TimS comments on Adding up to normality - Less Wrong

-3 [deleted] 13 July 2012 07:24PM

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Comment author: [deleted] comment score below threshold [+] (15 children)

Comment author: TimS 13 July 2012 09:03:10PM 8 points [-]

You have made certain observations, but the assertion that the stick changed location and grew is mediated by your theory. Theory A says the stick grew, Theory B makes noises about illusions caused by refraction. Theory C says you did not see a stick, and is rejected on that basis. If for no other reason, you should consider preferring theory B over A because B makes better predictions than A.

In general, detangling observation from theory is a hard problem in philosophy of science. But that doesn't justify throwing away belief in external reality.

Comment author: gwern 13 July 2012 09:28:25PM 2 points [-]

Exactly. Your observations are observations; to reify them any further, that a 'stick' must have been 'bent' when it entered the 'water', is to enter in the area of theory where theories can be discarded or adapted. Theory C says not just something about what it means for a 'stick' to be 'bent', it denies that you observed what you observed, and can be rejected solely on that basis.

Comment author: [deleted] 13 July 2012 09:49:32PM 1 point [-]

Let me ask you the same question I asked Tim then:

So what is the content of my observation? In the case of the bent stick, would you be willing to finish the sentence "I observed that..." such that this sentence cannot come up false on the basis of a new theory?

Comment author: JGWeissman 13 July 2012 10:20:16PM 5 points [-]

In the case of the bent stick, would you be willing to finish the sentence "I observed that..." such that this sentence cannot come up false on the basis of a new theory?

"I observed that my image of the stick shows the stick as bent." It is not a statement of objective reality, but a statement of appearances to me, in my direct experience, that a new theory must not contradict. The new theory is allowed to say that my image of the stick does not accurately describe the stick, but it may not say that I didn't observe the image.

Comment author: [deleted] 13 July 2012 10:22:55PM 0 points [-]

The new theory is allowed to say that my image of the stick does not accurately describe the stick, but it may not say that I didn't observe the image.

And would you agree that the only things that can be included in the 'normality' a theory must add up to are these kinds of images and appearing? In other words, would you agree that any statement of objective fact is always, however we want to put it, theory-laden or involving some kind of falsifiable explanation?

Comment author: komponisto 14 July 2012 08:15:41AM 1 point [-]

In other words, would you agree that any statement of objective fact is always, however we want to put it, theory-laden or involving some kind of falsifiable explanation?

Notice the word "statement" in the above. Perhaps communication of a fact requires the use of a theory; but this does not imply that the fact itself is somehow "theory-laden". (Maybe the latter is also the case, but the former doesn't imply it.)

Comment author: [deleted] 14 July 2012 01:45:58PM 0 points [-]

Perhaps communication of a fact requires the use of a theory; but this does not imply that the fact itself is somehow "theory-laden". (Maybe the latter is also the case, but the former doesn't imply it.)

Well, the word 'fact' tends to refer ambiguously to two things: first to the apple's being green, and second to the intensional, semantic object 'the apple is green'. I intended the second meaning. These kinds of facts, I'm saying, have to get excluded from the 'normal'. The other, former kind of fact have no place in any theory, since they're just the way the world is. I do think the wiki article on the normality of reality is based on an equivocation between these two senses of 'fact'.

Anyway, the question is whether or not facts of the intensional semantic sort could belong to 'normality'. If not (so goes the line of reasoning) then the only thing we can include in normality are statements of appearance and seeming. But this, I think, makes Egan's law trivial.

Comment author: [deleted] 13 July 2012 09:05:29PM -1 points [-]

You have made certain observations, but the assertion that the stick changed location and grew is mediated by your theory.

So what is the content of my observation? In the case of the bent stick, would you be willing to finish the sentence "I observed that..." such that this sentence cannot come up false on the basis of a new theory?

But that doesn't justify throwing away belief in external reality.

Agreed, and that is not at all my intention here.

Comment author: TimS 13 July 2012 09:15:41PM 2 points [-]

I believe, more strongly than most in this community, that it is essentially impossible to draw a clear line between observation and theory. But the important issue is deciding what theories are worth paying attention to, not figuring what observations to attend to.

Comment author: [deleted] 13 July 2012 09:46:20PM -1 points [-]

I believe, more strongly than most in this community, that it is essentially impossible to draw a clear line between observation and theory. But the important issue is deciding what theories are worth paying attention to, not figuring what observations to attend to.

This seems to me to entail a rejection of Egan's law, but I should qualify that. It doesn't reject the rule of thumb that a good theory preserves the phenomena (though it may overturn them too). As a heuristic about choosing between theoretical explanations, this is quite sensible.

But the thing I'm objecting to is the a priori claim that a true theory preserves observations. This originally came up in the context of an argument about free will in MWI. Egan's law was there used as an argument for the claim that MWI is compatible with free will, and I'm objecting to the validity of any such argument (note that I'm not claiming that MWI and free will are incompatibile, just that this isn't a good argument for their compatibility). In short, if theories may well overturn observations (since they cannot be entirely extricated from theory), then nothing prevents a true theory from overturning something like free will. It may have simply appeared to us that we have free will, in the way it merely appeared to me that the stick was bent.

In short, if Egan's law is 'All other things being equal, prefer the theory which preserves the phenomena' then fine. But then Egan's law can't be used to argue that a given theory actually does preserve a given phenomenon.

Comment author: OrphanWilde 13 July 2012 09:59:04PM * 1 point [-]

I suspect whoever used free will as a component in an argument about MWI was somewhat confused. (I made that particular mistake personally, so I probably have a pretty good idea of exactly how.)

[Edit] This wasn't a particularly helpful comment; I'll refer you here: http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Free_will

Comment author: wedrifid 13 July 2012 10:34:34PM 1 point [-]

I suspect whoever used free will as a component in an argument about MWI was somewhat confused.

That seems likely. Free will used as a component of an argument for just about anything is confused.

Comment author: [deleted] 13 July 2012 10:26:39PM 0 points [-]

I suspect whoever used free will as a component in an argument about MWI was somewhat confused.

I used it, and was confused. I think something fundamental to ethics (maybe free will?) is incompatible with modal realism, and was considering the thought that it's incompatible for the same reasons with the kind of realism concerning the mathematics of non-relativistic quantum mechanics which produces the MWI. I didn't make any real headway, but quite a few people said that MWI couldn't in principle conflict with the possibility of free will because of Egan's law. I'm here objecting that any interpretation of Egan's law on which this is a valid argument must be false.

Comment author: TimS 16 July 2012 02:47:02PM 0 points [-]

Might I recommend reading some more philosophy of science? Particularly Kuhn (Structures of Scientific Revolutions), Feyerabend, and responses to them.

My impression is that "preserve the phenomena" is trying to preserve physical realism from the Kuhn-type arguments about how fundamental objects like epicycles and impetus were abandoned as science progressed. It is not an argument at all about how to choose scientific theories. In short, I think you are applying the principle at the wrong philosophical meta-level.

Comment author: [deleted] 16 July 2012 02:58:39PM 0 points [-]

Might I recommend reading some more philosophy of science? Particularly Kuhn (Structures of Scientific Revolutions), Feyerabend, and responses to them.

I appreciate that. I'm student of philosophy, and I've spent some years with that material, though it's not my area of speciality or anything. But to be clear, I'm not trying to apply or endorse a principle like egan's law or 'preserve the phenomena'. I'm just trying to figure out what 'adding up to normality' is supposed to mean. My impression so far is that it unless it's a statement of the iterative nature of theoretical activity, then it involves a commitment to a foundationalist theory of empiricism.

TimS comments on Adding up to normality - Less Wrong

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