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Physicists (String Theorists) and Philosophers Debate the Scientific Method
StartsWithABang writes: One of the most damning, albeit accurate, condemnations of String Theory that has been leveled at it is that it's untestable, non-empirical, and offers no concrete predictions or methods of falsification. Yet some have attempted to address this failing not by coming up with concrete predictions or falsifiable tests, but by redefining what is meant by theory confirmation. Many physicists and philosophers have jumped into this debate, and a recently completed workshop has produced no agreements, but lots of interesting perspectives being live blogged by a physicist. Also weighing in is a philosopher in three separate parts.
String theorists are not physicists. They are mathturbators, at best.
Do you think it's a dick-measuring contest?
Science is about the testable. Math (and logic) is about the provable. Philosophy is about the more fundamental questions.
You may say "I know X to be true". That raises 3 fundamental questions without easy answers:
* What does "I" mean - Theory of Identity
* What does "know" mean - Theory of Knowledge (epistemology)
* What does "true" mean - Meta-Logic
Science is certainly practical. Philosophy rarely is. But philosophy does highlight how little we really know, despite our ever-growing skill at the practical. And it's worth remembering that every field of science started as philosophy, and only with the tools and the mindset did it eventually become practical, become science.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Thankfully the mathematicians and statisticians stepped in and made the philosophy robust. Sure, maybe you're a Bayesian and believe you can use Solomonoff Induction to judge purely theoretical hypotheses; good for you,but that's still strictly in the land of math and stats.
Oy - that's not the point.
The scientific method is exactly a philosophy. You gotta start somewhere. Intelligent design is a philosophy, so is creationism.
The philosophy of the scientific method demands the possibility of falsification, that experiments can be performed in order to prove or disprove a theory - and please please don't interpret hypothesis or wild assed guess as theory. The philosopies of creationism annd ID do not.
I do know the stringy guys have been bitching because their hypotheses are not testable, but if the debate to allow non-testable ideas into the philosophy of the scientific method, it will be a problem. That means that "God did it," is equally as valid as any proveable aspect of the universe we live in. We cannot prove God did or didn't, so in a falsifiable is optional philosophy, all bets are both on and off. Gravity might not exist - it might be the gentle hand of God on everyone's shoulders steadying us as we go through life. Prove that what I just wrote is wrong.
Though I'll finally be able to force schools to teach the controversey between the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and Quicky, the Flying Skink lizard.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Yes and it is full of tripe like the following:
You do realize that the quotations you give have to do with a talk by David Gross, a Nobel Prize winning particle physicist, right?
The report you quote is by a philosopher who participated in the conference, but the ideas you mention in the quotation come out of a talk by a PARTICLE PHYSICIST.
You want to complain about them? Fine. Just be clear that the "tripe" you're citing came from a paper by a physicist talking about the scientific method.
Oh, and in case you want to question the credentials of the "philosopher" who is reporting on the physicist, the philosopher who wrote the blog is Massimo Piglucci, who holds THREE doctorates: a doctorate in genetics, a Ph.D. in biology, and a Ph.D. in philosophy of science.
He's hardly an ignorant idiot who knows nothing about how "science" is done.