Induction and Science

No. I understand your arguments perfectly. You are just wrong. If that is youir view then it is no wonder that your description of non-inductive science is so at odds with the way science actually does operate. Then I guess we can just change our "standards" build a series of perpetual motion machines and solve the world's energy crisis before breakfast.I mean that pesky second law of thermodynamics doesn't actually tell us anything fundamental about the world does it? It would be.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Inductive reasoning?Or was this assumption yet another of your "derived from nothing" spectacularly fortuitous guesses?

Question: Is it the conclusion of science that the second law of thermodynamics applies only to those instances so far observed? Or is the second law of thermodynamics a statement of something far more wide ranging and fundamental about the way nature has been scientifically concluded to universally behave?This is not a rhetorical question. Newton’s universal law of gravitation has already been discussed (the name is the clue here). Conservation of energy. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. The second law of thermodynamics. All are examples of scientific principles which are considered by science to accurately describe the behaviour of nature universally. Not just here and now. Not just that which has been observed. But (tentatively) that which will be observed and even those things unobserved. So, like NWr, you think we are guessing or expressing opinions when we predict things like eclipses? The non-inductive view of science you and Nwr are advocating makes it impossible for science to conclude anything about the future behaviour of nature. All you can do is cite a standard and then see whether or not nature will or will not continue to operate in accordance with this standard. Without induction there is absolutely no reason at all to expect that it will. Yet science has concluded that we can expect (albeit tentatively) nature to continue to operate in accordance with our universal principles. Science keeps making very practical and very accurate conclusions about the behaviour of the real world on the basis of these inductively derived universal principles. Why would we expect our GPS system to work in an hours time unless the principles of relativity can be considered to apply then? The particle accelerator at CERN was designed ages ago so why would we possibly expect the principles applied to that design to facilitate any experiments we attempt today or tomorrow? No luminiferous aether was found in Einstein’s day but maybe we need to retest for it’s existence at least once a month just in case it makes an appearance? Has anybody checked whether or not nature is still operating in accordance with Boyle’s law today?I mean who knows? Right?It is the very fact that the non-inductive science you and Nwr are advocating denies the ability of science to conclude that nature will (tentatively) behave in certain ways that makes this description of science so at odds with real world science. Actually yes I have. See message 396. Although why you and Nwr are obsessing over this is a mystery.

Your non-inductive description of science spectacularly fails to deal with the indisputable fact that science as practised by real scientists makes inductive conclusions about the way nature will behave in as yet unobserved circumstances.Until you can describe science in a way that does not necessitate such genuibely scientific conclusions as being "guesses" or "opinions" you remain entirely refuted on this very crucial point regarding the inductive nature of science.Case closed as far as your main argument is concerned. But I see you now want to change the subject. I don't see how you can seperate the two in the way that you are suggesting. Our interpretations are worthless unless they say something about the actual world. OK. But idealisations of what? If you are saying that scientific theories are imperfect models nobody here will disagree with you. But what are our scientific theories modelling?The difference between imperfect models and the assertion that "scientific theories have nothing to say about how nature behaves" is enormous. We can all agree on the former. But no scientist and few philosophers of science would agree with your assertion that "scientific theories have nothing to say about how nature behaves". Can you tell us what it is you think scientific theories are doing and why they allow us to manipulate and control aspects of nature so successfully then?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

I feel a "derived from nothing" axiom coming.Urrrrgggghhhh.(**Clench and squeeze**)Axiom: Jon is an idiot.Look Jon!! By some bewilderingly improbable coincidence my "derived from nothing" axiom just so happens to coincide with all of my real world expereince. Just like yours do. I see we have reached that inevitable stage where you have effectively lost the argument so rather than actually engage in any further discussion you simply start asserting that you have made lots and lots of unanswered points.Rather than go through the usual routine of me asking you what these points are and you repeatedly refusing to cite any of them whilst continuing to insist that there are lots and lots of them why don't we do something different this time?Why don't you pick out that one most pertinent and argument clinching point that you think remains unanswered and put it to me?In return perhaps you can answer this?Jon — How is an assumption derived from nothing different to a blind random guess?

Nwr's view of non-inductive science is completely unable to account for the fact that science is able to successfully make very specific (albeit tentative) conclusions about as yet unobserved events.His "non-inductive" science provides no reason to think that any scientific prediction will tell us anything more about how nature will or won't behave than a blind random guess.

CS do you have any idea just how fundamentally wrong you are about this?Newtons third law tells us that a force is not merely something defined as being that which causes a change of velocity. It is a statement of the much more fundamental idea of force as an interaction between bodies. This underpins the logic of Newton's other two laws.Forces always arrive from interactions. That is what Newton's third law tells us.If we were to ever observe an isolated body undergoing an acceleration Newtons laws would have been violated in a fundamental way. They would have been falsified.Newton's third law also leads directly to the universal principle that is the conservation of momentum. If, as you are suggesting, Newton's third law only applied in some situations we would see the the principle of conservation of momentum being violated all over the place.Strangely we have never observed this.

You might be right. In which case Nwr has invented a form of science where theories are unfalsifiable because they are independent of nature.Radical. Nothing that prepared me for this non-inductive reality-independent form of "science".

Premises derived from what Jon? How is an assumption "derived from nothing" different to an entirely random guess?

Your entire position in this thread has been based on "derived from nothing" premises and now suddenly they are "off-topic" because you are unable to answer a question without your idiocy being so apparent that even you might have to recognise it?Incredible. As per the Mars example. We are applying Newtons laws to a new situation based on the inductive conclusion that if they can be successfully applied now on Earth they can also be successfully applied whenever on Mars too.We are doing this: Inductive Reasoning

Jon — How is an assumption derived from nothing different to a blind random guess? It means to apply to a specific new instance on the basis of inductively concluding that it applies to all instances.

Jon — How is an assumption derived from nothing different to a blind random guess?

Jon — How is an assumption derived from nothing different to a blind random guess? Can you read?I wrote "Why don't you pick out that one most pertinent and argument clinching point that you think remains unanswered and put it to me?"If you take me up on this offer we will deal with this multitude of apparently unaddressed points that you have made one by one.But I am not going to let you get away with your "I have made lots of points" bollocks this time.Cite one or shut the fuck up.

Those relying on the conclusions derived from blind random guesses might well care.I am about to have another of those "derived from nothing" axiom moments.Urrrrggghhh!!(**Clench and squeeze**)Axiom: Jon can fly.From this I deduce that if you climb to the top of the nearest tower block, jump off and head East you will be here in London in no time.I'll buy you a beer.

So you cannot name a single as yet unaddressed point then? Despite there being lots of them?Oh dear. Indeed. "Derived from nothing". I have. Your "method" is what is more commonly known as "guessing" and then coming to the exact same conclusions as the rest of us do inductively.It is a miracle of sheer coincidence.