I thought there was something like the Science of the Soul as well....so you mean science has limited itself to 'priori logical truths'? What if some of these 'truths' changed over the time??
I thought there was something like the Science of the Soul as well....so you mean science has limited itself to 'priori logical truths'? What if some of these 'truths' changed over the time??
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When asked how World War III would be fought, Einstein replied that he didn't know. But he knew how World War IV would be fought: With sticks and stones.
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No. What I said was that science presupposes logical and mathematical truths, without which it could not operate. These truths are not accessible to the scientific method, but science wouldn't work without them. And, yes, science is limited by these axioms, but so is everything else - and a jolly good thing too.Originally Posted by mazHur
If you understood what we're talking about, you wouldn't ask this question. A priori logical and mathematical truths - like modus ponens - are necessary truths. They cannot not be true. So, your question reads: "What if that-which-cannot-change changed over time?"
You are saying the same thing I'm saying, except that in your case, you do not want to accept that it is science that actually sent you and all philosophers to the museum. You just have a hard skin, and want to get out on weekends. But we can't give you a pass.
Yes, and writing novels is only a way of asking and answering questions about the human condition.
Scientific method is the unique way of asking and answering questions about the natural world. Science is somewhat bigger and has quite a lot of human mixed into it.
Generally, scientists quite often study things that they do find interesting and beautiful - well, at least they would like to if they were provided the grants for it. They are not robots who do stuff without motivation or emotion, caring only about applications and results, beauty is quite often a rather important reason for studying some things.
And by beautiful I do not mean the "oooh, pretty rocks!" thing that you keep bringing up though that can be there too - it is something of a deeper level, I think I could compare the difference to the difference between enjoying a novel and enjoying the cover picture of a novel - the simile is not perfect, but I just want to make clear that "pretty rocks" certainly isn't what I have in mind when I speak of beauty of science. Maybe the difference between the beauty of a chess board and the beauty of a chess game is a better simile - yes, I think I'll stick to that one. Can chess be thought of as an art form? Although it's "only about" winning?
I have posted this quote before on a rather similar discussion on this forum.
Keep in mind - I don't want to imply that all of science is beautiful - as you said, it is not it's main motivation, so there are not-so-aesthetic results too. But occasionally some rather beautiful results are found. And I would like to believe that the aesthetics is quite an important reason why people do it.
If you believe even a half of this post, you are severely mistaken.
I don't think I implied at all scientists are just mindless robots. It takes a lot of imagination and creativity to come up with scientific discoveries. There can even be beauty in the process of the scientific method itself, in designing experiments, and in discovering abstract principles and facts about the universe, but it still doesn't quite make it into art.
Last edited by Drkshadow03; 12-13-2011 at 07:20 PM.
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Too much logicgetting mixed up with science.....more power to modus ponens and modus tollens!
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When asked how World War III would be fought, Einstein replied that he didn't know. But he knew how World War IV would be fought: With sticks and stones.
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By some a Complete lack of understanding of the limits of science,its presuppostions and what it can and cant show. Not to mention the limits of technical or scientific language to 'describe' the 'truth'. Hence the popularity still of novels,art and poetry,not to mention the grand daddy of them all,personal experience. One would think that the men in lab coats have the human condition fully encompassed with their theoretical niceties. Ignoring the fact that hundreds year old entrenched 'scientific theories' get overturned regularly. Scientism is the new fundamentalism,religious in its dogma and fervour but like religion,wholly inadequate to describe the human condition.
Well it's not the method, that's just the skeleton. Results are just the tail end and not the motivating factor, the beauty of science usually found in the subject itself.
I understand what Taliesin means when he says that there is beauty in science. I was attracted to ecology and plants because of the absolute beauty and perfection in the systems. With ecology, I just love following feedback loops around, everything is so balanced. It's literally awesome to see what happens when one aspect of a niche is altered, tiny little details which you couldn't have even imagined would have been affected are affected. And plants, they're wonderful, they do everything that animals do (eat, mate, breathe, die) except they do it more efficiently and they're much more resiliant. On a micro scale the details of plants are wonderfully simple, but on a macro scale their forms are so complex and with such variation. My favorite thing of all is fungi, I spend quite a bit of time in the fall dissecting mushrooms and I wish that I could see the whole of the species underground, threaded around everything, just poking through the earth here and there. I loved learning about how they mate, it was the best thing that I have ever studied.
There definately is beauty and passion in science, and the appreciation of science is as profound for those who are are into it as books are to those who enjoy literature. It's this obsessive love for the subject itself that drives people to research it in the first place. As for whether it's an art, I'm not so sure. Doesn't that imply creation? Scientists don't usually "create" anything (I guess that you could argue that they create theories, but that doesn't seem quite right). Enjoying science is comparable to enjoying literature, but creating science =/= creating art.
Last edited by JuniperWoolf; 12-14-2011 at 10:27 AM.
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"Personal note: When I was a little kid my mother told me not to stare into the sun. So once when I was six, I did. At first the brightness was overwhelming, but I had seen that before. I kept looking, forcing myself not to blink, and then the brightness began to dissolve. My pupils shrunk to pinholes and everything came into focus and for a moment I understood. The doctors didn't know if my eyes would ever heal."
-Pi
I think creativity is a very primitive delusion. And if you include the vehicles in the process, the activity reduces to relationships and transformations of what's already given.
Well, the point is that science is not the be-all and end-all. Science is great. And its discoveries can be awe-inspiring. But we must be aware of its presuppositions and demarcations. There is an intellectual danger here. For we have a tendency to reductionism. In the later Middle Ages, logicism was popular. After Descartes, mathematism gained credence. And today it's scientism, which is the least tenable of the three (!).
People nowadays are reading the likes of the aforementioned Dawkins, uncritically, and being led astray. He's a good biologist, and an engaging popular-science writer too, but he has only a schoolboy's grasp of logic and philosophy. And it's this inadequacy that leads him, and similar writers, into overstatement and error. This is embarrassingly obvious in books like The God Delusion, but is just as painful in others like The Blind Watchmaker.
First this:
Then this:
Anyway, I know you'd like to think that philosophy is dead and buried, bit it's very much alive and well. And if you were up-to-date in the philosophy of science you wouldn't be so cocksure.You are saying the same thing I'm saying
About the philosophy of art, I think you guys are a little confused. The fine arts ultimately produce beauty for its own sake. And they employ any number of means - philosophy, for instance - to that end, but only as matter to form. Now, yes, scientific theories can be beautiful. And often, as the history of science witnesses, the more beautiful theory is given priority over the less beautiful. But here the beauty is not produced for its own sake. It is now matter to form. And it is logically accidental. So, again, what differentiates the fine arts from everything else is that they produce beauty for its own sake. That is their raison d'ętre.
By the way, Drkshadow03, you didn't respond to my earlier post. What do you think?
Posts like this remind me of what Orwell said about modern English writing in Politics and the english language.
You say a lot of vague things without giving examples like "For we have a tendency toward reductionism.", "And today it's scientism which is the least tenable of the three (!)."
I've heard all these criticisms of science before and I think I have a pretty good idea what they're trying to say in general, but the way you state it makes me wonder if you even know what you're talking about or you're just firing off a series of intelligent sounding phrases.
I don't doubt that some, maybe lots, of people misconstrue the scientific ideas presented in the works of writers like Dawkins and science writing in general, but that does not say much about science itself.
One good thing that you'll pick up from reading those popular science books is the idea that despite how wrong any individual scientist may be, that does not take away from science in general and, in fact, only makes it stronger. Maybe Dawkins does make overstatements and errors (again, you don't cite specific examples) but that does not mean that it's "intellectually dangerous" in viewing science as the best way to make observations of the physical world. It is I think in many ways the be-all end-all because its only purpose is describing things that already are. Even if God existed, for example, that wouldn't disprove science, it'd probably just mean that God is somehow based on science.
And about the aesthetic of science and people who view science as beautiful:
I don't think anyone is really saying science is an art. What they're saying is that it has it's own beauty, it's own poetry if you will. Those who see the beauty of science aren't just awed by the epic pictures of space or the cool technological innovations, but also by the tiny details/trivia and by the principles behind science. We (I'm one of them) are amazed by the neatness in the chaos (and vice-versa) of nature. We're amazed by how such few rules can lead to such complexity and diversity and how you can predict a variety of things based on these few rules.
In the end it's like Juniper said, it's the same as having an appreciation of Literature, but also philosophy or comic books or TV shows or whatever you like. It's having an appreciation for even the tiny details and being familiar with its language. I don't think that feeling this way necessarily means that you'll start "worshipping" science anymore than really loving TV shows means that you'll worship them or think that you can explain anything all of the time by watching them.
You'll find that I gave three historical examples of reductionism: logicism, mathematism, and scientism.
Well, how can I help you? Shall I spell it out in less technical language? (By the way, I've made no criticism of science, but only of popular-level misconceptions about science.)I've heard all these criticisms of science before and I think I have a pretty good idea what they're trying to say in general, but the way you state it makes me wonder if you even know what you're talking about or you're just firing off a series of intelligent sounding phrases.
We've no quarrel here.I don't doubt that some, maybe lots, of people misconstrue the scientific ideas presented in the works of writers like Dawkins and science writing in general, but that does not say much about science itself.
We could write tomes on this theme. (Remember, I'm talking about logical-philosophical rather than scientific blunders; Dawkins' popular-level books consists mostly of philosophising about science.) As a for instance, in The God Delusion Dawkins notes, 'I've forgotten the details, but I once piqued a gathering of theologians and philosophers by adapting the ontological argument to prove that pigs can fly. They felt the need to resort to Modal Logic to prove that I was wrong.' But the ontological argument just is an experiment in modal logic, the logic of the possible and the necessary. Dawkins is making a fool of himself. There are many of these sorts of unwitting admissions of ignorance. But they're more or less innocuous. Worse are his actual 'arguments.' But critiquing them would take more space. If you like, I can go ahead and do so, when I've the time.Maybe Dawkins does make overstatements and errors (again, you don't cite specific examples)
This is a straw man. I said reductionism was intellectually dangerous. Not science qua science.but that does not mean that it's "intellectually dangerous" in viewing science as the best way to make observations of the physical world.
No, why would it? My initial point was that science qua science can neither prove nor disprove extra-scientific propositions, like 'God exists.' But, again, we may prove or disprove such propositions philosophically with science-informed premises. (Big difference.)Even if God existed, for example, that wouldn't disprove science . . .
Last edited by Climacus; 12-14-2011 at 05:38 PM.
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