Philosophy 101

I have not dismissed it. No, of course not.

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Jesus was a liberal hippie

What has any of this co-ordinate stuff got to do with scientific theories or discoveries? What has it got to do with a philosophy of science? What point are you making here?I very much suspect that you are conflating scientific theories which attempt to explain and describe the world with arbitrary conventions such as longditude and latitude which are just convenient methods of communicating things like position. Given your track record on this subject this confusion on your part is hardly surprising. (To paraphrase Crashfrog): If scientific theories were descriptions of methods instead of descriptions of the world, they wouldn't be able to make accurate predictions about the world - just about methods. And the purpose of science is to explain the world, not to explain itself. That kind of circular focus would produce no knowledge at all, how could it?Your model of science makes it impossible for science to actually do what science observably does. Namely to successfully predict the behaviour of nature. Thus you're wrong. Obviously.Key Question: Why do you think some scientific theories yield more accurate predictions than others?

I especially enjoyed the rationallyspeaking blog.My favorite comment:

quote:

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(B)ut the accusations that all people using post-modernism as a tool are either fools or charlatans will convince only those who were already convinced, and not those of us who expect argument and reason...and not mere ad homonym attacks.

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I'm still cackling over a postmodernist denouncing "ad homonym" attacks.No wonder they think all texts collapse upon themselves.Edited by Omnivorous, : No reason given.

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Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?
-Shakespeare

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Real things always push back.
-William James

Written on a stall wall at Indiana University:"Coito ergo sum."And the rejoinder:"That's putting des whores before Descartes."The continuing colloquium covers an entire wall.

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Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?
-Shakespeare

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Real things always push back.
-William James

So you do believe that humans have, at least to some extant, innate knowledge ?Children have also being shown to believe in a creator God. Does that make it the 'naive commonsense view' ?(Brooks, M., Natural born believers, New Scientist 201(2694):31—33, 7 February 2009) When we say that 'objective truth exists' we say that as opposed to 'truth is relative'. Some philosophies think that truth is relative, that things can be true for someone but not for all. It's the classic discussion-stopper ''Well if it is true for you that's fine ...''Obviously, you can see that science could not work in those circumstances. When a scientists discovers something that is true, a physical law for example, it has to be true for all scientists. Then you must explain why science was never developped in a culture who didn't believe in order in the universe.I cannot comprehend how you can think that science can be done by someone who doesn't expect to find natural laws, and who does not expect beforehand to be able to hypothesize, theorize on what he sees in nature.This belief a an orderly universe is viewed as the basic tenant that enabled the birth of modern science.

As a side note, I don't see how children could have any view--naive or otherwise--before they absorb ideas that come from the culture.

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Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?
-Shakespeare

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Real things always push back.
-William James

When talking to nwr about the nature of science you have to bear in mind that he has something of an "unusual" take on this subject.nwr in a previous discussion: "Apparently, I was not clear enough. I'll say it again. Scientific theories have nothing to say about how nature behaves."

I asked myself this question also. But the study I referenced included japanese children, and they still gave the same results as children from other cultures, even though the the concept of a creating God is absent from their culture.

No. That probably comes from parents. I usually hear that presented as "absolute truth" vs. "relative truth."We use the term "truth" very broadly. We use it for assertions about the physical world, and we also use it for statements about cultural constructs. And then there are mixed statements which include part of both. Whether truth is absolute or relative depends on the kind of statement. I take scientific laws to be cultural constructs (within the culture of science). And, as such, they are not absolute truths. They are open for questioning, and they are questioned. Scientific laws are human constructs. They are not discoveries, they are inventions.

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Jesus was a liberal hippie

What? Why would you think that?The Japanese word for "God" is "Kami-sama", roughly "honored ghost". Japan has been visited by Christian missionaries since the 16th century, and exposed to Western thought since 1400 or so. Why would the notion of a "creator God" be absent from their culture?

Perhaps you can show that they do make accurate predictions about the 'world', and not just about the 'method'; or even show how the 'world' according to science exists in anyway independent of the 'method'.Jon

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Check out No webpage found at provided URL: Apollo's Temple!
Ignorance is temporary; you should be able to overcome it. - nwr

Do you understand that your example of the longditude/latitude co-ordinate system is not an example of a scientific theory?Because thus far you have quite clearly been under the serious misapprehension that the construction of arbitrary systems such as particular co-ordinate system for pragmatic reasons such as navigation is what science is all about. Hence the nonsensical assertions such as "Scientific theories have nothing to say about how nature behaves." Do you understand the relationship between conseravtion laws and symmetry invariance? If not I suggest you at least look this up before confidently making such sweeping statements.

That's a silly argument.It should be obvious that scientific theories do not make predictions about the world (accurate or otherwise). People (scientists) make those predictions. And the scientists who use theories when making predictions are actually using the methods described by the theories in order to make predictions.

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Jesus was a liberal hippie

You can make predictions using Tarot cards. There is nothing inherently scientific about plucking predictions from your arse using a given method.Key Question: Why do you think some theories yield more accurate predictions about the bevaviour of nature than others? Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Predicting eclipses.So Jon do you agree with nwr that "Scientific theories have nothing to say about how nature behaves."?