Posted by
glen ep ropella on
Jul 08, 2011; 1:57am
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/The-Grand-Design-Philosophy-is-Dead-and-Hubris-tp6559131p6560829.html
Owen Densmore wrote at 07/07/2011 06:39 PM:
> Good lord, how? Is it as empirical? Does it create as provably valid
> models? Or is it simply as worthy an area of study as science?
Well, as I said, philosophy is engaged with inference and science is
not. Hence, you must use philosophy in order to develop a scientific
theory. Vice versa, science is engaged with proving your theories
false. You can't pursue science without philosophy and you can't pursue
philosophy without science.
> I think the Par you are considering would not include your going to a
> philosopher for medical treatment, right?
Yes, actually. Effective diagnosis requires philosophy. Similarly,
every plumber I've ever paid has a "philosophy of plumbing". Every
landscaper I've ever met has a philosophy of landscaping. Etc. So, the
simple answer is, yes. Further, I would NOT go to a doctor who had no
philosophy (assuming such a beast exists).
The unfortunate part of this is that too many people engage in
philosophy with no science to eliminate their wacko theories.
> Er, how does Newton deal with negation? Isn't a clear set of equations
> saying what *will* happen? I mean of course one can say, It Is Not The
> Case That F=ma Is Not True, but really, just how can we think of science
> limited to negation?
Science is rooted in testability and falsification. And even if you're
not a fan of Popper, you should still be able to admit that no
untestable, unfalsifiable theory is scientific. So, science _at_least_
requires falsification. Many of Newton's theories were falsifiable, but
not falsified. Of course, it's also true that many of Newton's theories
were unfalsifiable and unfalsified. So, some of what Newton did was
scientific and some was not, just like the rest of us.
> Don't get me wrong, I have great respect for all the rich topics of
> investigation we pursue, philosophy included. However, I don't see that
> they are on par in any way other than you can study it.
You may well have different conceptions of what philosophy is ... and
what science is. That's fine. But _I_ think they are equally valuable,
equally useful, and equally "real". In pretty much every quantification
I can think of, they are on par ... oh, except that most people don't do
science. Hence, we see a bit of a back-lash amongst the scientists
bemoaning that ... hence silly statements like "philosophy is dead".
--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095,
http://tempusdictum.com============================================================
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