Hi Krim Try the problems with positivism mentioned here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positivism David M ----- Original Message ----- From: "Krimel" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, May 08, 2007 6:09 PM Subject: Re: [MD] Heads or tails? > [Ian said:] > Krimel, Platt, Ham, > > The thread I saw, went .. > > [Ham] > You are an objectivist who speaks the language of Science. Metaphysics is > not now, nor was it ever, "testable". It is precisely this "modern usage" > of objective data that has blinded us to philosophical enlightenment. > > [Krimel] > I know you are but what am I? Metaphysics that are not testable are > irrelevant. It is just snake oil. Philosophical enlightenment? OMG is that > a > joke or something? Is that what you actually think you are selling? Honey, > please... > > [Platt] >> Spoken like a true believer in scientism. >> > > Not sure exactly what the label "Scientism" means Krimel, but I find > myself agreeing with Ham and Platt. > > I'm not defending Ham's essentialism, but a metaphysics is not > "testable" in the falsifiable "scientific method" sense but is > indirectly testable by its fit with everything else observable, and > all manner of related inductive and deductive reasoning. > > Precious little is "testable" in the real world, the world is not a > science lab, so it's a non issue. To recognise that, is "enlightened" > in the sense Ham used the phrase you dubbed "snake oil". > > Platt, and Ham I'm sure, fall on pseudo scientific logic when it suits > their rhetoric, everyone does - it's our "addiction" to the objective > argument. It's very hard to avoid, if you want to sound serious and > credible - a problem I don't suffer from in DMB's eyes ;-) > > Now what was the actual argument ? > > [Krimel] > What is pragmatism but the notion that ideas have consequence and should > be > judged accordingly? We do not need to set up double blind experiments to > know whether the world is composed of things that wiggle and things that > hold still. Frankly I am hard pressed to think of any set of ideas that is > not testable in some sense. We judge good ideas from bad ideas based on > whether they work or not. > > Ham, asserts that metaphysics is in some sense a literary exercise. You > just > set up a bunch of ideas and they do not need to have any contact with the > world of experience. They require no criteria for assessing them. They do > not even require any known spoken language for explaining them. This might > have worked even 200 years ago but it simply doesn't any more. > > I never said what criteria would be needed to evaluate a metaphysics. In > fact I have asked Ham many times to suggest any criteria whatsoever to > evaluate his assertions. Mostly he seems to claim it is a matter of > esthetics. But this is the point at which he typically ends the > discussion, > as though this were an unreasonable request. > > Are you are chiming in here to support the adoption of baseless claims, > Ian? > > Scientism, is a word Platt throws out when he can't think of anything else > to say. > > 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/ > 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/
