Science

[Radagast]

lol, I note how you left off exploring reality.

You don't think numbers are part of reality? Are you assuming physical reality is the only reality?

 

[BL2KTN]

"There is also one other world, though many find difficulty in accepting its actual existence: it is the Platonic world of mathematical forms. There, we find the natural numbers 0,1,2,3,..., and the algebra of complex numbers. We find Lagrange's theorem that every natural number is the sum of four squares...

The natural numbers were there before there were human beings, or indeed any other creature here on earth, and they will remain after all life has perished. It has always been true that each natural number is the sum of four squares, and it did not have to wait for Lagrange to conjure this fact into existence." -- Roger Penrose

Why do you believe this supports what you have said? Dr. Penrose isn't proposing that numbers exist outside of the natural universe. That is what you have wrongly asserted.

 

[Davian]

You don't think numbers are part of reality?

You just had them in their own domain, and now they are back in reality.

And I take it that your book does not address the problem I highlighted in post #2.

Are you assuming physical reality is the only reality?

No. Tell us about these other realities that you have alluded to, and how you know about them, as a scientist.

 

[Radagast]

Dr. Penrose isn't proposing that numbers exist outside of the natural universe.

He certainly is. Like me, he's a mathematical Platonist. Read his books.

"What right do we have to say that the Platonic world is actually a ‘world,’ that can ‘exist’ in the same kind of sense in which the other two worlds exist? It may well seem to the reader to be just a rag-bag of abstract concepts that mathematicians have come up with from time to time. Yet its existence rests on the profound, timeless, and universal nature of these concepts, and on the fact that their laws are independent of those who discover them. The rag-bag – if indeed that is what it is – was not of our creation. The natural numbers were there before there were human beings, or indeed any other creature here on earth, and they will remain after all life has perished." -- Roger Penrose

And I'd be interested to hear what it means for the number 2^57,885,161 - 1 (or better yet, all the infinitely many digits of pi) to exist within the physical universe.

 

[Radagast]

You just had them in their own domain, and now they are back in reality.

Is that a "yes" to you believing (in contrast to Penrose and me) that reality = physical reality?

 

[Radagast]

No. Tell us about these other realities that you have alluded to, and how you know about them, as a scientist.

"When one ‘sees’ a mathematical truth, one’s consciousness breaks through into this world of ideas, and makes direct contact with it." -- Roger Penrose

 

[Davian]

Is that a "yes" to you believing (in contrast to Penrose and me) that reality = physical reality?

I do not know what you mean by "physical reality". Is it a subset, and of what?

Are we going to hear about these other realities that you alluded to or not?

 

[Davian]

"When one ‘sees’ a mathematical truth, one’s consciousness breaks through into this world of ideas, and makes direct contact with it." -- Roger Penrose

How does this relate to the OP?

 

[Radagast]

Are we going to hear about these other realities that you alluded to or not?

Let me say that (1) your level of impoliteness has crossed the threshold where I will no longer respond, and (2) I already answered that point.

Here, by the way, is a redrawn version of the diagram that appears in several of Penrose's books:

 

[Davian]

Let me say that (1) your level of impoliteness has crossed the threshold where I will no longer respond,

With a nod to this forum's Statement of Purpose, it may be that there is no polite way of critically examining the rational grounds of our most fundamental beliefs.

and (2) I already answered that point.

Where?

Here, by the way, is a redrawn version of the diagram that appears in several of Penrose's books:

Here is a recent commercial for the Honda CRV:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UelJZG_bF98

 

[Eyes wide Open]

I think best way to investigate reality is to do just that. You question, ask why, observe, interact, feel, think, engage in conversation, intuit, remain skeptical, (but also flexible to change if required) ) get out into the world. The resultant experience of those things is information from reality, its subjective.

If I want to investigate the human body, the cosmos etc, I'll go to the scientific model to gain the information. This too is information from reality or about reality and its objective.

In the course of investigating reality I've read various religious texts and found most don't align with my reality, via cultural/contextual/language differences, or the interpretation of those things under 'current outlooks' don't align, thus I have no religious faith. That said the combination of the subjective and objective have lead to my current perception of the world which leaves room for deity or multiple deities, but no belief mechanism in them. My belief mechanism is involved with investing in the subjective 'truths' I have gained from a life lived thus far. So I guess Winston was right, or perhaps partly so.

 

[Radagast]

I think best way to investigate reality is to do just that. You question, ask why, observe, interact, feel, think, engage in conversation, intuit, remain skeptical, (but also flexible to change if required) ) get out into the world.

From your statement below ("the human body, the cosmos etc") I assume you mean physical reality, in which case I agree. However, I would add the use of scientific instruments to supplement and extend naked-eye observations, and the importance of sharing observations (if you and I and several other people all see the same thing, the observations are more reliable than if only you can see it -- see the N-ray story).

The resultant experience of those things is information from reality, its subjective.

Do you mean objective?

If I want to investigate the human body, the cosmos etc, I'll go to the scientific model to gain the information.

I'm not sure what you mean here, exactly. A range of scientific models have been built in physics, chemistry, biology, etc. They rely, ultimately, on the experimental data used to test them. Some models have stood the test of time; others have been revised; some have died an ignominious death.

thus I have no religious faith

Yet, oddly, you have a religious faith icon, rather than an atheist or agnostic one.

 

[Eyes wide Open]

From your statement below ("the human body, the cosmos etc") I assume you mean physical reality, in which case I agree 100%. However, I would add the use of scientific instruments to supplement and extend naked-eye observations, and the importance of sharing observations (if you and I and several other people all see the same thing, the observations are more reliable than if only you can see it).

Yes physical reality. Or course more than one person seeing something is relevant, but then I have to have seen it too, otherwise its just others opinion, or their experience. If you said- " We all saw an amazing view from the top of the mountain" I'd understand that experience, so I didn't need to see it or be present to understand it.

Do you mean objective?

No I meant subjective, that's why I used the word.

I'm not sure what you mean here, exactly. A range of scientific models have been built in physics, chemistry, biology, etc. They rely, ultimately, on the experimental data used to test them.

Its that science is an extension of reality, but its objective. I can't experience DNA for example, I have no subjective experience of it.

Yet, oddly, you have a religious faith icon, rather than an atheist or agnostic one.

Lol, yes well, as I said I have no belief mechanism, that's not to say I'm not working on another religion. The religion of life perhaps.

 

[Radagast]

No I meant subjective, that's why I used the word.

Its that science is an extension of reality, but its objective. I can't experience DNA for example, I have no subjective experience of it.

In that case I don't understand you at all. To a first approximation, I would say science = observations + instruments + sharing + theories (with complex interactions among those 4 things, especially in testing the theories). I like this process chart, from Berkeley:

Consider the following steps:

1) I extract some DNA (this can be done at home -- see Find the DNA in a Banana - Scientific American)

2) I determine the chemical composition of DNA, using a variety of scientific instruments.

3) I hypothesise a structure for DNA, and build a model, like Watson and Crick:

4) From this, I hypothesise a mechanism, using DNA, to explain Mendel's empirical inheritance rules:

Which of these do you think are objective? Do you see the theoretical steps 3 and 4 as more objective than the data on which they are based? Or do you just believe what scientists say?

 

[Eyes wide Open]

In that case I don't understand you at all. To a first approximation, I would say science = observations + instruments + sharing + theories (with complex interactions among those 4 things, especially in testing the theories). Consider the following steps:

1) I extract some DNA (this can be done at home -- see Find the DNA in a Banana - Scientific American)

2) I determine the chemical composition of DNA, using a variety of scientific instruments.

3) I hypothesise a structure for DNA, and build a model, like Watson and Crick:

4) From this, I hypothesise a mechanism, using DNA, to explain Mendel's empirical inheritance rules:

Which of these do you think are objective? Do you see the theoretical steps 3 and 4 as more objective than the data on which they are based?

You can't have an experience of DNA. It's an objective understanding. That said I could see it under certain lab conditions and experience it subjectively in that manner.

 

[Radagast]

You can't have an experience of DNA. It's an objective understanding. That said I could see it under certain lab conditions and experience it subjectively in that manner.

I think we are using the words "objective" and "subjective" in such radically different ways that further discussion probably won't be helpful.

 

[Eyes wide Open]

I think we are using the words "objective" and "subjective" in such radically different ways that further discussion probably won't be helpful.

Ok. But for clarification and in relation to reality and our experiences of it my usage of the word initially was based around the link.


Subjective character of experience - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[GrowingSmaller]

For a start, before trying to gain knowledge, eat brekfast. Otheriswe we're doomed.

 

[KCfromNC]

Davian made a pretty interesting paraphrase of Churchill by saying, "science is the worst way to investigate reality, but all the others have been tried."

I would say that science is the tightest, most reliable way of getting to the truth; however this technically can't be the case because science involves falsification, which means you can only get at varying degrees of certainty and never certainty that you have the truth. Yes, even with evolution, which it would be worth betting the life of yourself and your entire family is true.

If you're defining truth as something which is impossible to attain and then criticizing methods for failing to attain it, you're not really saying much. Sounds like a problem in however you're defining truth rather than with science.

I can't help but notice you don't compare the relative track records of various approaches at generating knowledge. Any particular reason for that?

 

[BL2KTN]

He certainly is. Like me, he's a mathematical Platonist. Read his books.

"What right do we have to say that the Platonic world is actually a ‘world,’ that can ‘exist’ in the same kind of sense in which the other two worlds exist? It may well seem to the reader to be just a rag-bag of abstract concepts that mathematicians have come up with from time to time. Yet its existence rests on the profound, timeless, and universal nature of these concepts, and on the fact that their laws are independent of those who discover them. The rag-bag – if indeed that is what it is – was not of our creation. The natural numbers were there before there were human beings, or indeed any other creature here on earth, and they will remain after all life has perished." -- Roger Penrose

And I'd be interested to hear what it means for the number 2^57,885,161 - 1 (or better yet, all the infinitely many digits of pi) to exist within the physical universe.

Numbers and mathematics are just logical descriptors of the one reality. There can be no description of that which does not exist, and therefore (and quite clearly) numbers/mathematics exist as a part of the physical universe.