Misunderstanding Empiricism

You listed the factors that entered into your decision."My own personal experience could be irrelevant, or worse yet, completely misleading, because I'm not an expert on this subject" was not one of them.That's what gave me the "impression." Since you don't, apparently, take the uncertainty of your own experience into account, why would I get the impression that you did?

If you said anything I disagree with I couldn't find it, but I did see this terminological problem: It isn't empiricism that provides a special methodology, but science. And it isn't empiricism which declares our knowledge provisional, but science. Empirism is not a framework within which science works. Rather, science employs empiricism as part of the method.In other words, and coming back to the main issue, and saying something that from what I've read so far it seems you agree with, it isn't the case that science uses empiricism and personal experience does not. Rather, it's that science employs methods that make much better use of empiricism than personal experience. At heart all scientifically gathered evidence derives from the personal experiences (observations, measurements, etc.) of scientists, but science adds to these personal experiences a rigor and analysis not present with just personal experience alone.What is grossly deficient with the websites and naturopaths that LindaLou draws upon is any semblance of rigor and analysis. A website of anecdotal recollections is almost totally without value when compared to double-blind placebo-based replicated studies.--Percy

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But the point you're either ignoring or just not getting is that science is still the best method we have for figuring out the way the world works.

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Never said it wasn't.BTW my issue in this isn't concerning vaccines, it's just general. My issue is with being told one MD is right and another is wrong or one study is right but another is wrong etc., etc. It doesn't matter whether it is vaccines, surgery, supplements, etc.

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Okay, so let's say you're an average person getting mixed signals. The answer is to listen to the experts. The real experts, not the self-appointed ones with their own websites or who publish in their own journals.

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Who are the real experts available to the average person concerning medical issues?
Who do you think we're getting the mixed signals from?I've disagreed with doctors plenty before web sites came around.Since my daughter's birth was covered under the military, I had five different doctor's to deal with during the pregnancy. Four missed the fact that there was a problem, but the fifth caught it.There are dentists who say wisdom teeth should come out. Others say no need unless there is a problem and there are many ideas of what constitutes a problem.Are those not our experts? If they are, then what makes one practicing doctor right and one wrong?

I think this issue has been addressed at least several times, and the answer hasn't changed. The average layperson who insists on making his own assessments of complex scientific evidence but has no background or familiarity with science has one of two choices. He can embark upon a lengthy period of study that will probably be filled with many missteps and misunderstandings if he doesn't have some scientific aptitude (and he probably doesn't, else he'd already be familiar with science because he had found he was good at it while still in school), or he can wing it and become terribly confused.We aren't all equally gifted. Some people can play the piano, some, like me, can only make noise no matter how hard we try (and God knows I've tried). Some people "get" science, some don't. So if you don't "get" science you'll probably a never "get" science, just like I'll never "get" piano (I think I've proven that by now, certainly my wife would agree). So if you insist on looking at the evidence yourself and making up your own mind, only confusion and frustration will result, just like we're seeing. My advice hasn't changed: listen to experts, avoid the quacks, get your children vaccinated. But the solution wasn't to visit a quack, I hope. There is no wisdom tooth controversy. There can be legitimate differences of opinion between experts, but vaccinating your children isn't such an issue, and this thread was begun by JavaMan because of just such confusions exhibited in the vaccination discussions. I know you're not talking about vaccinations now, but that's where this issue began.I know you find what appear to you to be different legitimate opinions as indicating uncertainty, and I know that this is very common among laypeople. Sites like this one want to help as much as possible to alleviate the confusion. But don't assume that just because you can't find your way through the maze of information that the experts don't have any good answers, because that's definitely not the case for the issues we've been discussing.--Percy

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If we could see the experiment or study first hand, there would be no problem, but we don't usually have that option. The average person is at the mercy of the interpretations of others. (experts, authority, etc.)

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But PD, we already know that for various healthcare related things like your castor oil packs, you never required that studies showing their effectiveness for what you are using them for even existed.Why do you need to see studies first hand for some things, yet simply take your Naturopath's word word for it concerning other things?

No worries. I see you have plenty to respond to sans me. I do not know if what I say is actually in line with Percy on the class relations of science and empiricism or not. Your response to me in the past appeared more direct than the few less than substantial ones I have recorded from Percy before.I was simply trying to show that empirical investigations (my use of EVC being one) ARE distinct from rational and revelatory ones.It is the case that I

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Part of the problem is the notion of "information entropy" and other kinds that Gladyshev discusses. I do not hold it against anyone for not taking the more proactive position on Gladyshev's work as I do as I still struggle to get the clearest possible intuition of the affect on populations. Javaman expressed this opinion to me on EVC before as well.

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(I could not retrieve your post to me with the Search function nor with GOOGLE)
now have a "clear" intuition to this affect but making it spell words for you may be difficult, I do not know.I understand that this post was in response to another discussion. I was simply tying to justify your stages of empiricism in a reality EVC readers could have experienced if they so choose.
The thought process involved more rationally or biasedwise in some streach of 3-D space between quaternions and mutations is like

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P. W. Bridgman(2) observed, in 1961, that thermoelectric phenomena require the phenomenological description of e.m.f to allow for two different kinds of electromotive force, one that provides what he calls the "working" e.m.f, and the other that provides the "driving" e.m.f, for the thermoelectric system. The "working" e.m.f is responsible for the production of the total energy that emerges from the system, while the "driving" e.m.f is responsible for moving the charges in the system, giving rise to the electric current. These two e.m.fs, traditionally considered the same normally in electricity, are not the same when including thermoelectric effects. Bridgman invents a thermodynamic construction to define these two phenomenologically required e.m.fs, but he emphasises that since these are constructions they are not directly observable. Here we find an alternative explanation of Bridgman's idea of the two e.m.fs, on grounds much more fundamentally linked to the electromagnetic equations than to just purely thermodynamic arguments.

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http://www.hypercomplex.com/...h/emgrav/hypcx-p20001015.html

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but now your third condition would be the first of other two. In other words the sense becomes difficult to seperate from the reflection and judging.My initial reaction to Dr. Gladyshev's contacting me was to question if my seemingly more directly electromagnetic speculations (of Maxwell on EVC etc) trumped his more thermodynamic ones. I came to realize biologically that this was not necessary but explaining how the quaternions and panbiogeography are not simply a joke is no small task. You may think that his work is just a clamoring for attention but I FOUND it squarely inside my own biophysical conceptual nexus. This was lacking in discussion with Cornell professionals.Now what is possible for me is to go from the uncertainity of the third stage back to a more certain sense reception (by displaying the differences of the two emfs on the sibling ostracod to challenge the ESS view following an experimental setup that applied in nature addresses speciation via dispersal vs center of origin), and from there either finding consensus or not.This is DONE however by using extra empirical-studies-time. It is no magic bullet train but I did not expect to see thermoelectricty a consequnece of quaternionic thinking. Circling empiricism with personal attempts work every time as long as the figure and ground are clear. Science via empiricism (Kant's "horizon") can change the base-time from which your conditions apply, but then we have differences of opinion IN empirical science rather than revelation. There is a time for rational extensions without revelation perconcieved.

I'm not upset. I just want to know what your point was. Let me give you an example of what you sound like right now.Person A: I like dogs.
Person B: I like dogs, especially poodles.Person C quoting A and B: Person A: What's your point?
Person C: Why are you upset?
Person A: I'm not upset. I just don't get your point.

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Disclaimer:

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Occasionally, owing to the deficiency of the English language, I have used he/him/his meaning he or she/him or her/his or her in order to avoid awkwardness of style.

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He, him, and his are not intended as exclusively masculine pronouns. They may refer to either sex or to both sexes!

I'm sorry I'm so inept at English that you people really, really, really, really, can't comprehend me.Read the sentence, it has nothing to do with what I require. The average person does not have first hand access to experiments or studies. We are at the mercy of the interpretations of others. We are trained to take "experts" at their word. An expert is someone who has training. MDs, NDs, Nutrionists, etc. have training. We have been programmed.Watching the experiments or studies first hand, would be hard evidence and would probably leave little to the imagination. Unfortunately the average person doesn't have that option. The average person is at the mercy of the interpretations of others. Personal experiences factor into how we deal with those interpretations.BTW, if you assume that I divulge every little detail of how I make my healthcare decisions or that I have to justify them to you or this forum, you are incorrect.

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Read the sentence, it has nothing to do with what I require. The average person does not have first hand access to experiments or studies.

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What you wrote was:

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If we could see the experiment or study first hand, there would be no problem, but we don't usually have that option.

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All I was noting was that the existence of studies showing the effectiveness of the castor oil packs didn't seem to matter to you.Moreover, when confronted with the fact that no experiement existed showing that castor oil packs could even penetrate the skin, let alone affect internal organs, you ignored that evidence and held on to your preferred initial belief.So forgive me if I don't really trust that you would have no problem giving up your preferred belief if you could see an experiment first hand. I really doubt that it would make any difference.

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We are at the mercy of the interpretations of others. We are trained to take "experts" at their word. An expert is someone who has training. MDs, NDs, Nutrionists, etc. have training. We have been programmed.

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An expert has training, yes. But what kind of training?A person trained for 50 years in Traditional Chinese Medicine who prescribes powdered rhino horn for erectile dysfunction is still a quack, despite all of those years of training. A ND with training who prescribes castor oil packs for treating the liver or the uterus or any other internal organ is still a quack, despite their training.That is because both people are not basing their treatments on scientifically determined facts, but on anecdote and tradition.We are also "programmed" these days to see past the huckster and the sales pitch, and to not think of health care professionals as gods or as people with all the answers. We have to do our homework, and we have to have our bullshit detectors fully operational if we are going to not be conned or taken in by well-meaning quacks.Edited by nator, : No reason given.

What you mean "we"? I'm not programmed to blindly accept the advice of mainstream medicine, and most obviously you are not so programmed, so who are you talking about?The answer is that you're talking about a stereotype, the one about the all-knowing, all-seeing doctor who is supported in his knowledge by flawless science that can't be questioned. I see no one here at this site who buys into this stereotype, but a lot of criticism of the stereotype itself. It's time to stop beating this dead horse.You say you're at the mercy of the interpretations of others, and by others I assume you mean the medical establishment, but who would be a better source of medical advice? There are no better alternatives out there. Maybe you can't be convinced that the medical establishment can be trusted, but however good or bad they may be, they are far, far better than any alternative, and the evidence of history and all the diseases and conditions conquered supports this view. As I said earlier, if the only knowledge you trust is knowledge you either gather yourself or observe being gathered by others, then there is only a smidgen of knowledge that you'll ever accept. Obviously that is a completely unrealistic approach to knowledge, and all you're really doing is bemoaning a common aspect of the human condition. There are far more constructive avenues down which to direct any critical analysis.--Percy

I still don't understand why you're getting upset .

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'I can't even fit all my wife's clothes into a suitcase for travelling. So you want me to believe we're going to put all of the planets and stars and everything into a sandwich bag?' - q3psycho on the Big Bang

Again, I'm not upset. I just don't understand why you quoted Percy's and my statements.We essentially agreed with each other except for a very minor point. The minor point is he included everyday common sense things like determining whether the street light is red or green when he said there are other ways to accurately acquire knowledge beside the scientific method. I, on the other hand, felt it was so bleedingly obvious about the light thing and therefore didn't consider it at all. When I mentioned the acquisition of knowledge and that the scientific method is the only way we could accurately acquire knowledge, I was refering more to phenomena that are not so bleedingly obvious. For example, electromagnetism and why a compass always pointed north. Try using religion to explain the compass and you'll see what I mean.So, again, why did you quote both of us? Were you trying to make a point that we didn't agree each other? Were you aiming more for the lurkers? What was your point?

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Disclaimer:

​

Occasionally, owing to the deficiency of the English language, I have used he/him/his meaning he or she/him or her/his or her in order to avoid awkwardness of style.

​

He, him, and his are not intended as exclusively masculine pronouns. They may refer to either sex or to both sexes!

Sorry if I offended you. It was a bit cheap to quote you - I would have been annoyed if someone had done that to me, I must admit. So, apologies.I wasn't making a cheap shot, though, honest . In the opening post I'd claimed that some posters were arguing that science was the only route to knowledge. In his response, Percy said no one was making that claim. Your post was just a convenient example to prove him wrong.The point of this thread is to caution against an overenthusiastic praise of science. In principle, scientific results are no more certain than the everyday knowledge you reach by induction (for example, your knowledge that the sun will rise tomorrow) - science just tests more for conditions that might make the inductive reasoning false.Note that I don't believe there's anything that will give me more confidence than science (or rather, empirical knowledge generally). I'm an atheist materialist empiricist - what else am I going to use?

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'I can't even fit all my wife's clothes into a suitcase for travelling. So you want me to believe we're going to put all of the planets and stars and everything into a sandwich bag?' - q3psycho on the Big Bang

Maybe I've just spent too much time in my life finding ways around brick walls to just cave because something doesn't go as planned. A study or experiment is very specific. Closing one avenue doesn't negate all the other avenues to be investigated. Did a study or experiment address my particular issue? Does it negate one avenue and leave others open? You don't wish to take into consideration McGarey's work, I do. You provided nothing that showed that castor oil packs are dangerous.

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So forgive me if I don't really trust that you would have no problem giving up your preferred belief if you could see an experiment first hand. I really doubt that it would make any difference.

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That's your prerogative, but you would be wrong.What you miss is that if the packs don't work for me, I won't use them, just like Midol (which doesn't work for me). Risk factor is another key. Castor Oil is GRAS per the FDA. If it truly can't get through the skin, then there is no harm in someone trying it for themselves. IOW, first hand information.You keep saying think, but seem to be annoyed when I want to look at possibilities. Just because my thinking doesn't follow the same path as yours, doesn't mean it's wrong. We've had different experiences in life which equip us with different information.Remember: you do as much research as you can on your particular problem(s), and you see how they are to work with, and if what they do and advise you to do works.

But that's exactly what does make the results of scientific inquiry more certain than just lay knowledge and experience.How could you miss that?