Another Subjective Experience thread (for PTB)

[Philo]

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That's interesting and something I hadn't considered. I'm taking the meaning of "model" to include everything that goes into making the prediction. So if a prediction is tested and found false it falsifies the model. The point of the Duhem–Quine thesis - which talks about the impossibility of testing a scientific hypothesis in isolation - for the model therefore is that although the model has been falsified we don't know which element of the model we have shown to be false. For example, in the model of a moving earth that predicts that birds get thrown off into the sky whenever they let go of a tree branch, the test that falsifies the model does not tell us that the model's element of a moving earth is the one that has been falsified.

Along with the link you gave I think everyone here should read this one on what it means to be a Verificationist.

It looks to me like subfallen is trying to reinvent logical positivism. I've been somewhere in the post-logical positivism camp.

In the link there's an interesting reference to a post-logical postivist camp whose key objection speaks directly to one of the assumptions subfallen makes in his presentation. From the link:
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Verificationists need not be logical positivists; Willard Van Orman Quine is a famous example of a verificationist who does not accept logical positivism, on grounds of semantic holism. He suggests that, for theoretical sentences as opposed to observation sentences, meaning is "infected by theory". That theoretical sentences are reducible to observation sentences is one of the ‘dogmas of empiricism’ he rejects as incompatible with semantic holism.
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And there appears to be a new concept that's become popular in the last 20 years called Constructive Empiricism whose big idea is of the "empirically adequate". From the link:
-------------
Constructive empiricism states that scientific theories do not aim at truth, but to be empirically adequate and that their acceptance involves a belief only that they are empirically adequate. A theory is empirically adequate if and only if everything that it says about observable entities is "true" (or well-established). Constructive empiricism therefore rejects unverifiable positions not because they lack truth or meaning, but because they go beyond what is needed to be empirically adequate.
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I think my point still holds that tests cannot be performed for every possible prediction a scientific model can make. As I bolded in the passage from the link above, "their acceptance involves a belief only" that "everything that it says about observable entities is true(or well established)"

Finally, after all is said and done I'm afraid we are still left with the age old question,

What is Truth?

PairTheBoard

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I don't know what you mean by a 'model', and I don't know what 'falsifying a model' means.

[Philo]

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Moving to experience, it is important to note that science does not rely on a different "kind" of experience than any other endeavor. Every hypothesis ever made has been sparked by experiences felt by human senses, filtered through human biases, and, reacted to by human emotions. That is, experienced subjectively.

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You seem to be using the term 'subjective experience' in something like the sense of "affected by emotion, personal bias, etc." This is different from what philosophers usually mean by 'subjective experience'.

What philosophers mean by "subjective experience" are experiences that are not objectively accessible to others, i.e., the kind of 'private' or 'first-person' experiences of consciousness (like sensations) and self-conscious thought (like my awareness that I'm thinking about what the weather will be like for tomorrow). Pain is also a kind of subjective experience, since only I can feel my own pain. (there is a necessary objective aspect even to subjective experience but that is usually the domain of philosophy to deal with, not science)

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Science looks at objective data. When it has a model it can check to see if the model fits the data objectively. And it can test predictions of the model objectively. But when it creates models it relies on the inner creative process of scientists, which involves subjectivity.

PairTheBoard

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Yeah, that's not the kind of subjectivity that philosophers are talking about when they talk about being subjectively aware of our own existence. Since you were talking about being subjectively aware of your own existence (as in, "You can show me all the empirical evidence and make all the logical arguments about the "Truth" of your existence. But they can never carry as much weight as my subjective experience for the Truth that I exist. There's always the possiblity that I'm somehow dreaming my life and everthing in it. So maybe you all are just figments of my imagination. I don't think you can produce arguments that deep down cast the same doubt on my conviction that I exist") I thought that was the sense of 'subjective experience' you had in mind.

I don't know what to say about the idea that scientists use their own inner creative process, except "of course." I don't see how that changes the objective basis of empirical science though, so maybe you can elaborate.

[PairTheBoard]

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[ QUOTE ]

Moving to experience, it is important to note that science does not rely on a different "kind" of experience than any other endeavor. Every hypothesis ever made has been sparked by experiences felt by human senses, filtered through human biases, and, reacted to by human emotions. That is, experienced subjectively.

[/ QUOTE ]

You seem to be using the term 'subjective experience' in something like the sense of "affected by emotion, personal bias, etc." This is different from what philosophers usually mean by 'subjective experience'.

What philosophers mean by "subjective experience" are experiences that are not objectively accessible to others, i.e., the kind of 'private' or 'first-person' experiences of consciousness (like sensations) and self-conscious thought (like my awareness that I'm thinking about what the weather will be like for tomorrow). Pain is also a kind of subjective experience, since only I can feel my own pain. (there is a necessary objective aspect even to subjective experience but that is usually the domain of philosophy to deal with, not science)

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subfallen can speak for himself. Although I thought his wording was imprecise I took him to be getting at something I brought up on another thread.

PairTheBoard

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When you spoke about your subjective experience of your existence, weren't you talking about the sense of 'subjective experience' expressed in the cogito?

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I don't think I brought up the point we're looking at here in that thread. It was another thread. The point being,

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Science looks at objective data. When it has a model it can check to see if the model fits the data objectively. And it can test predictions of the model objectively. But when it creates models it relies on the inner creative process of scientists, which involves subjectivity. Also in the process of identifying those tests it thinks are important to test there will be subjectivity involved

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as an interpretation of what subfallen meant when he said,

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science does not rely on a different "kind" of experience than any other endeavor. Every hypothesis ever made has been sparked by experiences felt by human senses, filtered through human biases, and, reacted to by human emotions. That is, experienced subjectively.


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PairTheBoard

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Moving to experience, it is important to note that science does not rely on a different "kind" of experience than any other endeavor. Every hypothesis ever made has been sparked by experiences felt by human senses, filtered through human biases, and, reacted to by human emotions. That is, experienced subjectively.

[/ QUOTE ]

You seem to be using the term 'subjective experience' in something like the sense of "affected by emotion, personal bias, etc." This is different from what philosophers usually mean by 'subjective experience'.

What philosophers mean by "subjective experience" are experiences that are not objectively accessible to others, i.e., the kind of 'private' or 'first-person' experiences of consciousness (like sensations) and self-conscious thought (like my awareness that I'm thinking about what the weather will be like for tomorrow). Pain is also a kind of subjective experience, since only I can feel my own pain. (there is a necessary objective aspect even to subjective experience but that is usually the domain of philosophy to deal with, not science)

[/ QUOTE ]

Science looks at objective data. When it has a model it can check to see if the model fits the data objectively. And it can test predictions of the model objectively. But when it creates models it relies on the inner creative process of scientists, which involves subjectivity.

PairTheBoard

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, that's not the kind of subjectivity that philosophers are talking about when they talk about being subjectively aware of our own existence. Since you were talking about being subjectively aware of your own existence (as in, "You can show me all the empirical evidence and make all the logical arguments about the "Truth" of your existence. But they can never carry as much weight as my subjective experience for the Truth that I exist. There's always the possiblity that I'm somehow dreaming my life and everthing in it. So maybe you all are just figments of my imagination. I don't think you can produce arguments that deep down cast the same doubt on my conviction that I exist") I thought that was the sense of 'subjective experience' you had in mind.

I don't know what to say about the idea that scientists use their own inner creative process, except "of course." I don't see how that changes the objective basis of empirical science though, so maybe you can elaborate.

[/ QUOTE ]

Like I explained in my other reply, I don't think I brought up that point in the "I know I exist but I'm not so sure about You" thread. It was another thread and spoke to other things, which I don't recall right now. I'm just saying that I think that's what subfallen meant by his paragraph.

I think subfallen went on to argue that this observation does not affect his proposal that science is the method giving us our "best" look at what's "true".

As far as to how I think this affects the "objective basis" of science? I suppose it depends on what you mean by "basis". If by "basis" you mean science checking models to see if they fit the existing data and data produced by predictions made by the models, then it has no effect that I can think of. It might have other implications though about the nature of the models science invents.

PairTheBoard

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
That's interesting and something I hadn't considered. I'm taking the meaning of "model" to include everything that goes into making the prediction. So if a prediction is tested and found false it falsifies the model. The point of the Duhem–Quine thesis - which talks about the impossibility of testing a scientific hypothesis in isolation - for the model therefore is that although the model has been falsified we don't know which element of the model we have shown to be false. For example, in the model of a moving earth that predicts that birds get thrown off into the sky whenever they let go of a tree branch, the test that falsifies the model does not tell us that the model's element of a moving earth is the one that has been falsified.

Along with the link you gave I think everyone here should read this one on what it means to be a Verificationist.

It looks to me like subfallen is trying to reinvent logical positivism. I've been somewhere in the post-logical positivism camp.

In the link there's an interesting reference to a post-logical postivist camp whose key objection speaks directly to one of the assumptions subfallen makes in his presentation. From the link:
-------------
Verificationists need not be logical positivists; Willard Van Orman Quine is a famous example of a verificationist who does not accept logical positivism, on grounds of semantic holism. He suggests that, for theoretical sentences as opposed to observation sentences, meaning is "infected by theory". That theoretical sentences are reducible to observation sentences is one of the ‘dogmas of empiricism’ he rejects as incompatible with semantic holism.
----------------


And there appears to be a new concept that's become popular in the last 20 years called Constructive Empiricism whose big idea is of the "empirically adequate". From the link:
-------------
Constructive empiricism states that scientific theories do not aim at truth, but to be empirically adequate and that their acceptance involves a belief only that they are empirically adequate. A theory is empirically adequate if and only if everything that it says about observable entities is "true" (or well-established). Constructive empiricism therefore rejects unverifiable positions not because they lack truth or meaning, but because they go beyond what is needed to be empirically adequate.
----------------

I think my point still holds that tests cannot be performed for every possible prediction a scientific model can make. As I bolded in the passage from the link above, "their acceptance involves a belief only" that "everything that it says about observable entities is true(or well established)"

Finally, after all is said and done I'm afraid we are still left with the age old question,

What is Truth?

PairTheBoard

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't know what you mean by a 'model', and I don't know what 'falsifying a model' means.

[/ QUOTE ]

By "model" I mean everything that goes into making the prediction. For example, when we pre-Einstein calculate the path of mercury's orbit around the sun, the prediction of that path is using a model that includes Newton's laws of gravity, force, momentum, kinetic energy, 3-d geometry of space, etc. etc. etc. This total model was falsified when a closer look at mercury's orbit found peculiarities not predicted by the model. This presented a conundrum as to which element or combination of elements in the model was incorrect. Or in the words of "the Duhem–Quine thesis - which talks about the impossibility of testing a scientific hypothesis in isolation", we could not isolate one of the elements of the model as the hypothesis being falsified. It took the creation of a new model by Einstein to better fit the overall data.

PairTheBoard

[Philo]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
That's interesting and something I hadn't considered. I'm taking the meaning of "model" to include everything that goes into making the prediction. So if a prediction is tested and found false it falsifies the model. The point of the Duhem–Quine thesis - which talks about the impossibility of testing a scientific hypothesis in isolation - for the model therefore is that although the model has been falsified we don't know which element of the model we have shown to be false. For example, in the model of a moving earth that predicts that birds get thrown off into the sky whenever they let go of a tree branch, the test that falsifies the model does not tell us that the model's element of a moving earth is the one that has been falsified.

Along with the link you gave I think everyone here should read this one on what it means to be a Verificationist.

It looks to me like subfallen is trying to reinvent logical positivism. I've been somewhere in the post-logical positivism camp.

In the link there's an interesting reference to a post-logical postivist camp whose key objection speaks directly to one of the assumptions subfallen makes in his presentation. From the link:
-------------
Verificationists need not be logical positivists; Willard Van Orman Quine is a famous example of a verificationist who does not accept logical positivism, on grounds of semantic holism. He suggests that, for theoretical sentences as opposed to observation sentences, meaning is "infected by theory". That theoretical sentences are reducible to observation sentences is one of the ‘dogmas of empiricism’ he rejects as incompatible with semantic holism.
----------------


And there appears to be a new concept that's become popular in the last 20 years called Constructive Empiricism whose big idea is of the "empirically adequate". From the link:
-------------
Constructive empiricism states that scientific theories do not aim at truth, but to be empirically adequate and that their acceptance involves a belief only that they are empirically adequate. A theory is empirically adequate if and only if everything that it says about observable entities is "true" (or well-established). Constructive empiricism therefore rejects unverifiable positions not because they lack truth or meaning, but because they go beyond what is needed to be empirically adequate.
----------------

I think my point still holds that tests cannot be performed for every possible prediction a scientific model can make. As I bolded in the passage from the link above, "their acceptance involves a belief only" that "everything that it says about observable entities is true(or well established)"

Finally, after all is said and done I'm afraid we are still left with the age old question,

What is Truth?

PairTheBoard

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't know what you mean by a 'model', and I don't know what 'falsifying a model' means.

[/ QUOTE ]

By "model" I mean everything that goes into making the prediction. For example, when we pre-Einstein calculate the path of mercury's orbit around the sun, the prediction of that path is using a model that includes Newton's laws of gravity, force, momentum, kinetic energy, 3-d geometry of space, etc. etc. etc. This total model was falsified when a closer look at mercury's orbit found peculiarities not predicted by the model. This presented a conundrum as to which element or combination of elements in the model was incorrect. Or in the words of "the Duhem–Quine thesis - which talks about the impossibility of testing a scientific hypothesis in isolation", we could not isolate one of the elements of the model as the hypothesis being falsified. It took the creation of a new model by Einstein to better fit the overall data.

You mean by "model" what philosophers mean by a "paradigm" I suppose.

PairTheBoard

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Adopting a new paradigm, like adopting relativity theory over classical Newtonian mechanics because of the perihelion of Mercury's orbit and other observational anomalies, does not affect the underdetermination thesis.

For Quine underdetermination applies in all these cases equally--it has nothing to do with theory change or paradigm shifts.

[PairTheBoard]

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Adopting a new paradigm, like adopting relativity theory over classical Newtonian mechanics because of the perihelion of Mercury's orbit and other observational anomalies, does not affect the underdetermination thesis.

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I never said it did. I observed that the valid underdetermination thesis sheds a certain light on the change in paradigm.

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For Quine underdetermination applies in all these cases equally

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Right. I made one observation of how it applies.


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--it has nothing to do with theory change or paradigm shifts.

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First you say it applies, then you say it has nothing to do with it. Which is it?

I respectfully ask you to look again at what I actually said and speak directly to that rather than something you say it says. I was actually agreeing with your point and elaborating on it. You are a hard man to agree with.

PairTheBoard