On 11/16/2014 7:15 PM, Bruce Kellett wrote:
meekerdb wrote:
On 11/16/2014 10:51 AM, LizR wrote:
On 17 November 2014 00:31, Bruno Marchal <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Heisenberg was influenced by the positivism of the time (The
Vienna circles, the young Wittgenstein, etc.). That was very bad
philosophy, and we can say that is is virtually abandoned.
Positivism is easily shown self-defeating or just an
instrumentalism which abandon fundamental research.
Isn't that the Popperian view - falsification and so on - that David Deutsch is so
keen on in FOR? Or am I getting my wires crossed? If it is, I didn't know it had been
abandoned.
I think Deutsch takes the view that explanation is the important function of science,
whereas positivist eschew explanation and aim for prediction. Being falsifiable in
principle is still considered an essential attribute of any scientific theory, but "in
principle" can be pretty broadly intepreted.
It is a while since I read Deutsch, but I think one could categorize his position as
that of a (super)realist. Positivism does not really eschew explanation: the
characteristic of positivism is that observation is paramount and theoretical terms are
accepted only in so far as they can be reduced to observational statements. This
philosophy has gone out of fashion as people have realized that not all theoretical
terms can be so reduced. The realist position is that the theoretical terms of
well-established scientific theories actually correspond to 'elements of reality', or
parts of 'the furniture of the world'. Deutsch takes this to extremes with his claim
that quantum computing 'proves' the existence of the many worlds of MWI.
I agree. And there's a good reason not to use terms like "proves", when there are
alternative explanations (e.g. t'Hooft's superdeterminism). The scientist's reason for
entertaining different formulations and interpretations of a theory is that they may
suggest extensions of the theory, not because he wants the certainty of "proof".
Brent
"As an adolescent I aspired to lasting fame, I craved factual
certainty, and I thirsted for a meaningful vision of human life-- so I became a
scientist. This is like becoming an archbishop so you can meet girls."
-- Matt Cartmill
Falsification is seen as an important element of science, but not necessarily the final
touchstone. Naive Popperian falsificationism is clearly wrong, but there are no
universally accepted generalizations of falsifiability that measure up to all that one
might want. In sum, the Popperian quest for a clear demarcation between science and
non-science has assumed a less prominent role in recent philosophy of science.
Bruce
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