Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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The fact is that absolute certainty is not to be had


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When did I make absolute certainty an issue?


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Here, for example:

"Scientists believe in the order of nature even though they can't prove empirically 100% that it exists."

Maybe you are confused about common usage of the figure "100%". It doesn't usually mean 95% rounded up.

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See, it's that whole quantity and quality of evidence thing. I don't need any "faith" to see that.


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Quantity of evidence is meaningless if possibility is infinite. Quality of evidence is a value judgment that can't arise from the evidence itself.


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You want to try that kind of double-talk in a court of law?

If I have a murder weapon with fingerprints, I have some evidence of who the murderer is. If I have a credible eyewitness, I have both more quantity of evidence as well as a higher quality piece of evidence. I also have a stronger case as any reasonable person can attest to.

But you already acknowledged this, when you said:

Poster: When you use several different events and derive *general* models that apply to as-of-yet unobserved events, and they work, you can have a high degree of confidence that your model is right.

You: Where did I say you don't?

So you are behaving in a very confusing manner. In one breath you don't denty that models which are validated against the evidence give a high confidence in them, and then in the next breath you are trying to claim that quantity of evidence is irrelevant and seem to be implying that quality of evidence "can't arise from the evidence itself", as if this is some kind of barrier to recognizing quality evidence.

So, which is it? Can we gain confidence in models by comparing to evidence or can't we? And doesn't that confidence grow with a greater quantity of evidence, and higher quality evidence?

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Is it the number of people's whose lives were affected by a belief that we should use as a criteria for vetting its truthfulness? I don't think so.


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Of course it is. The fact that multitudes are affected by a belief has some significance.


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Tsk tsk tsk. Stop that.

I did not say, as you damn well know, that it didn't have "significance." What I said was that it was not a good criterion for determining the truthfulness of it. Of course you recognize the difference, and attempted to dodge it.

If you aren't going to do this honestly, I am going to stop wasting my time on you.

eastbay

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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You would have to tell me _exactly_ what claim of Hume's and Russell's you are claiming I am denying,without running circles around it or changing the subject every two seconds.


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I've never done that. Therefore read them yourself because whatever I say you will just claim I'm running around in circles.

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"Scientists believe in the order of nature even though they can't prove empirically 100% that it exists."


Are those not your words? 100% does not imply certainty? How exactly do you use 100%, if not to denote certainty?


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I wasn't debating the issue of absolute certainty at the time but illustrating that order in nature can't be proved. If I had said 99%, how would that be? Science can't put any probability number on order in nature, not scientifically. It's an assumption that can't be proved. Try Hume, he will explain it for you, then you can vent your emotion on him.

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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"Scientists believe in the order of nature even though they can't prove empirically 100% that it exists."


Are those not your words? 100% does not imply certainty? How exactly do you use 100%, if not to denote certainty?


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I wasn't debating the issue of absolute certainty at the time but illustrating that order in nature can't be proved.


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Well there's that "proof" word again. This is another attempt at implying certainty. 100%, proof, these are very certain words.

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If I had said 99%, how would that be?


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That would be very, very different. 100% leaves _no_ room for anything else. 99% does. That's a very important distinction.

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Science can't put any probability number on order in nature, not scientifically. It's an assumption that can't be proved.


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There you go with "proved" again. It's almost like a neurosis with you. Everything has to be "absolute", or "proved", or "100%."

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Try Hume, he will explain it for you, then you can vent your emotion on him.

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I am already familiar with the general outline of Hume's work. For example, I happen to agree with him in what people have coined the "extraodinary claims require extraordinary evidence" view. I can't reconcile this with the tenets of Christianity. Maybe you are the one who has something to learn from Hume.

eastbay

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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So, which is it? Can we gain confidence in models by comparing to evidence or can't we? And doesn't that confidence grow with a greater quantity of evidence, and higher quality evidence?


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Finite models yes. Probability applies within an area of known and limited facts. But the quantity I'm talking about concerns the assumption of order in nature. If the universe is infinite and eternal then the quantity of evidence is infinite and therefore can't advance the empirical proof of order, probability can't be applied to an infinite number of possibilities. Also, a "high degree of confidence" is not the same as rigorous logical proof.

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I did not say, as you damn well know, that it didn't have "significance." What I said was that it was not a good criterion for determining the truthfulness of it. Of course you recognize the difference, and attempted to dodge it.


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What you said was vetting which I take to mean investigating the subject not using it as a criterion. If you mean as substantive evidence of the truth, then it would be relevant but not very strong.

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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There you go with "proved" again. It's almost like a neurosis with you. Everything has to be "absolute", or "proved", or "100%."


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But I said science can't put ANY probablity number on order in nature. Not scientifically. Not even .000001 % probability. I will admit I've used some terms loosely because I'm discussing the philosophical justification of science, not the empirical, mathematical kind of proof. So let me clarify. Order in nature is an assumption. It makes no sense to do science unless you already believe order exists. You can't prove order logically from observation. And by prove I mean logically demonstrable, syllogistic proof. And by assumption so that faith is required I'm not talking about a systematic, doctrinal exposition of a specific set of beliefs in a higher being. I mean the kind of faith you have when you engage in ordinary activity for which you have incomplete information, from playing poker to getting married. Faith is necessary as part of life, no one operates without it. The most hard-headed, practical common sense scientist exercises faith all day long every day. That's all I'm trying to show on this score. The consequences of a belief that this universe is all there is involves much more, but I rarely get to that because I get bogged down in such obvious trivialies, questions that have been settled for hundreds if not thousands of years.

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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So, which is it? Can we gain confidence in models by comparing to evidence or can't we? And doesn't that confidence grow with a greater quantity of evidence, and higher quality evidence?


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Finite models yes.


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Finite models? Maybe you can explain to me what you mean by a finite model.

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Probability applies within an area of known and limited facts. But the quantity I'm talking about concerns the assumption of order in nature. If the universe is infinite and eternal then the quantity of evidence is infinite and therefore can't advance the empirical proof of order,


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Will you stop with your "proofs"? We have already established that science doesn't require a proof. Science builds cases of increasing strength, it doesn't close them.

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probability can't be applied to an infinite number of possibilities. Also, a "high degree of confidence" is not the same as rigorous logical proof.


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Of course it isn't, but it's a red herring. A scientist is not in the business of "rigorous logical proof" of the laws of nature.

So let's go back to what you originally said now.

First, you said "Science is based on faith." Then you partially rescinded that, and changed it to:

"Science requires faith."

Then a little later on you said:

"The very possibility of science requires an unprovable assumption that there is order in nature."

And they're all still false, and I think even you, as much as every bone in your body hates to admit it, will have to accept that those statements are not true.

Science does not require faith. It is not based on faith. It does not require an unprovable assumption. None of these things are true.

Science builds cases for models of nature like a lawyer builds cases of the innocence or guilt of clients. We can't ever prove anything in a rigorous way, just as every case that goes before court always leaves some room for doubt, no matter how remote. We can't rigorously prove that the laws of physics won't change. So why do we create theories in which they don't change? Simply because this is far better at predicting future outcomes than the assumption that the laws of physics will change. So we select models based on the evidence that supports the static model of the laws of physics over a dynamic model of the laws of physics. We haven't proved it, and yet we are still doing science to propose the model, and demonstrate that it is consistent with the evidence. No faith involved.

It would require faith to say that our models will always work in the future and they can't fail. Fine, that's a faith based statement, but it's also not a scientific statement. You're not doing science when you claim that. You're professing a religion of sorts. Personally I find no value in the religion of static models any more than I find value in the religion of Ganesha or Mohammed or Jesus Christ.

It may come in the future that suddenly our models begin failing, slowly and first and then more rapidly. Certainly some confused individuals will try to maintain a faith in static physics models. But the scientists will not. They'll start adjusting their models to match the changes that occur, finding ways to generalize the models to include both what we saw before in our static physical law, and also the new changing physical laws. That's how science proceeds. Until then, we have no evidence for dynamic laws of nature, so we have no reason to include them in our models.

eastbay

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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You can't prove order logically from observation. And by prove I mean logically demonstrable, syllogistic proof. And by assumption so that faith is required...


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So what you're telling me is that you're being a disingenuous prick this entire time, using the word "faith" to mean the use of assumptions about which there is any remaining uncertainty, no matter how remote?

I guess the other poster had your slimy ruse nailed from the get go. That's the not the same meaning of the word "faith" that I used in the original post which spawned this thread, and you know it.

eastbay

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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So what you're telling me is that you're being a disingenuous prick


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I didn't read the rest of your rant. I'm done. You're in kidluckee country.

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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So what you're telling me is that you're being a disingenuous prick


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I didn't read the rest of your rant. I'm done. You're in kidluckee country.

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Of course you didn't. Let's be clear on this. Let's go back to my original statement:

"This is quite a bit better however, than "faith" where you accept something based on no evidence at all."

Then you followed this up with:

"Science is based on faith."

This was directly below my words, which were quoted. #3877769 in case you forgot.

Then after running me all over the place you finally go on to say what you meant by faith:

" And by prove I mean logically demonstrable, syllogistic proof. And by assumption so that faith is required..."

In other words, and correct me if I'm wrong, faith is required for anything that does not have a rigorous proof, which is, really, everything. So that even the slightest shred of doubt in any fact, even if all reasonable people would agree that it is a perfectly reasonble belief supported by overwhelming evidence, requires by your use of the word, "faith".

Now are you going to sit there with a straight face and tell me that this debate was conducted honestly on your part? That you took my original statement which explicitly clarified a certain meaning of the word faith, that which is "based on no evidence at all" and then used the very same word in a direct follow up without clarifying that you had drastically changed the meaning of the word, and that this is a legitimate way to have a discussion?

No, your entire discourse was deceitful from square one and I have every right to call you a prick for it. I'm feeling rather kind to leave it at that.

eastbay

Re: Restating the Paradox
 

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It is only tricky when you try and make it tricky, which you obviously are trying to do.

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Why should I try and "make it tricky"? I don't get anything out of "randomness" being a tricky concept. But unfortunately, it _is_ a tricky concept.

Also, you can say what you have just said about almost any issue that is discussed in a "deeper than normal" way, including pretty much ALL of math and philosophy, blaming professional philosophers and mathematicians for "trying to make things tricky". You will be wrong, of course, or at least - lacking the ability/knowledge to understand them.