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that's trying to artificially constrain knowledge in a way so that your prior assertion is true (reminiscent of the incompleteness theorem). that's a common way

that's trying to artificially constrain knowledge in a way so that your prior assertion is true (reminiscent of the incompleteness theorem). that's a common way that people become simultaneously self-certain and wrong. scientific consensus has no hope of outrunning even what humans in general know, let alone every scientific conjecture ever made, most of which aren't disproven, but rather merely discarded. and all that is a tiny speck next to everything that's within reach of human knowledge, which is miniscule next to everything that could ever be known but is forever beyond our reach. it really does approach 0 at the limit.

cogman10 5y ago
I'm not "constraining knowledge" I'm not saying it isn't theoretically infinite. I'm saying that the amount of knowledge has no barring on whether or not an assertion is true. Further, the scenario of this entire thread is about current and future scientific consensus, not past consensus. The fact that protoscience said that that you need to balance the 4 humors to cure illness does not affect current scientific consensus which soundly rejects that notion. The number of assertions we have scientific consensus on is finite. The number of those assertions which are true is a finite number. The infinite nature of knowledge does not change that ratio because, again, we aren't making assertions about everything that is knowable. The entire point of this conversation is "What is more likely true, what the experts say or something else?". You are making the claim that because scientists don't know what every atom in the sun is doing, they can't correctly say that the sun will rise in the morning. Because, their knowledge of the sun is an infinitesimally small percentage of everything there is to know about the sun. My point is, scientists aren't making assertions about what every quark in the sun will do. They aren't making assertions about the temperature of every square inch of the sun. The assertions they are making are far more broad and, shocker, likely 90+% true. Which circles back to my main point. If an expert tells you "The surface of the sun is roughly 6000C" That's a correct statement. If you aren't going to address this in your next comment then don't bother because I'm done with this. You are being purposefully obtuse.

cogman10 5y ago

I'm not "constraining knowledge" I'm not saying it isn't theoretically infinite. I'm saying that the amount of knowledge has no barring on whether or not an assertion is true. Further, the scenario of this entire thread is about current and future scientific consensus, not past consensus. The fact that protoscience said that that you need to balance the 4 humors to cure illness does not affect current scientific consensus which soundly rejects that notion. The number of assertions we have scientific consensus on is finite. The number of those assertions which are true is a finite number. The infinite nature of knowledge does not change that ratio because, again, we aren't making assertions about everything that is knowable. The entire point of this conversation is "What is more likely true, what the experts say or something else?". You are making the claim that because scientists don't know what every atom in the sun is doing, they can't correctly say that the sun will rise in the morning. Because, their knowledge of the sun is an infinitesimally small percentage of everything there is to know about the sun. My point is, scientists aren't making assertions about what every quark in the sun will do. They aren't making assertions about the temperature of every square inch of the sun. The assertions they are making are far more broad and, shocker, likely 90+% true. Which circles back to my main point. If an expert tells you "The surface of the sun is roughly 6000C" That's a correct statement. If you aren't going to address this in your next comment then don't bother because I'm done with this. You are being purposefully obtuse.