On 10/28/2018 5:18 PM, Tomas Pales wrote:
On Monday, October 29, 2018 at 12:33:23 AM UTC+1, Brent wrote:
There is no logical inconsistency in a flying pink elephant
existing right now in my den beside me. But don't see one.
First, it is not clear whether the existence of a flying pink elephant
in your den is consistent with the rest of this universe. Many things
may seem consistent while they are actually inconsistent. Before the
20th century it seemed consistent with the laws of our universe that
there was no speed limit or that the energy of a particle could vary
continuously. Now we know that these phenomena are inconsistent in our
universe and that's why they don't exist here.
You don't seem to know the difference between /logically
consistent/="not entailing a contradiction by the rules of inference"
and /nomologically consistent/ = "not contrary to the laws of nature".
It is still /logically/ consistent for a particle to be faster than
light. The problem with trying to use nomological consistency to imply
existence is that we don't know the possible laws of nature and that
observation trumps theory as to what is nomologically possible. So no
matter what you think are the laws of nature, if you see something
contrary to them it just means they are wrong.
Brent
Second, it might be that both the existence and the non-existence of a
flying pink elephant in your den are consistent with the rest of this
universe. In that case the elephant both exists and doesn't exist but
in different universes, because it would be inconsistent for it to
both exist and not exist in the same universe. And you happen to live
in the universe where the elephant doesn't exist.
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