Mercury wrote: ↑November 9th, 2022, 10:32 am
Almost everyone except philosophers are sophisticated enough to be able to appreciate that scientific proof is proof of the hypothesis specified in relation to the evidence offered - and does not imply some absolutist concept of truth with a capital T - but a valid condition within the specified range, open to revision in light of further evidence. Your failure to describe, and allude to such a qualified concept of proof is a demonstration of the one eyed myopia of the tradition from which you speak, because clearly, science does provide proof - and everyone knows that but you!
Pattern-chaser wrote: ↑November 9th, 2022, 10:45 amWhat you describe isn't proof, it's something more like confidence. This isn't just pedantry, it's much more important than quibbling over word-meaning. It's about how science functions. Science is an inductive discipline. It cannot be otherwise. It starts from observations or measurements — evidence — and tries to go from these specifics to the general: theories. The universe did not come with a rule book for humans, so this is the only possible way we could ever apprehend the functioning of the universe.
And because science is inductive, it cannot prove anything, but only disprove it by/with a contrary/contradictory example. This is fundamental to science, and therefore to an understanding of science. It matters, even to non-philosophers.
Mercury wrote: ↑November 9th, 2022, 12:21 pm
I disagree. It can be shown that "A causes B" with regard to experiment, verified by an independent observer. If you drop a rock it falls to the floor. Why?
Pattern-chaser wrote: ↑November 10th, 2022, 11:42 amWe don't know. That's sort of the point of scientific investigation. So far, we have no valid explanation for gravity. We know that rocks drop to the floor, but we have no idea why. Our reference is apparent reality, if only because it's the only reference we have. Reality is always right. So is the evidence — assuming no observational or measurement errors — but all else is speculation.
Right, but we know that a rock dropped will fall to the floor - every time. Because there is a thing called gravity. We know how it works. We can model it mathematically. Gravity explains how everything else acts - so you cannot say this rock - when dropped, may or may not fall to the floor. Because that would be to negate the principle we see operating in everything else.
The absolute nature of reality is another question entirely. The mechanism of gravity aside; we know that:
F=Gx(M/R^2)
F = force
G = gravitational constant
m = mass of object
r = distance between centers of the masses.
such that....if you say A does not cause B, then you imply that planets don't orbit the sun. Consequently, it's not inductive reasoning to say A causes B.
Let me try and express this another way:
"The fundamental core of contemporary Darwinism, the theory of DNA-based reproduction and evolution, is now beyond dispute among scientists. It demonstrates its power every day, contributing crucially to the explanation of planet-sized facts of geology and meteorology, through middle-sized facts of ecology and agronomy, down to the latest microscopic facts of genetic engineering. It unifies all of biology and the history of our planet into a single grand story. Like Gulliver tied down in Lilliput, it is unbudgeable, not because of some one or two huge chains of argument that might–hope against hope–have weak links in them, but because it is securely tied by hundreds of thousands of threads of evidence anchoring it to virtually every other field of knowledge." Daniel C. Dennett.
Do you see how there's a cross referenced form of scientific proof here; where the rock must fall to the floor because the planets orbit in the heavens? The problem with the problem of induction is that it excludes all this -it has scientists snatching an hypothesis from thin air, and working methodologically, left to right through the scientific method, reducing the scientist to the absurdity of checking that every swan in the world is white - before he can claim knowledge.
And this is my point; in the philosophical tradition that was excluded by a massive overemphasis on Cartesian subjectivism, there is scientific proof.