Academic Freedom

1984 is a classic satirical novel on the nature of tyranny in the mass media driven, information age, totalitarian surveillance state. Accordingly, it is vital to appreciate the force of the Winston Smith on the Rack scene — yes, taken from the related movie — where the issue of the self-evident truth 2 + 2 = 4 comes up: First truths, in short, are inextricably intertwined with first duties, and both are equally self-evident. As one clear manifestation, gross injustice is always rooted in false, unreasonable, unwarranted, dishonest thinking. In case one is tempted to imagine that this is a dismissible satirical exaggeration, kindly ponder the sickening judicial torture-murder of Czech national hero and martyr, Milada Horakova and others on Read More ›

A classic case in point of self-evident truth can be seen by splitting our fingers into a two and a three then joining them again — and, sorry, this needs to be hammered home hard as we are cutting across the grain of current education and cultural conditioning. So, pardon demonstration by undeniable example and re-use of an illustration: As a bonus, we see another SET that is like unto the first, self-evident, but is subtler. That error exists is not only a massive empirical fact but an undeniable truth. The attempted denial actually supports the Josiah Royce proposition. By way of Epictetus (c. 180 AD), we can see a third case, SET’s that are first principles of reasoning antecedent Read More ›

It is highly relevant and timely to now ponder “Big-S Science and appeals to official consensus i/l/o the logic of the pessimistic induction and what warrant entails,” with “degrees of warrant, open mindedness and tolerance/diversity.” It is probably best to start with the pessimistic induction, here, via SEP: If one considers the history of scientific theories in any given discipline, what one typically finds is a regular turnover of older theories in favor of newer ones, as scientific knowledge develops. From the point of view of the present, most past theories must be considered false; indeed, this will be true from the point of view of most times. Therefore, by enumerative induction (that is, generalizing from these cases), surely theories Read More ›

Here, a video series explores Godel’s incompleteness results: The core point is that Hilbert’s scheme collapsed, nicely summarised. The Godel incompleteness results and the Turing machine halting challenge made Mathematics irreducibly complex. So, Mathematics, too, is a venture of knowledge as warranted, credibly true (so reliable) belief, which must be open to correction. An exercise of rational, responsible faith, not utter certainty on the whole, once a sufficiently complex system is on the table. (Yes, first duties of reason obtain . . . here, there be dragons that love chick peas [Cicero . . .].) The defeasible [= defeat-able] framework for understanding knowledge extends to Mathematics. A fortiori to Computer Science and Physics, then onward across the spectrum of disciplines Read More ›

Newton. The latest year zero reset target, as Telegraph reports: Sir Isaac Newton has been labelled as a potential beneficiary of “colonial-era activity” in draft plans to “decolonise” the engineering curriculum at Sheffield University. Students learning about the mathematician and scientist’s three laws of motion, the core of modern physics, could see changes in their teaching to explain the “global origins and historical context” of his theories, documents suggest. The plans form part of the engineering faculty’s efforts to “challenge long-standing conscious and unconscious biases” among students to tackle “Eurocentric” and “white saviour” approaches to science and maths, and promote “inclusive design”. When objectivity, core physical science and core Math are demonised through implicit, euphemistic tagging as racist, it is Read More ›

In discussing implication logic and first duties, Wikipedia on ID came up yet again. The lead’s manifest failure to be responsibly objective, descending into slander from the outset, speaks volumes: Intelligent design (ID) is a pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God, presented by its proponents as “an evidence-based scientific theory about life’s origins”.[1][2][3][4][5] Proponents claim that “certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.”[6] ID is a form of creationism that lacks empirical support and offers no testable or tenable hypotheses, and is therefore not science.[7][8][9] The leading proponents of ID are associated with the Discovery Institute, a Christian, politically conservative think tank Read More ›