McCaskey: How Best to Attack Ayn Rand’s System

[syrakusos]

A lot of scientists use the falsifiability logic of Popper and eschew definitions. They claim you can't prove anything is right, you can only prove it is wrong.

As a technical writer, I meet a lot of scientists. I never met one who said what you claim. Testing - falsification - is necessary and important to the process of experiment. But the purpose of an experiment is to discover something, not to fail in the non-discovery. Apollo XI did not fail to miss the goal of putting a man on the Moon. Medicines do not fail to kill - although we prefer that outcome... They cure. Testing for failure is important. It is not the goal.

Maybe you know other scientists than I do.

As for the flat Earth... By direct observation via our animal senses the world is apparently flat and limitless. The Sumerians, Egyptians, Greeks, and others who gave the matter any kind of conceptual treatment based on wider experiences developed different models. The spherical Earth dates to about 400 BCE give or take and accepting that mere argument is not proof.

When Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the Earth, he was not testing a hypothesis or attempting to disprove one. He was just measuring the circumference of the Earth. Its sphericity was accepted. I just yesterday put on my blog a review of a book about it, Circumference by Nicholas Nicastro. Read here.

The Pharos lighthouse at Alexandria was 380 feet tall: 30 stories. They did that so that it could be seen over the horizon at sea. It was built before Eratosthenes computed the circumference of the Earth. Just sayin', by then, everyone knew it was round.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Michael,

Popper's epistemology is not taken seriously by scientists?

Really?

All that scientific literature out there doesn't count? (Dayaamm! This is like saying names are not in telephone books.)

I agree with you that the scientists who existed before Popper wrote did not follow Popper's rules.

Here.

We can do it this way.

How many scientists adhere to the theory of concepts given in ITOE? (That is, excluding the scientists before Rand wrote it, since time-travel seems to be on the table? )

I specifically refer to Rand's distinction between inductive and deductive reasoning. I've always quoted this directly from the book (p. 28), but I just found it at the Ayn Rand Lexicon: Induction and Deduction.

The process of forming and applying concepts contains the essential pattern of two fundamental methods of cognition: induction and deduction.

The process of observing the facts of reality and of integrating them into concepts is, in essence, a process of induction. The process of subsuming new instances under a known concept is, in essence, a process of deduction.

I only know of openly Objectivist scientists who would adhere to that.

Michael

[Darrell Hougen]

Darrell,

A lot of scientists use the falsifiability logic of Popper and eschew definitions. They claim you can't prove anything is right, you can only prove it is wrong.

That is not Rand's method, either.

You hit on one of the distinctions by mentioning the axiomatic concepts (although you did not use that term, but instead mentioned the "existence exists" proposition based on them).

Michael

Michael,

Popper's epistemology is not taken seriously by scientists?

Really?

All that scientific literature out there doesn't count? (Dayaamm! This is like saying names are not in telephone books.)

I agree with you that the scientists who existed before Popper wrote did not follow Popper's rules.

Here.

We can do it this way.

How many scientists adhere to the theory of concepts given in ITOE? (That is, excluding the scientists before Rand wrote it, since time-travel seems to be on the table? )

I specifically refer to Rand's distinction between inductive and deductive reasoning. I've always quoted this directly from the book (p. 28), but I just found it at the Ayn Rand Lexicon: Induction and Deduction.

The process of forming and applying concepts contains the essential pattern of two fundamental methods of cognition: induction and deduction.

The process of observing the facts of reality and of integrating them into concepts is, in essence, a process of induction. The process of subsuming new instances under a known concept is, in essence, a process of deduction.

I only know of openly Objectivist scientists who would adhere to that.

Michael

Michael,

I agree that many scientists subscribe to Popper's philosophy of falsifiability which is why nothing (except for AGW) is ever considered to be conclusively proven by most scientists. However, I don't think most scientists actually use Popper's method in practice. If a scientist thinks that another scientist's results are in error, he might attempt to perform an experiment to disprove the previous scientist's results, but his usual goal is to attempt to discover new knowledge. So, the scientist generally accepts the results and conclusions of those that have gone before, implicitly considering those questions as settled, and looking for questions whose answers are unknown or only partially known and for methods of answering them. In that quest, he might look at the implications of current theories and attempt to test them, but he is much more likely to simply conduct experiments and observe the results. For example, a scientist studying cancer might start by looking at existing treatments and he might reason that other similar treatments might help, but then he will just start trying things to see what works. Similarly, a scientist studying how people or animals see, might perform brain scans, look at neurons, or write a computer program designed to interpret images to see whether he understands the process of seeing well enough to emulate it with a machine. If the program works, he will conclude that he at least understands one method of scene interpretation (though he might not understand how biological systems do it). He is not that likely to be thinking in terms of falsifiability. He's more likely to be thinking in terms of workability. If he gets the desired results, then he will conclude that he understands what he is doing. If not, he will conclude that he doesn't.

With regard to definitions, I think scientists are obsessed with getting them right. In physics, position, time, velocity and acceleration are rigorously defined. Position is measured by a ruler and the standard of length is the meter. Time is measured by a clock and is measured in seconds, minutes, and hours, according to a precise standard. Velocity is the rate of change of position and is given in meters per second (m/s). Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity and is given in meters per second per second (m/s/s) or (m/s^2).

In biology, living things are classified and reclassified as more becomes known about them. They are also very precisely defined. For example, I have been reading about E. Coli recently and this is what Wikipedia has to say:

Escherichia coli (/ˌɛʃɨˈrɪkiə ˈkoʊlaɪ/;[1] commonly abbreviated E. coli) is a Gram-negative, facultative anaerobic, rod-shaped bacterium that is commonly found in the lower intestine of warm-blooded organisms (endotherms).

...

In 1885, a German pediatrician, Theodor Escherich, discovered this organism in the feces of healthy individuals and called it Bacterium coli commune due to the fact it is found in the colon and early classifications of Prokaryotes placed these in a handful of genera based on their shape and motility (at that time Ernst Haeckel's classification of Bacteria in the kingdom Monera was in place[13]).[14] Bacterium coli was the type species of the now invalid genus Bacterium when it was revealed that the former type species ("Bacterium triloculare") was missing.[15] Following a revision of Bacteria it was reclassified as Bacillus coli by Migula in 1895[16] and later reclassified in the newly created genus Escherichia, named after its original discoverer.[17]

Rand states that a definition should give the category that the thing belongs to and name the essential characteristics that make it different from the rest of the objects in the category. So, the classic, "Man is a rational animal," names the category, "animal", and the essential characteristic, "rationality." The scientific definition of E. coli follows the same pattern. "Bacterium" is the category and E. coli differs from other bacteria by being, "gram-negative, facultative, anaerobic, and rod-shaped." Other definitions might start with a tighter categorization such as, "E. coli is a bacterium of the genus Escherichia," but, you have to admit that the above definition is a proper definition according to Rand and is also pretty good and I would say that that level of precision is typical in the scientific literature.

I agree that Rand's method is not the same as the scientific method, but it is similar. Scientists don't use axioms. Mathematicians do, but they usually view them in the opposite manner as Rand. That is, they use axioms or premises as a starting point for deductive reasoning. Rand views them as the ultimate abstractions. That is, an axiomatic statement is something that is true of all statements or all statements involving certain subjects. The same is true of mathematics, of course, but that's not how they are presented or used. For example, one of the Peano axioms might be SN = N + 1, that is, the successor of a number is equal to that number plus one. That could be thought of as an abstraction of an infinite number of mathematical truths, but it is usually viewed as a starting point for proving various theorems of arithmetic.

Although scientists don't use axioms, they often view scientific theories as generalizations or abstractions, as well as starting points for deductive reasoning. So, for example, in classical physics, one might have the equation for the trajectory of an object thrown or shot into the air. It is justified by saying that observers have noted that when an object is propelled into the sky it follows a (nearly) parabolic trajectory (neglecting wind resistance). Since any object follows that trajectory, the law is a summary statement about the behavior of objects. However, it can also be used as a starting point for predicting the trajectory of a new object given the initial position and velocity. The latter is, essentially, a deductive procedure.

BTW, thanks for that link to Rand's views on induction and deduction. In the above example, finding the law would be induction and applying it would be a case of deduction. It seems to me that Rand's view and the scientific method are pretty consistent, as least in the foregoing example.

Of course, Rand believed in certainty and most scientists current reject it. However, they behave as if it existed, at least with regard to clearly demonstrated results. Of course, they're also willing to modify their beliefs if someone demonstrates that the old model wasn't accurate in all cases.

Darrell

[Brant Gaede]

There's no need for falsification until an experiment is replicated. They couldn't replicate cold fusion.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Darrell,

You might be interested in an observation I just heard from novelist, Orson Scott Card. (Don't even ask how I stumble across this stuff. )

He mentioned that if you want absolute certainty about the world, in other words, total control of your knowledge about it, you must become a fiction writer, not a scientist.

He said every scientist knows deep inside that, irrespective of how profound or far reaching a discovery he makes, one day it will become superseded by another. His work will become obsolete and, by implication, so will he. (And that makes the vanity issues among many scientists all the more petty.)

A fiction writer, however, creates an entire universe and only he can change it for the change to be valid. The creator has absolute control of his world. And he can have absolute certainty he will never become obsolete within it.

This makes me wonder if Rand's attitude would have been different had she started at the scientific and/or philosophic end instead of fiction...

Michael

[PDS]

Darrell,

You might be interested in an observation I just heard from novelist, Orson Scott Card. (Don't even ask how I stumble across this stuff. )

He mentioned that if you want absolute certainty about the world, in other words, total control of your knowledge about it, you must become a fiction writer, not a scientist.

He said every scientist knows deep inside that, irrespective of how profound or far reaching a discovery he makes, one day it will become superseded by another. His work will become obsolete and, by implication, so will he. (And that makes the vanity issues among many scientists all the more petty.)

A fiction writer, however, creates an entire universe and only he can change it for the change to be valid. The creator has absolute control of his world. And he can have absolute certainty he will never become obsolete within it.

This makes me wonder if Rand's attitude would have been different had she started at the scientific and/or philosophic end instead of fiction...

Michael

Fascinating point. This also fits with Jonatan's theory that Rands artistic premises drove her other premises, i.e., her ethics, etc.

[anthony]

Darrell,

You might be interested in an observation I just heard from novelist, Orson Scott Card. (Don't even ask how I stumble across this stuff. )

He mentioned that if you want absolute certainty about the world, in other words, total control of your knowledge about it, you must become a fiction writer, not a scientist.

He said every scientist knows deep inside that, irrespective of how profound or far reaching a discovery he makes, one day it will become superseded by another. His work will become obsolete and, by implication, so will he. (And that makes the vanity issues among many scientists all the more petty.)

A fiction writer, however, creates an entire universe and only he can change it for the change to be valid. The creator has absolute control of his world. And he can have absolute certainty he will never become obsolete within it.

This makes me wonder if Rand's attitude would have been different had she started at the scientific and/or philosophic end instead of fiction...

Michael

Fascinating point. This also fits with Jonatan's theory that Rands artistic premises drove her other premises, i.e., her ethics, etc.

"I am working upon such a treatise at present; it will deal predominantly with the issue which is barely touched upon in Galt's speech: epistemology, and will present a new theory of the nature, source and validation of concepts."

[...]

"I am often asked whether I am primarily a novelist or a philosopher. The answer is: both. In a certain sense, every novelist is a philosopher, because one cannot present a picture of human existence without a philosophical framework; the novelist's only choice is whether that framework is present in his story explicitly or implicitly, whether he is aware of it or not, whether he upholds his philosophical convictions consciously or subconsciously. This involves another choice: whether his work is his individual projection of existing philosophical ideas or whether he originates a philosophical framework of his own. I did the second. That is not the specific task of a novelist, I had to do it, because my basic view of man and of existence was in conflict with most of the existing philosophical theories. I had to become a philosopher in the specific meaning of the term.

[...]

For reasons which are made clear in the following pages, the name I have chosen for my philosophy is Objectivism".

[Preface-FtNI]

Not too many writers who authored novels, and as an afterthought, threw off an entire philosophy 'on the side' (so to speak).

All to substantiate her metaphysical value-judgments of the nature of man and existence - which she'd portrayed in her fiction.

Broadly, it could be said that the fiction was by induction and the philosophy, deduction.

"I had to do it."

Whew...

[Serapis Bey]

Fascinating point. This also fits with Jonatan's theory that Rands artistic premises drove her other premises, i.e., her ethics, etc.

I remember hearing Peikoff's '76 taped course -- the whole series was an attempt to elucidate Objectivism from "the ground up", block by block, each new step logically derived from the preceding, until finally arriving at Rand's theory of art. However, the very first lecture was titled (iirc), "The Metaphysical Nature of Man", wherein Peikoff waxed eloquent on the "sense of life" of Objectivism, and how it differed from other philosophies. It was quite moving and inspirational. He offered some dubious excuse for why he chose to start the course off in this manner, instead of diving right into Metaphysics.

After Objectivism and I grew apart, I recognized the gambit for what it was -- subtle manipulation, what the psychologists call "priming", a technique often used by cult leaders. It allows the listener to hold psycho-emotive images in mind as the rest of "reasons" and "logic" are poured on top.

It was only until recently, after studying Nietzsche, that I no longer view what Peikoff did as "manipulation", but rather the reality of how EVERYONE "chooses" their philosophies. For humans, aesthetics comes first. Reverse-engineering their sentiments into """reasons""" comes second.

I hold no grudges.

[Serapis Bey]

Not too many writers who authored novels, and as an afterthought, threw off an entire philosophy 'on the side' (so to speak).

All to substantiate her metaphysical value-judgments of the nature of man and existence - which she'd portrayed in her fiction.

Broadly, it could be said that the fiction was by induction and the philosophy, deduction.

Fiction by induction and philosophy by deduction?

I wonder how Mr. "Identification First, Evaluation Second" (MSK) feels about this?

[Darrell Hougen]

Darrell,

You might be interested in an observation I just heard from novelist, Orson Scott Card. (Don't even ask how I stumble across this stuff. )

He mentioned that if you want absolute certainty about the world, in other words, total control of your knowledge about it, you must become a fiction writer, not a scientist.

He said every scientist knows deep inside that, irrespective of how profound or far reaching a discovery he makes, one day it will become superseded by another. His work will become obsolete and, by implication, so will he. (And that makes the vanity issues among many scientists all the more petty.)

A fiction writer, however, creates an entire universe and only he can change it for the change to be valid. The creator has absolute control of his world. And he can have absolute certainty he will never become obsolete within it.

This makes me wonder if Rand's attitude would have been different had she started at the scientific and/or philosophic end instead of fiction...

Michael

Michael,

Another possibility is that Rand adopted the notion of certainty because she felt she had no choice. A person that is passing moral judgments on other people and advising them about the ethical system they should adopt, needs to be able to counter the charge that it is all just a matter of opinion. And, people will contend that if your knowledge isn't certain --- if no person's knowledge is certain --- then opinions about right and wrong don't have a solid basis. It is interesting that people don't level the same charge against science. I guess a long history of success makes up for a lot of uncertainty.

Philosophically, there are really two questions: (1) Do people know things, i.e. do they have knowledge? and (2) Do they know what they know. i.e., can they be certain? Right now, it looks like the answer to the first question is yes and the second is no. We obviously know a lot, otherwise we wouldn't be able to build cars and airplanes and million other things. On the other hand, it seems as if we never know exactly what the limitations of our theories are.

That doesn't mean that all opinions are equal, however. Clearly, some are more correct than others. That is, most are clearly not correct. They contradict the evidence or logic. That leaves one with a theory, if one can be found, that has confirming evidence and no contradictory evidence.

Darrell

[Serapis Bey]

Darrell - the "long history of success" in science does not speak to our moral choices. Science might have a relationship to morality, but that relationship is orthogonal

[Ellen Stuttle]

A lot of scientists use the falsifiability logic of Popper and eschew definitions. They claim you can't prove anything is right, you can only prove it is wrong.

As a technical writer, I meet a lot of scientists. I never met one who said what you claim. Testing - falsification - is necessary and important to the process of experiment. But the purpose of an experiment is to discover something, not to fail in the non-discovery.

I agree that many scientists subscribe to Popper's philosophy of falsifiability which is why nothing (except for AGW) is ever considered to be conclusively proven by most scientists. However, I don't think most scientists actually use Popper's method in practice.

I meet a lot of scientists, too, and I don't think I've met one who says quite what MSK described. A distinction is needed between scientists in the "physical" or "hard" sciences - physics, chemistry, biology, geology, etc. - and the "social" or "soft" sciences - psychology, sociology, anthropology, etc. Persons in the latter category come closer to adopting a Popperian method, partly through having believed Bridgman's mistaken idea of how physics is done and thus adopting the idea of "operational definition."

In what follows, I'll limit my remarks to persons in the physical sciences and leave aside the murky issues of the "soft" sciences, including whether any of them is properly "a science."

Popper's "falsifiability" idea is accepted in the sense that it's used as a criterion of demarcation between science and non-science. If a theory or claim can't be falsified, it isn't science. (The reverse doesn't hold. A theory or claim which can be falsified isn't necessarily science.)

It's also the case that scientists think that fundamental theory can't be definitively proved right - as indeed it can't be, since there's no way to perform adequate tests. But this doesn't mean that they think that "you can't prove anything is right [emphasis added]."

I doubt there's a scientist going who doesn't accept the existence of atoms, and of molecules, and of chemical reactions as indisputably established, for instance. Plus many, many lesser conclusions.

I suspect, Michael, that you've been misled by certain Popper advocates into overestimating the degree to which scientists adhere to Popper's views on method. Popper is one of the philosophers whom you'll hear spoken of with respect by scientists, since he's one of the philosophers who have taken scientific issues with great seriousness and have bothered to learn some substantive science while theorizing. But working scientists don't consult philosophers for how to do it, or for advice on when to consider a result established.

Ellen

Edit: I changed my original sentence "Plus many, many lesser generalizations" to "Plus many, many lesser conclusions" in order to avoid the possibility of my being taken to mean by "generalization" what Peikoff means in his course "Induction in Physics and Philosophy" and in the material from that course which is used in The Logical Leap.

Edited December 18, 2013 by Ellen Stuttle

[Brant Gaede]

Darrell - the "long history of success" in science does not speak to our moral choices. Science might have a relationship to morality, but that relationship is orthogonal

Then it's bad science for there are many ways to be wrong and few, if more than one, ways to be right.

--Brant

science is profoundly moral

[Brant Gaede]

Fascinating point. This also fits with Jonatan's theory that Rands artistic premises drove her other premises, i.e., her ethics, etc.

I remember hearing Peikoff's '76 taped course -- the whole series was an attempt to elucidate Objectivism from "the ground up", block by block, each new step logically derived from the preceding, until finally arriving at Rand's theory of art. However, the very first lecture was titled (iirc), "The Metaphysical Nature of Man", wherein Peikoff waxed eloquent on the "sense of life" of Objectivism, and how it differed from other philosophies. It was quite moving and inspirational. He offered some dubious excuse for why he chose to start the course off in this manner, instead of diving right into Metaphysics.

After Objectivism and I grew apart, I recognized the gambit for what it was -- subtle manipulation, what the psychologists call "priming", a technique often used by cult leaders. It allows the listener to hold psycho-emotive images in mind as the rest of "reasons" and "logic" are poured on top.

It was only until recently, after studying Nietzsche, that I no longer view what Peikoff did as "manipulation", but rather the reality of how EVERYONE "chooses" their philosophies. For humans, aesthetics comes first. Reverse-engineering their sentiments into """reasons""" comes second.

I hold no grudges.

Thanks for this.

--Brant

[PDS]

Fascinating point. This also fits with Jonatan's theory that Rands artistic premises drove her other premises, i.e., her ethics, etc.

I remember hearing Peikoff's '76 taped course -- the whole series was an attempt to elucidate Objectivism from "the ground up", block by block, each new step logically derived from the preceding, until finally arriving at Rand's theory of art. However, the very first lecture was titled (iirc), "The Metaphysical Nature of Man", wherein Peikoff waxed eloquent on the "sense of life" of Objectivism, and how it differed from other philosophies. It was quite moving and inspirational. He offered some dubious excuse for why he chose to start the course off in this manner, instead of diving right into Metaphysics.

After Objectivism and I grew apart, I recognized the gambit for what it was -- subtle manipulation, what the psychologists call "priming", a technique often used by cult leaders. It allows the listener to hold psycho-emotive images in mind as the rest of "reasons" and "logic" are poured on top.

It was only until recently, after studying Nietzsche, that I no longer view what Peikoff did as "manipulation", but rather the reality of how EVERYONE "chooses" their philosophies. For humans, aesthetics comes first. Reverse-engineering their sentiments into """reasons""" comes second.

I hold no grudges.

Thanks for this.

--Brant

Agreed. Very well said SB.

[Brant Gaede]

Fascinating point. This also fits with Jonatan's theory that Rands artistic premises drove her other premises, i.e., her ethics, etc.

Ayn Rand admitted as such, to wit, what kind of philosophy did her ideal man need? The best reference I have right now is Who Is Ayn Rand (p.191 hb).

--Brant

for living on earth

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Philosophically, there are really two questions: (1) Do people know things, i.e. do they have knowledge? and (2) Do they know what they know. i.e., can they be certain? Right now, it looks like the answer to the first question is yes and the second is no.

Darrell,

I actually disagree with this.

I believe we can be certain of much.

I go from the premise that our minds are made out of the same stuff as the rest of existence, so they are perfectly suited to abstracting it and keeping accurate correspondence.

Michael

[anthony]

"I remember hearing Peikoff's '76 taped course -- the whole series was an attempt to elucidate Objectivism from "the ground up", block by block, each new step logically derived from the preceding, until finally arriving at Rand's theory of art. However, the very first lecture was titled (iirc), "The Metaphysical Nature of Man", wherein Peikoff waxed eloquent on the "sense of life" of Objectivism, and how it differed from other philosophies. It was quite moving and inspirational. He offered some dubious excuse for why he chose to start the course off in this manner, instead of diving right into Metaphysics.

After Objectivism and I grew apart, I recognized the gambit for what it was -- subtle manipulation, what the psychologists call "priming", a technique often used by cult leaders. It allows the listener to hold psycho-emotive images in mind as the rest of "reasons" and "logic" are poured on top.

It was only until recently, after studying Nietzsche, that I no longer view what Peikoff did as "manipulation", but rather the reality of how EVERYONE "chooses" their philosophies. For humans, aesthetics comes first. Reverse-engineering their sentiments into """reasons""" comes second.

I hold no grudges". [serapis Bey]

-------------

SB: This rather requires the question, why did you grow apart from Objectivism? Once you realised something so critical and radical, yet so simple? Heh, no need to reply.

But sure, good insight.

Objectivism is an aesthetic philosophy, I believe. Not only by its literary genesis, or only by its design -but by its nature, a nature which is exactly in accord with and reflects existence and consciousness.

Reason - more than opportune ""reasons"" - validates the 'art' of existence. Not, imo, as "first" or "second" (nor, reverse engineering) but similar to the smooth flow and interplay between induction and deduction, and identity and identification, cognition and emotion, and "is and ought" & etc.

I guess this explains my problem with the grim logicians, and likely their gripe with me. (Objectivism FLIES, fellas).