Is philosophy relevant to science?

[swansont]

This really makes no sense to me. If you (relativity theory) leave it as a non-entity, then you don't have to devise an experiment to test "it?"

You can just keep saying that mass distorts "it" without a hypothesis as to what "it" is? That looks like the ultimate "dodge" to me.

Like good ol' Cool Hand Luke said, "What we have here is a failure to communicate!"

 

Edit for clarification: The math describes the path (of masses mutually pulled by gravity.) And Einstein's math describing such paths was clearly an improvement over the Newtonian concept. But how is this mystery medium a required part of that improved theory and its math?

 

Once again I will point out that physics does not say there is a medium. You are just making that part up — repeatedly — which gives you an opportunity to complain about it — repeatedly. A straw man. Your underlying complaint would seem to be that science is not (or does not include) metaphysics.

 

If you think it's a dodge, then stop using your computer and gps and really any sort of technology, because science is the basis for all of that. It works. Your complaint about the reality of models applies to all of physics — energy isn't a substance, electric field lines aren't real, but they are not claimed to be. They are bookkeeping and they are useful in modeling how nature behaves. That is sufficient for science.

[Dekan]

The problem runs like this, To know the exact nature of the entities like space, time and matter one has to go beyond the senses to know them, thereof an experiment or a testable model to know their exact nature is not universal since everyone will not have the ability to see without using the sense organs. The mistakes where some people make is when they completely rubbish it as metaphysics, a hypothesis is regarded as metaphysics if it can neither be proved nor disproved. In this case we have a testable model but it is just not universal. Science takes mathematical models more seriously than any other models and it is not the only branch of philosophy or the only road we have, to know the reality. We have to shift our thoughts and consider other branches more seriously and this can be a new paradigm in human history.

 

I think a unified theory of everything will not come from scientists, it will come from real philosophers, who just don't think but actually experience and have a method to know the exact nature of all things as they are. I have to disagree with Kant, humans do have the epistemological knowledge to know the things as they are.

 

What one might call "pure" philosophers don't seem to do much good. Look at Aristotle. A historical disaster for physics, and especially Astronomy.

 

He retarded the progress of Astronomy for 1500 years. Because he had a "philosophical" idea, that planets ought to orbit in nice perfect circles. It took a scientist like Kepler to do the maths, using accurate observational data provided by Brahe. And show the planets actually move in ellipitical orbits. Which made Newton's further insights possible.

 

Philosophers deserve some respect. At least they think about things. But just thinking doesn't get very far.

 

I think you've touched on the point, by suggesting that there must be actual experience, and a method to know the exact nature of things as they are. Which sounds a pretty good definition of how experimental Science works. What needs to be added, is a dash of Philosophy. But not too much!

[JustinW]

What one might call "pure" philosophers don't seem to do much good. Look at Aristotle. A historical disaster for physics, and especially Astronomy.

 

He retarded the progress of Astronomy for 1500 years. Because he had a "philosophical" idea, that planets oughtto orbit in nice perfect circles. It took a scientist like Kepler to do the maths, using accurate observational data provided by Brahe. And show the planets actually move in ellipitical orbits. Which made Newton's further insights possible.

I disagree with the statement that Aristotle retarded astronomy for 1500 years. Just because he had the idea doesn't mean he was responsible for someone else not proving it wrong. In fact I would go as far as to blame everyone but Aristotle, because no one challenged the idea for so long and put it to the test. I also believe philosophers deserve a great deal of respect.(the good ones at least) It was that form of logical thinking that made so many things possible.

[owl]

If i may back up to yesterday's unanswered questions and Cap 'n R and I going around in circles...

 

Cap ‘n R in post 17:

So unless the nature of the "entity" of spacetime actually changes its observable behavior, there's nothing for science to test.

 

“...It’s observable behavior ?” What is being observed but the paths of objects effected by gravity?

 

End of my post 16:

But how is this mystery medium a required part of that improved theory and its math?

(Einstein's improved gravity equations over Newton.)

 

End of my post 20:

No, there is no experiment to test whether spacetime is an entity in the material world, because it isn't! But relativity insists that "it" is distorted by mass anyway. Surely you see how this makes no sense.

Cap 'n R;

How could I experimentally determine this? (Ed: that spacetime is not an entity in the material world.)

 

The non-entity-ness of spacetime would not prevent me from making highly accurate predictions about the universe. Making predictions about the universe is all science claims to do.

 

One can not 'prove the negative.' If "it" did exist, the burden of proof would be on its theorists to prove that "it" does exist.

 

Again, if "it" doesn't exist, then the claim that mass distorts "it" is ludicrous.

Take a look at M-theory's strings. Do they exist? No one will ever observe "them," so the "theory" is safe from being falsified, but many think that it is metaphysics without the possibility of scientific verification, not science. Yet they say that the complex math ends up with the same value on each side of the equation, so it has some kind of internal integrity as math without the "dimensions" having referents in the material universe. The same can be said for (against) "spacetime."

[PeterJ]

If Aristotle set back astronomy by 1500 years then astronomers must be complete rubbish at doing not just philosophy abut also astronomy.

[owl]

Cap 'n R:

For example, there's no experiment I can do to prove that spacetime is made of one kind of substance or another. I can, however, prove that the universe behaves as though it were made of a four-dimensional spacetime with certain mathematical properties.

Here is where the philosophy of science is relevant. Relativity constantly uses the term "spacetime" without a 'real world referent' as you do above, and claims that mass distorts it, even though "it" is nothing but the concept that time and space coalesce into ?something?, a conceptual four dimensional manifold, that is distorted by mass.

So, in the material universe, what are the 'mechanics' by which this non-entity, distorted by mass, "guides" matter and light into curved paths? This is a fair question which deserves an answer, not the usual 'dodge.'

[PeterJ]

The problem runs like this, To know the exact nature of the entities like space, time and matter one has to go beyond the senses to know them, thereof an experiment or a testable model to know their exact nature is not universal since everyone will not have the ability to see without using the sense organs.

Yes. I wouldn't disagree that we would have to 'go beyond the senses' to actually know. But I think we can think about what might be true. Space and time only exist for the senses, so to go beyond the senses would entail going beyond space and time. If it is possible to do this, as you suggest, then space and time are not fundamental, and some phenomenon accessible to us by some other means than our senses would have to be prior. I think this is pretty much Kant's and Hegel's reasoning, by which they arrive at this pre-spatiotemporal phenomenon as a unity, so it is certainly possible to theorise about this and yet still allow that you are right, we cannot actually know our theory is true without empirical knowledge. But this is true of all theories.

 

The mistakes where some people make is when they completely rubbish it as metaphysics, a hypothesis is regarded as metaphysics if it can neither be proved nor disproved.

Yes. It is a big mistake in my opinion also. But I would not agree that an hypothesis is metaphysical if it can be neither proved nor disproved. It is usually quite easy to disprove metaphysical statements. That's the whole problem with them. It is not that we can't decide which of, say, Materialism and Idealism is false and which is true. It is that we can falsify both of them quite easily. Your view is common, but to me it seems incorrect. Carnap rejected metaphysics because he could not find a metaphysical position he could not refute.

 

I think a unified theory of everything will not come from scientists, it will come from real philosophers, who just don't think but actually experience and have a method to know the exact nature of all things as they are. I have to disagree with Kant, humans do have the epistemological knowledge to know the things as they are.

Hmm. I think Kant may have been closer to agreeing with you than you might imagine. Note how quickly Hegel extended his view to reach your position. For what seems to be your view, to know things as they really are would be to know the voidness of phenomena, which is not far from what Kant proposed.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Here is where the philosophy of science is relevant. Relativity constantly uses the term "spacetime" without a 'real world referent' as you do above, and claims that mass distorts it, even though "it" is nothing but the concept that time and space coalesce into ?something?, a conceptual four dimensional manifold, that is distorted by mass.

So, in the material universe, what are the 'mechanics' by which this non-entity, distorted by mass, "guides" matter and light into curved paths? This is a fair question which deserves an answer, not the usual 'dodge.'

I'll refer you back to the second part of post 21 and swansont's addition.

 

Furthermore, suppose you do formulate the "mechanics" by which spacetime guides matter and light into curved paths -- something beyond what general relativity provides. How will you test your hypothesis?

[swansont]

Philosophers deserve some respect. At least they think about things. But just thinking doesn't get very far.

 

I think you've touched on the point, by suggesting that there must be actual experience, and a method to know the exact nature of things as they are. Which sounds a pretty good definition of how experimental Science works. What needs to be added, is a dash of Philosophy. But not too much!

 

That's the essence, I think. Philosophy is based on a premise, but unless that premise is tested in some way, you don't know if the logic actually applies to the real world. Science tests.

[tar]

PeterJ,

 

I don't find eastern philosophy implausable. It is most likely absolutely correct, as is, in my thinking, everybody's philosophy. My problem with it, is the same problem I have with everybody's philosophy (including my own), and that is, that they are the ones that see it correctly, and everybody else is missing the point.

 

My current investigation is to understand the common "meaning". Why and how we think what and how we think.

 

I do not think the universe changes all that much, depending on what we think of it. However we would not think at all, without it.

 

If I do not accept eastern philosopy as plausable, I would have to abandon my investigation and all its premises with it.

 

Each thing that eastern philosphy says. I can understand in "my" terms. So they are not saying anything that I do not already find very plausable.

 

As I said, my objection is to the attitude that you know something I don't. That you have grasped its total nature, and I am just wallowing about clueless. (you being the shaman, or the monk, or the Buddah, or some other person in touch with the "true" nature of reality.)

 

 

My theory is, that we all, already get it. We are just trying to figure out what the heck to do about it.

 

Regards, TAR2

[Appolinaria]

Not relevant at all. The addition of the "philosophy" section was completely random.

 

 

They spun a wheel. The other options were; Culinary Arts, Claymation, L.A.R.P.-ing 101.

Edited November 19, 2011 by Appolinaria

[PeterJ]

Tar - I'm not sure how you can say that you take mysticism seriously when what you say contradicts it so directly. Feint praise methinks.

 

For instance, you say - "I don't find eastern philosophy implausable. It is most likely absolutely correct, as is, in my thinking, everybody's philosophy."

 

This comment makes no sense to me at all. Have I misunderstood it? It seems to say that the truth is whatever we want to believe it is. This view would understandably horrify a scientist. If you mean there's some truth in all philosophies then maybe you're right, but all of our philosophies will be wrong except one. At any rate, this postmodern idea is in direct opposition to the idea that mysticism is worth taking seriously. It's doctrine is either true or false, and it is not a matter of opinion.

 

I see your problem is, "the same problem I have with everybody's philosophy (including my own), and that is, that they are the ones that see it correctly, and everybody else is missing the point."

 

But of course they think they see it correctly. Indeed, often they say they know they do. Why else would they argue for the truth of their view? Are you saying it is not possible to know the truth? This would make 'eastern' philosophy a load of rubbish. It seems to contradict even your own view about knowledge.

 

My arrogant opinion is that the reason why philosophy gets such a bad rap is that the way we do it is wrong and certain to fail. Physics was transformed in the early twentieth century, yet philosophy remains as it was in 1750, as if nothing at all has happenened in physics in the meantime. Clearly it is time for philosophy to move on, yet here we are, still writing footnotes to Plato. It's not surprising that we tend to dismiss our philosophy for being innefective. It obviously is. But this is not a criticism of philosophy, just our approach to it.

 

Physics has never contradicted a philosophical result, so there is no reason to suppose our philosophical reasoning cannot be trusted, or is not a safe guide to the truth. As far as I can tell it is a precise and accurate way to establish the nature of the world, and I would say that it is a terrible mistake and massively counterproductive for scientists to assume it is not. Trouble is, professional philosophy is in such a mess that it is all too easy to make this assumption.

[swansont]

Physics has never contradicted a philosophical result, so there is no reason to suppose our philosophical reasoning cannot be trusted, or is not a safe guide to the truth. As far as I can tell it is a precise and accurate way to establish the nature of the world, and I would say that it is a terrible mistake and massively counterproductive for scientists to assume it is not. Trouble is, professional philosophy is in such a mess that it is all too easy to make this assumption.

 

What? The example Aristotle and circular orbits was given in this very thread.

[PeterJ]

Aristotle's circular orbits were not a philosophical result. Obviously not, since otherwise philosophers would still be arguing for circular orbits. They were a conjecture.

[immortal]

I think you've touched on the point, by suggesting that there must be actual experience, and a method to know the exact nature of things as they are. Which sounds a pretty good definition of how experimental Science works. What needs to be added, is a dash of Philosophy. But not too much!

 

I think we need more than that, we need new physics, I'm on the side of Penrose, Einstein and others. I was very conscious when I made that statement since I have some serious doubts as to whether science can really model the objective world in the first place with its current scientific attitude. The more we have dwelled in comprehending the working of the nature the more is the evidence that the things what ever out there is very much different from the things what we imagine in our models or the things taught in our schools. With Bell's inequality disproving the objectivity of the world that the properties of an object always exist irrespective of an observer we hardly have a picture of what the hell is happening.

 

 

We have to learn from the positivist approach of Quantum Physics which is very strict on what the theory claims to explain and what the theory predicts.

 

A quote from Niels Bohr.

Every atomic phenomenon is closed in the sense that its observation is based on registrations obtained by means of suitable amplification devices with irreversible functions such as, for example, permanent marks on a photographic plate caused by the pentration of the electrons into the emulsion.

 

"From this point of view, the function of quantum physics is to make statistical predictions about the outcome of experiments and we should not attribute any truth value to any experiments we may draw about the nature of the quantum system itself" - Alastair I.M. Rae

 

 

I don't think Einstein was kidding when he said that all events are always happening and our notion of past, present and future is a mere illusion. He would have never took back that statement easily.

 

But the picture given by quantum physics is something else it forces us to model ourselves (i.e the state of the observer) in order to model the objective world. We need a way to predict the next firing in the neuron of the brain or the next choice of the observer, we're an integral part of the system and to model the universe from the begining till the end we need to model ourselves.

 

Now if science claims to give an objective account of reality it has to model the observer as indicated by QM who is beyond science itself.

 

The positivist approach might have helped in explaining various phenomena like superconductivity, superfluidity, bose-einstein condensates etc but it doesn't satisfy people like Einstein and Penrose.

 

 

Yes. I wouldn't disagree that we would have to 'go beyond the senses' to actually know. But I think we can think about what might be true. Space and time only exist for the senses, so to go beyond the senses would entail going beyond space and time. If it is possible to do this, as you suggest, then space and time are not fundamental, and some phenomenon accessible to us by some other means than our senses would have to be prior. I think this is pretty much Kant's and Hegel's reasoning, by which they arrive at this pre-spatiotemporal phenomenon as a unity, so it is certainly possible to theorise about this and yet still allow that you are right, we cannot actually know our theory is true without empirical knowledge. But this is true of all theories.

 

 

Hmm. I think Kant may have been closer to agreeing with you than you might imagine. Note how quickly Hegel extended his view to reach your position. For what seems to be your view, to know things as they really are would be to know the voidness of phenomena, which is not far from what Kant proposed.

 

 

Yes. It is a big mistake in my opinion also.

 

The distinction made by Immanuel Kant between the phenomenon and the noumenon was itself a big paradigm and I have repeatedly posted about this and the attitude of the physicists in here and in my blog, I don't like to name it since it is against the rules of this site to advertise one's posts. Yes without the kantian philosophy my whole view will be baseless. Kant completely overthrew metaphysics stating that a synthetic a priori statement was not possible in metaphysics since it required to go beyond the senses, that's the only point where I disagree with him. But he was absolutely right in pointing out that one needed both experience as well as reason to model the reality. Yes its not far from his views.

 

But I would not agree that an hypothesis is metaphysical if it can be neither proved nor disproved. It is usually quite easy to disprove metaphysical statements. That's the whole problem with them. It is not that we can't decide which of, say, Materialism and Idealism is false and which is true. It is that we can falsify both of them quite easily. Your view is common, but to me it seems incorrect. Carnap rejected metaphysics because he could not find a metaphysical position he could not refute.

 

I was saying it from the context of science where a model which can not be testified under basic axioms of science was considered to be metaphysical. Ofcourse one could disprove it with other metaphysical arguments.

 

 

I don't find eastern philosophy implausable. It is most likely absolutely correct, as is, in my thinking, everybody's philosophy. My problem with it, is the same problem I have with everybody's philosophy (including my own), and that is, that they are the ones that see it correctly, and everybody else is missing the point.

 

My current investigation is to understand the common "meaning". Why and how we think what and how we think.

 

I do not think the universe changes all that much, depending on what we think of it. However we would not think at all, without it.

 

If I do not accept eastern philosopy as plausable, I would have to abandon my investigation and all its premises with it.

 

Each thing that eastern philosphy says. I can understand in "my" terms. So they are not saying anything that I do not already find very plausable.

 

As I said, my objection is to the attitude that you know something I don't. That you have grasped its total nature, and I am just wallowing about clueless. (you being the shaman, or the monk, or the Buddah, or some other person in touch with the "true" nature of reality.)

 

 

My theory is, that we all, already get it. We are just trying to figure out what the heck to do about it.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

I don't like to drag this too much in this thread but to have the ability to know the reality would mean to be able to manipulate it and one can go on to create a parallel world if you would like to, when you have reached that state you are no longer interested in knowing anything or doing anything because you know everything that's the beauty of it, infact they can look into the future but they are not interested in it and so it has to be ensured that a knowledge like that should not go into wrong hands and therefore one has to have a pure mind and body in order to know the reality. We all have conditional access to reality one has to prepare one's mind and body to know the reality, one should earn it. If not people like you and me will be pushed out from the door to reality.

 

 

 

[tar]

Immortal,

If not people like you and me will be pushed out from the door to reality.

 

 

Not sure what you mean by that.

But an investigation of the "meaning" behind language is what I am currently involved with.

 

I have as a standard in this investigation, that everybody, meaning all humans, are just that, humans.

 

Outside of gross deformities, accidents, and disease, all humans have remarkably similar equipment.

We did not get this equipment by accident or gift. We developed it, because it worked, it fit, it allowed us to stick around.

 

There is a difference between the universes I can create in my mind, and the "actual" universe. I can "manipulate" the models in my mind, far more easily than the actual uninverse/world that I derive my models from.

 

But I am not without the ability to manipulate the actual world.

 

The current hypothesis I am working on is that our internal sense/motor neural arrangement that allows us to monitor and control our own bodies, can be, and has been extended, by various methods to attempt the same thing with items in the real world, outside of our bodies. Pack hunting, farming, building shelters, roads, ships, smoke signals, vehicles, tools, equipment, machines, sensing devices and measurement schemes. All in some sense, extentions of our sensing and motor control skills.

 

But here the difference between the world we model, and the actual world becomes evident and crucial to differenciate between. You can imagine going out with a movie star. So can a million others. But only one (or so) people at a time can actually go out, with the actual movie star.

 

What is done in ones mind does not have to fit reality. What is done in reality actually does exactly fit reality.

 

What is done in ones mind has little effect on reality, outside of some expenditure of energy, and some synapse rearrangement in ones own skull. Things can be gotten wrong, gotten right, work or not work, and easily changed.

 

But out in the real world, past the limits of our neural connections, once done, the manipulation is permanent and real.

You break the vase, and you own it.

 

I go through all that, just to let you know, that I don't know what you mean by "pushed out from the door to reality".

 

By my thinking there is no door between my mind and reality. My brain is real, my senses pick up real actual patterns from and about reality and perceive them and store them in an analog fashion as to represent rather acurately what is going on around me. I can build maps and models of it, use transforms and analogies, and get a pretty good "idea" of what it is that I am in and of. I can put "myself" in the shoes of any entity I chose, and imagine what they might be experiencing. I can "imagine" unseen others.

 

It is in light of these thoughts that I "understand" other's philosophies, religion and psychology.

And from my personal point of view, the scientific method is a fine way for us to utilize the explorations of reality that others have made, and to add those explorations to my own understanding of the nature of "the thing in itself".

 

People like me and you? Absolutely. That's everybody.

 

Regards, TAR2

Edited November 20, 2011 by tar

[immortal]

Not sure what you mean by that.

But an investigation of the "meaning" behind language is what I am currently involved with.

 

I have as a standard in this investigation, that everybody, meaning all humans, are just that, humans.

 

Outside of gross deformities, accidents, and disease, all humans have remarkably similar equipment.

We did not get this equipment by accident or gift. We developed it, because it worked, it fit, it allowed us to stick around.

 

There is a difference between the universes I can create in my mind, and the "actual" universe. I can "manipulate" the models in my mind, far more easily than the actual uninverse/world that I derive my models from.

 

But I am not without the ability to manipulate the actual world.

 

The current hypothesis I am working on is that our internal sense/motor neural arrangement that allows us to monitor and control our own bodies, can be, and has been extended, by various methods to attempt the same thing with items in the real world, outside of our bodies. Pack hunting, farming, building shelters, roads, ships, smoke signals, vehicles, tools, equipment, machines, sensing devices and measurement schemes. All in some sense, extentions of our sensing and motor control skills.

 

What is done in ones mind does not have to fit reality. What is done in reality actually does exactly fit reality.

 

What is done in ones mind has little effect on reality, outside of some expenditure of energy, and some synapse rearrangement in ones own skull. Things can be gotten wrong, gotten right, work or not work, and easily changed.

 

But out in the real world, past the limits of our neural connections, once done, the manipulation is permanent and real.

You break the vase, and you own it.

 

I go through all that, just to let you know, that I don't know what you mean by "pushed out from the door to reality".

 

By my thinking there is no door between my mind and reality. My brain is real, my senses pick up real actual patterns from and about reality and perceive them and store them in an analog fashion as to represent rather acurately what is going on around me. I can build maps and models of it, use transforms and analogies, and get a pretty good "idea" of what it is that I am in and of. I can put "myself" in the shoes of any entity I chose, and imagine what they might be experiencing. I can "imagine" unseen others.

 

It is in light of these thoughts that I "understand" other's philosophies, religion and psychology.

And from my personal point of view, the scientific method is a fine way for us to utilize the explorations of reality that others have made, and to add those explorations to my own understanding of the nature of "the thing in itself".

 

People like me and you? Absolutely. That's everybody.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

According to mystics the brain and the mind are two different things, they are dualists. Yes the synaptic plasticity of the brain will help us to learn things and manipulate the stuff of nature as you have mentioned in the OP which is very much real but mystics claim that seeing through the eyes is not the only way to know things there is an another way which is as real as the former one is by seeing without the sense organs. There has to be a reality which is fundamental and which we can not know of, this might interest you as you want to understand what we know of and how we know what.

 

 

 

They view the mind as a tightly held rope with the five senses attached to one end and the intelligence attached at the other end. They don't see intelligence as something associated with the brain instead they see it as physical entities existing in their own realm like platonic values. This model is based upon the individual experiences of persons who have observed the mind. Note that there is nothing associated with the brain or any other signals, it doesn't come into the picture at all.

 

 

 

If one has to have mystical experiences then they have to detach the connection between the mind and the sense organs. Now the mind appears as a fallen rope and only then we can experience the noumenal world otherwise we'll be seeing the phenomenal world as we see through our eyes. This is the reason why such people abstain themselves from worldly pleasures. It is normally believed that the more pleasure you give to your sense organs more is the strength of the connection between the mind and the sense organs so in order to gain knowledge about the noumenal world through experiences one has to refrain himself from desiring worldly pleasures.

 

But here the difference between the world we model, and the actual world becomes evident and crucial to differenciate between. You can imagine going out with a movie star. So can a million others. But only one (or so) people at a time can actually go out, with the actual movie star.

 

Nothing is what it seems, if the movie star can appear in many places at once then he can obviously go out with as many people as he could. It is these things like quantum teleportation, looking into the future and many other things which begs the question is there something more fundamental than what we can see through our eyes.

 

I hope by now you can understand what I meant when I said that we'll be pushed from the door to reality, this isn't the only reality that exists.

Edited November 20, 2011 by immortal

[PeterJ]

Immortal, no offence meant, but are you quite sure you can speak with such authority? Some of your explanation made me think you could have been a little more modest.

 

'... there has to be a reality which is fundamental and which we can not know of.'

 

I suppose it depends what you mean, but for most interpretations this would seem nothing to do with the perennial philosophy. It's the phrase 'we can not know of'. The entire message of the view you are claiming to represent is that there is a knowledge beyond that which 'we' can 'know of'. I'd rather believe 'Aurobindo, for whom 'The Unknown is not the Unknowable'.

 

You continue,

 

'...this might interest you as you want to understand what we know of and how we know what.'

 

Did you really mean to suggest that you personally understand how we understand things, and know how we know what we know? If so, then I apologise for finding it difficult to believe you. I believe that this knowledge is possible, where many people here would doubt it, but it is usually more obvious from their words when a person has such knowledge. It's not your view that bothers me, it's your claim to represent my view when it is not the same as yours.

 

How could you know how we know things, which would require knowing just about everything there is to know, and at the same time know that there is a reality, or a part of our reality, about which you know nothing whatsoever and never will? It doesn't seem add up.

Edited November 21, 2011 by PeterJ

[immortal]

PeterJ,

 

You have missed my point, In the earlier post I had said that we have conditional access to reality, we can not know the fundamental reality but it is not impossible, we don't have a free access to it, we have to earn it. To know the fundamental reality one has to start interacting with the world without using the sense organs and turn the mind inwards, it is this part of the process which is the most difficult and there's not quite a lot of people who can show you your mind and we don't have much knowledge of how this can be done so that the sciences can predict it, it is in this context which I meant that we can not know of the fundamental reality, I didn't said it was impossible to know it or never will.

 

Yes ofcourse we can know about everything that there is and as for the authority of it is concerned I'm trying to find an universal way of how this can be done, till then I know no one would believe it and its not right on me either to expect everyone to believe in it, as I have said in my posts I made those statements based on persons who have observed the mind and how it is associated with the platonic intelligence and I'm quite crystal sure about the authority of those persons. But this is not enough to make the scientific community believe in it. I apologize if I was not modest here.

Edited November 21, 2011 by immortal

[tar]

Immortal,

 

Perhaps my memory of Plato is rather flakey, being that I probably read and thought about him in college which was 30 years ago. But I have since understood "the cave" and the "shadows", as having to do with the way we sense the world in terms of analog "representations". Like a shadow. Same shape, same movement, same relationship between various shadows. This of course means that there is something casting the shadow. But I have understood this to be the nature of our understanding. What we experience is a representation of the thing as it is. A rather good one on a lot of scores. But we have to learn through these experiences. The outside world is available to us in this manner. We can think about these things, and consider how they all fit together, and they are absolutely existant. But we can not know them directly, with out the sensing of them, and the thinking about them, and the figuring of our relationship to them.

 

I am quite disheartened by the flight inward, and the very often suggested idea that we are a ghost in the machine.

That there is a reality more important than this one that we should escape to. Or as you put it, if we disown our attachment to the senses, we can just communicate with the real reality directly.

 

I do not think this makes scientific sense. The universe is just as magnificient if we accept the small portions of it that we can sense, and imagine the rest in analogy. What use do we have of a reality that we can not sense?

 

Not that I do not have a "feeling" that I am attached to reality in a more permanent manner than my short lifetime would demand. But the beauty is in the fact that we are part of it. Why disown what we have achieved, in favor of a dream.

 

Which is better?

 

A. Sitting in a dark room imagining a reality only you can see.

B. Sitting outside on a cool clear evening looking at the stars, which we are all under.

 

Regards, TAR2

[PeterJ]

Tar - Bear in mind that for the 'nondual' view there would be two worlds, but the two worlds would, at the limit, be one. We cannot escape reality, we are in it. But we can see it for what it is, and not fall for the wysiwyg view proposed by so many philosophers. We would not be disowning reality for a dream, we would be doing exactly the opposite. Hence the idea of the Matrix, which is based on Buddhist ideas. Holding this view, or seeing the world in this way, is not to abandon it but to embrace it. We can note that Jesus says the kingdom of heaven is laid out on the Earth but men do not see it. He does not say heaven requires leaving the planet or no longer enjoying the stars at night.

 

You don't like the flight inwards, so you choose the flight outwards. But for the practioner both the inward and outward arrows would be important.

 

This idea that we should 'disown our attachment to our senses', as you put it, is not quite right. Our senses cannot be disowned, we'd starve to death in no time. This is especially true when we consider that for Buddhists the mind is counted as a sense. What we are asked to do is examine the process by which our senses operate and produce mental phenomenona, and not to simply take those phenomena as given. The senses are not ignored, and Budhhism's Abbidhamma pitaka gives an extensive analysis of their operation and results.

 

 

Immortal - You write - 'Yes of course we can know about everything that there is'. Hmm. Again you claim more than I think you mean to. It is one thing to say that the literature claims we can know everything there is to know. This is verifiable by anyone who can read. But it is quite another to state that we can do this. I feel that appeals to personal experience are out of place in a science forum even if they are genuine.

[swansont]

Aristotle's circular orbits were not a philosophical result. Obviously not, since otherwise philosophers would still be arguing for circular orbits. They were a conjecture.

 

I can accept that under the realization that philosophy cannot make statements about the physical world. Thus, philosophy cannot be falsified by experiment, which draws a clear line between it and science.

 

Otherwise it sounds like the no true Scotsman fallacy.

[PeterJ]

Sorry, but I see it differently. The results of philosophy can be tested and are tested on a daily basis by physicists. For example, all attempts to experimentally prove Materialism fail. No substance can be found at the heart of matter. Or not yet. The testing continues. If nothing is found this will vindicate logical anaysis. If scientists had found atoms to be billiard ball planetariums then philosophy would have been tested abd failed, and many other findings would have the same consequences. I'd say it is not obvious that science tests philosophical theories mainly because if they are any good they never fail.

[swansont]

Sorry, but I see it differently. The results of philosophy can be tested and are tested on a daily basis by physicists. For example, all attempts to experimentally prove Materialism fail. No substance can be found at the heart of matter. Or not yet. The testing continues. If nothing is found this will vindicate logical anaysis. If scientists had found atoms to be billiard ball planetariums then philosophy would have been tested abd failed, and many other findings would have the same consequences. I'd say it is not obvious that science tests philosophical theories mainly because if they are any good they never fail.

 

So then why is the idea of circular orbits a conjecture rather than philosophy that was proven wrong?

[owl]

Cap ‘n R, in post 21:

However, it is not necessarily true that the components of the models -- such as various mathematical concepts used to compute their predictions -- correspond to physical entities in reality.

 

The philosophy of science questions the relevance of the models to the real world, including what relativity means by “spacetime is distorted by mass.”

 

You say:

I can, however, prove that the universe behaves as though it were made of a four-dimensional spacetime with certain mathematical properties.

 

When relativity adopted a non-Euclidean “model”, it was a concept of a four dimensional spacetime manifold without a referent in the real world for how space combined with time to “make” such a malleable “whatever” which is curved by mass and guides masses in curved paths.

What it is does matter? And if it remains just an abstract concept, then how is it necessary to the math describing how mass attracts mass (and light) to create curved paths. In other words, how does the observed “behavior” of masses in curved paths around other masses require a “four dimensional spacetime manifold” to make the improved predictive math work? If "it" is nothing, really, then Occam's razor can cut it out, and nothing will be changed.

You say:

If two different explanations produce exactly the same results, how can I distinguish between them through experiment?

 

Since Earth orbits the Sun “as if’” gravity simply pulled on it constantly (without even knowing how it works), why is it necessary to introduce the concept of a four dimensional spacetime manifold, a non-entity to explain it?

 

Do you believe that such orbits follow intrinsically straight lines within an “extrinsically” curved manifold, (“spacetime”) as non-Euclidean geometry and cosmology asserts? Or are all these orbits just like they look, following curved, elliptical paths through empty space. Science doesn't care what space is (or time) but mass makes "it" (spacetime) curve?

 

This is a philosophical challenge to the non-Euclidean nonsense that planetary orbits are straight lines through curved space.

 

I'll refer you back to the second part of post 21 and swansont's addition.

 

Furthermore, suppose you do formulate the "mechanics" by which spacetime guides matter and light into curved paths -- something beyond what general relativity provides. How will you test your hypothesis?

Reviewed the links. Summary: Physics models don't need real world referents, and the ontological inquiry into what the hell science is talking about when it refers to space, time, and spacetime is not relevant.

 

Since the ontology I have studied in depth sees time (not an entity) as only event duration as thing move around and space as the volume (not an entity per se but the emptyness between things) through which they move, I will never hypothesize that

" spacetime guides matter and light into curved paths..."

 

The burden of proof remains with relativity, as the theory endorsing spacetime as "that" which guides things in their curved paths... to explain how that happens. Does "it" have grooves in it that guides stuff or what? How does "it" influence things to follow "its" curvature?

 

I think that quantum mechanics will blow "curved spacetime" right out of the water eventually. The "mechanics" requiring intermediate particles or "strings" or "the curved fabric of spacetime", or whatever will give way to "action at a distance", just like entangled particles, and science, I think, will give up on requiring intermediate particles or media like spacetime to "explain" gravity.

 

Not relevant at all. The addition of the "philosophy" section was completely random.

 

 

They spun a wheel. The other options were; Culinary Arts, Claymation, L.A.R.P.-ing 101.

So epistemology* is not relevant to science?

* Wiki:

....The branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope (limitations) of knowledge.

 

*What is knowledge?

*How is knowledge acquired?

*How do we know what we know?

 

So your philosophy is like "who cares?" Maybe something like, "Because Einstein (or whatever authority or textbook) said so" is enough for folks like you?