arndt@smurf.DEC (04/28/84)
Hey ho. Hi again. It's me. Ken from the Greyhound washroom in N.H.
Thanks for the replies. They certainly put my mind at rest.
However, let me describe an unexpected event that happened here at the ole
marble palace today.
I was mopping out the stalls like I always do, when this shabby derelict (he's
not a regular) goes by mumbling something about "Bishop Berkeley's balls".
Well, I started to hustle him right out the door! I run a straight place here.
A place you'd be proud to bring your family. On the way to the door a book
drops out of his pocket (he's got I don't know how many books with him - in a
bag he carries and in his pockets!) I picked it up to throw that out too and
what do you think, it's something called ANNALEN DER PHYSIK, by somebody named
Albert Einstein. It's all dog-eared and marked up. I figure its some foreign
dirty book that turns the guy on. (Gotta watch those foreigners in here, they
got funny habits. Not that I got anything against foreigners, you know, it's
just that I've had trouble with foreigners ever since I came to this country.)
Anyway, he blurts out that he's not a pervert but - hang on to your slide rules
gang - he's a physcist! Or was. Claims he was ruminating under his breath
about METAPHYSICAL CAUSES. Seems this Bishop Berkeley had a theory of
causation that included the concept that it took power to make a cause.
He was talking about two billiard balls, one striking the other because it
had the power to do so. Like the sun has the power to make things grow.
Like our ideas (sensations) being "inert" must be caused by some "active"
agent such as ourselves or God. (He showed it to me in another book in his
bag - A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Understanding,sec. 25-29)
By now he's got my attention and we have stopped our motion toward the door.
(What caused that? - forget it!) He starts bringing out books and going
through a history of modern ideas about causes. From An Enquiry Concerning
Human Understanding, Sections 4-7, which he waved under my nose , he says
a guy named Hume got rid of the idea of power and any necessary connection
between events. Moving on to Laws of Nature, & "uniformities", he whiped out
Thomas Reid, Essays on the Active Powers of the Human Mind, Essay 4, Ch.9
to show that "Laws" can never be shown to ALWAYS be in effect, ergo, is there
really such a thing as a law in nature? (I think he wanted me to say no.)
One thing follows another- but like night follows day, without causation.
[All this time I was looking through that dog-eared copy of PHYSIK. Couldn't
make much of it. It seems to me that this Einstein fellow was saying that if
you bent over at the waist while looking straight ahead, without any
obstruction in your line of sight and if you could see far enough you could
peep up your bum.]
He kept pulling out books and going on and on (I really wish one of you
guys had been here); it was getting towards lunch time, although I was't
as sure of that as before this guy started in.
Just to show him who he was up against I jumped in with, "So where's the beef?".
That slowed him down. I knew it would.
"The beef, my young bucolic friend, is that modern physics operates on the
basis of an INCOMPLETE INTERPRETIVE SCHEME."
"Oh yea", I said.
"Yea", he says. "They are reduced to being mere technicians,- tinkerers among
the machinery of the universe. Their minds are locked up by the idea that
causes do not exist as such but are only the formulation 'A follows B' on a
statistical basis. They actually believe that they are doing physics in a
vacuumn, without any reference to an intergrating philosophy or religion.
They worship probability and degrees of verification as a means to truth."
"Have you told them?", I asked, somehow knowing the answer.
"They did not listen, they're not listening now." (I thought I heard music)
"So what's wrong with probability or degrees of verification?" says I.
"Probability!", he shrieked.
Reaching for his bag of books he says, "It's highly problematic! For any
hypothesis there are an indefinite (if not infinite) number of test
consequences. Think of a simple example - looking at a physical object.
Verifying the statement, 'I see a physical object before me' involves an
(in principle) an endless number of possible perceivings of the object, both
personal and interpersonal (conformation of what I see by others). At any
point if the harmonious development of the perceptual process goes awry (say
the visual object turns out not to feel solid or others fail to perceive what
I perceive) doubt is cast on the belief, no matter how plausible it was
initially. The point is that if there are an indefinite number of test
instances for a hypothesis, then no mathematical formulation of its probability
is possible. (Try dividing a given number of confirming test instances, say
twenty five, by an indefinite number to see what probability you have achieved.
Of course, you cannot do it until you know what the indefinite number is, but
that is just what we do NOT know when testing a belief.)
If the number of test consequences trailing off into the future are counted
as being infinite, then the probability of a hypothesis can never rise above
zero.
Degree of verification fares no better. (He wrote down: p ] q
q
------
p
That is, p implies q; q; therefore p. This is invalid. On the basis
of q nothing at all can be said about p. It's called the fallacy,
'affirming the consequent'.
To justify any interpretation by extracting test consequences from it and
then affirming them falls into the trap of affirming the consequent. This
procedure does not verify the interpretation in question unless you already
know that NO OTHER INTERPRETATION COULD POSSIBLY ACCOUNT FOR THE POSITIVE
RESULT.
But while a hypothesis cannot be validly verified, it can be falsified.
'modus tollens'
However, even the falsification of an interpretation depends on having criteria
(tests) which the hypothesis might violate. How is it possible, then, to get
criteria to which all will agree? If we try to show that a given set of
criteria was the correct one, this would seem to involve a new set to evaluate
the first, ad infinitum. If we can't all agree then the essense of science
falls and we all live in our own universes.
[He said all this while waving Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations,p33-59
under my nose.]
What's left? Self-evidence? But all that is needed is for someone ELSE to
appeal to the self-evidence of another set of criteria.
Testing a hypothesis against the facts? Which facts? Under what interpretive
framework?
AND THERE IT IS!, he shouted. (Two men left hurriedly -I hadn't been watching)
Modern physics has no interpretive framework to make sense (by which to judge)
the 'lower' limited theories."
"You make them sound gutless", I said.
"No, that's not what I mean", he said. "I mean nothing less than that they
have no METAPHYSIC!!!" "No conceptual map of reality."
"Look here, young man, testing is contextual. An assertion standing alone
cannot be tested. A single statement is consistent or inconsistent in relation
to one or more other statements. Remember, our tests are - consistency,
coherence, comprehensiveness, and perhaps even congruity. Only an interpretive
scheme can be consistent, etc. An individual assertion can only be evaluated
by assessing the interpretive scheme to which it belongs, including this one.
The correctness of claims about what really exists can only be dealt with by
seeing their relations to a broader interpretive picture of reality which is,
METAPHYSICAL! Such claims always involve at least implicit metaphysical
assumptions, even when the one who makes them denies the possibility of
metaphysics.
The alternative to explicit metaphysics is not neutrality or no metaphysics,
but a naive and uncritical metaphysics."
[I started to move him toward the door again.]
"Allow me to sum up, young man."
"I reject all those positions which attempt to justify belief starting with
logical or experientially unshakable beliefs and using those as reasons for
holding other beliefs. Any such position which builds a structure of belief
on a foundation of undoubtable prior beliefs falls of its own weight.
Instead, I have argued for the view that beliefs are justified by inclusion in
a global (metaphysical) system of beliefs that is itself justified by meeting
the criteria of consistency, coherence, comprehensiveness, and congruity.
These are chosen as the best starting point because as soon as one opens ones'
mouth to do more than bark one agrees to a form of logic - A is not non-A, etc"
"The best of human knowledge consists of interpretive schemes (metaphysics)
which can withstand strong criticism. They are plausible and probable in the
non-mathematical sense. Open to continued testing,(I do not reference limited
theories with no metaphysic to fit into and give them meaning, but the
metaphysic itself is what I am talking about) such a scheme can show the
strength of its internal structure and its ability to illuminate experience."
(He was tearing pages out of Epistemology, by David Wolfe.)
"Ahh, if you're so smart, how come you live in your car with your family?",
I said.
"They didn't want to hear about 'religion' or 'philosophy'. They think they
can do science without them. They looked me right in the eye and told me
I was just a moving field of mass and energy- and if I keep it up I'll only
move in one direction. Out. I went home and tucked my little girl in for
the night and when she kissed my cheek and said 'I love you daddy' I could
not bring myself to beleive she was only a field as well. So I started to
look around for more than bubble traces in a tank."
"Well whatever you've found, you certainly are charming and colorful now",
I finished off the conversation with.
[By this time I had him to the door, which I quickly opened and chucked him
out. Hey, his isn't the only sad story here at the bus station.]
So what's he talkin' about guys? I mean is METAPHYSICS the long awaited
cure for constipation? Or was he standing a little too close to the pile?
It certainly was a singular experience talking to him.
Don't roll over on me now. Let's hear from someone.
Regards,
Ken Arndt
unbent@ecsvax.UUCP (04/30/84)
Ref: decwrl.7451 ==> This one belonged in net.philosophy. I've dumped a reply to it there. See ecsvax.2401. Yours for clearer concepts, --Jay Rosenberg Dept. of Philosophy ...mcnc!ecsvax!unbent Univ. of North Carolina Chapel Hill, NC 27514
rcd@opus.UUCP (Dick Dunn) (05/01/84)
But why, if Ken Arndt must present us with these long pseudo-philosophical
ramblings, must he post them separately to net.flame (?!), net.physics, and
who-knows-where-else-until-I-get-to-that-group.
--
...Relax...don't worry...have a homebrew. Dick Dunn
{hao,ucbvax,allegra}!nbires!rcd (303) 444-5710 x3086gwyn@brl-vgr.ARPA (Doug Gwyn ) (05/02/84)
I enjoyed your postings from the bus station. You have made it quite clear why philosophers have been so ignored by practicing physicists. However, it is not possible to work in science (or in life in general) without being guided by philosophical principles; if they are not deliberately chosen then they will very likely default to the prevailing cultural attitudes. I think some of the craziness in today's accepted science can be so explained. A better analysis of this than I am capable of appears in Ayn Rand's "Philosophy: Who Needs It". (Is this yet another besotted philosopher or does this one know what she's talking about? You decide.)
csc@watmath.UUCP (Computer Sci Club) (05/03/84)
Just a couple of points.
1) I very much like the idea of considering physics to be the construction
of models to predict experimental results. The success of a model to
be judged by its applicability and accuracy. Questions as to the
"reality" of such models are interesting and possibly important but
should be considered outside of Physics. Certainy no one can survive
without some kind of "metaphysic" (how does one define applicability
and accuracy otherwise) but many such "metaphysics" can be consistant
with the practice of physics as defined above. Naturaly p implies q;
q is obseved; therefore p; is a falacy. However p implies q; q is observed;
therefore p is a good model; is perfectly valid. If r also implies q
then r is also a good model. If p and r agree on all predictions of
experiments then questions as to the difference between p and r, and which
is more valid lie outside of physics. This, I understand from limited
reading in the subject is the essence of the "Copenhagen" viewpoint
championed by Bohr. (If I am wrong I am sure someone will correct me, this
is the net after all :-) )
2) It is true that if we make a finite number of observations of a random
process we cannot determine the underlying probability distribution.
(Although sampling thoery says that we can make estimations which are
very likely to be very close). But we can produce a model which
says that is we run experiment x, N times, we should get result x(1)
n(1) times; x(2) n(2) ... Then proceed to carry out the experiment and
see if the model is any good. Questions as to whether the outcome is
"really" random are only meaningful within physics if phrased: do there
exist deterministic models which also correctly predict experimental
results. (Experiments concerning the famous Bell inequality appear to
show that a certain class of deterministic models do not correctly predict
experimental results). Questions as to what is "really" going on may
be important to philosophers, and physisists as human beings but should
not concern Physics.
William Hughescrummer%AEROSPACE@sri-unix.UUCP (05/19/84)
From: Charlie Crummer <crummer@AEROSPACE> Ken, your ruminations are fascinating. I hope you publish them sometime. Charming and colorful indeed! When my kids get scared watching a TV program I say, comfortingly, that they are just seeing phosphor dots and detecting compressions and rarefactions in the air. It does wonders! Nothing means anything unless I say so! --Charlie