biep@cs.vu.nl (J. A. "Biep" Durieux) (08/06/87)
[Reactions to areticles of Sarge Gerbode, Frank Adams and Robin Faichney.
Bob Myers, I am not forgetting you, just still busy working out my article.]
To Sarge Gerbode:
Does every science try to arrive at universal laws? Do you consider
taxonomy (e.g. in biology) a science? Archaeology? Paleontology?
I don't know quite what you hide under "empirical", but I have a feeling
there is a lot of methodological stuff over there, about how to set up
experiments, what logic to use, etc. E.g. I suppose it will include the
rule "let rational arguments prevale over emotional ones". But then again,
perhaps you catch those things with "general consensus" (so if most people
preferred some sort of emotional argument, that would be scientific too,
since there would be a general consensus). But then again, perhaps I am
plain wrong with all this.
--
To Frank Adams:
I don't know how biased my view of mathematics is, having a masters
in it (which might constitute a very valid cause of bias!).
My teachers have always warned me not to take anything for granted without
being aware of doing so. And read the start of the Principia Mathematica,
where the "proofs" are not used to make the result credible, but, the result
already being credible, to make the (their) notion of "proof" credible.
But I yield you, that most mathematicians will most of the time take things
for granted, in the sense most Christians will most of the time (outside
praying, Bible studies, etc - also the math.ians outside studying the
fundamentals) not think about God: they are just too busy doing other things.
But if you ask them...
Perhaps it's just the somewhat philosophical nature of the university (Leiden)
that made me being warned.
--
To Robin Faichney:
[While re-reading the following I get the impression it sounds very negative
and attacking. It isn't meant a such; I just try to find holes in the de-
finition in the hope someone can come up with either additional clauses,
or a split in the definition ("in fact there are two notions 'philosophy',
one that...") or just a new definition.
Of course, if you just answer "I don't consider all those things proper
philosophy", then the duscussion is over, too.]
>Philosophy is the activity of attempting to discover and/or propagate
>conceptual truths
>
>where a conceptual truth is one which is true by definition (a tautology) or
>whose logical premises are conceptual truths.
>
>Thus formal logic, when dealing only with concepts, is the `purest' form of
>philosophy. Other forms of philosophy are less formal, but (hopefully) still
>logical methods of juggling concepts. Before the rise of experimental
>methodology, all serious thinking was philosophical. (Which is not to say
>that it was good philosophy.) When a branch of philosophy began to have
>(or be capable of having) its theories tested by experimentation, it became
>a science.
I like the part about concepts, but don't feel happy with the notion of
"truth", especially in the way you link it with logics.
I think in this way you cut off the more fundamental parts of philosophy.
What about thinking about whether "truth" is a valid notion? What about
ethics, aesthetics? Of course, logicians have tried to set up deontic and
other logics, but then again, an aestheticist might view truth in terms of
beauty. In a former article you accused someone of provincialism; take care
of not falling into logicians' provincialism. [Is provincialism the right
word? I mean the stand of seeing ones own ideas, discipline, etc. better
than others']
If you succeed describing reality in terms of models and truth, and I succeed
in describing it in terms of good and bad, or of ugly and beautiful, or
whatever, who says your description is better?
What about (Hegel-like) dialectic philosophers? Or those who try to explain
why other forms of logic are better than dialectical "logic"? Or do you have
a broad definition of logic that encompasses many (if not all) of these
examples?
>The Concise Oxford English Dictionary: [longish definition, in fact several]
>This to me is an outdated and/or laymans definition of the word.
I suppose the task the COED tries to fulfill is to describe what the general
speaker of English means with a certain word. As such, the (deleted) defini-
tion(s) may be quite OK.
>My definition is (hopefully) that of a modern philosopher.
>(Perhaps I should say - a British/American academic philosopher.)
Is there such an agreement among them? Could I equate them (more or less)
with the old logical positivists?
--
Biep. (biep@cs.vu.nl via mcvax)
But who said I was right??sarge@thirdi.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode) (08/08/87)
In article <844@klipper.cs.vu.nl> biep@cs.vu.nl (J. A. "Biep" Durieux) writes: >Does every science try to arrive at universal laws? Do you consider >taxonomy (e.g. in biology) a science? Archaeology? Paleontology? Sure. A "pure" discussion of taxonomy, without empirical content, I might classify as philosophy (Nelson Goodman talks at length about different principles of classification, and I'm sure many other philosophers do also). Pure classification schemas, I think, are neither sciences nor philosophies, since they do not involve arriving at universal truths. The Dewey Decimal system, for instance, is in this category. But, of course, zoology and botany, though they may *include* taxonomic systems, *are* sciences, in that they strive to arrive at universal laws regarding animal and plant life, respectively. Archaeology and paleontology are sciences, insofar as they endeavor to arrive at universal laws regarding the way things change over time, the nature of social systems, and the way evolutionary changes occur. They are not sciences, but a form of history, insofar as they address the issue of discovering the specific series of changes that have occurred on this planet. >I don't know quite what you hide under "empirical", but I have a feeling >there is a lot of methodological stuff over there, about how to set up >experiments, what logic to use, etc. Actually, to me empiricality is pretty simple. A idea is empirical if there are some experiences that would tend to verify it and others that would tend to falsify it. It is not empirical if its truth or falsity can be determined independent of specific experiences. >(so if most people >preferred some sort of emotional argument, that would be scientific too, >since there would be a general consensus). You've got an excellent point here. One could easily imagine a consensus based on something quite illogical -- like brute force. Many religions have been established on this basis. Also, one could imagine a consensus based on convincing lies. So maybe some kind of proviso would have to be added about non-application of force (includes use of emotionality) and deception. My revised definition, then, would be: A science is a discipline whose purpose is to arrive at universal empirical laws, whose data is consensually validatable, and where there is a prevalent paradigm that is widely or universally agreed on by other than forceful or deceptive means. I'm assuming, in this definition, that logic and reason are non-coercive. They could almost be *defined* as the art of non-coercive, non-deceptive persuasion. The issue of whether logic *is* non-coercive has been discussed elsewhere in this newsgroup. -- "Absolute knowledge means never having to change your mind." Sarge Gerbode Institute for Research in Metapsychology 950 Guinda St. Palo Alto, CA 94301 UUCP: pyramid!thirdi!sarge