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Science never in fact required ontic naturalism. The only real assumption is that "there exists something as opposed to nothing", i.e. that there are some pheno
by qsort 6y ago
Science never in fact required ontic naturalism. The only real assumption is that "there exists something as opposed to nothing", i.e. that there are some phenomena independent of the subject doing science.
It is a tenable position to argue that the theory of general relativity (or quantum mechanics, or anything else) is not what the world is, but merely a model of the world, that we accept because it's useful and provides correct (or "correct enough") predictions.
Regardless of whether one agrees or not with that perspective, it's entirely possible to discuss a scientific theory with no consideration of its ontological status; one may at the same time disagree with the interpretation and agree with the mathematical account.
It doesn't seem to me like any kind of 'naturalistic' assumption is required for science to work.
- throwaway9887 6y ago>The only real assumption is that "there exists something as opposed to nothing", i.e. that there are some phenomena independent of the subject doing science. Former does not imply the latter.
- qsort 6y agoIt's rather difficult to make sense of the concept of 'existing' starting from the point of view that everything is the product of one's mind, but yeah, strictly speaking I used imprecise language (which is why I put that sentence in quotes). The actual assumption is the latter.
- ncmncm 6y ago>It is a tenable position to argue that the theory of general relativity ... is not what the world is It is not just tenable, but unavoidable, because GR is, in detail, incompatible with QM. QM has been tested overwhelmingly more thoroughly than GR, and GR doesn't seem to predict any of it.