About F=ma ... I think Norwood Russel Hanson, in "Patterns of Discovery", wrote nicely about the multiple possible interpretations..
About the other things you mention: whether I as a human would describe these things as "causal" wasn't really my point. You can have scientific theories of the form "In contexts of type C, if action A is taken at time T, then result R will occur at time T+S with probability p". If you want to interpret these as "causal" in some sense that is up to you. -- Ben On Sun, Oct 26, 2008 at 8:07 AM, Mike Tintner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>wrote: > > > Ben: > > The notion of "cause" is not part of any major scientific theory, > actually. It's a folk-psychology concept that humans use to help them > intuitively understand science and other things. There is no formal notion > of causation in physics, chemistry, biology, etc. > > P.S. > > Googling juar "viruses cause" gets 277,000 hits - many scientific. IOW > what's your point? > > ------------------------------ > *agi* | Archives <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now> > <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/> | > Modify<https://www.listbox.com/member/?&;>Your Subscription > <http://www.listbox.com> > -- Ben Goertzel, PhD CEO, Novamente LLC and Biomind LLC Director of Research, SIAI [EMAIL PROTECTED] "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." -- Robert Heinlein ------------------------------------------- agi Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=117534816-b15a34 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
