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Boyi comments on How to Not Lose an Argument - Less Wrong
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Yes! Thomas Kuhn is a brilliant writer and his theory is powerful. But let me ask you what you think he is saying in that book? I am asking because I feel that we draw different conclusions from it.
The post-modern question to science is not about whether or not science can predict reality. The question is whether or not science is produced scientifically. Or to put it another way, can science be separated from power and discourse?
No. Obviously not. (This is not the majority position in this community).
I would hope that a scientist familiar with post-modern thought would agree that producing knowledge scientifically means nothing more and nothing less than getting better at predicting reality.
My take on Kuhn? The incommensurability of scientific theories (e.g. Aristotelian physics vs. Newtonian physics) is a real thing, but it does not imply scientific nihilism because there are phenomena. Thus, science is possible because there is "regularity" (not sure what the technical word is) when observing reality.
interesting, can you explain your reasoning?
is that the thing where from one theory the other one looks bogus and you can't get from one to the other? Seems to me that it doesn't imply nihilism because using the full power of your current mind, one model looks better than the other. it might be the same as EYs take on the problem of induction here.
Yes, incommensurability is the problem of translating from one theory into a later theory.
If different scientists are looking at a different reality, how on earth did we keep making better predictions? Thus the appeal to the regularity of phenomena, which rescues the concept of scientific progress even if we think that our model is likely to be considered utter nonsense a generation or so into the future.
ETA: The social position of science is an expansion of the halo effect point I made.
That's exactly the problem that was noted by grandparent.
If science were just determined by "power and discourse", it would be surprising if you could use it to make planes fly.
Look I am not trying to disagree with the scientific method. It is incredibly powerful and beneficial methodology for producing knowledge. What I am saying is
1-that as an institution and a belief-sysetm "science" does not live up to the scientific method. 2- That it is impossible to do so given what we have learned about the human condition.
I'm not sure what it would mean for science to "live up" to the scientific method. The scientific method is, well, a method; it's not an ideology.
Sure, scientists are humans with power and discourse and all kinds of cognitive biases, and thus they don't practice the scientific method with absolute perfection. And yes, I bet that there are quite a few traditions and institutions within the scientific community that could be improved. But, even with all its imperfections, science has been devastatingly effective as far as "belief systems" are concerned. As it was said upthread, science actually predict which planes will fly and which will fall; so far, no other methodology has been able to even come close.
Somewhat agree. Science is broken in systematic ways. See the quantum physics sequence.
That statement is a rather bold one to post on a site dedicated to improving human epistemological methods. It doesn't seem to me that a bit of irrationality should prevent us from doing better; we didn't even know what we were doing up until now.
EDIT: On 1 did you mean that science as we do it does not match the ideal, or the ideal does not work as well as is possible? Both are true.
I wouldn't say 2 is bold at all, really, provided it is taken in a weak form - particularly if we factor out the transhumanist element. Yes, we will never be perfect Bayesian reasoning machines. This doesn't mean we can't or shouldn't do better ever better. I'm not sure what reasonably charitable interpretation would be a really bold claim, here... "We're so far gone we shouldn't bother trying," perhaps, but that doesn't seem to square with this poster's other posts.
I don't really have a clear idea of what boyi is even trying to say, so I'm not trying to square it with other posts.
The way I see it, "it's impossible to make science live up to the ideals" is pretty bold. I'll try to see a charitable interpretation.
I don't know, there's a general sense in which ideals are almost never reached.
yeah. I interpreted it closer to "impossible to do better" than "impossible to be perfect". Looking back, the former is the more charitable interpretation.
I get this distinct feeling of having fallen for the fallacy of gray (cant be perfect == can't do better).
Idiomatically speaking, I think you can usually parse "can't be perfect" as a proxy for "should not aspire to the ideal, even if you accept that it can only be approached asymptotically".
On 1. I meant both.
On 2. I realize that it is a bold statement given the context of this blog. My reason for making it is that I believe taking the paradox of rationality into account would better serve your purposes.
If what you mean by 2 is that we can never be perfect, then yeah, that is a legitimate concern, and one that has been discussed.
I think the big distinction to make is that just because we aren't and can't be perfect, doesn't mean we should not try to do better. See the stuff on humility and the fallacy of gray.
What I mean by 2 is that we can never be perfect and that the "rationale man" is the wrong ideal.
That's why we call ourselves "aspiring rationalists" not just "rationalists". "rational" is an ideal we measure ourselves against, the way thermodynamic engines are measured against the ideal Carnot cycle.
Read the stuff I linked for more info.
What do you mean by "the paradox of rationality"?
(Have you read this?)
You mean can bayes structure work without mapping it onto the social domain? Yes.
RETRACTED: If science works, as in predicts reality, why are any other questions even relevant?
Because scientists do not naturally limit themselves to that domain. Scientists routinely do things like abusing the halo effect
Good point. I knew that point would bite me. I'm going to edit.