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Science and Truth

I guess it's very important to note that I very well understand that empiricism/quasi-empirical character of mathematics are not somehow "better" explanations than just presenting the given particular physics explanation. This is just a variation of Deutsch's idea that presenting arguments that empiricism is all the knowledge there is seem to rule themselves out....there's ultimately nothing holy or self-justifying about empiricism!

However, the point to me is that when we use some kind of umbrella term for the type of knowledge we're pursuing (whether that type is moral or physical), it seems to me if there's any sense in using these words, there should be something distinguishing these kinds of knowledge. Popper was happy to describe a criterion of testability for science, for instance -- this is one principle repeatedly invoked to claim the hard-to-vary property holds in scientific explanations.
Otherwise, we could dispense with the term "moral" and simply present examples of good explanations directly -- not distinguishing moral from physical ones. It's not that this would be wrong,it's just we seem to clearly think there's types of statements, so it can be helpful to qualify what kinds of principles are commonly invoked to justify the hard-to-vary-ness in the different bodies of knowledge.

I think at the core of it, when we pursue rational discussion/ask questions, we obviously can't have ZERO idea what we're talking about, else criticism doesn't make any sense -- we need to have some idea. And it seems to me that, even if we may not fully know the objects in question (whether moral objects or physical ones), the bottom line is the more precise a statement we make+the more canonical a source of turning our ideas about something into precise statements there is, the more definitively we can criticize it or affirm. I think the quasi-empirical character of math/the physical-math map is mainly a source of making our ideas about the physical world into precise claims, even if there remains much mysterious about what exactly the physical world is.
That is why I think it can help result in hard-to-vary explanations -- it's hard to feel it is up to chance whether a certain mathematical description of the physical world is true or not.

I am personally on a quest to find similar such principles (not empirical, though) which apply in the moral sphere. No, this isn't necessary -- we could jump straight to examples without characterizing what is common to the examples, but since we bother to categorize "moral" explanations at all, as I said above, I think it's at least nice to have some reason why we'd expect there's objective knowledge we can refer to by an umbrella term called "moral". I agree there's no reason to inherently dismiss moral knowledge as illusory just because it is not necessarily empirical.

It isn't vital to discussing (as opposed to concluding about!) morality that we have complete knowledge of what "morality" is, but if we hope to arrive at truly hard-to-vary explanations, at some point we have to have good reason to believe there are some things we can say about it with relatively high definiteness, else we'll forever be stuck in arguing over what morality even means as a term -- and if there's nothing whatever we can say about it with precision and certainty, I think our criticisms and affirmations can only be so certain.
Notice that we may change our interpretation of empirical facts (E.g. no longer believe in determinism after quantum physics), but that the equations of classical physics work hasn't changed, and this ensures there is something we definitely can precisely say about the physical world--even if we don't know what it really is.

I realize I'm pushing hard to acknowledge there's something that's worked in physics, and that isn't because I think physics has a monopoly on objectivity so much as we should take seriously why it's worked so well as a clue (this doesn't mean blindly apply empiricism everywhere).
 
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Popper was happy to describe a criterion of testability for science, for instance -- this is one principle repeatedly invoked to claim the hard-to-vary property holds in scientific explanations.

Actually, doubt whether this is true. I've never actually seen Popper or Deutsch invoke the principle of testability as a reason to believe that scientific explanations are difficult to vary. Whats more is that Deutsch applies his principle of good explanations to ALL forms of human knowledge, not just science. As far as I remember, tesability is the principle that is used to distinguish science from pseudoscience. It is not a principle that explains why it is possible to create good explanations in science. Maybe you can clarify the connection here a bit. I can't see it in the rest of your post.

Otherwise, we could dispense with the term "moral" and simply present examples of good explanations directly

I don't see how this follows either. Deutsch uses "difficult to vary" as a blanket term without explaining how they emerge in different disciplines. He never actually distinguishes between good explanations science and philosophy; he does say that rationality is the thing that ties them together though. Again, maybe you can explore this idea

I think the quasi-empirical character of math/the physical-math map is mainly a source of making our ideas about the physical world into precise claims, even if there remains much mysterious about what exactly the physical world i

Ok, I can agree with this.

I think at the core of it, when we pursue rational discussion/ask questions, we obviously can't have ZERO idea what we're talking about, else criticism doesn't make any sense -- we need to have some idea

Agreed. I would characterize morality as a set of prescriptions about what one ought to do. Notice that this is quite vague, and includes prescriptions that apply to things like epistemology and rationality in general. In fact, I am tempted to think that epistemology is actually a branch of morality. This would answer your question about what distinguishes moral questions from physical questions. In either case, I'm not too comfortable exploring this idea just yet since I haven't thought about it enough.
 
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I agree they don't invoke testability that way, they just say that testability is characteristic of science. The additional point is my own (everything after the dash that you quoted) :) and again, let's be very clear, this isn't an assertion that it isn't ultimately reason that produces hard to vary explanations. It's simply an ingredient of the claim of goodness often in science .... i.e. the simple old-fashioned "hey, your theory can't be as good as mine, cuz it just doesn't pass muster with the data!"
 
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I agree they don't invoke testability that way, they just say that testability is characteristic of science. The additional point is my own :) and again, let's be very clear, this isn't an assertion that it isn't ultimately reason that produces hard to vary explanations. It's simply an ingredient of the claim of goodness often in science .... i.e. the simple old-fashioned "hey, your theory can't be as good as mine, cuz it just doesn't pass muster with the data!"

Maybe you can explain the connection for me. Oh and I edited my last post after you replied to it!
 
I think repeatedly I must emphasize I'm NOT invoking something other than reason/good explanations ultimately. I'm just saying they often take a certain form in a certain field. Empiricism doesn't explain why it's possible to produce good explanations -- there's a difference between saying it explains why it is possible vs saying that it is often used as part of justifying the "goodness." I.e. "my model fits the facts, yours just doesn't -- thus yours is not equal". Now WHY it can be used that way is a whole extra level that I'm not sure we can answer.
eg why is mathematics quasi-empirical?
 
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Also this isn't the claim that we can only make empirical statements -- that all physics is simply empiricism, so much as that there's an empirical component to physics, and that it tends to be integral to how we justify that our explanations can't really be varied much.
 
I think repeatedly I must emphasize I'm NOT invoking something other than reason/good explanations ultimately. I'm just saying they often take a certain form in a certain field. Empiricism doesn't explain why it's possible to produce good explanations -- there's a difference between saying it explains why it is possible vs saying that it is often used as part of justifying the "goodness." Now WHY it can be used that way is a whole extra level that I'm not sure we can answer.

Fair. I am curious though, do you agree that epistemological truths are also moral truths? That is, that irrationality is immoral? When one actively avoids rationality, one also avoids error correction. But what happens when one refuses to correct for errors? Since beliefs affect actions, it follows if one refuses to correct for errors in belief, one also refuses to correct for errors in action. And if one refuses to correct for errors in action, it follows that he/she will do harm not only to oneself, but to others as well. Is this not immoral?
Now one could argue "That not all beliefs affect action. And that consequently, not all irrational beliefs lead to harm". But of course one can not determine this without first having a good explanation about why you should expect this to be the case. But if one is looking for good explanations, he/she is also being rational. But then isn't the person still acting irrationally? Since although he can explain why his actions will not lead to harm, he could still be acting irrationally. To which I would ask, is it possible to act irrationally and not cause harm? Now or in the future?
 
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Whoops I'd typed a reply to this and forgotten to actually finalize it. But yeah I agree -- the way I'd phrase it is that one can't really selectively adopt rationality as far as I can tell. It doesn't make sense to say I'll be rational here and irrational there. I might grant that someone could commit no immoral actions while being irrational, but I can't characterize the person as moral (in the precise same way I can't characterize someone who got the answers on a test right based on improper or nonexistent reasoning), because ultimately being moral depends on justification, and I don't see a case for selective adoption of justification -- that selectivity seems to lead to absurdity.

Now, if you're still wondering about that conundrum you brought up, I think a nice way to resolve it is just to say there may be knowledge we are justified in not seeking out because it isn't relevant to our moral decision-making by our best rational estimates. There's no problem here, and I suspect Deutsch would agree, as he emphasizes the difference between his dream to understand everything vs the more impossible aim of knowing every fact under the sun. If one has enough understanding to say that a certain piece of knowledge isn't strictly necessary for a certain rational endeavor, that's completely fine (obviously that claim itself should be subject to error correction like anything else, but you get the point).

But of course not seeking every fact under the sun is quite different from being irrational, i.e. holding beliefs based on irrational justification. Irrationality does harm morality.