On Oct 1, 2014, at 4:00 AM, John Collier wrote:
I think that it is a given that for any realist position there is a
nominalist position in the contemporary sense that can fit the same
assent structure. Typically one is realist about some things, but
not others (for example one can be a realist about physical laws
but not numbers, or vice versa).
HP: That is the way most physicists think (if they think about it).
They don't make a big point of it one way or the other because any
model must be empirically testable. Epistemological opinions do not
provide a test.
JC: So contemporary nominalism, if it works at all, will work for
all claims of reality involving a specific external existence.
HP: Physicists feel no need to stick with one or the other. They are
"unprincipled epistemic opportunists".
At 02:03 PM 10/1/2014, Clark Goble wrote:
It's also interesting in that even people I'd largely call
nominalist in science still tend to have a "dodge" regarding the
fundamental laws of physics that govern dynamics within fundamental
stuff. Those they treat as real and in that sense they aren't
nominalists. However in practice they're very nominalist towards
everything else. i.e. don't accept mathematical abstract entities,
colors, qualia or so forth as mind independent.
HP: That is the case. But why do you call this a "dodge"? In physics,
Natural Law is a category based on its principles of invariance and
symmetry to obtain maximum objectivity. Laws are expressed in the
formal language of mathematics, but this language is a different
category. It has many types of axioms and rules that are not
dependent on, or limited by, Natural Laws (except for information
processing satisfying the 2nd Law).
CG: But it's also tricky in that most scientists aren't
philosophically informed and thus are ignorant of many subtle
issues. Incoherent beliefs that might bug a philosopher are thus quite common.
HP: The European founders of modern physics had philosophy in their
curriculum. As C. P. Snow would have said, "most philosophers aren't
scientifically informed and thus are ignorant of many subtle issues.
Incoherent beliefs that might bug a scientist are thus quite common."
Howard
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