From: snodgras@cyber.net (John E. Snodgrass)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: invention of time
Date: 28 Sep 92 07:09:36 GMT
Organization: The Cyberspace Station


       In article <burt.717181418@aupair.cs.athabascau.ca>
burt@aupair.cs.athabascau.ca (Burt Voorhees) writes:

>>      It seems a little unfair to compare the notion of
>>treating nature as systems, and attempting to model it in a
>>relatively unbiased manner, with the blatant projections of
>>mathematical concepts employed by relativity and QM -- to say
>>they are both 'just projecting'.

>          Not at all unfair.  Recall that the mathematical
>concepts employed in relativity and quantum mechanics themselves
>derived from eighteenth and nineteenth century physics.  Although
>it does not seem unfair to me, it does seem dumb to think that
>only a bottom up approach is proper for doing science.  (I am
>currently developing a course in scientific reasoning so have
>been looking at this very carefully)  In fact, what seems to
>always be the case is that there is a cycle of which the two
>poles are a bottom up (i.e., what snodgrass calls a systems
>approach) [...stuff about bottom up vs top down deleted...]

       A systems approach is not a "bottom up" approach any more
than the current paradigm is a top down approach. When dividing
paradigms up in this manner, you might consider adding a footnote
that strictly bottom up and top down approaches are unknown in
real science. Framework physics can be carried out with more of a
view to empiricism is a descriptive discipline, i.e. what you are
calling bottom up, (a la Newtonian or Rutherford), or as a top
down approach -- Einsteinian or Bohrian etc.

       A systems approach simply makes a different set of
assumptions from those of current framework physics. It makes the
assumption that the universe can be divided up into pieces that
have the property that they attempt to remain stable -- for
whatever reason -- and that they behave with this intent. So
called "laws of nature", in this view, result from interaction of
such systems. Thus this is top down in the sense that it makes a
grandiose assumption, and bottom up in the sense that it tries to
explain or describe real observations from this viewpoint.

       IOWs, top down does not have to involve projection of
mathematics onto reality -- it is simply the nature of the
conceptual foundation. Projection of mathematics is, in this
view, an poor concept from which to build a cosmology, not
because it's top down, but because it lacks a convincing
conceptual basis -- i.e. it is NOT sufficiently top down.

>>     One might even go so far as to suggest that this
>>'metaperception' of modeling processes will be the doom of what
>>now seem the archaic and crude methods employed to create
>>relativity and QM.

>         A rather feeble response.  Seems that you are suffering
>from what Vico called "the conceit of scholars."  That is, the
>assumption that the ancients were archaic, crude, even dumb, and
>not nearly so enlightened as we are today.  Considering the
>success of both relativity and quantum mechanics it seems rather
>premature to assign them to the dustbin of history quite so
>easily.

       Relativity and QM may or may not be successful compared to
the best of all possible worlds. One author writing on the
history of science remarked that science as we know it might have
been something altogether different if Newton had had the nerve
to publish some of his more private speculations on the structure
of the universe -- a different picture from what we regard as
Newtonian today. Anyway, the history of science shows us that all
paradigms were to some extent successful -- e.g. the theory of
phlogiston was successful in bringing many phenomena to light --
so it is not necessary for short term success to be based on
correct ideas. But when a more correct idea does arise, the older
way of doing things does look archaic, crude, even dumb.

       The advent of computer science seems quite effective in
this regard, especially when we consider the effect of computer
modeling, not just on the area we are modeling, but on our
appreciation for the art of modeling itself. This was what I was
referring to as 'metaperception' of the modeling process: IMO
this will result in a more powerful undermining of the current
paradigm than any empirical evidence would likely produce. Theories
can always adjust to 'problem' data. But when something really
does just start looking dumb.... And this is the case now
because the current paradigm was created by people with little
capacity for handling data at all -- this drove them into
mathematization, something they apparently only dimly perceived
they were doing. In the Information Age, this looks quite
"information-naive".

       >bv

       John E. Snodgrass [snodgras@cyber.net]

Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech