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This has nothing to do with postmodern philosophy. There is a difference between the reality, and a human's conceptualization of that reality. In fact, we can a
by gnulinux 3y ago
This has nothing to do with postmodern philosophy. There is a difference between the reality, and a human's conceptualization of that reality. In fact, we can abstract further and say that there is a difference between X and the concept of X. Now, the GP comment is saying that the model of X (which is how a human being conceptualizes X) is different than X. So, when you look at nature as it is, there are no electrons. There are just things that humans happen to model as electrons. We could also happen to model them as something else perhaps inconceivable to us at the moment. But the reality of what-we-call-electron is independent from the concept of electron. This insight is as old as Plato and Kant.
- Kranar 3y agoFascinating, you went from saying this has nothing to do with postmodern philosophy to describing constructive postmodern philosophy. I love it!
- thejohnconway 3y agoI don’t think there’s anything postmodern about it…
- imtringued 2y agoHow is this philosophy? Any information based system will have information about a real thing it has observed.
- GoblinSlayer 2y agoConstructive postmodernism would propose a competing constructive model. At the very least doubt should have justification, otherwise it's naive agnosticism.
- fermisea 3y agoThat is true for all physics. We can only claim to build approximate models that have degrees of freedom that only make sense within the context of that model. In a sense, every object that you attach to a physical explanation has an inductive bias because of the mechanisms that you use to interpret the observations surrounding that object..
- chii 3y ago> the concept of electron. but this claims that the concept-of-electron as a discrete entity which the what-we-call-electron only approximates at best. But because concept-of-electron is unscientific (aka, it is not produced from a falsifiable hypothesis), you can claim anything from it, including that it exists and supercedes the what-we-call-electron. aka, it's akin to claiming god.
- BlueTemplar 2y agoI can't help but point out the humor of one being hundreds of years old while the other thousands. (But yeah, Mediterranean/Europe wasn't at its best in-between...) Also, postmodern science concepts of relativity and various quantum weirdness not having had an impact on postmodern philosophy (with the incompleteness theorem straddling both) is quite a bold claim.