My Philosophy Teacher: A Probabilistic Study of Science

[Pythagorean]

Here's the thing: directing you to these quotes does not answer the question of whether or not she proposes that gravity, itself, might be different in 10,000 years, or whether she only meant our conception of gravity might be different. Her statement is ambiguously phrased such that it can be read either way, and these additional quotes don't clarify it.

That could be considered good in a philosophy class because it doesn't presume to take one side of the scientific realism debate or the other.

 

[atyy]

Your teacher is wrong. We already know the law is not valid.

 

[zoobyshoe]

That could be considered good in a philosophy class because it doesn't presume to take one side of the scientific realism debate or the other.

What's "the scientific realism debate"?

 

[zoobyshoe]

Your teacher is wrong. We already know the law is not valid.

Hehe. You're the first in this thread who's made that assertion. In what sense is it not valid?

 

[StevieTNZ]

I didn't ask, I simply listened. It would have had little effect if i had decided to argue with her. She has a reputation of being biased and harsh on students who dare defy her ways of reasoning. She makes it mandatory to read her book (written by her). It is full of examples such as gravity not being necessarily valid in 10 000 years, etc.

Doesn't sound like a very good teacher. I'm thinking that in philosophy courses, what view the lecturer supports is what is pressed onto the students.

 

[Pythagorean]

What's "the scientific realism debate"?

Scientific realism is central to the philosophy of science. Spend some time on google.

 

[atyy]

Hehe. You're the first in this thread who's made that assertion. In what sense is it not valid?

Newton's law of gravity has been falsified by classical GR.

Classical GR is not consistent with QM, so the theory is not even wrong.

Maybe she was talking about string theory?

One thing we know for sure that will remain valid in a 100 years is the TOE - because if it isn't, it's not the TOE! Caveat - unless time exists only up till 99 years from now. The other possible attack on the teacher's statement is the assumption that probability exists - is she a frequentist or a Bayesian?

 

[zoobyshoe]

Scientific realism is central to the philosophy of science. Spend some time on google.

I'm not interested in anything called "The Philosophy of Science". I like science because it makes engineering hella easier.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Newton's law of gravity has been falsified by classical GR.

I've never heard this asserted. What I hear is more along these lines:

General relativity reduces to Newtonian gravity in the limit of small potential and low velocities, so Newton's law of gravitation is often said to be the low-gravity limit of general relativity.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton's_law_of_universal_gravitation

 

[Pythagorean]

I'm not interested in anything called "The Philosophy of Science".

I can tell by the way you avoided spending time/energy in this thread

 

[zoobyshoe]

I can tell by the way you avoided spending time/energy in this thread

I enjoy rigorous logic. "Philosophy" is when you smoke some hash with your buddy, look at the stars and proclaim "Dude! Do you realize that in 10,000 years the law of Universal Gravitation might not be valid?"

"WHOAA! Shut up man! That's TOOO heavy!"

 

[atyy]

I've never heard this asserted. What I hear is more along these lines:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton's_law_of_universal_gravitation

That Newton's gravity is only the weak field slow motion limit of GR means that Newton's gravity has been falsified (doesn't have to be that strong - Newtonian gravity already gets mercury wrong, while GR gets it right).

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

General relativity reduces to Newtonian gravity in the limit of small potential and low velocities, so Newton's law of gravitation is often said to be the low-gravity limit of general relativity.

In other words, Newton is wrong in all gravity fields. The lower the gravity, the less wrong.

Actually, that's a wiki quote, not a zooby quote.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

I'm not interested in anything called "The Philosophy of Science". I like science because it makes engineering hella easier.

You have company.

Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.

wikiquote (and therefor unreliable)

 

[Maui]

You have company.

wikiquote (and therefor unreliable)

Here is one more:


“If you thought that science was certain - well, that is just an error on your part." R.Feynman

 

[zoobyshoe]

In other words, Newton is wrong in all gravity fields. The lower the gravity, the less wrong.

I don't completely get this. Newton set out to prove gravity was universal: that all heavenly bodies had gravity. This, he did, by a mountain of geometric proofs that showed that, if they did, we'd see the orbits we actually do see (he didn't know about Mercury, and I don't see how his failure to predict the Mercury thingy invalidates the theory that all heavenly bodies have gravity.) To say he's wrong or has been falsified should mean we've found some masses out there that don't have gravity.

Einstein was in a position to formulate a much more "meta" conception of gravity, but I don't see it as 'invalidating' Newton. "Superseding" Newton, is acceptible:

Newton's law has since been superseded by Einstein's theory of general relativity, but it continues to be used as an excellent approximation of the effects of gravity. Relativity is required only when there is a need for extreme precision, or when dealing with gravitation for extremely massive and dense objects.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton's_law_of_universal_gravitation

To say he's been "falsified" or 'invalidated" seems to misunderstand the point of his theory.

 

[zoobyshoe]

“If you thought that science was certain - well, that is just an error on your part." R.Feynman

To every purpose, there is a Feynman quote.

 

[Maui]

To every purpose, there is a Feynman quote.

I think you are misunderstanding what people are saying to you in this thread(incl. the philosophy teacher, who i don't perceive as attacking valid scientific inferences, but mistaking tentative but valid to the best of our knowledge conclusions for all encompassing truths). DaveC makes good points(as ever)

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Newton proposed three postulates. Using those postulates, he makes numerical predictions on the outcomes of experiments. The numbers don't match experiment. What more do you want to falsify a theory?

 

[zoobyshoe]

I think you are misunderstanding what people are saying to you in this thread(incl. the philosophy teacher, who i don't perceive as attacking valid scientific inferences, but mistaking tentative but valid to the best of our knowledge conclusions for all encompassing truths). DaveC makes good points(as ever)

It's perfectly OK with me to suggest I'm mistaken, but explain what you think Dave is saying that I don't understand, and rephrase what you said about what the teacher is saying. I couldn't make heads or tails of it the way you put it.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Newton proposed three postulates. Using those postulates, he makes numerical predictions on the outcomes of experiments. The numbers don't match experiment. What more do you want to falsify a theory?

I would want it not to constitute" an excellent approximation of the effects of gravity". That would make it much clearer.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

I would want it not to constitute" an excellent approximation of the effects of gravity". That would make it much clearer.

Have you seen that video of Feynman where he sweeps his hands as if calling a runner out at home plate?

 

[chiro]

I think noting the point that science is largely an inductive endeavor is important.

It has worked for us in great ways like with gravity and electro-magnetism and maybe for this reason it has created a dangerous precedent to use induction without necessary caution.

None the less, if we take philosophers advice but maintain a low kind of 'philosophic paranoia' then I think the scientists will still do the amazing things they do and still minimize overconfidence and arrogance.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Have you seen that video of Feynman where he sweeps his hands as if calling a runner out at home plate?

No, I saw the one where he sweeps equal areas in equal times.

 

[Maui]

If we don't know gravity (or anything at the same fundamental level) is going to be valid in 10,000 years, then we don't know it will be valid in 10 minutes, either. Strictly speaking, we don't.

It's always easier to predict outcomes that lie 10 min from now than ones that lie 10 000 years away. The latter would be definitely more tentative and much more likely to be wrong in so many ways. You seem to extrapolating scientific conclusions to truths and extending them unreasonably far, which is what the teacher appears to be fighting against.

Not wishing to be a science zealot I can, therefore, recommend this teacher jump off a cliff at the first opportunity. Because I take her point: I have no definite means of knowing if gravity will be valid when she does.

That's not her point, you are arguing against your own interpretation of her words. Both scientific overconfidence and arrogance and its philosophical counterpart - "it's just a theory" are signs of immaturity(IMO).


We don't know if the law of universal gravity holds. We assume it does(we don't have the means to verify in all corners of the universe, but only make limited observations and reach conclusions based on the observations and the part of the visible universe in question)

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

No, I saw the one where he sweeps equal areas in equal times.

If it disagrees with experiment, it's wrong. That's all there is to it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYPapE-3FRw
If your theory makes both correct predictions and incorrect ones, then it's just as falsified as if it only made incorrect ones. This principle has been applied to the phlogiston theory which also got some things right.

In practical terms, I think scientists would be reluctant to abandon a falsified theory if there were no better theory to take its place. However, this is not the case with Newton. Whenever Newton gets it right, so does Einstein. But when Newton gets it wrong, Einstein gets it right. Game over. The only thing left is to speculate whether in the future, Einstein may in his turn be falsified. In addition to philosophical reasons, I think there are theoretical reasons to expect it may. As I said before, there is currently no consistent theory including both gravity and quantum physics. Something's got to give.

 

[Pythagorean]

I enjoy rigorous logic. "Philosophy" is when you smoke some hash with your buddy, look at the stars and proclaim "Dude! Do you realize that in 10,000 years the law of Universal Gravitation might not be valid?"

"WHOAA! Shut up man! That's TOOO heavy!"

Arrogance...

 

[chiro]

Arrogance...

While he clearly is making a mockery, some philosophers can be too far out there to be practical (they might actually be technically correct or make a good point, but again its what I refer to as 'too much paranoia').

If you end up getting stuck in an 'analysis paralysis' then that doesn't do anyone any good. Finding the sweet spot between 'arrogance' and 'analysis paralysis' is something that will probably be debated for a very long time.

 

[Pythagorean]

Some (enter group here) can always be too far out.

 

[fuzzyfelt]

One thing we know for sure that will remain valid in a 100 years is the TOE - because if it isn't, it's not the TOE! Caveat - unless time exists only up till 99 years from now. The other possible attack on the teacher's statement is the assumption that probability exists - is she a frequentist or a Bayesian?

Interesting!

 

[DaveC426913]

...which I demonstrate by suggesting she apply it to her own real life.

But you know that's not what she meant, which means you're being deliberately obtuse.

You know she didn't mean gravity would change right now; she meant it could change at some arbitrarily distant time in the future.

I seriously question her powers of reason and motives. If she thinks a tiny, tiny probability should be given so much weight, let her action speak louder than words. Otherwise, her point is incredibly poorly made, and her motivation, therefore, highly suspect.

Well, remember, we weren't there. We did not hear what she said in context. We have only the OP's contextless transcript. And since we can't judge, we are obliged to give her the benefit of the doubt. For all we know, the next thing she said was "of course, that doesn't mean go jump off a cliff. We're pretty darn sure it won't change anytime soon - but the principle is there."

I see the point as similar to saying that QM asks the question 'is the Moon there when we aren't watching it?' or 'is the cat is two states at once?'The budding scientist must be taught that our knowledge, while excellent, is not ironclad. To temper the numbers with a sanity check.

ar·gu·men·ta·tive *(ärgy-mnt-tv)
adj.
1. Given to arguing; disputatious.
2. Of or characterized by argument:
If I were, which I am not, then you would be also,

No. Comments like ''why doesn't she go jump off a cliff?" are discussion-closers, not discussion-openers. They designed to encourage derision and dismissal of the opposing case. They are appeals to emotion rather than rationality. That is argumentative.

How does it teach humility to coach people to doubt an assertion which has a minuscule probability of being erroneous?

Because miniscule is not zero.

In the classical world, a particle in a box will stay in that box FOR.EV.ER. In the quantum world, small as it may be, budding scientists must realize that our world is fuzzy around the edges. Gravity's constancy is the same kind of 'remember you can't speak for forever.'

Dave, it speaks well of you that your knee-jerk reaction was to assume...

It is not a knee-jerk reaction. But nice try
The hallmark of a knee-jerk reaction is evident in yours - when pressed to defend it, you went off on a tangent about UFOs and perpetual motion machines - as if she was guilty of saying these things. You judge this case on the merits of some other case(s) that you obviously relate to this one, yet they have no bearing here.

It was apparent that you had your arguments cocked and loaded for rapid fire long before this thread was started and you fired them whether or not they actually applied here. That is a knee-jerk reaction.

 

[chronon]

It's always easier to predict outcomes that lie 10 min from now than ones that lie 10 000 years away. The latter would be definitely more tentative and much more likely to be wrong in so many ways. You seem to extrapolating scientific conclusions to truths and extending them unreasonably far, which is what the teacher appears to be fighting against.

I think part of the problem is that as a nonscientist she sees 10000 years as a longgggggggggg time, but as far as basic physics is concerned it just isn't. A long time in this context would be more like 10^40 years
Suppose I could put myself into suspended animation and set to wake in 10000 years time, then I might have many worries of what I would wake up to, but a different law of gravity wouldn't be one of them.

 

[atyy]

You know she didn't mean gravity would change right now; she meant it could change at some arbitrarily distant time in the future.

But if she meant that, isn't that misleading? Logically we can't tell if induction works. Hence we don't know for sure if our local laws of physics hold throughout creation (I'm only using that word in case spacetime is not an applicable concept in some parts of it). Hence she should mean that we can't tell if Newton's law of gravity remains an equally good approximation 10 seconds from now, just as much as 10000 years from now. If she meant that 10 seconds from now we are surer than 10000 years from now, then I would really ask how that probability is being calculated. As chronon says, 10000 years from now is as good as (or as bad as) 10 seconds from now with respect to this law.

 

[DaveC426913]

But if she meant that, isn't that misleading? Logically we can't tell if induction works. Hence we don't know for sure if our local laws of physics hold throughout creation (I'm only using that word in case spacetime is not an applicable concept in some parts of it). Hence she should mean that we can't tell if Newton's law of gravity remains an equally good approximation 10 seconds from now, just as much as 10000 years from now. If she meant that 10 seconds from now we are surer than 10000 years from now, then I would really ask how that probability is being calculated. As chronon says, 10000 years from now is as good as (or as bad as) 10 seconds from now with respect to this law.

She's not claiming answers, she's simply reminding us the questions need to be asked. That is a lesson for budding scientists to keep in mind.

 

[atyy]

She's not claiming answers, she's simply reminding us the questions need to be asked. That is a lesson for budding scientists to keep in mind.

Yes, but being illogical is not a lesson for budding scientists to keep in mind. Being skeptical is. My claim was that being skeptical of 10000 years from now but not of 10 seconds from now is illogical, and insufficiently skeptical.