John M wrote: > Breent > your distortion of my words may come from my mindset of a > non-IndoEuropean mothertongue - in English. > I wrote: > >".../by building further levels on unfounded > > assumptions - no matter how fit they may be > to a theory we favor...</ > you wrote: > >You imply that our theories are just a matter of "favor". < > As I understand it has a different meaning. I imply nothing. I presume > we have a similar idea about 'scientific method': not restricted to > reductionist model-views, yet the 'preaching' I got about it does not > rely to my text. I may 'favor' (i.e. like better than another one) a > theory freely. An nth level of conclusions - based on an idea I may not > approve - may be a likeable formula, I keep my mind free enough. IMO it > does not 'fit' into MY 'scientific method', because the original startup > was an assumption on maybe shaky grounds.
What's the difference between starting with an hypothesis and an assumption? Isn't that step one in the scientific method? >I trust my sense of > 'scientific' logic because it landed to me 38 patent-approvals. > (=Pudding test). > BM: > "There's a difference between wishful speculation and informed > extrapolation... " > The question is: what is the 'information' based on? If on a model-based > selective (statistical?) assumption, oops: calculative explanation, > and extrapolated into beyond-model areas, The whole point of a model is to extrapolate (and interpolate) to unobserved cases - otherwise science could just be a compendium of data. Brent Meeker --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
