Induction and Science

So this axiom of yours which you have repeatedly asserted is "derived from nothing" is actually derived from experience. That it will always apply, as per your "axiom", is thus an inductive conclusion.Exactly as I have been saying all along. You said that to falsify your little logic exercise I "need only provide one example of an argument that is inductive that cannot be made deductive by adding missing premises".You have conceded that your "derived from nothing" axiomatic starting point of your little deductive exercise is in fact derived from experience.Have you ever woken up to observe the world in a state that is inconsistent with it functioning as observed while you were not observing it?Have you (for example) ever awoken to find that the world appeared to have been on pause during your period of non-observance?Do you think you ever will? Then you remain refuted.

No. Force, mass, and acceleration are properties of the world. They -- and their relationship expressed as F=ma -- were discovered through observation and experiment. Using induction, this law of nature was assumed to apply to all relevant instances anywhere in the universe -- past, present, and future.nwr is confused about what a standard is. Newton's laws can be used to develop standards when scientists agree to plug certain values into an equation. Unlike laws, standards are not assumed to be universal; they are conventions and can be changed at any time by mutual consent.To say that a law of nature exists to serve as a standard would be like saying height exists to calibrate rulers.

If the standard is to apply to future observations of nature in the same way that it applies to existing obsevations then you must be implicitly assuming that nature itself will in the future behave in a manner that is consistent with past behaviour.Thus your "standard" is nothing more than the rebranded inductive conclusion that nature will behave in the future as it has been observed to behave in the past.Although how you reconcile this with your assertions that predicted timings of eclipses are nothing but "opinions" and "guesses" remains a mystery.

See, I'm not so sure about that bolded part.For things like Pi (3.14159...), I'd expect, say, an alien culture from the planet Arcturus (an internet high five to anyone who gets that reference [escept Oni 'cause I know he knows]) to come to the exact same number as we have, because its an intrinsic property of the world.But I would not expect them to come to the same categorizations of things like mass and accelaration and the force that those yield. They might have F = xyz, where they're defining force in a way that employs something else that we don't.Ya know what I mean? You see the difference? But the F can't be anything other than the m times the a because that's what it is defined as being. We don't need to induce anything about the future to maintain a definition... well, maybe some things but they'd be ridiculous to question.The point is that F=ma is different from a theory like 'All swans are white' because it doesn't use the same inductive process. Or maybe he's not really saying what you think he is. I'm not sure what is meant by a "universal standard"... I'd guess it would be somehting like Pi.But I am getting the point of there being scientific stuffs that haven't employed the inductive process.Although I do see that science can and does use induction.I think his point has been better expressed in other posts (and in other threads), but I'm not putting the time into outlining it

Doesn't it?Do you think that the scientific conclusion is that F=ma only applies to those occurrances we have actually observed rather than ALL events where forces apply? Can't be? Are you saing that nature cannot be applying forces that are proportional to the mass squared elsewhere in the universe because our theory simply won't allow that to occur?CS Do you think nature cares what the standard is or will behave in accordance with this standard just because we have defined it as a standard?Without induction what reason do you have to expect your standard to apply to anything that has not been directly observed to behave in the standard manner?

You only confirm that you don't know what standard is.Suppose I go out and perform an experiment, but I choose not to follow standards. My experiment refutes Newton's laws of motion. Will you conclude that Newton was wrong? Or will you conclude that my evidence is no good because I failed to follow the standards? Irrelevant. The standards apply to us. We don't expect nature to observe our standards. We expect ourselves to follow the standards.

---

Jesus was a liberal hippie

The standard applies to existing observations, as long as we followed the standard in making those observations. The standard will apply to future observations as long as we follow the standard when making future observations.Are you from Mars, or from somewhere outside of the Milky Way galaxy You are pontificating about science, but sounding as if you haven't a clue as to how science is actually done.

---

Jesus was a liberal hippie

Whatever nomenclature you use the conclusion that nature will behave in the future as it has been observed to behave in the past is inductive. And any universal principle of science is necessarily considered to apply to past, present and future events. So.EITHER you are advocating a description of science that is entirely non-inductive and which thus considers conclusions regarding future events to be nothing more than guesses and opinions. This position makes scientific universal principles an impossibility. This view of science is refuted by the very fact that science does in practise derive principles which are considered to be universal.OR you are advocating a standard which includes the ability to make universal statements and which is thus itself inductive (as per Message 363). In this case your entire non-inductive science argument is trivially refuted by the underlying presence of inductive reasoning.You started with the former of these two positions. Now you seem to be advocating the latter.But either way your position(s) are refuted. If you find objective repeatable evidence of a force that is not the result of an interaction or of an interaction where the motion of a body is not affected in a manner consistent with Newton' laws then you will indeed have falsified Newton's laws.Your Nobel prize awaits....... If your entire "standards" argument is ultimately inductive as per Message 363 this can hardly be described as irrelevant to the question of whether science is inductive or not now can it?The fact you cannot answer a question without contradicting yourself doesn't make it irrelevant Nwr.

And why would you expect nature to comply with your standard in these future observations?

You are thinking like a creationist.

In the beginning God created force, mass and acceleration. And God saw that it was good.

​

When Adam ate the apple Newton was bonked on the head by the apple, his eyes were opened. And suddenly he knew force.

You are quite clueless as to how science works.

---

Jesus was a liberal hippie

Nature isn't being required to comply with anything.Take a class in science, maybe a freshman physics class. Be sure to include the lab class. Maybe you might learn something.

---

Jesus was a liberal hippie

I agree that it is possible that intelligent life forms from Planet Arcturus might discover different properties of nature, and their F=xyz might be equally valid -- or perhaps even more accurate and useful than F=ma.Nonetheless, Newton discovered laws that tell us something true about the world. Is there room for improvement? Of course there is. Quantum mechanics and general relativity have already shown that. I disgaree with your implication that F=ma is tautological. F=m/a is also a definition, but it is false.Induction is used to universalize F=ma. If my 2,000 lb. Chevy runs out of gas and I push it with all my might, I may find that I can get it up to 1 mile per hour over a distance of one block. From this I can calculate the net force I am capable of applying. Maybe tomorrow my 3,000 lb. Ford will run out of gas. Now that I know how much force I can apply, I can calculate the acceleration that I can expect to achieve. But without inductive reasoning, I would have no reason to believe that F=ma will apply to my Ford on Tuesday just as it had applied to my Chevy on Monday.In fact, thanks to induction, I can use F=ma on Arcturus, notwithstanding the Arcturans' F=xyz. I don't think anyone in this discission has asserted that scientists use induction only. I'm certainly not asserting that. But induction is used often. And until someone comes up with something better, it is a necessary part of the scientific method.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.

Pots and kettles.....Do you think that our theories define or reflect reality Nwr?Do you think nature cares what the standard is or will behave in accordance with this standard just because we have defined it as a standard?This standard that has been constructed is completely worthless if new observations do not conform to it isn’t it?But unless you are inductively conclude that nature will continue to behave as observed thus far why would your standard apply to any new observations?Without induction what reason do you have to expect your standard to apply to anything that has not been directly observed to behave in the standard manner?Without induction how is it possible to have anything that could even be called a universal principle?Yet science does derive universal principles. Because we do inductively conclude that nature will continue to behave in the same way it has been observed to behave prevoulsy.This is a part of science that your non-inductive view of science just cannot cope with.

Talk about change the question!!! I didn't ask what was "required".It seems that you are unable to answer the question actually put to you without refuting yourself. Let's see what the possible answers are:A) "I don't expect nature to comply with a standard in any future observations" In which case your induction-free-science argument makes genuinely scientific universal principles an impossibility. Yet they exist. Thus you are refuted.B) "I do expect nature to comply with the standard in future observations because nature can be assumed to behave in the future as it has in the past". In which case you are using inductive reasoning. In which case you are also refuted.So Nwr which is it? Or do you have a third option? Do share.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : Spelling

No.Well, okay, some of our theories might partly reflect reality. However, the best of our theories do neither. Nature doesn't give a damn about our standards. Standards are not about nature. Standards are about us. New observations will be in accordance with the standards, as long as we observe the standards when making our observations. They are called standards because they standardize how we make our observations. That's bullshit. The standards have nothing to say about how nature behaves. They are about how we should behave, in order to make observations.You really ought to learn something about science before you pontificate about it.

---

Jesus was a liberal hippie