On Mon, May 13, 2019 at 3:49 PM Jason Resch <jasonre...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, May 12, 2019 at 11:20 PM Bruce Kellett <bhkellet...@gmail.com> > wrote: > >> On Mon, May 13, 2019 at 2:00 PM Jason Resch <jasonre...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >>> On Sun, May 12, 2019 at 9:52 PM Bruce Kellett <bhkellet...@gmail.com> >>> wrote: >>> >>>> On Mon, May 13, 2019 at 12:40 PM Jason Resch <jasonre...@gmail.com> >>>> wrote: >>>> >>>>> On Sun, May 12, 2019 at 9:04 PM Bruce Kellett < >>>>> bhkell...@optusnet.com.au> wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> From: Jason Resch <jasonre...@gmail.com> >>>>>> >>>>>> On Fri, May 10, 2019 at 6:02 PM Bruce Kellett <bhkellet...@gmail.com> >>>>>> wrote: >>>>>> >>>>>>> On Fri, May 10, 2019 at 11:42 PM Jason Resch <jasonre...@gmail.com> >>>>>>> wrote: >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> On Fri, May 10, 2019 at 8:16 AM Bruce Kellett < >>>>>>>> bhkellet...@gmail.com> wrote: >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>>> >>>>>>>>> Then with mechanism, we get the many-histories from a simple fact >>>>>>>>>> to prove: all computations are realised in all models of arithmetic. >>>>>>>>>> >>>>>>>>> >>>>>>>>> But arithmetic does not exist independently of the human mind, and >>>>>>>>> mechanism is manifestly a pipe dream. >>>>>>>>> >>>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> You sound certain. What is your evidence? >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Jason >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> The is no evidence for mathematical realism, >>>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> There is plenty given in my other post to you. Even if there were >>>>>> none, what evidence do you have against it for you to be so sure it is >>>>>> false? (mathematical realism is the leading philosophy of mathematics, >>>>>> among mathematicians, >>>>>> >>>>>> On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.The other days of the week most >>>>>> mathematicians are nominalists! (And I had this from a professional >>>>>> mathematician!) >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> That's an anecdote, not data. >>>>> >>>> >>>> The truth of these issues is not determined by counting heads. >>>> >>> >>> It does not. But your conviction that Platonism is false requires some >>> justification or reason, given that it would overturn a predominate theory >>> in a field. >>> >> >> No, you have to give evidence in support of platonism, given that this >> view has been a philosophical failure, leading to a dead end, not a >> progressive theory. >> > > That is false. Taking the pre-existence of all conscious states (a natural > consequences of Platonism) is the only theory in science I am aware of that > plausibly explains why our universe has: > > - https://arxiv.org/pdf/1712.01826.pdf > > I have started to read this paper. It seems to be just another take on computationalist arguments such as given by Bruno. It could be criticised in detail, but the main problem I see is the rejection of scientific realism at the start, and the unquestioned assumption of mathematical realism. Defining 'things' by relationships loses the distinction between physics and mathematics, which is the cause of all the trouble. > - Simple physical laws that are probabilistic > - Persistent regularities > - An external world that contains the observer > - Inter-subjective agreement on physical laws > > These are just empirical observations. We choose laws that are as simple as possible to describe observations. There is nothing profound in that. > > - Simple initial conditions > > Who said the initial conditions of the universe were simple? > > - Observation of a universe that evolves in time > > What is time in General relativity. It is merely a local phenomenon. > > - Observation of a universe with an absolute beginning in time > > Does it? There are plenty of cosmological theories where this is not the case. > > - https://arxiv.org/pdf/physics/0001020.pdf > - Why Occam's razor works > - Why the postulates of QM hold > - http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/publications/SANE2004MARCHAL.pdf > - Why physics is quantum mechanical > > Bruno has not proved this. The real question is why do we observe a classical world? > > - Why certain qualia are incommunicable > > All quail are incommunicable by definition. Not something that requires explanation. > Why do you consider it a failure? Where does Nominalism succeed where > Platonism fails? > Scientific realism rejects platonism. And scientific realism is where the progress has been made. And that is nominalism wrt mathematics. > > I await your reason, argument, or evidence. >>> >> >> Arithmetical realism is part of platonism, if not the whole of it. And >> arithmetical realism is manifestly false -- numbers are not things. >> > > What is a thing anyway? > > Maybe the relationships are all that exist. Maybe the world is made of > math. At first that sounded nuts, but when I thought about it I hard to > wonder, what exactly is the other option? That the world is made of > "things"? What the hell is a "things"? It was one of those concepts that > fold under the slightest interrogation. Look closely at any object and you > find it's an amalgamation of particles. But look closely at the particles > and you find that they are irreducible representations of the Poincaré > symmetry group--whatever that meant. The point is, particles, at bottom, > look a lot like math. -- Amanda Gefter > > So what? What separates the existent from the non-existent? > > > It might be that at a certain level of description it becomes impossible > to adequately represent the world other than mathematically. ... > So yeah, you might think, if we eventually did have a one-to-one mapping, > what could be the grounds for denying that reality was mathematical? I'm > not really sure. I suppose I'm very skeptical of anything in philosophy > that purports to explain the difference between abstract maths and maths > that's substantiated. Because in the end, what could possibly explain that > difference in terms of? Like, I reject the question 'What breathes fire > into the equations?' Because anything you say is just gonna be figurative, > right? Because you'd say, 'Well, there's the abstract maths and then the > actual universe is a sort of substructure of all the possible structure > there could be. So what's the difference between the uninstantiated > structure and the instantiated structure?' Well, the philosopher will say > there's a primitive instantiation relation or something--you could invent > some metaphysical language to talk about it, but to me that's no different > from saying that some of the maths has pixie dust in it. It's not going to > do any work. Because what could it possibly connect to that would have any > meaning? If you ask questions in science like 'What causes an earthquake?' > you appeal to conceptual resources and those are non-empty because they're > tied to observation. But maths--pure maths isn't tied to observation. If > the theory of everything id a mathematical theory, how would you test it? > It would have to have some content that has to do with something other than > mathematics. -- James Ladyman, when asked "Does that mean the physical > world is made of math?" > > That sounds confused. But if anything, Ladyman is arguing for scientific realism > what is your alternative?) >>>>>> >>>>>> Nominalism. >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Incompleteness disproves nominalism. Arithmetical truth was proven >>>>> not only to be not human defined, but to be not human definable. >>>>> >>>> >>>> What has arithmetical truth got to do with it? >>>> >>> >>> The independence of arithmetical truth *is* Platonism. With it you get >>> all the consequences of that infinite truth: >>> >>> - The truth that 9 is composite implies the existence of its factor >>> 3. >>> - The truth of the Nth state of the machine during the execution of >>> a Kth program implies the existence of the execution trace of program K, >>> etc. >>> >>> >> You are making the usual mistake of taking the existential quantifier >> over a domain as an ontological statement. >> > > Why should one's ontological opinions take precedence over what our best > theories tell us? > Our best theories are based on scientific realism, not mathematical realism. > You have still not addressed that nominalism is disproved by > incompleteness. > You have not shown that it is. Numbers are just names, not existing things. >>>> >>> >>> Again, where is your evidence? I gave you mine in support of Platonism. >>> >> >> You gave no viable evidence for platonism. >> > > See above. When simple theories explain many facts, that's generally taken > as evidence in support of the theory. > > >> >> >>> If you have no evidence contrary to Platonism you should at least >>> remain undecided/agnostic/humble on the matter. >>> >> >> Why? Platonism rests on a confusion. I reject that confusion, and hence >> platonism. >> > > What is the confusion? > Existential quantifiers confused with ontology. > What replaces it at the simplest level is nominalism -- numbers are names, >> not things. >> >> > > Let's define what is meant by "thing" first. Then we can debate whether > or not numbers meet that definition, and whether or not it is important to > the question of whether numbers and their relations could explain the > appearance of reality. > > But before that, let's address this question: *Do you believe it is > possible (in principle) that the physical universe could be explained from > something more primitive?* > No. Bruce -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAFxXSLRA9jhLSsgzqF_Ftp3phNuYOPa4n_kKuaD6ACej5Z5LMw%40mail.gmail.com.
