Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[RJG]

..."logic" or more accurately "guesswork" is very prone to errors…

Not so. There is no "guesswork" whatsoever to deductive logic. Deductive logic is as objective and straightforward as mathematics.

[LuckyR]

..."logic" or more accurately "guesswork" is very prone to errors…

Not so. There is no "guesswork" whatsoever to deductive logic. Deductive logic is as objective and straightforward as mathematics.

Well, experience doesn't lie. Experiments commonly disprove logically derived hypotheses, so either your definition of deductive logic is so broad so as to be useless, or you are using it inappropriately.

[RJG]

Well, experience doesn't lie. Experiments commonly disprove logically derived hypotheses...

Can you give a specific example where an experiment's result didn't follow the logic?

[LuckyR]

Well, experience doesn't lie. Experiments commonly disprove logically derived hypotheses...

Can you give a specific example where an experiment's result didn't follow the logic?

Well, you do bring up (tangentially) the separate issue that positive (confirmatory) research findings are much, much easier to get published in scientific journals than negative (nonconfirmatory) research. This is called publication bias and is currently considered a flaw or weakness in the modern scientific community. Now to your point, while negative studies are somewhat uncommonly found in high profile journals (as explained above) don't confuse that with the reality that numerous (admittedly unpublished) research studies do not support their hypotheses.

[RJG]

Lucky, sorry I don't follow. What specifically is the sound deductive logic that is being contradicted by science?

Note: science can never contradict (overrule) sound deductive logic. For example, if something is logically impossible, then no amount of science can make the impossible, suddenly possible.

Logic trumps Science.

[Raymond]

The only way for science to progress is to be objective. The particle physicists wants her preons to be objective, the wants chemist his molecules to be objective, the molecular biologist her DNA, the neuro scientist his spike potentials and neuron connection strengths, the astronomer the precession of Mercury, the cosmologists their inflation, and many more. Why shouldn't their views be objectively true? You can keep on trying to falsify but there will come a moment one can say something is objectively true. Though exactly what's objectively true can be different from person to person. You can consider continuous media objectively true or granular. Hidden variables and pure chance are both viable theories of QM (untill experiment can decide). Evolution theory can be based on a selfish gene (central dogma in molecular biology) or it can be based on altruistic genes (contrary to dogma, giving control to the organism leading to Lamarckian evolution). Also here experiment has to decide, though some observations poit to

[Pattern-chaser]

If something is logically impossible, then no amount of science can make the impossible, suddenly possible.

Well yes, I suppose so. But, when we look really carefully, we can sometimes see that our judgement of something as "impossible" or "possible" was mistaken, or that we misunderstood, perhaps because our understanding was incomplete. I think the best we can do in this arena is to say that something is impossible given our understanding of it, which may be wrong, and is definitely incomplete.

[Pattern-chaser]

Why shouldn't their views be objectively true? You can keep on trying to falsify but there will come a moment one can say something is objectively true. Though exactly what's objectively true can be different from person to person.

This is a very unusual use of the word "objective", especially on a philosophy forum. You seem to be equating objectivity with subjectivity, or perhaps claiming that objectivity is subjective? I'm confused. [This isn't unusual. ]

[Raymond]

"This is a very unusual use of the word "objective", especially on a philosophy forum. You seem to be equating objectivity with subjectivity, or perhaps claiming that objectivity is subjective?"

Well, since Xenophanes introduced his one and only, unimaginable Supergod, and a one and only objective unknowable (only approximate) reality saw the daylight in ancient Greece (Plato's mathematical heaven), this idea got a firm grip in western thinking. But the idea can be criticized. Why should there be one such story? Why can't they live side by side? There are as many objective realities as there are creatures. You can of course call this another objective reality, but its different from an objective objective reality, if you know what I mean.

"I'm confused. [This isn't unusual.]"

Haha! We all are here!

[Pattern-chaser]

This is a very unusual use of the word "objective", especially on a philosophy forum. You seem to be equating objectivity with subjectivity, or perhaps claiming that objectivity is subjective?

Well, since Xenophanes introduced his one and only, unimaginable Supergod, and a one and only objective unknowable (only approximate) reality saw the daylight in ancient Greece (Plato's mathematical heaven), this idea got a firm grip in western thinking. But the idea can be criticized. Why should there be one such story? Why can't they live side by side? There are as many objective realities as there are creatures. You can of course call this another objective reality, but its different from an objective objective reality, if you know what I mean.

OK, so we have been talking at cross-purposes. By "objective", you mean what I would mean if I wrote "subjective". You aren't referring to anything absolute, but only to your own perspective. That's OK, but you have to realise that's not what most people mean when they write "objective" in a post to a philosophy forum!

[Raymond]

"OK, so we have been talking at cross-purposes. By "objective", you mean what I would mean if I wrote "subjective". You aren't referring to anything absolute, but only to your own perspective. That's OK, but you have to realise that's not what most people mean when they write "objective" in a post to a philosophy forum! "

Hi! My laptop is dead and needs a lap up badly (if still possible, because she's over six years old and all data in it might possible be lost...), so I can't quote as supposed to (except the whole comment, which can be rather cofusing).So I quote like this, hoping you will notice.

I refer to one absolute truth also. The same for everyone. But I don't think there is only one such truth. I know this sounds paradoxically. As said, one truth is the other's fairytale, one's reason the other's insanity, and one's justice can be other's way of hel.

So the objective truth of Dawkins ("The Selfish Gene") is a different reality than the view that all creatures act out the lives of the gods. Though Dawkins view is just one interpretation of evolution, like there are various interpretations of Christianity. His view is based on the dogma of molecular biology, which is an unproven assumption, and the alternative is Lamarckian evolution. You can see "just" evolution as a cause of life, but does it render meaning? For evolutionists maybe. One can deny evolution altogether. In my absolute truth it exists but as a means only, not as a process in a universe that just exists. The laws of physics are too stupid to create themselves.

[Pattern-chaser]

I refer to one absolute truth also. The same for everyone. But I don't think there is only one such truth.

Of course there is more than one such 'truth'. No-one has suggested otherwise. But if a particular truth is "absolute", "the same for everyone", then it is universal - not just one person's opinion. I will not point out this obvious truth again. I've done so enough already. I'm done here. Take care.

[Raymond]

The point is that different people don't consider their truth an opinion but as a universal truth valid and applicable to everything and everyone. And we are taught that there is just one such truth. But why there can't be more? Not as some new overarching truth but just different ones. In old Greece it was once defined as the only one for all. Which it is. But this only one depends on who you ask about it. Its hard to imagine, I know, but that's because our brains are prepared to think in only one truth.

[Sculptor1]

Good science is objective.

But recently I have been studying the methods of epidemiology in relation to dietary advice and have found the conclusions hoplessly wrong , biased and partisan, especially where food companies such as the sugar association, Coca-Cola and others pushing sugar are co-funders in the process.

[Sculptor1]

Good science is objective.

But recently I have been studying the methods of epidemiology in relation to dietary advice and have found the conclusions hoplessly wrong , biased and partisan, especially where food companies such as the sugar association, Coca-Cola and others pushing sugar are co-funders in the process.

eg on U tube
Nina Teicholz - 'Red Meat and Health'
402,726 views25 Mar 2018