[Krimel] Science provides us with unprecedented opportunities to remake the world in our own images.
[Marsha] What exactly does that last sentence mean? [Krimel] It means that from stone tools to skyscrapers we as a species have learned to reshape the world according to our conceptions of how it ought to be. [Marsha] The extended life expectancy might be for no better reason than men learned they needed to wash their hands. You've written scientific public-relation nonsense. Children are still starving in numbers too large to contemplate. [Krimel] And your complaints sound like little more that the whining of ZMM's romantics. Cancer and heart attacks are not prevented by hand washing. Certainly cleanliness helps but dismissing antibiotics, vaccines, surgery, advanced medical diagnostic techniques and the myriad contributions of medicine to longer life and greater health is ludicrous. If children are starving in the world it is because they don't have access to the benefits of science. Starvation is a political and economic problem far more than a scientific one. The science is available to end starvation. You are venting fury masked as hyperbole. [Marsha] Science, politics and economics are in a codependent relationship with each other. As are technology and the user of technology. They are mutually dependent. Interconnect patterns. [Krimel] This is true but look at the pattern of interaction. Politics is a formal process for establishing social value. Economics is a process for distributing and redistributing the value of goods and services. Science is a method of discovery. Again I would say your bitch is with politics and economics not science. > [Krimel] > Ham refuses to address the many points I have raised about his affection > of philosophical sophistication. So I have little to say about his third > person allusions to my posts. But I would point out for your benefits that > Pirsig advocates an expanded view of empiricism. He also at some point > advocates a kind of scientific idealism. [Marsha] For this last sentence, you will have to elaborate and site references. And what this has to do with an expanded empiricism? [Krimel] I don't recall exactly were the reference to scientific idealism came from. As I can not lay hands on the reference I will gladly withdraw the statement. As for the "expanded view of empiricism" it is James' radical empiricism. dmb goes on about it all the time. > [Krimel] > At this point I would mention that he is acknowledging the essential > monistic quality of science. [Marsha] Please explain. [Krimel] Science is the quest for the simplest terms that can be found to describe and account for the greatest number of phenomena. Much has been written about the notion of a "theory of everything", for example. Many scientists, Einstein for example have expressed a conviction that reality is a monism. [Marsha] I don't see that Quality can be defined as either idealistic or materialistic. It's undefinable. As long as one keeps it in mind that mountains are ultuimately not mountains, one can proceed safely acknowledging mountains. [Krimel] If one blind man touches an elephant and says it is like a wall and another blind man touches an elephant and says like a rope. Both have defined aspects of the elephant but neither definition is complete. It is not that we cannot conceptualize mountains, elephants or Quality itself; it is that no conceptualization in complete. I believe this is the point you are making. What bothers me about your attitude towards all this is that you seem to be saying the effort is futile and the blind men should just keep their hands in their pockets. While I would say the more blind men touch the elephant the better their joint conceptualization becomes. While no conceptualize is perfect some are more accurate than others and certainly more accurate than none at all. > [Krimel] > I would also insist that the Value of science is its refusal to make > dogmatic claims about nature. [Marsha] And it dogmatically believes this statement to be true. [Krimel] I expect that kind of ignorant rubbish from Platt. It is truly disappointing coming from you. But I have no intention of dignifying it with comment. > [Krimel] > Rather it constantly scrutinizes and questions its assumptions and > its findings. [Marsha] Only when forced to by litigation. Science, as well as politics, is owned and controlled by capital producing entities. [Krimel] As an argument for changes in the funding of pure research I whole heartedly agree. Beyond that it sounds like more anti-intellectual venom. [Marsha] I've never stated that conceptual patterns are in any way worthless. Don't put words in my mouth. It is important that they be acknowledged for what they are, and they are conceptual patterns. They are also the way the conventional world functions. [Krimel] I was addressing the afore mentioned fury and venom of your comments. Where do you get the idea that science or scientists are not working with conceptual patterns. Theories and equations are stated as conceptual patterns. Methods of research are set up as a set of conceptual steps that are undertaken to support or falsify these conceptual patterns and are themselves conceptual patterns. Science is rubbish? Science is wrong? Science is misguided? Science is without value? WTF are you getting at? [Marsha] This genetic code thing hasn't proven itself to be all that was initally claimed. It's story is still being written, and the pen is in the hands of the pharmaceutical companies at the moment. [Krimel] So now science is guilty of false advertising because it isn't living up to Marsha's expectations? This sounds more like a misunderstanding of what is going on than a serious indictment of or prediction of the results of the human genome project. [Marsha] The patterns are the meaning. That's why it's important to understand them first as conceptual entities. [Krimel] If you think this point is lost on me then you have misunderstood me. Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
