Posted by
glen ep ropella on
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/Wimsatt-and-robustness-tp1597523p1599480.html
Thus spake Russ Abbott circa 11/30/2008 09:31 PM:
> It seems to me that most branches of modern science (particle physics,
> astronomy, neuro-anatomy, ...) rely on tools to see what's real, and those
> tools do not provide a variety of independent ways to access them. It feels
> initially intuitively comforting to say that one wants a variety of
> independent way to perceive something before deciding that it is real. But I
> don't think that's how science works.
Speaking from ignorance, as I usually do, it strikes me that the
concepts "robustness" and "consistency" are related. It sounds like
that definition of robustness biases it toward the concept of consistency.
I would accept "things are (relatively) consistent if they are
accessible (detectable, ...) in a variety of independent ways."
Formally, a stronger sense would be "things are consistent if they
obtain regardless of the way they're accessed."
There's part of the concept of robustness that is left out of that
definition (which biases it toward consistency). I think that might be
something more like "vigor" or emphasis -- the capability of surviving
onslaught. And that sort of concept lends itself nicely to the type of
technophilic scientific discoveries you refer to above. Even if there's
only a single path to a result, if that result has intense meaning,
emphasis, or "vigor" as a concept, then it is robust. E.g. a long
sought after datum validating some old, accepted, but not yet validated
theory.
The problem is that this latter sense of robustness includes false memes
that take hold and persist despite being proved false or overly
simplistic. So a vigorously robust belief (like flying spaghetti
monsters or gravitons) need not be true.
--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095,
http://tempusdictum.com============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at
http://www.friam.org