> On 15 Nov 2019, at 00:56, Alan Grayson <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > On Thursday, November 14, 2019 at 4:49:36 PM UTC-7, Philip Thrift wrote: > > > On Thursday, November 14, 2019 at 4:25:16 PM UTC-6, Alan Grayson wrote: > The problem with physics is physicists ! Yeah, that's my conclusion after > many years of studying, arguing and reading. Many, perhaps most, attribute > ontological character to what is epistemological; namely the wf. This leads > to all kinds of conceptual errors, and ridiculous models and conjectures -- > such as MW, particles being in two positions at the same time, radiioactive > sources that are simultanously decayed and undecayed, and so forth. The wf > gives us information about the state of a system and nothing more. Sorry to > disappoint. AG > > > > > Physics is only models that come and go. One model (an expression in a > language) can be replaced by another if it's useful. Physicists who jump from > a model to an absolute statement about reality are out over their skis. > > How Models Are Used to Represent Reality > Ronald N. Giere > https://www.researchgate.net/publication/216300663_How_Models_Are_Used_to_Represent_Reality > > <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/216300663_How_Models_Are_Used_to_Represent_Reality> > > Most recent philosophical thought about the scientific representation of the > world has focused on dyadic relationships between language-like entities and > the world, particularly the semantic relationships of reference and truth. > Drawing inspiration from diverse sources, I argue that we should focus on the > pragmatic activity of representing, so that the basic representational > relationship has the form: Scientists use models to represent aspects of the > world for specific purposes. Leaving aside the terms "law" and "theory," I > distinguish principles, specific conditions, models, hypotheses, and > generalizations. I argue that scientists use designated similarities between > models and aspects of the world to form both hypotheses and generalizations. > > @philipthrift. > > I fundamentally disagree. The premise underlying models is that they > progressively approach a "true" discription of the external world. Do you > really think the Earth-centered model of the solar system is equally true as > our present understanding? AG
The problem is not with physicist, but with physicalism. Then a huge technical problem is that the term “model” is used in opposite sense by physicists and logicians, and the sense of “model” used by logicians is technical and required some good understanding of what is a theory as considered in logic (basically a finite machine, actually). Physics works well, but when confused with metaphysics, it leads to difficulties which should not even exists if people were more aware of the epistemology/ontology problem. That problem, when taken into account, destroys the physicalist hypothesis for any “reasonable theory of what is a qualia, or what can be a conscious first person confirmation of an event. And the many-world confirms what we know already about the existence of all computations, and that no machine can self-localize itself in any singular computations. Here, many physicalist use an ontological commitment to hide the metaphysical technical difficulties, which are made precise when we assume Mechanism or even quite weak versions of it. With mechanism, there is no philosophical problem, but a real technical problem: comparing the physics in the head of the machine with the physics observed, and thanks to the MW formulation of QM, it fits remarkably until now. It fits also formally, until now. The problem of physicalism (not of physics) is that it requires a non-computationalist theory of mind, and there is none, except for vague statement like “consciousness collapse the wave” (debunked by many, notably Abner Shimony). Bruno > > -- > 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 [email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/f5303132-7830-46c9-8ccf-eef08bf3d45d%40googlegroups.com > > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/f5303132-7830-46c9-8ccf-eef08bf3d45d%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>. -- 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 [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/E244D519-2D8B-4527-B313-D08ABB697F15%40ulb.ac.be.
