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> I am making the empirical observation that the most effective method for expanding human knowledge is science. I think you're still basically begging the que

by abeppu 3y ago

> I am making the empirical observation that the most effective method for expanding human knowledge is science. I think you're still basically begging the question here. Is it directly observable whether a belief is "knowledge", such that the efficacy of a method can be known by "empirical observation"? How would one know? > Like what? I think ethics are pretty important, but aren't about something that's objectively true in the world. One can know some of the characteristics of preference utilitarianism as an ethical model, for example. But in this conversation, perhaps the most important gap is epistemology. You feel confident you know what knowledge is and isn't and how one can arrive at it -- did you arrive at that understanding by directly observing what is and is not knowledge in an objective external universe? What does it mean to know, or even for a belief to be "justified"? Since you brought up Kant, and then re-canted (rimshot), Kant had the analytic vs synthetic distinction on propositions, where synthetic propositions are those which depend on how their meaning relates to the world -- i.e. can be true or false depending on what's true about the world. Math, logic, etc are analytic truths; we don't validate that e.g. arithmetic works the way we know it does by doing "experiments" and "empirical observations" of operations with large cardinality sets of physical objects.

lisper 3y ago
> Is it directly observable whether a belief is "knowledge", such that the efficacy of a method can be known by "empirical observation"? Yes. > How would one know? Just look around you. You have computers, GPS, mRNA vaccines, etc. etc. etc. Those things were not produced by philosophers. > I think ethics are pretty important, I agree. > but aren't about something that's objectively true in the world. What can I say? You are simply wrong about that. Ethics are instincts produced by evolution. Like all instincts, they exist because they have survival value: genes that build brains with instincts about ethics reproduce better (in certain environmental niches) than genes that don't. Ethics are every bit as amenable to scientific inquiry as any other natural phenomenon. > we don't validate that e.g. arithmetic works the way we know it does by doing "experiments" and "empirical observations" of operations with large cardinality sets of physical objects Of course we do, because there are different ways of doing arithmetic. Some of them are better models of the world than others, and so those are the ones that we tend to think of as "the way" of doing arithmetic. But the only thing that makes standard arithmetic special is that it corresponds to the way that (parts of) the world work.
- abeppu 3y ago
  > Just look around you. You have computers, GPS, mRNA vaccines, etc. etc. etc. Those things were not produced by philosophers. You're clearly not getting this. Yes, you can see the products of scientific progress. That's not the same as seeing the absence of knowledge produced by anyone else. And one would expect that truths revealed about the physical world we live in should of course be the ones that give rise to physical artifacts you can point at. > Ethics are instincts produced by evolution. ... and yet, our ethical beliefs are not biologically determined, but change as a function of culture, and at least in part through the work of philosophers. Our beliefs about the importance of freedom, equality, fairness (or what those mean) change dramatically over decades, far too quick for genetics to have any contribution to the change. Re arithmetic, "the integers are closed under addition" is still something one can know without making any observations of the world, even if standard addition were somehow not useful in making predictions about the physical world. Further, by arguing that the importance of mathematical knowledge is only its relationship to making predictions about physical reality, you are once again begging the question.
  - lisper 3y ago
    > That's not the same as seeing the absence of knowledge produced by anyone else. But that's not what you asked, and it's not what I claimed. I didn't say that philosophy is entirely devoid of value, only that a lot of it is. > our ethical beliefs are not biologically determined What difference does that make? A lot of your physical characteristics aren't biologically determined. That doesn't put them beyond the reach of scientific inquiry. > "the integers are closed under addition" is still something one can know without making any observations of the world Really? How do you know what the word "integer" means without making any observations of the world? How can you even become aware of the existence of the word "integer", let alone what it is that that word denotes, without making any observations of the world? > Further, by arguing that the importance of mathematical knowledge is only its relationship to making predictions about physical reality, you are once again begging the question. Am I? What is it that made you decide to write "the integers are closed under addition" if not some prediction on the effect that writing those words rather than some other words (like, say, "pandas are partial to purple parkas") would have on physical reality?

by abeppu 3y ago

lisper 3y ago

> Is it directly observable whether a belief is "knowledge", such that the efficacy of a method can be known by "empirical observation"? Yes. > How would one know? Just look around you. You have computers, GPS, mRNA vaccines, etc. etc. etc. Those things were not produced by philosophers. > I think ethics are pretty important, I agree. > but aren't about something that's objectively true in the world. What can I say? You are simply wrong about that. Ethics are instincts produced by evolution. Like all instincts, they exist because they have survival value: genes that build brains with instincts about ethics reproduce better (in certain environmental niches) than genes that don't. Ethics are every bit as amenable to scientific inquiry as any other natural phenomenon. > we don't validate that e.g. arithmetic works the way we know it does by doing "experiments" and "empirical observations" of operations with large cardinality sets of physical objects Of course we do, because there are different ways of doing arithmetic. Some of them are better models of the world than others, and so those are the ones that we tend to think of as "the way" of doing arithmetic. But the only thing that makes standard arithmetic special is that it corresponds to the way that (parts of) the world work.

abeppu 3y ago
> Just look around you. You have computers, GPS, mRNA vaccines, etc. etc. etc. Those things were not produced by philosophers. You're clearly not getting this. Yes, you can see the products of scientific progress. That's not the same as seeing the absence of knowledge produced by anyone else. And one would expect that truths revealed about the physical world we live in should of course be the ones that give rise to physical artifacts you can point at. > Ethics are instincts produced by evolution. ... and yet, our ethical beliefs are not biologically determined, but change as a function of culture, and at least in part through the work of philosophers. Our beliefs about the importance of freedom, equality, fairness (or what those mean) change dramatically over decades, far too quick for genetics to have any contribution to the change. Re arithmetic, "the integers are closed under addition" is still something one can know without making any observations of the world, even if standard addition were somehow not useful in making predictions about the physical world. Further, by arguing that the importance of mathematical knowledge is only its relationship to making predictions about physical reality, you are once again begging the question.
- lisper 3y ago
  > That's not the same as seeing the absence of knowledge produced by anyone else. But that's not what you asked, and it's not what I claimed. I didn't say that philosophy is entirely devoid of value, only that a lot of it is. > our ethical beliefs are not biologically determined What difference does that make? A lot of your physical characteristics aren't biologically determined. That doesn't put them beyond the reach of scientific inquiry. > "the integers are closed under addition" is still something one can know without making any observations of the world Really? How do you know what the word "integer" means without making any observations of the world? How can you even become aware of the existence of the word "integer", let alone what it is that that word denotes, without making any observations of the world? > Further, by arguing that the importance of mathematical knowledge is only its relationship to making predictions about physical reality, you are once again begging the question. Am I? What is it that made you decide to write "the integers are closed under addition" if not some prediction on the effect that writing those words rather than some other words (like, say, "pandas are partial to purple parkas") would have on physical reality?