I keep having to remind myself that science is self-correcting …

_{Denyse O'Leary

May 20, 2009

Ethics}

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I have often been wearied by legends in their own lunchroom huffing that science differs from other endeavours because it is “self-correcting.”

To which I reply: Aw come off it, fellas. Any system that does not go extinct is self-correcting – after it collapses on its hind end. This is true of governments, businesses, churches, and not-for-profit organizations. I’ve seen enough of life to know.

Here’s a classic: At The Scientist’s NewsBlog, Bob Grant reveals (May 7, 2009) that

Scientific publishing giant Elsevier put out a total of six publications between 2000 and 2005 that were sponsored by unnamed pharmaceutical companies and looked like peer reviewed medical journals, but did not disclose sponsorship, the company has admitted.

Elsevier is conducting an “internal review” of its publishing practices after allegations came to light that the company produced a pharmaceutical company-funded publication in the early 2000s without disclosing that the “journal” was corporate sponsored

[ … ]

The allegations involve the Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine, a publication paid for by pharmaceutical company Merck that amounted to a compendium of reprinted scientific articles and one-source reviews, most of which presented data favorable to Merck’s products. The Scientist obtained two 2003 issues of the journal — which bore the imprint of Elsevier’s Excerpta Medica — neither of which carried a statement obviating Merck’s sponsorship of the publication.

The linked related stories and comments are most illuminating, and bear out my critique of “peer review” here. Let’s just say that peer review started out as a good idea, but …

(Note: There is no paywall, but you may need to register to view the story, .)

Also, today at Colliding Universes

Neutrinos: Sudbury Neutrino Observatory does the sun’s bookkeeping

Origin of life: The live cat vs. the dead cat

Cosmology: Wow. It takes guts to wage war with Stephen Hawking … he appeared in Star Trek

Universe: Arguments against flatness (plus exposing sloppy science writing)

Origin of life: Latest scenario gives RNA world a boost

Colliding Universes is my blog on competing theories about our universe.

Comments

---Diffaxial: "Surely, whether or not you accept the conclusions of quantum physics, you are not disputing that it entails profound indeterminacy of individual subatomic events - which is the principle Pagels sought to illustrate." I am not disputing the scientific conclusions of quantum physics, which would, in itself, be an irrattional response to facts in evidence. On the other hand, I certainly dispute the notion that the events are causeless or that an omniscient being, who established the physical laws in the first place, could not predict how they would play out. Such things would be child's play for one who could know future history, which would entail calculating the impact of all human thoughts, words, deeds, and intentions, in conjunction with everyone else’s thoughts, words, and deeds, in combination with all the biological, psychodynamic, environmental factors that tend to pull us in one direction or another. If an omniscient God could calculate the final result of all human decisions, who have the power to resist his will, he could much more easily calculate the final result of a law that he designed to behave according to his will. I am sorry, but Pagel's statement was thoughtless and uninformed. And, paying tribute to Nakashima, if Ed Freidkin said something similar, then he is equally misguided.StephenB_{May 29, 2009
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Diffaxial: “As the late Heinz Pagels put it, even “the perfect mind of God” cannot predict the specific outcome of individual quantum events.” I think Ed Freidkin said something similar in his book Digital Physics. That even an omniscient being could not predict a future state of the universe from its laws and initial conditions, but would actually have to run it to find out.Nakashima_{May 29, 2009
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"It is not that there are hidden facts or facts unknown to us, or even facts that exist but are inherently undiscoverable; There simply are no such further facts in quantum mechanics underlying specific events that display quantum indeterminacy and the associated irreducible randomness. Therefore facts analogous to the further facts establishing the “cause” of macroscopic walls simply don’t exist for these events. This is why quantum theory is sometimes said to be “acausal.” This is rich!! Difff is using the law of non contradiction to refute the law of non contradiction!!!! Vividvividbleau_{May 29, 2009
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StephenB
If causeless effects can occur in any context...
The only assertion at hand is the irreducibly indeterminate nature of events within extremely specific contexts - those within which quantum description departs from that of classical physics. No one is making an assertion about "any context."Diffaxial_{May 29, 2009
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StephenB:
That quote, and the principle it tries to support, is complete nonsense.
Surely, whether or not you accept the conclusions of quantum physics, you are not disputing that it entails profound indeterminacy of individual subatomic events - which is the principle Pagels sought to illustrate. (He died accidently in 1988).Diffaxial_{May 29, 2009
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----Rob: "As I’ve said repeatedly, the problem is semantic. The assertion that all events have causes seems to be saying one thing, but it’s really saying something else, or, more accurately, saying nothing." No. The problem is that you, like Diffaxial, are rejecting the metaphysical foundations that underlie science. If causeless effects can occur in any context, then you can rule out nothing. One important way we reason in the abstract is to eliminate possibilities. Unless the principles of right reason are non-negotiable, it is impossible for science to correct itself because, under the circumstances you both propose, one could not say that the earlier theory is incompatible with the latter theory. If a thing can both be and not be, or if an effect can exist without a cause, Newton would never have given way to Einstein and Heisenburg. All apparently contradictory theories could be reconciled, and we could rule out nothing. There would be no progress because no one would have honored the standards of right reason. Both of you think that you are being progressive, but you are really suggesting that we go back to the stone age---a time when magic explained everything and logic had no currency.StephenB_{May 29, 2009
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----Diffaxial: "As the late Heinz Pagels put it, even “the perfect mind of God” cannot predict the specific outcome of individual quantum events." That quote, and the principle it tries to support, is complete nonsense. One would not expect an atheist physicist like Pagels, who knows nothing of theology, to comprehend the concept of an omnisicient God. By definition, the perfect mind of God knows the outcome of all events.StephenB_{May 29, 2009
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KF:
Bottomline: The quantum event is stochastic but that does not translate into being causeless. No more than the stochastic nature of the uppermost side of a tossed die — effectively a random outcome across the range of possibilities — is causeless...But again the central issue turns on observability/ uncertainty, thence also stochastic distributions.
Many classical processes result in stochastic outcomes, the results of many tosses of a fair die being one of them. However, if you are asserting that the indeterminate and hence random outcomes observed in quantum phenomena are comparable to that of a the outcome of tosses of a die, and hence at least in principle determined and knowable at some level (albeit difficult or impossible to discern at a practical level), you are profoundly mistaken. As the late Heinz Pagels put it, even "the perfect mind of God" cannot predict the specific outcome of individual quantum events.Diffaxial_{May 29, 2009
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Sorry to butt in here, but it appears that kairosfocus isn't getting the question that R0b and Diffaxial are trying to ask. Perhaps this will help. kairosfocus, imagine that you begin observing a single atom of radon-222 (half-life roughly four days) at 9 AM tomorrow. It decays after 15 hours, 6 minutes and 49 seconds. What causes it to decay then and not at some other time?serendipity_{May 29, 2009
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Diff and Rob: About to close off, having just done 1st pass on a client need. I would like to see you both address the fire triangle example. This would set a baseline for common ground on sufficient, necessary and N & S causal factors. I cited alpha decay as it is a reasonably accessible instance of a quantum phenomenon, which brings to bear the typical factors that affect such a decay. (Way back, that is how we took a first case study. More exotic decays are much more inaccessible and subject to a lot more interpretation, with bubble chamber tracks and whatnot. Remember, Rutherford proved alphas were He nucleii by collecting them and testing the He. Originally, they were counted with scintillation screens -- ZnS flashes; the statistics of which first established that the atomic nucleus is a dense core positive charge, ~ 10^-14 m, through large angle deflections on shooting alphas at thin Au foil. [A lot less is being assumed or inferred in such cases.]) Particles do decay or transform themselves, e.g. photon to electron-positron pair if above the energy threshold. As the gamma photon transformation case shows, there are energy constraints [enough to form the mass of the e+/e- pair; with issues of symmetries (particle/antiparticle, charge balance), energy conservation, etc as well], and of course there are evident spontaneities. Again, we see necessary causal factors [here: enough photon energy] and constraints on the reaction [here, energy conservation, charge, particle/antiparticle etc . . . constraints, not causal forces], as observed, and we see that there are other factors that may set up a stochastic distribution in a population. Bottomline: The quantum event is stochastic but that does not translate into being causeless. No more than the stochastic nature of the uppermost side of a tossed die -- effectively a random outcome across the range of possibilities -- is causeless. Beyond that, of course there are particles that exhibit multiple pathways of behaviour [we do not have to go to decays to get that, electrons shot at a double slit or the equivalent are good enough . . interference showing wave-particle duality] and we see superposed wavefunctions and indeed onward interesting particle entanglement issues. But again the central issue turns on observability/ uncertainty, thence also stochastic distributions. We still do not see things that happen without necessary or sufficient causal conditions. (And, it is those conditions that give us analytical handles that we may do science, not magic.) GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{May 29, 2009
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Diffaxial and kairosfocus, I was the one who introduced C-14 decay, as I thought it was a good example of quantum indeterminacy. If I was wrong about that, then please pardon my ignorance of the relevant physics.R0b_{May 29, 2009
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kairosfocus:
Onlookers, observe how objectors to the reality of necessary causal factors seem to always stay strictly away from discussing a concrete, familiar example that shows what is going on.
I've been talking about necessary conditions since my very first post on this subject (330). If you equate "causal factors" with "conditions", which I assume you do, then your claim that I've denied the reality of necessary causal factors is pretty bizarre. As I've said repeatedly, the problem is semantic. The assertion that all events have causes seems to be saying one thing, but it's really saying something else, or, more accurately, saying nothing. To me the assertion would imply that all events are, if not determined by, at least made probable by antecedent conditions. But StephenB says that this is not what he means. Events may, in fact, occur with any probability from almost zero to one. The only thing that the assertion rules out is the occurrence of an event with probability 0 -- that is, every event has a necessary condition of nothing preventing the event from occurring. If StephenB is okay with a claim that tells us nothing, then I'm okay with it.R0b_{May 29, 2009
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KF:
PS: Onlookers, observe how objectors to the reality of necessary causal factors seem to always stay strictly away from discussing a concrete, familiar example that shows what is going on. No prizes for guessign why.
In that spirit, map your analysis of necessary conditions onto a simpler quantum indeterminacy, such as the timing of particle decay - the type of decay event I originally cited. You've described radioactive decay (of a complex nucleus), which introduces many complexities that obscure the issues.Diffaxial_{May 29, 2009
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Mr Fox: Passed by again. I note that, complaints and computer difficulties -- for which you have my sympathies (I have had a few posts eaten myself . . . ) -- aside, neither you nor any other objector to the principle of causality has to date specifically responded to the fire example as a simple and familiar case in point on the reality of necessary and sufficient causal factors. (And, BTW, you are not primarily in mind, as the remark on lighting a gas stove with the gas knob at "off" illustrates.) That, if you may pardon a direct comment, is indeed highly significant and noteworthy for onlookers. For, what is at stake at this point is basic rationality: nothing that begins, does so unless [a] all necessary causal factors are in place, and [b] sufficient cause is there for it to occur. For specific instance, [a] is how you prevent or extinguish a fire, and [b] is how you start one or keep it going. In the case of a population of atoms subject to a given alpha decay, certain factors give rise to a predictable stochastic pattern of behaviour, so that t1/2 = ln2/lambda, lambda being the decay constant, a measure of probability of decay per unit time. The same also obtains in principle for a universe that is habitable for life, for life within it, for diverse life in it, and for minded creatures such as we are. (In turn, this speaks to the issue you have raised on first causes twice above, which I responded to several posts above, and for which your onward comment was unfortunately eaten.) GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{May 29, 2009
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Mr M. writes (among other things):
Onlookers, observe how objectors to the reality of necessary causal factors seem to always stay strictly away from discussing a concrete, familiar example that shows what is going on. No prizes for guessign why.
Even there's no prize at stake, I'll tell you the reason you are not hearing from me is I just spent nearly an hour responding in detail to your posts 351, 352, 353 quoting you and adding my comments. (This to demonstrate the ridiculous length of your posts and their inconsequential digressions.) On reviewing the preview there were some tag errors, which did not resolve on correction and I made the mistake of refreshing the page. The post has been eaten and I have not the time or inclination to repeat the exercise. So the answer to why no responses to your screeds is indeed obvious! The loss of my post is a divine indication to me that it is a monumental waste of time to engage with you, time that could be better spent. I knew this before I started that post, too. An hour of precious life wasted. Let that be a lesson to one and all. No more comments to G. from me!Alan Fox_{May 29, 2009
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Again, I must remind both Rob and Diffaxial, that if the principles of right reason are negotiable, we would never have arrived at our present knowledge about quantum mechanics in the first place. If a thing can be true an false at the same time, for example, [and both of you are OK with that proposition in some circumstances] then pre-quantum mechanics could never have been corrected by quantum mechanics. Indeed, if the princples of non-contradiction [or causation, or "not something from nothing"--- (all related)] were negotiable, we could not even have made the transition from a geo-centric to a helio-centric conception of the solar system. Copernicus' adversaries could simply have said, [in the name of a flexible law of non-contradiction] "but the earth and the sun could, under some circumstances, both be the center of the solar system. Under the circumstances, we cannot replace the former theory with the latter theory because we cannot rule out the former on the grounds that it is inconsistent with the later." (Would Rob and Diffaxial have been sympathetic to that proposition. It would appear so.) It is only because we know without doubt that such cannot be the case, that we can correct geo-centrism with helio-centrism. In the same way, it is only because we know without doubt that effects cannot occur without causes that we can replace earlier conceptions of physics with quantum physics. All science is based on the metaphysical proposition that the rules of right reason are non-negotiable. If they are negoatiable for any reason, the entire rational enterprise collapses and science goes with it.StephenB_{May 29, 2009
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Rob: Passed back for a moment. Have you tried lighting a gas stove with the gas turned off yet? If you have, you will understand why necessary causal factors are indeed vitally important causal factors. (In fire fighting, the idea is to cut off a necessary causal factor to break the fire chain reaction.) As Copi notes in his Logic, we tend to focus on sufficient factors when we want to make something happen, and on necessary ones when we want to prevent something from happening. In either case the cause-effect bond is real. GEM of TKI PS: Onlookers, observe how objectors to the reality of necessary causal factors seem to always stay strictly away from discussing a concrete, familiar example that shows what is going on. No prizes for guessign why.kairosfocus_{May 29, 2009
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StephenB:
Return to the example in which 0 degrees centrigrade constitutes the conditions which cause water to freeze. Ask yourself all the same questions in that context and see if they make any sense. Try to stay away from Boston, NBA basketball, and Russia nuking Boston.
You're asking me to focus on a case involving sufficient conditions, and ignore a case involving insufficient conditions. But my whole point is that it seems strange to say that an event is caused by woefully insufficient conditions. Your usage of "cause" renders your "no uncaused events" claim rather weak. We could say that all events we observe are caused by the existence of the universe, or by the existence of an meta-universal context. Or we could say that all events are caused by the condition that nothing prevents them from occurring. If your claim is consistent with any conceivable state of affairs, is it really telling us anything?R0b_{May 29, 2009
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PS: Above, I have provided a step by step explanation of how the key cirted process, RA decay, illustrates how Q-mech is NOT a "causeless" or "acausal" explantion. We have seen relevant dynamics and factors that give rise to a stochastic pattern of behaviour, so that we EXPECT to see a population of a given element subject to alpha decay showing a half-life, i.e a stable [more or less . .. ] probability of decay, due to tunnelling. Moreover, given teh uncertainty limits on position-momentum and energy-time,. we know that we wil have to be content with a population level stochastic explanation. DA's latest reiteration of objections boils down to saying unless a causal factor or cluster is sufficient it is somehow not "really" a cause. But the fire example shows just why that fails. By contrast, a concrete wall is well above the Heisenberg and/or Einstein observability threshold [they are related] so a concrete wall appearing "out of nowhere and/or nothing [no pre-existent materials or construction process -- which last is intelligent . . . ]" WOULD be a violation of quantum explanations, and so could properly be said to be without cause. We do not see that, but on the quantum levels we do see phenomena consistent with virtual particles popping up from the sea of energy that populates space at large, e.g. the Casimir effect. SB remains right.kairosfocus_{May 29, 2009
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a --> As the fire triangle shows, causal factors -- or "constraints" or "conditions" if you will -- come in two flavours: necessary, and sufficient: and in some cases, we have factors that are individually necessary and jointly sufficient. If you try to light a gas stove with the gas flow tuned off, you will be unsuccessful. Fuel is a necessary condition and in the presence of oxidiser and heat, will provide a sufficient cause for a fire. (Similarly, Boston and the Celtics must exist to have the Bostion Celtics be part of the NBA playoffs in a given year. Thus, tying this condition down to one of the many underlying remote causal factors [causes usually come in chains . . . ] -- there was no massive nuke exchange between the USSR and the USA during the Cold War era -- is irrelevant. But, it sure makes room for ridicule and contempt-filled dismissive rhetoric.) b --> As SB remarked, if we only see certain necessary factors of a situation, we may see what is spontaneous, highly contingent [very different outcomes on rather similar observed initial conditions] and even stochastic, i.e. following random law statistical distributions. (BTW, this is not unrelated to the point that design theory explains high contingeny by appeal to chance circumstances as the DEFAULT, distinguishing purposefully directed contingency by its ability to target narrow functional zones in the config space that on simple chance would be maximally improbable, being overwhelmed by the statistical weight of the non-functional macrostate. E.g. most random strings of 805 ASCII characters, the length of this point, do not make contextually responsive remarks in recognisable English.) c --> Now, taking Alpha decay as a case in point, we see that due to the mutual repulsions of protons confined to within about 10^-14 m, atomic nucleii "should" be unstable. What holds them together is a short-range force, the strong nuclear force, which in effect occurs by pairs of neighbouring nucleons exchanging mesons that they both grab on to. However, as proton number rises, neutron number must rise disprtportionately,and so for large and unstable nucleii, shedding alpha particles [2p + 2n] will move them back towards the belt of stability. So, already, we see many causal factors at work in triggering alpha decay. d --> But, a complication: many emitted alpha particles have insufficient energy to climb the potential wall to get out of the nucleus. So, we come to the notion that potential hills are porous, because of tunnelling. In turn tunelling raises the energy-time uncertainty constraint, which links to the sea of energy sitting in space itself [which let us note from current cosmology, is held to be expanding based on an energy density of space parameter . . . ] -- so, space is another causal factor inplicated, along with the uncertainty limit on our ability to observe. Space, BTW, which is NOT to be equated to "nothing" as it has properties and constrains events, e.g. c as the cosmic speed limit. e --> In short, quantum effects like radioactive decay do not show "something coming from nothing," but instead show a case where we know certain causal factors, see that we cannot observe beyond a certain limit, and also see that we have a definite stochastic pattern reflecting hidden to us but nonteheless real constraints. f --> And all through, we are relying on guidestar principles of reasoning and warranting knowledge, which we ignore on pain of at once faling intot he most patent absurdities and confusions.
4] The latest red herring track . . . What about "theological debates on first causes"? First, they were never an issue in the thread until raised by those interested in objections to the above. Second, the idea of a first cause is secondary to the idea of a cause, which is secondary in turn to the issue of self-evident truths that form a key part of our ability to approach science and other important endeavours with solid guidestars. And, thse are of course derivative from our primary point: self-correction is a challenge in common to all sorts of institutions, so science should not be held up as uniquely authoritative because it does in some cases -- too often after too long -- correct itself. That is a commonality with all institutions that survive across time -- including churches. It will help to briefly define a first cause: the first link in the causal chain, or from a different view, the foundation on which all other causes sit. (The former is temporal, the latter does not require pre-existence.) Going back to our fire triangle: (a) so soon as fuel-oxidiser-fuel come together, we get the fire, (b) so long as they are still together, the fire continues to exist. So -- simplifying to a toy universe with a begining in which a fire is all that exists -- the first cause of the fire is whatever brought the factors into existence and co-joined them, triggering the fire we see with the mind's eye. but equally, by the logic of necessity and sufficiency, if there the fuel-oxidiser-heat triangle had ALWAYS been present, so would have been the fire. But the fire would still be caused, as we may see from a simple observation: each of its sufficient causal factors is not only present but also NECESSARY. The controversy that Mr Fox is trying to raise is the issue that classically, one of the arguments to God is that the universe plainly had an initationg or foundational cause, who most credibly is God. of course, given the issue that all argumets trace to starting points,and that big arguments as a rule trace to points where people will differ on premises, such an argument is not a deductive proof that answers to all and any objections. To which, the answer is: so what? In science and many other fields of endeavour, we infer to best current explanation. [This approach to warrant is logically "opposite" to a proof: we reason by comparing alternative explanations that more or less entail the observed facts, so the facts cannot establish the explanations, they are inherently provisional and selected on a best of live options basis. (After all IF "Tom is a cat," THEN "Tom is an animal," AND "Tom is an animal," do not demonstratively establish that "Tom is a cat." But, substitute "theory" and "Observations," and we will see that science similarly stricvlty affirms the consequent. That is why inference to best explanation is a provisional, defeatable type of warrant! And so, Mr Barberini had a point after all . . . ] Notwithstanding the inherent provisionality we routinely put heavy weight of trust on such theories and associated wordviews. (For instance, US NAS member, Mr Lewontin in his notorious 1997 NY Review of Books article, actually thinks that "Science, [is] the only begetter of truth.") So, on pain of selective hyperskepticism, we ought not to put evolutionary materialist metaphysics and its handmaiden scientific origins theories up on an epistemological pedestal, without permitting level playing field comparative difficulties critical analysis. And, once such artificial, censoring barriers are knocked down, there is plenty good reason to see that a first intelligent cause of our observed cosmos is just as viable today as it was in Newton's day when he wrote in his General Scholium to his Principia, that:
. . . This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. And if the fixed stars are the centres of other like systems, these, being formed by the like wise counsel, must be all subject to the dominion of One; especially since the light of the fixed stars is of the same nature with the light of the sun, and from every system light passes into all the other systems [i.e there is a common electromagnetic order tothe cosmos, supporting that there is a common law of nature . . . the very opposite of a God of the gaps argument] . . . . This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of his dominion he is wont to be called Lord God pantokrator , or Universal Ruler . . . And from his true dominion it follows [in of course the context of a best explanation] that the true God is a living, intelligent, and powerful Being; and, from his other perfections, that he is supreme, or most perfect. He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, his duration reaches from eternity to eternity; his presence from infinity to infinity; he governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done. He is not eternity or infinity, but eternal and infinite; he is not duration or space, but he endures and is present. He endures for ever, and is every where present; and by existing always and every where, he constitutes duration and space. Since every particle of space is always, and every indivisible moment of duration is every where, certainly the Maker and Lord of all things cannot be never and no where. Every soul that has perception is, though in different times and in different organs of sense and motion, still the same indivisible person. There are given successive parts in duration, co-existent puts in space, but neither the one nor the other in the person of a man, or his thinking principle; and much less can they be found in the thinking substance of God. Every man, so far as he is a thing that has perception, is one and the same man during his whole life, in all and each of his organs of sense. God is the same God, always and every where. He is omnipresent not virtually only, but also substantially; for virtue cannot subsist without substance. In him are all things contained and moved [i.e. cites Ac 17, where Paul evidently cites Cleanthes]; yet neither affects the other: God suffers nothing from the motion of bodies; bodies find no resistance from the omnipresence of God. It is allowed by all [circa 1700 . . . ] that the Supreme God exists necessarily; and by the same necessity he exists always, and every where. [i.e accepts the cosmological argument to God.] . . . [.] We know him only by his most wise and excellent contrivances of things, and final cause [i.e from his designs and their evident purposes]: we admire him for his perfections; but we reverence and adore him on account of his dominion: for we adore him as his servants; and a god without dominion, providence, and final causes, is nothing else but Fate and Nature. Blind metaphysical necessity, which is certainly the same always and every where, could produce no variety of things. [i.e necessity does not produce contingency] All that diversity of natural things which we find suited to different times and places could arise from nothing but the ideas and will of a Being necessarily existing. [That is, implicitly rejects chance, Plato's third alternative, and explicitly infers to the Designer of the Cosmos.] But, by way of allegory, God is said to see, to speak, to laugh, to love, to hate, to desire, to give, to receive, to rejoice, to be angry, to fight, to frame, to work, to build; for all our notions of God are taken from the ways of mankind by a certain similitude, which, though not perfect, has some likeness, however. And thus much concerning God; to discourse of whom from the appearances of things, does certainly belong to Natural Philosophy. [Which in the C17 view was the active exercise that when successfully applied yielded knowledge of nature, i.e "science."]
Notice, Newton's focus on the first cause being known from the evident purposefulness and cosmic order of the universe that we live in, observe and think about; asking "what best explains . . .?" GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{May 29, 2009
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Onlookers: Here in Montserrat, one of the road traffic law offenses is "driving without due care and attention." Looks like we have a problem now with ID-objecting commenters who -- on the charitable interpretation -- seem to comment on strawmannish versions of points raised, having "read without due care and attention." (In some cases, it must be asked whether there is an intent to distract through red herrings led out to strawmen soaked with ad hominem oil and duly ignited to cloud and confuse the issue, sometimes also poisoning the atmosphere for serious discussion.) One hopes that it is the former, not the latter at work above. Now, let us therefore remind ourselves of first the primary issue in this thread, and the secondary one that has come up, which set up the context for my remarks yesterday in support of SB on why it is that quantum events are not properly viewed as "uncaused." (For, it seems there is a common "blinded with science" appeal to various Q-mech phenomena to suggest or declare that non-contradiction etc are now empirically disproved. [But the very fact that we see an appeal to a counter-example and to statements that declare that he state of the world is NOT-A, as opposed to A, already hint that the whole objections exercise is self-referentially incoherent. BTW, in former years, there was a similar appeal to the theory of relativity to try to suggest that relativism was supported by science. Of course, as Francis Schaeffer was fond of pointing out, special relativity starts with certain key invariants as its key postulates: c holds the same constant value in any inertial frame of reference, and the laws of physics take their simplest form in such a frame. Could we call these the "central dogmas" of special relativity? [And thus the points where it is maximally committed to being exposed to direct test and refutation . . . as should be familiar to anyone who has read 1 Cor 15:1 - 20 "with due care and attention."] ) 1] Review . . back to the beginning: At the top of the thread, Mrs O'Leary of Toronto observed:
I have often been wearied by legends in their own lunchroom huffing that science differs from other endeavours because it is “self-correcting.” To which I reply: Aw come off it, fellas. Any system that does not go extinct is self-correcting - after it collapses on its hind end. This is true of governments, businesses, churches, and not-for-profit organizations. I’ve seen enough of life to know . . .
I add to that, that Santayana and other historians have a biting corollary: History teaches us two main things: (i) those who refuse to learn from it are doomed to repeat its worst chapters, and (ii) by and large, we refuse to learn lesson (i); thus of course the reason why "history repeats itself." For instance, those who now refuse to learn from the mistakes a certain Mr Maffeo Barberini made in handling Galileo, and insist on imposing Lewontinaian materialism as a philosophical straitjacket on on science today, will find themselves dismissed with contempt tomorrow. [And, this goes beyond debates on points as to where design theory may be right or wrong. Galileo's iconic status shines through in the teeth of (i) his own scientific errors (G did not take on board Kepler's 3 laws of planetary motion [1609 - 19] and his theory of the tides was plainly nonsense and counter to what you could see in your friendly local harbour, say in Venice) and (ii) his terminal social and political ineptness that made him think it appropriate to put a friendly and embattled Prince's warnings on the limitations of science in the mouth of a simpleton bested in a dialogue. (Warnings that in essence are correct BTW; never mind the rationalist spin so often put on them: scientific explanations are inherently provisional, not absolute . . . [More later.])] In short, the course if the history of significant ideas and institutions is that if they survive they have to recognise and recover from drifting into errors. But usually, power holders committed to dominant schools of thought and their conventional wisdoms of the day resist corrections and tend to abuse power in their own defense [shades of the parable of Plato's Cave . . . ], so that it takes a pratfall or two to wake them up. In time, if they are lucky. (If not, the fate is like Britain and France in the 1930's: it would have been easy in 1934 to stop Hitler -- indeed, Italy did so when Hitler menaced Austria that year, murdering its president and threatening a Nazi coup: Mussolini sent several divisions to the Brenner Pass, and personally visited and comforted the widow of the murdered Dolfuss; she had fled to Italy. Hitler backed right down. But, people were bent on saying "peace, peace, when there was no peace." [Guess which "barbarous book form barabrous tribes that comes from . . . ] So, by the time it got to 1939 by which time Hitler had a huge air force and a large army with the stolen Czech trucks and tank force to reinforce his own [he had produced hardly any medium or heavy tanks to speak of by that time so T 35s and T 38s, and the trucks seized from that vainly sacrificed country thrown under the bus at Munich in 1938 . . . hint, hint . . . made all the difference], France was doomed, Britain was going to have to fight for its life against long odds, and dozens of millions would pay with their lives. Parallels to our own day are NOT accidental.) And, given the frailties and foibles of human nature, it should be utterly unsurprising that just as churches and governments have a persitent, endlessly repeated problem with being self-correcting, so also does science. It DOES correct itself in the end -- like other institutions that have endured for centurties -- but usually after it has been sharply reminded of the high price of insisting on sticking to error. This much is obvious to any historically literate or observant educated person. So, why then has there been a 300+ comment tread? [Hint: think, Santayana's second main lesson of history as applied to the currently dominant school of origins science . . . ] 2] The issues of self evident truths and of "dogmas" Once we see -- thanks to Josiah Royce -- that error exists, and that this is an undeniably true claim; we immediately should acknowledge that it demonstrates through key example how self-evident truths exist. This also of course entails that such truths accurately describe the real world; "say[ing] of what is that it is, and of what is not, that it is not." Further to this, such truths can be warranted: so soon as we understand them in light of our experience of the world as minded -- understanding, not merely defining -- creatures, we see that they do not just happen to be true, but they must be true. Of course, one of those self-evident truths is that we sometimes go off the rails into error, so we need to have solid guide star principles to correct us. Such include that if a claim reduces itself to affirming and denying the same thing, it is obvious confusion, absurdity and falsehood: non-contradiction is a premise of all reasoning and knowing, and for that matter discussing. Otherwise we are free to interpret a statement as meaning as well its opposite, or anything that strikes our fancy! (The resulting chaos from having that spread across just a discussion, much less a society should show us that such radical relativism is utterly incoherent and destructive, to the point that it fails Kant's Categorical Imperative and is thus exposed as actually immoral.) But soon enough, such truths were dismissed as "dogmas," with the plain intent being that not only were they being held as being self-evidently so "absolutely" [purely and fully] true, but that instead the claimed truths were being held closed mindedly and in the teeth of counter-evidence. (Notice how in the above it is the Christians who have been arguing on logic and common sense in light of our common experience of the world as minded creatures [i.e. this goes beyond any one worldview and its claims], and who it was above who consistently tried to drag in dogmas of Christian religion etc. Unsurprisingly, this "injection of religious dogma" objection is also a main objection to design thought, never mind its actual history of ideas roots and current status as a science that infers from empirically reliable signs such as functionally specific complex information to the best -- empirically warranted -- explanation of such signs: intelligence.) But, VJT has set the record straight: scientific theories NEED core dogmas that they lock into heir core and expose to REALISTIC empirical test, otherwise they become unfalsifiable, being almost infinitely pliable in the face of evidence that may today point to A and on the morrow point to its opposite. 3] But, Quantum theory says . . . Above, it has been claimed that Q-theory for some 70 years has been a standing refutation to the laws of reasoning by inference to cause and effect: there are Q -theory phenomena that happen without cause, that come out of nothing and just happen, spontaneously. For instance, radioactive decay is random: e.g. we cannot predict that this particular atom will emit an alpha particle just now, because conditions A, B, C . . . have been satisfied. It "just happens," in effect. Since this is a matter of a fairly technical and hard to understand science, such an appeal backed up by the general authority of "Science" has had a very strong intimidatory effect. That is why I took it up, step by step at 325 - 6 above [with a later pick-up on frustrated total internal reflection that slipped my mind first time around -- tunnelling through forbidden zones is real and as observable as your friendly neighbourhood touch-screen]: [ . . . ]kairosfocus_{May 29, 2009
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StephenB:
To be uncaused, there can be no necessary or sufficient conditions at all.
Consider a scenario that refers to your notion that, in light of my irrationality, I should expect cement walls to appear out of nowhere on the highway. Imagine that I approach you with a surprise proof that effects CAN occur without causes: I point to a concrete wall in the highway and state that it appeared out of nowhere. Would you reply as follows? "The appearance of the wall is not uncaused. We know a variety of necessary conditions for this event may be enumerated. The chemical properties of cement that permit it to act as a binder in concrete is a necessary condition. Ditto for the properties of water that is mixed with the cement. The existence of a highway is a necessary condition. Gravitation, which holds the wall in place, is a necessary condition. The emptiness of the space into which the wall was to materialize was a necessary condition. Therefore we have explained the sudden appearance of the wall, and know it is not uncaused." I think not. Rather, I would expect that you would assert that the cause of the appearance of the wall had yet to be identified, and equally confident that one exists, whether or not it is ever found. You would remain confident even were many walls to materialize, and a the probability of that event calculated. Perhaps I caused them to appear through some elaborate apparatus. Perhaps they are holographic projections. Perhaps I have found a way to suspend the consciousness of all observers while the walls are constructed, or used a flashy thingy to induce amnesia for the event. Whatever the cause of the walls' sudden appearances, I would expect that it was only once those proximal factors were discovered that you would say that we had identified the cause, and he had directly refuted my claim. At the quantum level, "necessary conditions" for quantum events may be listed (e.g. tunneling is possible under certain specific circumstances pertaining to the contrasting media and relative energy levels of the particle and the barrier). Yet there are no further facts that determine the specifics of the occurrence of tunneling events (why this particle rather than that?), the appearance of virtual particles and particle decay (why now rather than later?), facts analogous to the facts that you would demand and expect with regard to the sudden appearance of walls. It is not that there are hidden facts or facts unknown to us, or even facts that exist but are inherently undiscoverable; There simply are no such further facts in quantum mechanics underlying specific events that display quantum indeterminacy and the associated irreducible randomness. Therefore facts analogous to the further facts establishing the "cause" of macroscopic walls simply don't exist for these events. This is why quantum theory is sometimes said to be "acausal." Now, we can skirmish verbally 'till the cows come home over the question of whether this "really" makes quantum physics acausal. But that goes to my point that the "verbal descriptions and pictorial representations of the physical world we derive from experience with macroscopic objects (and perhaps even from sensory systems and conceptual categories adapted to coping with macroscopic objects) are simply NOT APPLICABLE to quantum events. Much of the struggle over the interpretation of these physical and mathematical facts arises from to struggle to translate those findings into macroscopic language." Utterances such as "every effect has a cause" no longer usefully correspond to what we know (from decades of beautifully precise experimental confirmation) to be the underlying reality. And, of course, these macroscopically strange events are also prime candidates for a scientific model of an uncaused emergence of the universe from quantum fluctuations.Diffaxial_{May 29, 2009
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----Diffaxial: "At the bottom of KF’s account of alpha decay is a quantum tunneling event (in ‘particle talk’). Those events, vis the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, display irreducible randomness (with a probabilistic distribution) regarding which particular particle tunnels when, other conditions being equal. There are no local hidden variables that determine why this particle tunnels, rather than that identical particle, and hence why this nucleus decays, rather than that. In that respect tunneling events are similar to the appearance of pairs of virtual particles from the quantum vacuum and spontaneous particle decay, the timing and particulars of which may be said to be uncaused." This is just another version of your earlier argument. The point is still the same: spontaneous + unpredicable does not = uncaused. To be uncaused, there can be no necessary or sufficient conditions at all.StephenB_{May 28, 2009
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----Rob: "Certainly, in the case of sufficient cause, the event is caused. But what if there isn’t sufficient cause? Is the event caused, uncaused, or partly caused? If it’s partly caused, can we refer to the uncaused portion as an event? If not, does the problem inhere in nature, math, or simply the English language?" Return to the example in which 0 degrees centrigrade constitutes the conditions which cause water to freeze. Ask yourself all the same questions in that context and see if they make any sense. Try to stay away from Boston, NBA basketball, and Russia nuking Boston.StephenB_{May 28, 2009
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At the bottom of KF's account of alpha decay is a quantum tunneling event (in 'particle talk'). Those events, vis the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, display irreducible randomness (with a probabilistic distribution) regarding which particular particle tunnels when, other conditions being equal. There are no local hidden variables that determine why this particle tunnels, rather than that identical particle, and hence why this nucleus decays, rather than that. In that respect tunneling events are similar to the appearance of pairs of virtual particles from the quantum vacuum and spontaneous particle decay, the timing and particulars of which may be said to be uncaused.Diffaxial_{May 28, 2009
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kairosfocus:
And that the Celtics must exist and Boston must exist for the Boston Celtics to be in the Basketball leagues, is no stranger than that you must have fuel, oxidiser and heat to have a fire.
So you don't find it strange to say that Russia caused the Celtics' loss. Potayto potahto, I guess. As I said in 335, as long as I understand the usage, I'm fine with it.
As to the probability of decay of a C-14 atom, the point is that unless it exists and has in it the cluster of nucleons that are unstable, it will not have the probability of decay that gives rise to the well-known half-life.
Yes, that's the point I addressed in 340, albeit poorly. We commonly refer to unconditional probabilities, P(E), where E is defined relative to a set of assumed conditions. But I guess you could argue that the conditions are still there, even if they're built into the definition of E, so the argument is poorly formulated. But consider that the all of the existent conditions may be nowhere near sufficient to explain the occurrence of E. See my questions after the following quote...
And the fire example shows them at work; there we see individually necessary factors that combined give a sufficient cause.
Certainly, in the case of sufficient cause, the event is caused. But what if there isn't sufficient cause? Is the event caused, uncaused, or partly caused? If it's partly caused, can we refer to the uncaused portion as an event? If not, does the problem inhere in nature, math, or simply the English language?
That makes no more sense than to say that just because the uppermost face of a fair die is stochastic, it has no cause.
That's surprising. Do you disagree with the notion that Bell-type inequalities falsify either determinism or locality? This is a sincere question from a non-physicist to a physicist.R0b_{May 28, 2009
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Alan Fox, There’s a long history with our friend beelzebub, otherwise known by a host of other names, trying to begrudge the Lord of hosts.
I have followed Keith's obsession with UD since 2005. I think he sharpens up the discussions here. It's your loss.Alan Fox_{May 28, 2009
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Alan Fox, There's a long history with our friend beelzebub, otherwise known by a host of other names, trying to begrudge the Lord of hosts. :)Clive Hayden_{May 28, 2009
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Next time, please avoid strawman misrepresentations.
Well I did hesitate! I should have known better. I share Marx's view of philosophy, and also think that the Aristotelian first cause argument as developed by Aquinas unconvincing. But what do I know?Alan Fox_{May 28, 2009
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@ ScottAndrews Unfortunately you will not receive a reply form Beelzebub, as Clive has banned him. (See #331 above.) The more eloquent ID critics seem to get weeded quite regularly, notwithstanding Barry Arrington's new broom.Alan Fox_{May 28, 2009
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