consistency and universality (within our science and regarding what we have actually observed) of the Laws of Thermodynamics.YOU: Are you saying it is an absolute presupposition or is not?
— Clarky

I'd say it's universal applicability is an assumption based on what we have observed so far. I'm not sure if that would count as 'absolute'. Again, the caveat would be that we only know it applies to what we have observed, and any assertion beyond that would be an assumption, if not a presupposition. — Janus

For me, and I think for Collingwood, this all comes back to the fact that we have and can only observe a very limited portion of the universe.

From proconsul heseloni to homo sapiens, as a species, we have brought about nothing but destruction and catastrophe on this planet. From torturing animals on a daily basis in slaughterhouses for our luxurious meals to making entire species go extinct to waging wars and killing fellow species to slavery, we have done nothing good. Say a circumstance were to come bestowing upon you the final choice, the decision that ends us all, the choice to let humankind as a whole perish (painlessly and instantaneously), should you choose to let it happen? — TheSoundConspirator

Sure, I'll kill my children; my wife; my brothers and sister and their children; my step mother; my friends; people I respect and admire; and then eight billion more. All so I can be sure to finally kill Dr. Phil and make sure anti-natalists and depressive eco-dorks won't have to feel guilty and alienated any more.

See Causality, Determination and such stuff. I think Anscombe's differentiation between causation and determination would serve your purposes well, in that you might avoid the incessant arguments about first causes and such. So if one has a scientific law in mathematical form that provides a satisfactory description of some event, including being predictive, then notions of cause are inconsequential. — Banno

I have argued before that the idea of causation is not very useful. Didn't you and I discuss that previously? In 1912, Bertrand Russell wrote "On the Notion of Cause" which endorsed that view. On the other hand, I think scientists in 1905 in general assumed that all events are caused.

We come up to the point raised in the title of the thread: the metaphysics of materialism. If you say that studying the universe as was done in 1905 is metaphysics - that's fine. Though I doubt scientists then thought they were doing metaphysics.

They were doing physics. They study what we still call "matter", but beyond that name, I don't see a metaphysics. They studied the universe, call it whatever you like. The results won't vary if you call matter, "immaterial" or "mental", as you seem to agree. — Manuel

Scientists don't do metaphysics. As Collingwood wrote, metaphysics describes the underlying assumptions that scientists follow while doing science. They are often not explicitly aware of those assumptions.

But if by understand you mean "theoretical understanding" - then we do not disagree — Manuel

I didn't say the universe is understood, I said it can be understood. It is understandable.

Pretty good OP Clark. — Manuel

I forgot to say thank you. Thank you.

No problem. I will just ignore you from now on. — Jackson

Oh, @Jackson, you're just so cranky and cute. I want to give you a big hug.

Given (3), why do we need (6)? — Banno

As I noted in the OP, there may be some overlap, but I think 3 and 6 are different.

If as proposed scientific law is found to work in one situation and not in another, then it needs modification. A generalisation that accounts for both instances would suffice. — Banno

That's true.

And no one who disputes you is allowed? — Jackson

I am not a materialist, although I think most scientists are and were in 1905. As I noted in the OP, I want to keep this focused on absolute presuppositions and not on the validity of a materialist position.

Kind of but that also that philosophical naturalism is too extreme and a lot of folk think all scientists presuppose this too. — Tom Storm

How does philosophical naturalism differ substantially from materialism and physicalism?

Well it depends upon what you mean by all times, and what you mean by universe. I'm not a big science guy, but I guess my point would be if you mean 'in the known universe and since what we call the 'big bang'' then yes. I don't know what might be true outside of the known universe or outside of time as we know it. — Tom Storm

Yes, I thought of that but didn't address it. I think I'm saved by the fact I specified before 1905.

My line by line response. My response in italics:

[1] is not true: the universe cannot be understood by human beings, at least not metaphysically (which is the purpose of this thread) - the ultimate grounds of reality are sealed out for us. I disagree. If the universe can not be understood, science is pointless.

[2] Is more terminological than anything else. Yes, there is a universe out there - it can be called "physical", "neutral", "material", "immaterial", it does not have consequences for our inquires- for whatever the universe is made of, whatever word is used - this is what we study. I don't necessarily disagree with you, but many people do. I guess the question is whether or not most physicists have this as a presupposition.

[3] Yes, sure. We could substitute "laws" for "habits", but it is fine. Ok

[4] Yes. Or at least, we can best describe its behavior through applied mathematics. Ok

[5] Given the time period, perhaps this was assumed to be true. There may be exceptions, but, fine. Again, I think most physicists probably assume this.

[6] Yes.

[7] So far as was known, correct.

[8] And assumed to be infinite too. I'm not sure about that.

[9] Space and time are considered absolute and not the same thing, as is now the case. I think that's a good one. We can add it to the list.

Or, thoughts in the mind of God. Another forum of idealism. — Jackson

As noted in the OP, this discussion is about a materialist view of reality.

Here's a line by line response in italics. I am mostly responding how I think Collingwood would respond:

[1] I don't think this is an absolute presupposition, insofar as we have found that the universe is fairly coherently and consistently understandable to us in scientific terms. You are making an assumption based on having observed a very limited part of the universe.

[2] There does not seem to be any other serious candidate for basic substance, unless God or Universal Mind is posited. Does that mean you agree it is a good example of an absolute presupposition?

[3] Laws are formulated post hoc to codify the behavior of observed invariances. We know that the substances and parts of the universe that we have observed seem to behave invariantly. Again, we have observed a very limited amount of the universe.

[4] I think the fact that the so-called Laws of Nature can be expressed mathematically is something we have discovered, so not an absolute presupposition.There is a long debate about whether the mathematical behavior of the universe is discovered or projected by observers. I come down on the side of projection.

[5] This is an assumption based on us never having observed a counterexample. Of course we cannot observe anything but the most vanishingly tiny fraction of all places and times. Agreed.

[6] Again this is based on the expectation that comes with habit and/or the fact that we are constituted such that we cannot comprehend events without thinking in terms of causation. Agreed

[7] I think this is more speculative, but it is bolstered by the apparent consistency and universality (within our science and regarding what we have actually observed) of the Laws of Thermodynamics. Are you saying it is an absolute presupposition or is not?

[8]. This certainly seems to hold in an abstract, logical kind of sense. It is hard to know what it could even mean beyond that context. I'm not sure if I have an answer. We can ask Kant. It was one of his.

Firstly, are humans substances? — karl stone

This is my interpretation - humans are made up of substances.

Are our thoughts, feelings, actions - caused? You wish to stick to physics, but have immediately invoked the question of consciousness/free will. — karl stone

As I noted in the OP, we are discussing the absolute presuppositions of a materialist approach to science. It is not the purpose of the thread to discuss whether materialism is valid.

I don't see how free will/determinism, Godels incompleteness theorem, or chaos theory are relevant to the issue raised in the OP.

That’s fine. It’s your thread, you can do with it as you please. But you referenced Collingwood, so it hardly seems fair to call something an AP that conflicts with the predicates of that reference. — Mww

Here are examples that Collingwood, in "An Essay on Metaphysics" identified as Kant's absolute presuppositions:

[*] ...between any two terms in a series, however close together they are, there is always a third term.
[*] ...mathematics can be applied to the world of nature; in other words that natural science is essentially an applied mathematics.
[*] Here the presupposition which makes him think about them in this way is stated by saying that he believes in the permanence or indestructibility of substance.

Of course the absolute presupposition of materialism is that matter - nowadays, matter/energy - are the only real substances. — Wayfarer

Agreed, but it's not the only absolute presupposition of a materialist approach to science.

It's not a mistake, so much as a very pervasive confusion in philosophy, in particular.

The everyday meaning of substance is 'a material with uniform properties'. Examples might be gases, plastics, metals, radioactive substances, etc. The difficulty is, 'substance' in philosophy has a different meaning, namely, 'the bearer of attributes'. — Wayfarer

I thought I was being clear. I hope I didn't confuse things. Thanks.

[1] We live in an ordered universe that can be understood by humans.
[2] The universe consists entirely of physical substances - matter and energy.
— Clarky

(1) is of greater antiquity than (2). The idea of an ordered universe was one of the motivating beliefs of the Greek philosophers and indeed of science wherever it was found. But (2) was until recently one view among others, proposed by the ancient atomists and other materialist philosophies. — Wayfarer

The issue, for the purposes of this discussion, is whether or not these two presuppositions are absolute presuppositions of a materialist point of view.

[7] Substances are indestructible, although they can change to something else.
— Clarky

What do you think is the meaning of 'substance' in this context? I ask this, because I think there is considerable confusion about the philosophical, as distinct from everyday, sense of the word 'substance'. It is related to Cartesian dualism as mentioned above. — Wayfarer

When I said "substance" I meant matter and energy. If the word is ambiguous in this context, that's my mistake.

Is that because you are an advocate of a materialist viewpoint?( Just curious) — Joshs

No, I'm not an advocate. I picked it because I thought it would be the easiest to discuss and also because I think it matches most people's, including scientist's, understandings of how science works.

The metaphysical universe is extremely consistent, albeit unproven. — Bird-Up

Are you saying that the universe is homogeneous? I think that's probably true. It is my understanding that matter is well distributed within the observable universe and the cosmic microwave background radiation is uniform in all directions. I think that is a scientific finding, not an underlying assumption.

Did you not mean to call the propositions in that list APs? — Mww

I am proposing the items in my list as the underlying assumptions, i.e. absolute presuppositions, of materialist/physicalist/realist physics. As I noted in the OP:

Collingwood wrote that absolute presuppositions are neither true nor false, but we won’t get into that argument here. — Clarky

Does that mean we can’t critique materialism — Joshs

The purpose of this thread is not to discuss the validity of a materialist viewpoint.

I am unsure about 5. — Tom Storm

Item 5 on my list - "The same scientific laws apply throughout the universe and at all times"

If by "unsure" you mean you're not sure it's true, of course you're not. There's no way you could be. But if it's not true, and if we can't at least act as if it were, we can't do science.

Not sure if this helps but generally the physicalists I know call themselves methodological naturalists as opposed to philosophical naturalists. — Tom Storm

From Wikipedia:

• Methodological naturalism - Naturalism that holds that science is to be done without reference to supernatural causes; also refers to a methodological assumption in the philosophy of religion that observable events are fully explainable by natural causes without reference to the supernatural.
• Metaphysical naturalism - form of naturalism that holds that the cosmos consists only of objects studied by the natural sciences, and does not include any immaterial or intentional realities

It seems like either one of these would be consistent with the absolute presuppositions I listed. Or was that your point?

I beg to differ. I've written dumber things. — Bitter Crank

If you need testimony to that effect, I'd be happy to help.

They are not internally blocking or hindering their own thought. They are reacting in a socially appropriate way to a situation that that might lead to conflict and trying to decide the best way to handle it. They have been asked a question that is polarizing and divisive and they don't know who their audience is or how their answer might be used for or against them. Their views on "what is a woman" might be very well formed and thought out, but they refrain from responding simply because they don't care to have that debate or advertise their position. — Hanover

Oh, good. Now I don't have to respond. Thanks.

Doing my best here to ferret out a locus of concurrence. — ZzzoneiroCosm

[irony]No need for concurrence. Just knowing I'm right is enough.[/irony]

Pragmatism (Peirce) already eliminated metaphysics, quite a long time ago I might add, by asking a simple question "does a metaphysical propositions's truth/falsity matter to us in any real, tangible way?" The answer was "no, it doesn't!"[ — Rocco Rosano

As R.G. Collingwood wrote long after Peirce, and as I quoted earlier in this thread:

Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or group of persons, on this or that occasion or group of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking.

Prop. 5. Absolute presuppositions are not propositions.

This is because they are never answers to questions; whereas a proposition is that which is stated, and whatever is stated is stated in answer to a question. The point I am trying to make clear goes beyond what I have just been saying, viz. that the logical efficacy of an absolute presupposition is independent of its being true: it is that the distinction between truth and falsehood does not apply to absolute presuppositions at all, that distinction being peculiar to propositions...

...Hence any question involving the presupposition that an absolute presupposition is a proposition, such as the questions ‘Is it true?’ ‘What evidence is there for it?’ ‘How can it be demonstrated?’ ‘What right have we to presuppose it if it can’t?’, is a nonsense question. — Clarky

Not, as a whole, an "exemplar," if you like. But it's defensible to hold that the Tao Te Ching has ontological, and therefore metaphysical, content. — ZzzoneiroCosm

For me, the Tao Te Ching is primarily, not incidentally, a metaphysical document. It is fundamentally about the nature of reality. Ontology. Metaphysics. Yes, I know I said I was done, but, like Popeye, that's all I can stands and I can't stands no more. Now I'm going to sleep.

Nuff said.

Ad hominem. — Wayfarer

Yes. I know I was bad. But I stand by my position that they both have mixed up their physics and their metaphysics.

it's mistaken to take the Tao Te Ching as an exemplar of the subject of metaphysics — Wayfarer

Here's a link to the SEP article on Chinese Metaphysics.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/chinese-metaphysics/

"Dao" is mentioned 43 times. Here's the first instance:

As far as we know, explicit metaphysical discussions began in China in the mid to late 4th century BCE with the Laozi (Daodejing) and associated texts.

I'll take them at their word. — Wayfarer

They're physicists, not philosophers. Most physicists don't take metaphysics seriously.

As the Tao Te Ching is amenable to vastly divergent interpretations, it makes sense that some folks call it metaphysics, others not so much. — ZzzoneiroCosm

It's a notoriously difficult word to define. I grant there's a vernacular definition of metaphysics which denotes a wide range of ideas from many different traditions and cultures, but I try to keep in mind the definition specific to European culture (e.g. here.) — Wayfarer

What could the Tao Te Ching be if it's not metaphysics? A literal description of the Ancient Chinese understanding of astronomy? A pretty poem I guess. As I said, I think this is too big a disagreement to be addressed here.

Tao Te Ching is not metaphysics per se. — Wayfarer

Of course it is. The whole theme of this thread is about whether it is possible to reason without metaphysics. It is clear to me it is not possible.

This is too big a disagreement to fit into this thread. We can take it up some other time.

It never happened in China — Wayfarer

Are you saying the Ancient Chinese didn't have metaphysics? If so, I'm surprised to hear you say it. The Tao Te Ching is pure metaphysics. The fact that it's poetic in form is not relevant.

There was nothing of the kind in the Tao Te Ching. — Wayfarer

Of course there was.

All things are born of being.
Being is born of non-being.

Therefore, by the Everlasting Non-Being,
We desire to observe its hidden mystery;
By the Everlasting Being,
We desire to observe the manifestations

So as these presuppositions evolve , so does scientific theory. — Joshs

Maybe the other way around or maybe they evolve together.