The Logical Leap: Induction in Physics

[BaalChatzaf]

If physicists can redefine words, then why can't philosophers?

Indeed, philosophers can and do. But physicists do more than define the terms they need. They make postulate systems that reflect observed fact. They also check their results experimentally. Which is why physicists turn out systems that when applied yield up useful devices and processes, whereas philosophers generate hot air (mostly). Physics produces useful stuff. What does philosophy produce?

Would you ride a vehicle whose design flows from Aristotelian metaphysics or Aristotelian physics.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Philip Coates]

> I think this all gets back to the idea that there is a "correct" definition for each of our words [semantically confused individual]

Yes, it does.

As Francisco pointed out, "words have an exact meaning." If you don't get logic 101, I can't imagine debating concepts in physics with you.

[Brant Gaede]

> I think this all gets back to the idea that there is a "correct" definition for each of our words [semantically confused individual]

Yes, it does.

As Francisco pointed out, "words have an exact meaning." If you don't get logic 101, I can't imagine debating concepts in physics with you.

Better: "Words have exact meanings."

--Brant

deport Francisco (he best stay away from Arizona)

[George H. Smith]

Physics produces useful stuff. What does philosophy produce?

Philosophy produced the fundamental ideas that generated the American Revolution, for one thing. Philosophy also produced decisive arguments against slavery and religious persecution, and it played an essential role in the secular perspective that emerged from the Enlightenment. Philosophy also played a formative role in the development of free market economics. David Hume and Adam Smith, for example, were philosophers, not economists in the modern sense. Even modern free market economists, such as Mises and Rothbard, incorporated a good deal of philosophy into their economic theories. Praxeology, for instance, is a philosophical theory about the nature of human action. Mises included a lot of philosophy not only in Human Action but in other important books as well, such as Epistemological Problems of Economics and The Ultimate Foundation of Economic Science.

A number of important disciplines, especially in the area of social theory, grew out of philosophy. (In the 18th century, any theory that dealt with human action was called "moral philosophy." Physics, chemistry, etc., were classified as "natural philosophy.") Over time, as these disciplines became more specialized, they branched off and became distinct disciplines in their own right. But this separation did not cause them to lose their philosophic roots.

Lastly, many eminent physicists have written articles and books on the philosophy of science. They obviously do not share your dogmatic disdain for the discipline. If you ever discuss the cognitive status of scientific theories and models, the role of induction versus deduction, the meaning of "laws of nature," determinism versus indeterminism, and similar issues, then you are engaging in the philosophy of science, not science per se.

Would you ride a vehicle whose design flows from Aristotelian metaphysics or Aristotelian physics.

If the vehicle worked like it was supposed to, sure I would. But who is defending either Aristotelian metaphysics or physics? Not I.

Ghs

[Ellen Stuttle]

Definitions are conventions in the use of language. There are no "correct" definitions, only definitions agreed upon in various contexts and situations. The is no God of Languages handing down Definitions scribed on tablets of stone.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Meanings *of words* are "conventions in the use of language," and agreed that there's "no God of Languages handing down Definitions scribed on tablets of stone." However, definitions *of concepts* are not "conventions in the use of language," and the definition of a *concept* can be wrong. The difference between a concept and the word used to label it seems perpetually to elude several posters here.

Consider an apropos example, a concept labeled by the term "gravity." Suppose that the concept a person has in mind in using the term "gravity" is that of some kind of force which keeps physical entities from drifting apart from each other. Suppose the person defines this concept as "an unmarried woman." I'll be surprised if you don't consider that definition for that concept wrong, and probably no one would seriously propose that definition for that concept. But some major physicist did define "gravity" as a force of attraction which acts at a distance. Is "gravity" a force of attraction, or is it a force carried by a particle or wave? Does it act at a distance or not? These are questions to be answered in order to form a correct definition of the concept being referred to by the label "gravity."

Ellen

Edited July 31, 2010 by Ellen Stuttle

[Ellen Stuttle]

> I think this all gets back to the idea that there is a "correct" definition for each of our words [semantically confused individual]

Yes, it does.

As Francisco pointed out, "words have an exact meaning." If you don't get logic 101, I can't imagine debating concepts in physics with you.

You sound just as unclear on the difference between words and concepts as GS.

Francisco was being dramatic in a novel, not speaking exactly in compliance with the Objectivist theory of concepts.

You don't get to decree what "space-time" means, Phil, and still less, whether or not there in fact is a curvature of the phenomenon being referred to by that label.

Ellen

Edited July 31, 2010 by Ellen Stuttle

[tjohnson]

However, definitions *of concepts* are not "conventions in the use of language," and the definition of a *concept* can be wrong. The difference between a concept and the word used to label it seems perpetually to elude several posters here.

I believe it is nonsensical to speak about "definitions of concepts". You can only define words, you cannot define a concept.

[rhartford]

For me, this is not a question of whether space is flat or curved. Rather, it is an issue of whether or not we commit a category mistake in attributing any such attributes to space. Only an existent can have attributes, and I daresay that in most normal discourse we don't think of space as something with this kind of ontological status.

. . .

Or would he argue that space itself is an existent and not merely "nothing"? If he were to say this, then it makes sense to attribute characteristics to space, such as calling it "curved." Otherwise, however, it makes no more sense to call space "curved" than it does to call it "green" or "temperamental."

"The units of ... 'existence' ... are every entity, attribute, action, event or phenomenon that exists" (IOE p.56) I view Existence as the totality of that which exists. Part of Existence consists of regions between entities and characteristics of those regions. Just as one can study attributes of "mental entities," one can study attributes (characteristics?) of a region of space. Those characteristics are determined by the distribution of matter in Existence. So yes, I do argue that a region of space is an existent and that its characteristics justify identifying it as "curved."

[BaalChatzaf]

> I think this all gets back to the idea that there is a "correct" definition for each of our words [semantically confused individual]

Yes, it does.

As Francisco pointed out, "words have an exact meaning." If you don't get logic 101, I can't imagine debating concepts in physics with you.

Well Francisco was wrong. Many words have multiple meanings and some of these meanings are quite fuzzy. For example, define the word "fair" precisely, exactly, unequivacobly ("fair" in the sense of just) in such a way no one will quarrel with your definition.

Words are slippery critters in many cases. Getting the meanings definite is sometime like nailing jelly to a tree.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I believe it is nonsensical to speak about "definitions of concepts". You can only define words, you cannot define a concept.

GS,

So how do you account for the fact that chair, cadeira, chaise, stuhl, καρέκλα, szék, and so on all mean the same thing?

After all, they are all different words.

And how do you know it? After all, according to what you just said, they all must have "different" definitions.

Is all this merely a gigantic coincidence--that they all mean the same thing?

That would be a stretch, don't you think?

How about, they all mean the same concept, which has the same definition in any language?

Ta daa!

Michael

[merjet]

Francisco way overstated the truth. He was partly right and partly wrong. Much depends on how a word is used.

Consider tree and trees. Suppose I say "a big branch fell from that tree during the storm", while pointing at the tree. There "tree" is used as a particular and has an exact meaning. If somebody says "trees shed their leaves in the autumn", it is used as a general term and the statement is not true for every particular tree. It is false for evergreens and even dead leaf-bearing kinds. "Shoe tree" and "genealogical tree" show that many words have multiple meanings. "Shed" and "kind" also.

In addition to "fair", consider "tall". It not having an exact meaning is what makes it flexible and is another example of word economy, which Rand wrote a little about in ITOE. Basketball pro Steve Nash at 6'3" is tall compared to men in general but short compared to all NBA players as a group. "Big" and "bigger" are even more fuzzy and flexible.

Possibly what Francisco meant was that propositions have an exact meaning. Of course, that is far from always true. If he did mean "propositions", then he didn't use "words" exactly.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Merlin Jetton

[BaalChatzaf]

In addition to "fair", consider "tall". It not having an exact meaning is what makes it flexible and is another example of word economy, which Rand wrote a little about in ITOE. Basketball pro Steve Nash at 6'3" is tall compared to men in general but short compared to all NBA players as a group. "Big" and "bigger" are even more fuzzy and flexible.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzzy_logic

Ba'al Chatzaf

[tjohnson]

I believe it is nonsensical to speak about "definitions of concepts". You can only define words, you cannot define a concept.

GS,

So how do you account for the fact that chair, cadeira, chaise, stuhl, καρέκλα, szék, and so on all mean the same thing?

After all, they are all different words.

And how do you know it? After all, according to what you just said, they all must have "different" definitions.

Is all this merely a gigantic coincidence--that they all mean the same thing?

That would be a stretch, don't you think?

How about, they all mean the same concept, which has the same definition in any language?

Ta daa!

Michael

A concept is something you imagine, it is not a word. We use words to represent concepts and these words can be defined with other words which also represent concepts. It is important to make this distinction between words and what they represent. You may have a concept of a tree and I may have one also. Yours may look like a red oak and mine may look like a white pine but this has nothing to do with the definition of 'tree', which attempts to unify all the various concepts that are possible. The word 'tree' represents an abstraction from all the various concepts.

[Ellen Stuttle]

A concept is something you imagine, it is not a word. We use words to represent concepts and these words can be defined with other words which also represent concepts. It is important to make this distinction between words and what they represent. You may have a concept of a tree and I may have one also. Yours may look like a red oak and mine may look like a white pine but this has nothing to do with the definition of 'tree', which attempts to unify all the various concepts that are possible. The word 'tree' represents an abstraction from all the various concepts.

You've been on this list for more than 3 years. You must have been told at least a hundred times that you're using "concept" to mean an image, which isn't the Objectivist meaning of "concept." You ignore the many explanations you've been given of the Objectivist meaning, and your own repeated declamations about words typically having more than one meaning. Hello?

Ellen

[Philip Coates]

1. > You sound just as unclear on the difference between words and concepts as GS [Ellen, Post #331]

2. > I believe it is nonsensical to speak about "definitions of concepts". You can only define words, you cannot define a concept. [GS]

3. > ["words have an exact meaning."] Francisco was wrong. Many words have multiple meanings and some of these meanings are quite fuzzy. [baal]

4. > [You can't] define the word "fair" precisely, exactly, unequivacobly ("fair" in the sense of just) in such a way no one will quarrel with your definition. [baal]

5. > Francisco way overstated the truth...Much depends on how a word is used...consider "tall". Its not having an exact meaning is what makes it flexible...Basketball pro Steve Nash at 6'3" is tall compared to men in general but short compared to all NBA players as a group. [Merlin]

6. > Possibly what Francisco meant was that propositions have an exact meaning. [Merlin]

6. > [ii] Of course, that is far from always true. [Merlin, #337]

7. > See http://en.wikipedia....iki/Fuzzy_logic [baal]

--Ellen [#1], in this kind of informal context, words and concepts are used as synonyms.

--GS [#2], basically the same point: When you define a word, you define a concept.

--Baal [#3] and Merlin [#5], Francisco's point does not relate to the point that a word can be used in different senses, to designate different meanings; it is that -each- time you use it, it has to be one of the valid meanings of the word.

--Baal [#4], the fact that people will quarrel over something proves little. The word 'fair' in the sense of just does have an exact meaning, once one specifies the context. It can be defined in different ways (in a pocket dictionary vs. the OED, formally vs. informally, etc.) with all of those definitions being different ways of saying the same thing.

--Merlin [#6(ii)], this is simply an extension of the points I've made in reply to Baal and GSem. First, words can have different meanings. One needs to define (or at least have clearly in mind) EXACTLY which sense is being used in all of the words in both the subject and predicate of a proposition. That's what makes (or ought to make) all your porpositions or all the ones a thinker utters have an exact meaning. Second, once the context is clear (among all men, among basketball players), the term 'tall' is clear and correct or incorrect (or borderline). But that is not the kind of situation Francisco was talking about--see below.

--Baal [#7], we are not discussing fuzzy logic in this exchange. To bring the topic in just because it's something that interests you is pedantic in the extreme. To simply link to a "dump" of a whole article on a complex, technical, academic entire field of study without summarizing in clear English what aspect of it you think is relevant is lazy in the extreme.

--Merlin [#6(i)], here's the exchange:

"I want to be prepared to claim the greatest virtue of all--that I was a man who made money."

"Any grafter can make money."

"James, you ought to discover some day that words have an exact meaning." [AS, Part I, Ch. V]

Francisco's first statement summarizes his earlier points when he discussed why he was studing mining and why he was studying electrical engineering and why he was studying philosophy, all so that he can be a better head of his company. And when he said he intends to raise the production of d'Anconia Copper by one hundred percent.

His first statement above is about "making money" in the sense of creating wealth: producing value, not stealing it. Words have an exact meaning is a simple reproach to James for twisting the -concept- by using it in the sense of theft.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Philip Coates

[Philip Coates]

> [GS] You've been on this list for more than 3 years. You must have been told at least a hundred times that you're using "concept" to mean an image, which isn't the Objectivist meaning of "concept."

Ellen, I'd excuse this more for people like GS who aren't Oists and post as if they have never read all those books and taken all those courses so that the basic concepts haven't sunk in or become part of their mental furniture. When you constantly see the ideas used in a different way in books and academic literature it's easy to revert back to the conventional usage.

I find this is probably true for Xray as well. She forgets (or didn't fully absorb) the way we are using concepts like selfishness, objectivity, capitalism.

Edited July 31, 2010 by Philip Coates

[tjohnson]

GSem, same point: When you define a word, you define a concept.

But it is possible to learn words and not concepts. I can memorize a passage from a book on surgery but I would have little or no concept of what the surgery entails. If Objectivism insists that these are the same then you are going to have a great deal of trouble getting the majority of the population to understand you. If this is the case, what word to you use to represent the visual idea that words bring to mind when you read or hear them?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

GS,

A concept in Objectivism is a mental category based on a hierarchy of abstract components (ultimately rooted in the senses if you go down the hierarchy). Rand calls the category and components integrations and units (and units can also be integrations themselves), but call them what you will. The important part is that components with specific identities are grouped into a hierarchy.

To say it differently, the components are isolated according to their most fundamental characteristics (the units are identified) and integrated (grouped) into a hierarchy.

You keep using image as basis. Images are included in many concepts, but they are components, not concepts themselves. Also, there are other senses: sound, touch, taste, smell (and even others if you accept other criteria like gravity awareness).

As a minor point and to be precise, there are countless perceptual instances and lower level "integrations" that make up a concept, most of which are not consciously identified, but they can be identified if focused on. And their position can be located within the hierarchy (if focused on).

That is a concept in Objectivism.

It's a kind of mental awareness shorthand for a vast array of things, experiences and ideas--but an organized one.

Another important point is that each concept is a sort of virtual (or mental) entity with its own identity, albeit one that is interconnected all over the place with countless other concepts and abstractions.

You constantly use the word "concept" as if no hierarchies are involved.

Maybe that will help you understand why this confusion keeps on happening..

Michael

[Dragonfly]

So, I'm back in town... When physicist talk about space, this is the same space that is used in daily usage. The difference is that physicists tell us that there is more to space than meets the eye. The reason that they often refer to space-time is that certain properties of space depend on the time coordinate that is chosen, while the combined space-time is invariant under Lorentz transformations, which gives more general results. That time goes slower the more space-time is curved has been unambiguously demonstrated by countless experiments, only we don't observe that in daily life as the effects are then extremely small, therefore it seems counterintuitive to us (but for the correct functioning of the GPS system it is essential to take this effect into account). It is not true that the physicist defines space as something different from the common concept, he merely shows that our common perceptions are only approximations and that the properties of space and time in reality are not so simple as we'd intuitively believe, they are not the independent absolute entities they may seem to us in daily life.

[Xray]

How can a layperson having only little or no knowledge in a physicist's field of expertise assess that the physicist "speaks nonsense"?

Use the same standards that you would apply to anyone else. For example, you don't need to be an expert in physics to realize that attributing "free will" to subatomic particles is nonsense.

George,

Surely you will remember the detailed discussion about this issue on the Science & Mathematics thread. http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?app=forums&module=post&section=post&do=reply_post&f=30&t=386&qpid=99292

Excerpts from your posts and the responses you received:

When Conway says that a "particle has a choice," is it also a mistake to take this literally? Is Conway capable of speaking in anything other than fanciful metaphors?

The article characterizes Conway's position as follows: "The gist of it is this: They say they have proved that if humans have free will, then elementary particles -- like atoms and electrons -- possess free will as well."

This sounds like much more than a "mathematical theorem" to me; it sounds like a muddled philosophical conclusion based on a mathematical theorem. And I don't care how great of a mathematician Conway is; this is nonsense, pure and simple. Mathematicians and scientists are as capable of speaking philosophical gibberish as anyone else.

Did you read the article? Speaking about particles that possess free will is no more nonsense than speaking about "the virtue of selfishness" or "the benevolent universe". But Rand is always excused when she uses her own ideosyncratic definitions, the argument being that as long as she gives a clear definition of her own terms, there's nothing wrong with it. So why not apply that same principle when mathematicians and physicists use their jargon with its typical definitions? If you can tell us why the conclusions in that article are wrong, using the definitions given in that article, then I'd like to hear that. When scientists talk about "no free lunch theorems", "cosmic censorship", "God playing or not playing dice", or "color", "flavor", "charm" when talking about quarks, you shouldn't interpret them literally in the everyday sense either.

"Conway and Kochen do not prove that free will does exist. The definition of "free will" used in the proof of this theorem is simply that an outcome is "not determined" by prior conditions, and some philosophers strongly dispute the equivalence of "not determined" with free will." (quoted from the Wiki article on the Free Will Theorem)

I see no problem with this. Do you?

(bolding mine):

Please explain how this talk of "free decisions" by the universe (such terminology recurs throughout the paper) follows from the "mathematical result" of the paper. Do you think the universe makes decisions?

That's the same thing as blaming Einstein for using the phrase "God doesn't play dice" by taking it literally, while it was obviously a metaphor. When Conway writes about the universe making decisions he means of course just that what happens in the universe at a certain event in space-time, whether that depends on the information of the past light cone of that event. Such anthropomorphizing terms are quite common in science, like particles that "see" something or atoms that "want" something, etc. Nothing to get excited about.

Yes, I read the article. Have you?

Sure.

[Ghs]: If you think I have been unfair to Conway, then state what you think is his basic argument (regarding his use of terms like "free will"), and I will respond.

He discusses experiments with spin 1 particles, measuring the square of the spin component of the particles in a certain direction, where the assumption is that the choice of these directions by the experimenter is independent of the information available to him, the information in his past light cone (that is his definition of free will). He then proves that if that assumption is true, the response of those particles in the experiment is also independent of the information that is available to those particles, i.e. the information in the past light cone of those particles. By analogy of the independent decisions of the experimenter he calls that property of the particles then the "free will" of the particles. This is a purely physical definition that has nothing to do with treating particles as conscious entities. That is for example similar to use the term "design" in biology, which does not imply that biological structures are designed by some conscious entity (what the ID proponents of course claim, after all they use the term intelligent design).

There exist enough books written for interested laypersons by world-famous physicists who are perfectly able to "express themselves intelligibly".

I never denied this. But if you read such books, you will find that these physicists sometimes reach different philosophical conclusions,

Your point being? Everybody has his/her philosophy. So when e. g. the world-famous physicist Steven Weinberg says (I'm paraphrasing) that the more he realizes about the universe, the more senseless it appears to him, this is a philosophical position one can share or not. Edited July 31, 2010 by Xray

[Xray]

Rand's theory of definitions is very good.

A concept is something you imagine, it is not a word. We use words to represent concepts and these words can be defined with other words which also represent concepts. It is important to make this distinction between words and what they represent. You may have a concept of a tree and I may have one also. Yours may look like a red oak and mine may look like a white pine but this has nothing to do with the definition of 'tree', which attempts to unify all the various concepts that are possible. The word 'tree' represents an abstraction from all the various concepts.

GS,

A concept in Objectivism is a mental category based on a hierarchy of abstract components (ultimately rooted in the senses if you go down the hierarchy). Rand calls the category and components integrations and units (and units can also be integrations themselves), but call them what you will. The important part is that components with specific identities are grouped into a hierarchy.

To say it differently, the components are isolated according to their most fundamental characteristics (the units are identified) and integrated (grouped) into a hierarchy.

A concept is something you imagine, it is not a word. We use words to represent concepts and these words can be defined with other words which also represent concepts. It is important to make this distinction between words and what they represent. You may have a concept of a tree and I may have one also. Yours may look like a red oak and mine may look like a white pine but this has nothing to do with the definition of 'tree', which attempts to unify all the various concepts that are possible. The word 'tree' represents an abstraction from all the various concepts.

You've been on this list for more than 3 years. You must have been told at least a hundred times that you're using "concept" to mean an image, which isn't the Objectivist meaning of "concept." You ignore the many explanations you've been given of the Objectivist meaning, and your own repeated declamations about words typically having more than one meaning. Hello?

Ellen

Ellen, I'd excuse this more for people like GS who aren't Oists and post as if they have never read all those books and taken all those courses so that the basic concepts haven't sunk in or become part of their mental furniture. When you constantly see the ideas used in a different way in books and academic literature it's easy to revert back to the conventional usage.

I find this is probably true for Xray as well. She forgets (or didn't fully absorb) the way we are using concepts like selfishness, objectivity, capitalism.

Question to George H. Smith, Michael Stuart Kelly, Ellen Stuttle, Philip Coates:

In ITOE, p. 13 Rand states: "A concept is a mental integration of two or more units possessing the same distinguishing characteristic(s), with their particular measurements omitted."

So what are the "two or more units" of e. g. the concept "selfishness" (one of the Objectivist virtues)? And what "particular measurements" are "ommitted" in that concept?

Edited July 31, 2010 by Xray

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ye Gods!

Xray cracked open ITOE!

Now if she'll only read it, she'll find her questions answered in the text.

But hell... let's be grateful for one miracle at a time...

Michael

[BaalChatzaf]

His first statement above is about "making money" in the sense of creating wealth: producing value, not stealing it. Words have an exact meaning is a simple reproach to James for twisting the -concept- by using it in the sense of theft.

Indeed, that is what he meant. However some words are inherently fuzzy (i.e. do not have an exact meaning). Give me an exact meaning for the word "tall" or "short". I bet you can't. Fuzzy Logic as formulated by Lofti Zadeh is a kind of logical scheme for dealing with terms that do not have a precise meaning by do denote a range of possibilities or values. So the statement: X is tall - is not precisely true or false. It is contextually dependent and there are associated parameters such as tall compared to what?

Lawyers have to create layers and layers of verbalisms to disambiguate language sufficiently for contracts to be understand correctly by all participating parties. It is precisely because words do not always have exact meanings that people go to great lengths to make sure what they say or write is not misunderstood.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

Indeed, that is what he meant. However some words are inherently fuzzy (i.e. do not have an exact meaning). Give me an exact meaning for the word "tall" or "short". I bet you can't.

"Tall" is not "short" and "short" is not "tall."

--Brant

keep it simple

[BaalChatzaf]

Indeed, that is what he meant. However some words are inherently fuzzy (i.e. do not have an exact meaning). Give me an exact meaning for the word "tall" or "short". I bet you can't.

"Tall" is not "short" and "short" is not "tall."

--Brant

keep it simple

A circular definition is not definition at all. Try again.

Ba'al Chatzaf