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Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

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Tom Johnson

Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] 505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Owen Densmore

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Administrator

Abs fab!

But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe itself to test its own theories.

One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden from us but not by gravity.

Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought nowadays.

-- Owen

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" value="+15054739646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Patrick Reilly

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Tom Johnson

Hi Tom:

Thanks for turning me on to this article. It's valuable to known that we are likely 10 EE15 degrees away from observing the true fundamentals of physics.

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops; the imagined "principles" of political and economic dynamics empowers empiricists to promise candy mountains when we are better off observing the actual effect of actually instantiated policies and laws. The US used to be the world leader in social pragmatism . . .

Great article!

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 3:59 AM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" value="+15054739646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

The information contained in this transmission may contain privileged and confidential information. It is intended only for the use of the person(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or duplication of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, please send an email to [hidden email].

Nick Thompson

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Tom Johnson

Thanks, Tom,

Really quite nifty.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Tom Johnson
Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 8:59 PM
To: Friam@redfish. com <[hidden email]>
Subject: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] 505-473-9646
===================================

Nick Thompson

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Patrick Reilly

Hi Patrick,

I didn’t altogether follow you here.

Can you say a bit more?

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 10:13 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Tom:

Thanks for turning me on to this article. It's valuable to known that we are likely 10 EE15 degrees away from observing the true fundamentals of physics.

Great article!

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 3:59 AM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Rich Murray-2

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

my comment:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

By: Natalie Wolchover

December 16, 2015

Comments (61)

Physicists George Ellis (center) and Joe Silk (right) at Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich on Dec. 7.

Physicists typically think they “need philosophers and historians of science like birds need ornithologists,” the Nobel laureate David Gross told a roomful of philosophers, historians and physicists last week in Munich, Germany, paraphrasing Richard Feynman. .....

layman, 73, Imperial Beach, California -- Scientific American level about all aspects of science -- spiritually enlightened a la Dzogchen, Zen, Franklin Merrell-Wolff, Joel Sol Goldsmith, ACIM, Advaita, nonduality, We Space -- this is experimentally scientific via allowing the same level of expanded awareness to be acknowledged by flexible sharing face-to-face or via video chat -- I savored the article and all comments, so want to experiment with offering some clues from beyond all boxes -- yes, entanglement of every item with every other, as each is always already forever intimately all of single entire spontaneous creative unified open fractal hyperinfinity -- the appearance of these very little crooked word le t t e r s right now within visual space of awareness... here is a possible jumping off point for noticing a higher level awareness background -- so, "causality" is multidimensional and instantaneous and multidirectional and discontinuous, uh, co-dependent co-origination, so things, histories, and beings are so transient and ever changing that nothing fixed or even repetitive ever exists -- yet infinite symphonic improvisations seem within themselves to be reality systems with agents and lawful patterns -- Charlie may indeed succeed in kicking the football, but almost always Lucy snatches it away, as he flips dazed on his back -- a few of you will resonate with these words, realizing they are far from incoherent -- laughter is a very good outcome ... note that the empirical process of all sciences the last 500 years since Galileo expands exponentially in all aspects, faster and faster, so this by now is strong evidence that the play is forever, even for as simple a game as the theory of integers...

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 9:51 PM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Hi Patrick,

I didn’t altogether follow you here.

Can you say a bit more?

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 10:13 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Tom:

Thanks for turning me on to this article. It's valuable to known that we are likely 10 EE15 degrees away from observing the true fundamentals of physics.

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops; the imagined "principles" of political and economic dynamics empowers empiricists to promise candy mountains when we are better off observing the actual effect of actually instantiated policies and laws. The US used to be the world leader in social pragmatism . . .

Great article!

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 3:59 AM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

--
The information contained in this transmission may contain privileged and confidential information. It is intended only for the use of the person(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or duplication of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, please send an email to [hidden email].

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Prof David West

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Tom Johnson

I expect Nick to be prepared to argue why Pierce anticipated Bayesianism at the next meeting of FRIAM.

davew

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015, at 08:59 PM, Tom Johnson wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================

Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism

Santa Fe, NM

SPJ Region 9 Director

[hidden email] 505-473-9646

===================================

============================================================

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv

Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College

to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Roger Critchlow-2

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

That will be quite a trick:

Bayes' theorem is named after Rev. Thomas Bayes (/ˈbeɪz/; 1701–1761), who first^{[citation needed]} showed how to use new evidence to update beliefs. It was further developed by Pierre-Simon Laplace, who first published the modern formulation in his 1812 Théorie analytique des probabilités.

Charles Sanders Peirce was an American philosopher, logician, mathematician, and scientist who is sometimes known as "the father of pragmatism". He was educated as a chemist and employed as a scientist for 30 years. Wikipedia
Born: September 10, 1839, Cambridge, MA

-- rec --

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 9:21 AM, Prof David West <[hidden email]> wrote:

I expect Nick to be prepared to argue why Pierce anticipated Bayesianism at the next meeting of FRIAM.

davew

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015, at 08:59 PM, Tom Johnson wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================

Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism

Santa Fe, NM

SPJ Region 9 Director

[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" value="+15054739646" target="_blank">505-473-9646

===================================

============================================================

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv

Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College

to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Nick Thompson

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Prof David West

Ah Dave,

You do me honor. If only I understood Peirce, better, let alone Bayes. We need Bybee (philosopher at St. Johns) to come do this for us. It does seem to me that Bayesian inference is a lot like abduction. And I had a vague notion that Peirce had read Bayes. Therefore I went to the Arisbe Site (the CS Peirce archive) where, to my astonishment, a search on “Bayes” produce exactly zero hits. So then I went to the Standford Encycopedia of Philosophy Peirce entry , and searched on Bayes, which produced a goldmine. I recommend it.

That’s not to say I understand it.

I hope you can explain it to me when we next meet.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Sunday, December 27, 2015 9:22 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

I expect Nick to be prepared to argue why Pierce anticipated Bayesianism at the next meeting of FRIAM.

davew

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015, at 08:59 PM, Tom Johnson wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] 505-473-9646
===================================
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Patrick Reilly

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Tom Johnson

Hi Nick:

Well, I practice IP/Patent Law in Silicon Valley and I am rather frequently exposed to libertarian-drivel about how social problems can be solved by applying the principle of liberty and drowning the government. Not unusually, the proponents of these views are quite bright, contentious and have the life experience of, well, and under-30 programmer.

Programmers, especially the really good ones, get used to creatively solving any problem that is thrown at them with applied logic. And they often fail to realize that the overwhelming majority of their architecture challenges are thin problems, wherein all relevant influences and underlying principles can be assumed or quickly ascertained. In contrast, most social-legal problems of our technological society exist precisely because these problems are thick problems and can seldom be successfully addressed with empirical analysis of applied alternate solutions.

One example of a failed libertarian approach in criminal justice is to attempt to extract payments from the "users" of the criminal justice system to fund the police force, al a Ferguson, where frequent fines were promiscuously issued with the explicit purpose of generating revenue. In particular, the Ferguson police officers were given increasing ticketing quotas and were conditioned to see citizens as ATM machines, especially the less empowered citizens.

So I can now cite the article's noting of rationalist/empiricist approaches in physics (a discipline that nerds generally hold to be sacred and inviolate) as a basis for saying, "so first we may want to find a country where you ideas have been actually applied . . . like Somalia or Indonesia . . . "

----- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 5:51 AM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Hi Patrick,

I didn’t altogether follow you here.

Can you say a bit more?

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 10:13 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Tom:

Thanks for turning me on to this article. It's valuable to known that we are likely 10 EE15 degrees away from observing the true fundamentals of physics.

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops; the imagined "principles" of political and economic dynamics empowers empiricists to promise candy mountains when we are better off observing the actual effect of actually instantiated policies and laws. The US used to be the world leader in social pragmatism . . .

Great article!

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 3:59 AM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

--
The information contained in this transmission may contain privileged and confidential information. It is intended only for the use of the person(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or duplication of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, please send an email to [hidden email].

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Nick Thompson

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi, Patrick,

Thanks for getting back to me. Wow, was that a form of libertarianism!? I would have thought the “users” were property owners who “use” the police to protect them from the anger of the poor. Anyway.

One of the lessons that FRIAM has taught me over the years is to be much more careful in my deployment of “ist” and “ism” words. They just don’t seem to have the stability of reference that that I assumed when I learned them and started to use them. I don’t know quite what to do about that. It would be nice to be able to identify some clusters of opinion and associate some people with those opinions and be able to refer back to them as points of departure in my thought, but every time I try, I fail. One really good example is the word, “pragmatist.” In some hands, “pragmatism” means solving problems as they come along with a view mostly to the immediate tangible future. Americans are said to given to such pragmatic solutions, as, say, the drone program which eliminates some bad actors in the short run but runs the risk of recruiting others in the long run. In other hands, the word “pragmatism” refers to an almost precisely opposite philosophy which focuses on where human understanding is “headed”, i.e., where it is likely to fetch up in the very long run. For a pragmatist, in this sense, there are no “facts of the matter” beyond human understanding, in the broadest sense, because whatever world is “out there” is filtered through our understanding of it.

Now, I think the debate that occurred at the physics conference had a lot to do with this latter sort of pragmatism. Philosophical pragmatists have tended to be very hard on the “theory-fact” distinction. To these folks, a fact is nothing more than a theory that we would be VERY VERY VERY surprised to see contradicted.

What I am struggling with, here, is how to map all of this (which may be irrelevant from your point of view) onto

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops;

Now I get that you are pissed off at some folks. I would probably be pissed off by those same people. What I can’t yet work out is the relation between these Libertarians and Marxists and the distinction between rationalist and empiricist.

Can you help further?

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Sunday, December 27, 2015 1:22 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Nick:

----- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 5:51 AM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Hi Patrick,

I didn’t altogether follow you here.

Can you say a bit more?

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 10:13 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Tom:

Thanks for turning me on to this article. It's valuable to known that we are likely 10 EE15 degrees away from observing the true fundamentals of physics.

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops; the imagined "principles" of political and economic dynamics empowers empiricists to promise candy mountains when we are better off observing the actual effect of actually instantiated policies and laws. The US used to be the world leader in social pragmatism . . .

Great article!

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 3:59 AM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

--
The information contained in this transmission may contain privileged and confidential information. It is intended only for the use of the person(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or duplication of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, please send an email to [hidden email].

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Grant Holland

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Owen Densmore

Mathematics already went through this "crisis of confidence" in the latter half of the 19th century when Lobachevsky and Riemann came up with alternative, non-Euclidean, geometries. The issue that forced this new look at the soul of mathematics was, I believe, the verifiability - consistency, actually - of Euclid's fifth postulate with respect to his other four. This was followed historically by the works of Dedekind and Cantor who engaged naked logic to expose a number of counter-intuitive "truths" of mathematics. The entire hoopla was addressed by Hilbert's program in an attempt to put the matter to rest for once and for all. However, the work of Russell and Whitehead to further Hilbert's program by developing arithmetic from Hilbertian foundations was eventually stymied by Godel, whose work was generalized by Turing.

The result of all of this, according to my understanding, is that mathematics ceased to see itself as a "seeker after the true nature of the universe" (as do both science (which physics thinks it owns) and philosophy even today); and began to see itself as a "constructor of logically consistent models, regardless of their verifiability". Verifiability was dropped from the program of pure abstract mathematics, and was left to the "impure" pursuits of physicists, philosophers and applied mathematicians.

I'm sure someone on this list can set straight my recollections of mathematical history. But I do hold to the point that mathematics addressed, and "kind of" resolved, its own crisis of confidence over its assumed need for verifiability about a century ago. It's conclusion? Forget verifiability and pursue pure mathematics as art - not science.

Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking "the truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract mathematics?

Grant

On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Abs fab!

But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe itself to test its own theories.

One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden from us but not by gravity.

Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought nowadays.

-- Owen

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="tel:505-473-9646" value="+15054739646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

David Eric Smith

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

It's a fun way to put the question, Grant,

Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking "the truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract mathematics?

(in context of your longer summary).

One can almost do a meta-Popper on the relation of syntax to semantics of formal languages (or maybe the ur-Popper already did this, but the heathen in their sound-bites never get this far into his actual writing).

A language that is not even internally consistent presumably has no hope of having an empirically valid semantics, since evidently the universe "is" something, and there is no semantic notion of ambiguity of its "being/not-being" some definite thing, structurally analogous to an inconsistent language's being able to arrive at a contradiction by taking two paths to answer a single proposition. However, a language that is internally consistent could still be empirically invalid. So here, "syntactically internally inconsistent" takes the place of Popper's "falsified", whereas "apparently syntactically internally consistent" takes the place of Popper's "not yet falsified". Trying to find a semantics for an apparently-consistent formal system takes the place of building empirical confidence in claims that in Popper's construction are still eligible to be "true".

One then builds the commonly-discussed Popper-cum-Bayes notions of validity or invalidity of models as an analysis within the mapping of formal tokens to empirical events, predicated on the internal consistency of both the formal-token system and the empirical-event systems, each within itself.

I think the argument that sustains the string theorists has a lot of this flavor. Most of the extrapolations one tries from the Standard Model of quantized gauge field theories (for matter) plus general relativity are demonstrably not consistent, so not even eligible for validation. The string theorists seem to still (believe they) have a construction that is not demonstrably inconsistent. To the extent that it has been hard to find any such construction, they hope to be lucky and have also found a valid one. Not surprising that the string theorists are in many ways hard to distinguish from mathematicians these days, and are among the first from physics in almost a century to have made contributions to hard problems in topology of manifolds.

I did have to wonder, upon reading the Quanta article that was circulated, about whichever philosopher was claiming physics should give up long-held prejudices, such as that "quantum mechanics and gravity should be unified". I was curious what she thinks that combination of words means, that it could be given up: If you have gravitational contexts in which your efforts to do quantum field theory produce probabilities that do not sum to one, you have an internal contradiction within your formal language, and that means there must be a mistake somewhere. My understanding (though I cannot produce the argument myself) is that one cannot make a consistent quantum field theory with a non-quantum-mechanical gravitation dynamically coupled to it. To me, that was what the program of unification was about, much more fundamentally than whether quantum gauge fields were the appropriate formal language to include gravitation as well as matter.

Eric

Grant

On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
Abs fab!

But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe itself to test its own theories.

One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden from us but not by gravity.

Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought nowadays.

-- Owen

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="tel:505-473-9646" value="+15054739646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Patrick Reilly

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Hi Nick:

In further reply, I've argued with Marxist's who assert craziness like "under true communism there will be no crime". They assert such nonsense under "rationalist" arguments that a "truly fulfilled person", as a communist utopia must exclusively generate, would be a naturally law-abiding citizen.

So the empiricist reliance in the physics dialogue is a useful reference to me in my counter argument of "what actually existing society supports the argument of a more ethical society eliminating irrational crime".

I say again that the core strength of using this reference lies in the belief widely held among our intelligentsia that Physics has the quality of offering the purest of all possible truthiness . . .

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 9:39 PM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Hi, Patrick,

Thanks for getting back to me. Wow, was that a form of libertarianism!? I would have thought the “users” were property owners who “use” the police to protect them from the anger of the poor. Anyway.

One of the lessons that FRIAM has taught me over the years is to be much more careful in my deployment of “ist” and “ism” words. They just don’t seem to have the stability of reference that that I assumed when I learned them and started to use them. I don’t know quite what to do about that. It would be nice to be able to identify some clusters of opinion and associate some people with those opinions and be able to refer back to them as points of departure in my thought, but every time I try, I fail. One really good example is the word, “pragmatist.” In some hands, “pragmatism” means solving problems as they come along with a view mostly to the immediate tangible future. Americans are said to given to such pragmatic solutions, as, say, the drone program which eliminates some bad actors in the short run but runs the risk of recruiting others in the long run. In other hands, the word “pragmatism” refers to an almost precisely opposite philosophy which focuses on where human understanding is “headed”, i.e., where it is likely to fetch up in the very long run. For a pragmatist, in this sense, there are no “facts of the matter” beyond human understanding, in the broadest sense, because whatever world is “out there” is filtered through our understanding of it.

Now, I think the debate that occurred at the physics conference had a lot to do with this latter sort of pragmatism. Philosophical pragmatists have tended to be very hard on the “theory-fact” distinction. To these folks, a fact is nothing more than a theory that we would be VERY VERY VERY surprised to see contradicted.

What I am struggling with, here, is how to map all of this (which may be irrelevant from your point of view) onto

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops;

Now I get that you are pissed off at some folks. I would probably be pissed off by those same people. What I can’t yet work out is the relation between these Libertarians and Marxists and the distinction between rationalist and empiricist.

Can you help further?

Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Sunday, December 27, 2015 1:22 PM

To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Nick:

Well, I practice IP/Patent Law in Silicon Valley and I am rather frequently exposed to libertarian-drivel about how social problems can be solved by applying the principle of liberty and drowning the government. Not unusually, the proponents of these views are quite bright, contentious and have the life experience of, well, and under-30 programmer.

Programmers, especially the really good ones, get used to creatively solving any problem that is thrown at them with applied logic. And they often fail to realize that the overwhelming majority of their architecture challenges are thin problems, wherein all relevant influences and underlying principles can be assumed or quickly ascertained. In contrast, most social-legal problems of our technological society exist precisely because these problems are thick problems and can seldom be successfully addressed with empirical analysis of applied alternate solutions.

One example of a failed libertarian approach in criminal justice is to attempt to extract payments from the "users" of the criminal justice system to fund the police force, al a Ferguson, where frequent fines were promiscuously issued with the explicit purpose of generating revenue. In particular, the Ferguson police officers were given increasing ticketing quotas and were conditioned to see citizens as ATM machines, especially the less empowered citizens.

So I can now cite the article's noting of rationalist/empiricist approaches in physics (a discipline that nerds generally hold to be sacred and inviolate) as a basis for saying, "so first we may want to find a country where you ideas have been actually applied . . . like Somalia or Indonesia . . . "

----- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 5:51 AM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Hi Patrick,

I didn’t altogether follow you here.

Can you say a bit more?

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 10:13 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Tom:

Thanks for turning me on to this article. It's valuable to known that we are likely 10 EE15 degrees away from observing the true fundamentals of physics.

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops; the imagined "principles" of political and economic dynamics empowers empiricists to promise candy mountains when we are better off observing the actual effect of actually instantiated policies and laws. The US used to be the world leader in social pragmatism . . .

Great article!

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 3:59 AM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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The information contained in this transmission may contain privileged and confidential information. It is intended only for the use of the person(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or duplication of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, please send an email to [hidden email].

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Frank Wimberly-2

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Grant Holland

Students of relativity should be happy that mathematicians pursued their interest in "unverifiable" non-Euclidean geometry.

Frank

Sent from my Verizon Nexus 6 4G LTE Phone
(505) 670-9918

On Dec 28, 2015 1:51 AM, "Grant Holland" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Mathematics already went through this "crisis of confidence" in the latter half of the 19th century when Lobachevsky and Riemann came up with alternative, non-Euclidean, geometries. The issue that forced this new look at the soul of mathematics was, I believe, the verifiability - consistency, actually - of Euclid's fifth postulate with respect to his other four. This was followed historically by the works of Dedekind and Cantor who engaged naked logic to expose a number of counter-intuitive "truths" of mathematics. The entire hoopla was addressed by Hilbert's program in an attempt to put the matter to rest for once and for all. However, the work of Russell and Whitehead to further Hilbert's program by developing arithmetic from Hilbertian foundations was eventually stymied by Godel, whose work was generalized by Turing.

The result of all of this, according to my understanding, is that mathematics ceased to see itself as a "seeker after the true nature of the universe" (as do both science (which physics thinks it owns) and philosophy even today); and began to see itself as a "constructor of logically consistent models, regardless of their verifiability". Verifiability was dropped from the program of pure abstract mathematics, and was left to the "impure" pursuits of physicists, philosophers and applied mathematicians.

I'm sure someone on this list can set straight my recollections of mathematical history. But I do hold to the point that mathematics addressed, and "kind of" resolved, its own crisis of confidence over its assumed need for verifiability about a century ago. It's conclusion? Forget verifiability and pursue pure mathematics as art - not science.

Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking "the truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract mathematics?

Grant

On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
Abs fab!

But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe itself to test its own theories.

One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden from us but not by gravity.

Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought nowadays.

-- Owen

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" value="+15054739646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Grant Holland

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

I've gotta give you that one, Frank! And fortunately you are right. After all, mathematicians make their living by selling mathematical trinkets to unsuspecting physicists for promoting their quests for TRUTH (and the American way).

What I'm saying is that, since Hilbert's program, empirically-observable validity is no longer the acid test for mathematical acceptability or, even prudence. (Although Hilbert Space (attributed I believe to von Neumann) is still going for top dollar.)

Grant

Sent from my iPhone

On Dec 28, 2015, at 10:01 AM, Frank Wimberly <[hidden email]> wrote:

Students of relativity should be happy that mathematicians pursued their interest in "unverifiable" non-Euclidean geometry.

Frank

Sent from my Verizon Nexus 6 4G LTE Phone
(505) 670-9918
On Dec 28, 2015 1:51 AM, "Grant Holland" <[hidden email]> wrote:
Mathematics already went through this "crisis of confidence" in the latter half of the 19th century when Lobachevsky and Riemann came up with alternative, non-Euclidean, geometries. The issue that forced this new look at the soul of mathematics was, I believe, the verifiability - consistency, actually - of Euclid's fifth postulate with respect to his other four. This was followed historically by the works of Dedekind and Cantor who engaged naked logic to expose a number of counter-intuitive "truths" of mathematics. The entire hoopla was addressed by Hilbert's program in an attempt to put the matter to rest for once and for all. However, the work of Russell and Whitehead to further Hilbert's program by developing arithmetic from Hilbertian foundations was eventually stymied by Godel, whose work was generalized by Turing.

The result of all of this, according to my understanding, is that mathematics ceased to see itself as a "seeker after the true nature of the universe" (as do both science (which physics thinks it owns) and philosophy even today); and began to see itself as a "constructor of logically consistent models, regardless of their verifiability". Verifiability was dropped from the program of pure abstract mathematics, and was left to the "impure" pursuits of physicists, philosophers and applied mathematicians.

I'm sure someone on this list can set straight my recollections of mathematical history. But I do hold to the point that mathematics addressed, and "kind of" resolved, its own crisis of confidence over its assumed need for verifiability about a century ago. It's conclusion? Forget verifiability and pursue pure mathematics as art - not science.

Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking "the truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract mathematics?

Grant

On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
Abs fab!

But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe itself to test its own theories.

One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden from us but not by gravity.

Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought nowadays.

-- Owen

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" value="+15054739646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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gepr

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by David Eric Smith

On 12/28/2015 06:30 AM, David Eric Smith wrote:
> A language that is not even internally consistent presumably has no hope of having an empirically valid semantics, since evidently the universe "is" something, and there is no semantic notion of ambiguity of its "being/not-being" some definite thing, structurally analogous to an inconsistent language's being able to arrive at a contradiction by taking two paths to answer a single proposition.

It's not clear to me that the presumption is trustworthy. Isn't it possible that what is (reality) does not obey some of the structure we rely on for asserting consistency (or completeness)? In other words, perhaps reality is inconsistent. Hence, the only language that will be valid, will be an inconsistent language. Of course, that doesn't imply that just any old inconsistency will be tolerated. Perhaps reality is only inconsistent in very particular ways and any language that we expect to validate must be 1) inconsistent in all those real ways and 2) in only those real ways.

Further of course, inconsistency is a bit like paradox in that, once you identify an inconsistency very precisely, you may be able to define a new language that eliminates it. ... which brings us beyond the (mere) points of higher order logics and iterative constructions, to the core idea of context-sensitive construction. There is no Grand Unifying Anything except the imperative to approach Grand Unified Things.

And this targets Patrick's argument against the idealists (e.g. libertarians and marxists). The only reliable ideal is the creation and commitment to ideals. Each particular ideal is (will be) eventually destroyed. But for whatever reason, we seem to always create and commit ourselves to ideals. Old people tend to surrender over time and build huge hairballs of bandaged ideals all glued together with spit and bailing wire. Any serious conversation with an old person is an attempt to navigate the topology of their iteratively constructed, stigmergic, hairball of broken ideals ... and if that old person is open-minded, such conversations lead to new kinks and tortuous folds ... which is why old people make the best story tellers.

But I can't help wondering why music is dominated by the young. [sigh]

--
--
⊥ glen ⊥

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uǝʃƃ ⊥ glen

Nick Thompson

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Patrick Reilly

Patrick,

For the aforementioned reasons, I am probably wrong about all of this, but …

Idealism is the position that the categories by which we understand reality exist prior to experience. Empiricism is the position that all knowledge of reality comes from experience. [philosophical] pragmatism is the position that all knowledge is knowledge of experience period. (To talk of a reality beyond experience is just silly.) To a pragmatist, what we call “reality” is just that upon which we will all agree in the very long run. Something is “truthy” (to use your term) just in case it seems like the sort of experience that will endure the test of time. Properties of experience that make them seem “truthy” include coherence with other understandings of prior experiences the capacity to pull together the understandings of working experimentalists. (Think about the manner in which various understandings of the periodic table converged over the 19^th Century.) The fact that physicists are arguing about these matters suggests that physicists’ ideas right now are not as “truthy” as those of Newton.

Now none of this clarifies for me why you are mad at Marxists and Libertarians. Oddly enough, I would suggest the best way to get at this problem is to precede idiographically, avoiding any –ist or –ism words, to tell a few stories in which you were abused by a particular Marxist and/or libertarian, so we, ourselves, can decide if and how you were treated unfairly.

Gotta run,

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Monday, December 28, 2015 7:54 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Nick:

I say again that the core strength of using this reference lies in the belief widely held among our intelligentsia that Physics has the quality of offering the purest of all possible truthiness . . .

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 9:39 PM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Hi, Patrick,

Thanks for getting back to me. Wow, was that a form of libertarianism!? I would have thought the “users” were property owners who “use” the police to protect them from the anger of the poor. Anyway.

One of the lessons that FRIAM has taught me over the years is to be much more careful in my deployment of “ist” and “ism” words. They just don’t seem to have the stability of reference that that I assumed when I learned them and started to use them. I don’t know quite what to do about that. It would be nice to be able to identify some clusters of opinion and associate some people with those opinions and be able to refer back to them as points of departure in my thought, but every time I try, I fail. One really good example is the word, “pragmatist.” In some hands, “pragmatism” means solving problems as they come along with a view mostly to the immediate tangible future. Americans are said to given to such pragmatic solutions, as, say, the drone program which eliminates some bad actors in the short run but runs the risk of recruiting others in the long run. In other hands, the word “pragmatism” refers to an almost precisely opposite philosophy which focuses on where human understanding is “headed”, i.e., where it is likely to fetch up in the very long run. For a pragmatist, in this sense, there are no “facts of the matter” beyond human understanding, in the broadest sense, because whatever world is “out there” is filtered through our understanding of it.

Now, I think the debate that occurred at the physics conference had a lot to do with this latter sort of pragmatism. Philosophical pragmatists have tended to be very hard on the “theory-fact” distinction. To these folks, a fact is nothing more than a theory that we would be VERY VERY VERY surprised to see contradicted.

What I am struggling with, here, is how to map all of this (which may be irrelevant from your point of view) onto

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops;

Now I get that you are pissed off at some folks. I would probably be pissed off by those same people. What I can’t yet work out is the relation between these Libertarians and Marxists and the distinction between rationalist and empiricist.

Can you help further?

Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Sunday, December 27, 2015 1:22 PM

To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Nick:

Well, I practice IP/Patent Law in Silicon Valley and I am rather frequently exposed to libertarian-drivel about how social problems can be solved by applying the principle of liberty and drowning the government. Not unusually, the proponents of these views are quite bright, contentious and have the life experience of, well, and under-30 programmer.

Programmers, especially the really good ones, get used to creatively solving any problem that is thrown at them with applied logic. And they often fail to realize that the overwhelming majority of their architecture challenges are thin problems, wherein all relevant influences and underlying principles can be assumed or quickly ascertained. In contrast, most social-legal problems of our technological society exist precisely because these problems are thick problems and can seldom be successfully addressed with empirical analysis of applied alternate solutions.

One example of a failed libertarian approach in criminal justice is to attempt to extract payments from the "users" of the criminal justice system to fund the police force, al a Ferguson, where frequent fines were promiscuously issued with the explicit purpose of generating revenue. In particular, the Ferguson police officers were given increasing ticketing quotas and were conditioned to see citizens as ATM machines, especially the less empowered citizens.

So I can now cite the article's noting of rationalist/empiricist approaches in physics (a discipline that nerds generally hold to be sacred and inviolate) as a basis for saying, "so first we may want to find a country where you ideas have been actually applied . . . like Somalia or Indonesia . . . "

----- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 5:51 AM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Hi Patrick,

I didn’t altogether follow you here.

Can you say a bit more?

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Patrick Reilly
Sent: Saturday, December 26, 2015 10:13 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

Hi Tom:

Thanks for turning me on to this article. It's valuable to known that we are likely 10 EE15 degrees away from observing the true fundamentals of physics.

On another note, the discussion of the "rationalists" v. "empiricists" crystallized in me how to best argue against Libertarian-hacks and Marxist fops; the imagined "principles" of political and economic dynamics empowers empiricists to promise candy mountains when we are better off observing the actual effect of actually instantiated policies and laws. The US used to be the world leader in social pragmatism . . .

Great article!

--- Pat

On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 3:59 AM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

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The information contained in this transmission may contain privileged and confidential information. It is intended only for the use of the person(s) named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, dissemination, distribution or duplication of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message. To reply to our email administrator directly, please send an email to [hidden email].

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Nick Thompson

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Grant Holland

Grant,

What is the implicit definition of “art” you are running with there?

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Grant Holland
Sent: Monday, December 28, 2015 1:51 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>; Owen Densmore <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Abs fab!

But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe itself to test its own theories.

One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden from us but not by gravity.

Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought nowadays.

-- Owen

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson <[hidden email]> wrote:
Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
===================================
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
[hidden email] <a href="tel:505-473-9646" target="_blank">505-473-9646
===================================

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gepr

Re: Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

It's a bit of slippage to swap out rationalism in favor of idealism. I do it on purpose. I'm hoping others don't do it by accident.

On 12/28/2015 10:29 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Idealism is the position that the categories by which we understand reality exist prior to experience. Empiricism is the position that all knowledge of reality comes from experience. [philosophical] pragmatism is the position that all knowledge is knowledge */of /*experience period. (To talk of a reality beyond experience is just silly.) To a pragmatist, what we call “reality” is just that upon which we will all agree in the very long run. Something is “truthy” (to use your term) just in case it seems like the sort of experience that will endure the test of time. Properties of experience that make them seem “truthy” include coherence with other understandings of prior experiences the capacity to pull together the understandings of working experimentalists. (Think about the manner in which various understandings of the periodic table converged over the 19^th Century.) The fact that physicists are arguing about these matters suggests that physicists’ ideas right
now
> are not as “truthy” as those of Newton.
>
> Now none of this clarifies for me why you are mad at Marxists and Libertarians. Oddly enough, I would suggest the best way to get at this problem is to precede idiographically, avoiding any –ist or –ism words, to tell a few stories in which you were abused by a particular Marxist and/or libertarian, so we, ourselves, can decide if and how you were treated unfairly.

--
⇔ glen

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uǝʃƃ ⊥ glen

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