Just one more thought and then I'll shut up. I'd say that even theoretical and highly speculative science is not myth because on some far off day it may be proven and if it is not, it will be discarded and a new explanation will be sought. I recall some time ago reading about the possible unification of quantum mechanics (the behaviour of the very small) and general relativity (the behaviour of the very large) via string theory. I don't think any of this has been verified and perhaps it will never be, but it is very interesting. I believe Einstein speculated about a unification of the very large and very small but failed to come up with anything before he died.
That's it. I bought a bag of pistachios when I was out shopping this morning and must now sit outside and eat them. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: Ed Weick To: [email protected] ; RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION,EDUCATION Sent: Friday, August 27, 2010 11:41 AM Subject: Re: [Futurework] Comments Great piece of thought, Mike. Nevertheless, I'd still make a distinction between myth and science, with science being concerned with the discovery of the true state of things and myth being what is placed on some original perceived truth whether derived scientifically, mystically, or whatever. For example, the CERN Hadron Collider is currently being used the attempt to find the Higgs Boson. If it is found, it will move from scientific theory to scientific reality. It will also quite likely be moved into the realm of popular culture and mythology. What I quoted from was a very interesting paper prepared by Ray Harrell and Mike Hollinshead for the commission studying the residential school system. I'll forward Ray's email along with the paper to you. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Spencer" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, August 27, 2010 12:57 AM Subject: [Futurework] Re: Comments > > > > Ed wrote: > > EW> I said that I'd send along more comments on the paper that you and > EW> Mike Hollinshead put together for the commissioin investigating > EW> the residential school system. [1] You say: Economic progress > EW> (embodying linear time) and the scientific method are the modern > EW> European's mythology. They tell him everything which is important > EW> to know about the cosmos and his place within it. That is a > EW> mythology. Unfortunately, modern Europeans do not believe they > EW> have myths and a mythology. Those are things the ancient Greeks > EW> and Aboriginals have They are utterly convinced they do not have > EW> one. That creates a huge problem for the future. How do you get > EW> people to change something they do not believe exists? > EW> > EW> Personally, I don't like the idea of the scientific method being > EW> thought of as part of European mythology. I'd argue that it > EW> belongs to everybody, that everybody can contribute to it, and > EW> that it deals with reality and is not therefore myth. > > One thing that we'uns erudite debaters forget (or overlook in a spasm > of Political Correctness) is this: A large fraction of the public is > stupid. An even greater fraction is ignorant. Many of the latter > category are non-stupid and some have the credentials of extensive > education. > > The ignorant are not, typically, ignorant of everything because, if > not bone stupid, they learn to survive where they find themselves and > often excel at a trade, craft or profession. But a majority of the > population is ignorant of science. [2] They are ignorant of the > scientific method and of the basics of the hard sciences. An example > occurs in the Wired magazine article, "Welcome to Armageddon, USA", > about Picher, Oklahoma that Ray recently circulated: > > Outside Garner's little colony, others have found their own ways > to survive. Fred Von Moss, a 64-year- old former school custodial > supervisor who still remembers the boomtown days, has rigged a > makeshift security system--a motion-sensitive light, two dogs, > and a shotgun full of birdshot. Around 1988, he and his wife, > Marsha, bought a ranch house here just before they got married, > and they won't leave. She keeps a small garden with tomatoes and > zucchini and okra, and he picks wild asparagus from around the > edges of the chat piles, hunts quail and duck, and fishes for > bass in nearby rivers. Both say they figure that cooking or > freezing will eliminate any toxins. > > It's elementary science fact that freezing & cooking don't detoxify > heavy metals. This sort of ignorance is depressingly widespread, not > just the manifestation of neurological damage occurring in Picher. > > So science and the scientific method are not, themselves, myth. What > does qualify as myth is what is written, said and done "under color of > science". Science has been a pop subject for over a century. > Electrification entered electricity into the lists as The Secret Power > of the Universe. Invisible X-rays led to all kinds of > mysto-scientific rays and you can still find Q-ray bracelets in > (putatively) respectable pharmacies. After Einstein's publication on > relativity, the word was, so to speak, on every tongue. After the > Manhattan Project, there were Atomic Cafes and Atomic > $WHATEVERS. Better living through chemistry. Electronic brains to > whom [sic] were addressed the question, "Is there a God?. [3] DNA and > the secret of life. Finally, we have quantum everything. Put the > quoted phrase "quantum x" into google, substituting any one of your > ten favorite nouns for 'x' and you get a hit on most of them. [4] > > As a component of popular culture, science is a large myth construct. > Because there are practitioners whose credentials involve years of > study and multiple advanced degrees, you might even call it -- the > popular embodiment science -- a religion, a religion made manifest in > its miracles, for prosthetic ceramic hips and cell phones work > miraculously. Some people, those who are put off by ex cathedra > pronouncements that can't be explained or defended in a few words or > pages of commonplace words, consequently dismiss science as *just* > another religion or myth system. Perhaps the epitome of the latter > hostile (scornful?) reaction is the PoMo movement that wants to boil > the entire universe of discourse (and tangible reality along with it) > to a universal semantic quibble. Everything is metaphor, including > this one. [5] > > People generally hate uncertainty and ambiguity. They like to know > they're doing the best they can. Schumacher wrote that "When people > ask for education,....what they really are looking for is ideas that > would make the world, and their own lives, intelligible to them." > Most religion offers surcease from hateful ambiguity. So does the > religion of science, albeit a "science" no better understood in detail > than other myth structures. And you don't have to restrict your diet, > go to confession or wear special clothes to believe in science. > > A problem arises in that science -- real, methodical science -- offers > *only* ambiguity. No answer is final. Some "facts" are established > beyond doubt -- that iron is needed for healthy human blood, that > there are only 92 naturally occurring elemental substances -- but in > general, uncertainty is the basic state of science. It's only the pop > version, the version explainable to someone who has never learned the > basic principles, that offers certainty. > > Worse than the clathrosynclastic coprocephaly of the PoMos, however, > are the putative sciences that aren't sciences at all, the > intellectual pursuits suffering from physics envy. B. F. Skinner > proclaimed that there was no such thing as an "inner state" of mind; > there was only observable behavior. And then he had the hubris to > call what he did a science. [6] Economics as it is practiced is > (AFAICT) based on numerous assumptions, many of which are false. > > Such intellectual (or practical) pursuits as economics, political > "science" and behavioral psychology are not intrinsically wrongheaded > but they project a specious aura of scientific certainty that not only > deludes the stupid and the ignorant but, as well, feeds back onto their > practitioners a stream of self-confirming certainty. > > All that is not to say that such non-science pursuits will not evolve > (or chance upon) useful strategies or even valid truths. > > Some time ago, Arthur wrote: > > AC> I like to define economics as the "allocation of scarce resources > AC> among competing uses". > > Which does not a science make. > > AC> I think this is still a valid way to see it but when it comes to > AC> operationalizing this within any particular system then we quickly > AC> see why economics used to be called political economy ...and > AC> should still have that name. Perhaps then we will be more > AC> realistic as to what it can or cannot do. > > Yes. Allocation of scarce resources is a matter, variously, of > ethics, practicality, power, negotiation, law, subterfuge, kindness > and so on. There is no experimentally demonstrable correct answer. > > An example of (what I take to be) a scientifically defensible proposal > by economics is the *concept* (not the embodiment in the Real World) > of the market. Like evolution, the market represents a distributed > (as opposed to a centralized) system where decisions are made locally > or local rules obeyed. In non-exceptional circumstances, there is no > single point of (system-wide) failure. Local failures are replaced by > the exfoliation of local successes. In addition to the salient > example of natural evolution, research, both serious and ludic, with > cellular automata, show that such systems can exhibit stability, > emergent properties of interest and so on. > > But a contradiction arises when (as Arthur implies) "when it comes to > operationalizing [market principles] within any particular system". > We don't want to live in a society (or, for that matter, in a world) > where whole populations live with destitution, endemic disease, > ubiquitous violence, slavery or continual fear. But that is the > natural outcome of "the market" because "the market" is an embodiment > of just such a cellular automaton. Unmitigated market economics > implies social Darwinism. > > Sanwichman wrote: > >> 1. A "new economic paradigm" would be like getting a dead man a new >> pair of shoes. >> >> 2. The Hell's Angels need a new code of personal conduct. > > and in another venue, > >> Besides this charade of calling for a new paradigm gets pretty tired >> after a while. WHICH new paradigm? > > Kuhn's "new paradigm" was that of scientific understanding, compelled > by new evidence and permitted by the eventual demise of an old guard > who refused to accept it. [7] That doesn't work so well in the > humanities where ambiguities and conflicts always emerge from the > human condition. > > Circa 1970, Schumacher wrote, > > The modern economy is propelled by a frenzy of greed and indulges > in an orgy of envy and these are not accidental features but the > very causes if its expansionist success....If human vices such as > greed and envy are systematically cultivated, the inevitable > result us nothing less than the collapse of intelligence. If > whole societies become infected by these vices, they may indeed > achieve astonishing things but the become increasingly incapable > of solving the most elementary problems of everyday existence. > > Make everyone stupid, eh? Sounds like a case of "The Hell's Angels > need a new code of personal conduct" to me. Sandwichman wrote, "What > is needed is a different metaphysics" and Schumacher wrote, "The task > of our generation, I have no doubt, is one of metaphysical > reconstruction." > > I'm weak on metaphysics. I tilt toward the positivist notion that > metaphysics -- the nature of things beyond the facts of their physical > existence and interaction -- is a pointless pursuit. But I see no > conflict between the notion that mind is an emergent property of brain > and the long-standing notions of human virtue. You know that you are > you. From other capabilities of mind, we all infer a similar > personhood in other people. "We hold these truths to be > self-evident..." doesn't need metaphysics. > > But the Hell's Angels who naturally aggregate and gravitate to > positions of power in a social structure that intentionally promotes > and rewards "a frenzy of greed and indulges in an orgy of envy" > certainly need a new *something* and you can call it metaphysics if > you like. > > I better stop here. > - Mike > > > > > > [1] I try to archive everything from FW but I seem to have let this > one slip away, so I can't precisely verify what Ed is (indirectly?) > quoting here.Theory of the No-Good Shit > > [2] I'm guessing here, based on my own observation and based on my own > experience. I have a degree in chemistry, have worked in > biochemistry and, over the last 50 years, have read, albeit > somewhat haphazardly, quite a bit of fairly hard-core technical > stuff, yet I find myself often unable to evaluate "scientific" > claims. > > [3] Answer, after dimming the lights over three states for a hour: > "Now....there....is." > > [4] Yes, 12,000 hits for "quantum sex". You had to ask.... > > [5] See: Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative > Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity, Alan D. Sokal, Social Text > #46/47, pp. 217-252 (spring/summer 1996). > > [6] Ergo, Skinner had no ideas. ;-) > > [7] Circa 1967, I went to a lecture by J. Tuzo Wilson on continental > drift. My date was a recent Smith grad in geology. She thought > he was a good speaker but simply spurned the evidence he presented > and its implications. The old guard isn't always that old, just > comfortably free of ambiguity and uncertainty. (She's now an > Anglican rector.) > > -- > Michael Spencer Nova Scotia, Canada .~. > /V\ > [email protected] /( )\ > http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/ ^^-^^ > _______________________________________________ > Futurework mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
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