On 12 Mar 2012, at 21:01, meekerdb wrote (to acw):
On 3/11/2012 11:38 PM, acw wrote:
Some of those beliefs can be greatly justified by evidence, while
others are unjustified. All of them are provably unprovable, even
given the right evidence. Some of them can be believed with high
confidence given the right evidence, others match certain
heuristics which indicate a likely to be true theory (such as
Occam's Razor), while others fail such heuristics and yet are still
believed by less rational means (authority, indoctrination, etc).
I think you got to far when you refer to things supported by lots of
evidence as "assumptions" and "provably unprovable".
But we are reasoning in a theoretical framework. When we believe in
something due to lot of evidence, we are doing inductive inference,
not deduction. And even deductions are always based on inference.
despite important nuances existing between math and physics, I prefer
to say that in math the axioms are also inferred, even if we can take
them as definition (in which case this move will seem less reasonable).
Are you applying mathematical standards of proof to empirical
facts? Of course they are unprovable in that sense. But
mathematical proof is only relative to axioms and rules of inference
anyway.
I agree with this. Axioms are always provable in one line proof "like
see axiom number n".
And some truth are unprovable in a strong sense. despite they are
true, they become false or inconsistent when added as an axiom. For
example, if the theory having as axioms:
-axiom 1
-axiom 2
-axiom 3
is consistent; then the theory
-axiom 1
-axiom 2
-axiom 3
-axiom 4 = {1, 2, 3} is consistent
is consistent, but the following theory, which you can build with the
Dx = xx trick will not:
-axiom 1
-axiom 2
-axiom 3
-axiom 4' = {1, 2, 3, 4'} is consistent
axiom 4 is true, but axiom 4' is false and inconsistent, by Gödel
second incompleteness theorem. This is a key remark for the whole AUDA.
Bruno
If you're on a jury in a criminal trial you don't look for, and
would not accept, an axiomatic proof of guilt. You look for a proof
beyond reasonable doubt based on evidence - and there are plenty of
"assumptions" that meet that standard. The standard for science is
somewhat higher, because it requires that you test your assumptions
to see if they can be made to fail and it never reaches a fixed
conclusion, as a jury must. But to dismiss scienctific knowledge as
"provably unprovable" and "assumptions" on the same level as
religious myths is silly.
As to why religious myths are widely believed and (unlike math and
science) culturally dependent I highly recommend Craig A. James book
"The Religion Virus" and the similarly named but different "The God
Virus" by David W. Ray.
Brent Meeker
Religion has the exact same job assignment as science, to make sense
of the world, that's why science and religion can never co exist
peacefully Science changes its stories based on better evidence,
religion writes its stories on stone tablets.
--- Bob Zannelli
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