"Guilty" is such an ugly word. How about if we use "complicit", or "implicated", or "I have an alibi, I was with my girlfriend at the time, Officer!"
On Tue, Jul 14, 2009 at 4:54 PM, Nicholas Thompson < [email protected]> wrote: > Great post, Robert. Thanks. > > Would you agree that we could readily find examples of the recent import of > scientific ideas into philosophy? So the modern traffic does seem to move > in at least that direction. > > So, to look for contradictions to your proposal, I need to find cases where > philosophical ideas have found their way into scientific practice. Would > Bayes be an example? I realize that Bayes himself isnt modern, but there > seem to be a moment in the sixties when "we" in psychology were required to > start thinking about statistics differently and it certainly wasnt coming > from our field. Another example might be Thomas Kuhn. > > I am guilty as charged by Doug of using this list to pick people's brains, > so if you don't want to have yours picked, just leave this alone. > > thanks for the post, > > Nick > > > > Nicholas S. Thompson > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, > Clark University ([email protected]) > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/> > > > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > *From:* Robert Holmes <[email protected]> > *To: *glen e. p. ropella <[email protected]>;The Friday Morning > Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]> > *Sent:* 7/13/2009 8:21:31 PM > *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Analytic philosophy - Wikipedia, the free > encyclopedia > > I think the argument (I paraphrase) "all math/science is traceable back to > Aristotle/Parmenides/Zeno/pick-your-philosopher, therefore everything > subsequent is mere derivations of their original thoughts" is not completely > sound. It's probably reasonable up to the period of Newton, Descartes and > Leibniz: these people were philosophers *and* scientists. As has been > pointed out several times, there was no real distinction between the two > practices: they were just the one entity - natural philosophy. > But then came the Scientific Revolution and during the 16th-18th centuries > both disciplines professionalized and - for all but a > few exceptional individuals - they split. Philosophers did philosophy, > scientists did science. Philosophers might comment on what was happening in > science but that does not mean that they were driving it or suggesting the > questions that scientists should ask. Philosophy might comment on science > but - for most practitioners of science - it did not *inform* science. > My own experience bears this out. I'm a physicist and have worked in > research environments all my professional life. When my colleagues and I > discuss research priorities, or potential areas for study, or appropriate > methodologies we refer to the work of other scientists, not philosophers. I > don't think this is unusual. I strongly suspect that it is the work of other > scientists and the lessons we learn from our scientific mentors that drive > our scientific endeavors. > > -- Robert > > > On Mon, Jul 13, 2009 at 7:18 PM, glen e. p. ropella <[email protected] > > wrote: > >> Thus spake Robert Holmes circa 09-07-11 07:47 AM: >> > Y'know if Glen's resolution was true I'd expect more of the scientific >> > papers I read to be referencing Quine and Aristotle rather than Landau >> and >> > Lifschitz. Explicitly acknowledging their debt, if you will. >> >> That's just plain silly. You _know_ that math has its origins in >> philosophy. Just look at Russell and Whitehead's attempt to provide a >> foundation for math that would lead to Hilbert's program (of which the >> Riemann hypothesis was a part, and was instigated by Frege). Or look at >> Tarski's and Goedel's independent discoveries of >> incompleteness/inconsistency, which derailed the program. >> >> Sheesh. Are you unable to use Google? Are you that lazy? >> >> > So perhaps you could give me some concrete >> > examples: which philosopher should mathematicians thank for suggesting >> that >> > the properties of the Riemann zeta function were worth studying? >> >> Oh, I don't know. Let's start with Zeno, shall we? Without him, we >> wouldn't have a clear concept of the limit, the foundation of modern >> analysis. Or, perhaps we go a little farther downstream and talk about >> Cantor, whose work was philosophical enough to garner criticism from all >> manner of authority. >> >> > Which >> > philosopher should physicists thank for suggesting that it's worth >> hunting >> > for the Higgs boson? >> >> Well, you can start with Democritus. I could trace the evolution of the >> Standard Model for you... but I won't because your questions are either >> just snotty and/or lazy. If you want to know which philosophers helped >> cause the hypothetical higgs boson, then you look it up yourself. >> >> -- >> glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://tempusdictum.com >> >> > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org > -- Doug Roberts [email protected] [email protected] 505-455-7333 - Office 505-670-8195 - Cell
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