Logic Is An Act Of Love

[bornagainathiest]

Ah... it looks like Llwellyn beat me to it.

 

I was going to post and say that I'm cool with whatever she'd like.

 

Ergo, post away, Disillusioned.

[disillusioned]

Ok. Well, hopefully this will bring us back to the question of chance in any case, so perhaps it fits as well here as anywhere.
 
BAA, I appreciate everything you have written above, and, believe me, I’m not unfamiliar with it. My central issue, though, is of a somewhat different nature. I’ll attempt to illustrate this below.
 

Our observable universe will become more and more causally-disconnected from these already far distant, disconnected regions.  Eventually, the shrinking sphere of causal disconnection will isolate our Local Group from the rest of the universe.  So, rather than the future holding the potential for infinite interactions, our poor hydrogen atom will have fewer and fewer particles it can interact with.

This quotation is significant, because it points the way to my main contention here. Let’s leave the hydrogen atom aside for the moment (I will return to it eventually, I promise). Under inflationary theory, you are quite right in what you say above. As the universe continues to expand, everything will move farther and farther apart. Lawrence Krauss puts this as follows:

 

“In 5 billion years, the expansion of the universe will have progressed to the point where all other galaxies will have receded beyond detection. Indeed, they will be receding faster than the speed of light, so detection will be impossible. Future civilizations will discover science and all its laws, and never know about other galaxies or the cosmic background radiation. They will inevitably come to the wrong conclusion about the universe......We live in a special time, the only time, where we can observationally verify that we live in a special time.” (A Universe From Nothing: Why There is Something Rather Than Nothing).

 

Inflationary theory, then, seems to entail that at some point in the future science will no longer be able to provide us with an accurate picture of the universe as a whole. It will be possible, in this time, to do science correctly, and from valid observations, form an entirely incorrect model of the universe. But if this is possible in principle, then it seems to demand that we ask how we can know that we have not already reached that point. And here we are back at the center of my objection: science, evidently, can be done correctly and still produce incorrect results regarding the universe as a whole. Hence, I am very distrustful of any scientific claims about what lies beyond the observable universe. Inflationary theory calls its own efficacy into question, because it leads to the conclusion that it will, one day, of necessity, be unable to provide the answers it is looking for. Perhaps we have already reached that day. There is simply no way to know.

 

The rest of your argument turns on the efficacy of inflationary cosmology. And I don’t mean to say that inflationary theory is entirely useless. It provides us with some interesting ideas, and it allows us to make accurate predictions about the observable universe. But where it moves from the observable universe to a discussion of a possible infinite multiverse beyond the possibility of detection, I grow distrustful of it. It seems to me to push the bounds of credibility.

 

Returning to our hydrogen atom, I’m quite content to grant that I may have been in error with respect to my assertion that it can have an infinite number of interactions. I still think that even with a finite number of particles to interact with, if the time-frame is infinite, then the number of possible interactions may be infinite as well. Perhaps there is no way to know this for sure. But this is, now, beside the point. Unless I'm mistaken, the universe cannot be demonstrated to be infinite by science. The science which claims to demonstrate that it is so calls its own efficacy into question along the way. It is possible, therefore, that the universe is infinite, but this cannot be concluded. It must either be assumed, or not. I make no such assumption. I don’t, in other words, attempt to take the “God’s-eye” view.

 

Logic therefore requires that anything of finite potential, within the wider context of an infinity, must repeat it's finite number of permutations and do so, over and over again.  There is no viable physical mechanism for resetting this cosmic asymmetry.

I’m not sure that this is correct. It rests on a very significant assumption--namely, that the type of things which exist in the various undetectable sections of the speculative multiverse are the same as the type of things which exist here, in the observable universe. Consider the following analogy. Suppose I’m tossing a regular, six-sided die here, in my living room. There are a finite number of outcomes that I can get (6, in this case). If I toss the die an infinite number of times, then each of these outcomes will repeat itself an infinite number of times. This is analogous to the argument you make for repetition within an infinite multiverse. But suppose now that my die can only be thrown once, and after each throw it is replaced with something entirely different, and the possible number of things it can be replaced with is infinite. So first I toss the die, but when I go to pick it up to throw it again I find that it is now a coin. So I flip the coin, then I pick it up and it is now a deck of cards. I draw a card, but when I replace it I find that the deck of cards is now a die with 72 sides, on each of which is inscribed a different word. You get the picture. In this sort of situation I will never be able to obtain the same results twice, because the things I am working with are never the same twice. Surely this could also be true of an infinite multiverse. Could it not be possible that whatever exists in the undetectable regions is somehow fundamentally different from that which exists here? This is, of course, wildly speculative, but so is the opposite assumption: that it must all be fundamentally the same.

 

Please note that my assertion that causally distinct areas of the multiverse may contain fundamentally different things is not in any way a claim that we occupy a special, privileged place in the multiverse. Rather, it is a claim that it is possible that every place in the multiverse is uniquely special. But in either case, it seems to me that if we are discussing the nature of things which cannot in principle be observed, then I think we would do well to restrain ourselves from speaking as if we know what we are talking about. But this entails that we cannot draw the conclusion of infinite repetition, even in an infinite multiverse (which we also cannot know exists).

[bornagainathiest]

Deleted!

 

Hit the 'Reply' button too soon.

[bornagainathiest]

Thank you for this, Disillusioned.

 

As usual, you require me to marshal my thoughts, organize them and to set them down in as clear a way as possible.   I value this!  

 

 

Ok. Well, hopefully this will bring us back to the question of chance in any case, so perhaps it fits as well here as anywhere.
 
BAA, I appreciate everything you have written above, and, believe me, I’m not unfamiliar with it. My central issue, though, is of a somewhat different nature. I’ll attempt to illustrate this below.
 

Our observable universe will become more and more causally-disconnected from these already far distant, disconnected regions.  Eventually, the shrinking sphere of causal disconnection will isolate our Local Group from the rest of the universe.  So, rather than the future holding the potential for infinite interactions, our poor hydrogen atom will have fewer and fewer particles it can interact with.

This quotation is significant, because it points the way to my main contention here. Let’s leave the hydrogen atom aside for the moment (I will return to it eventually, I promise). Under inflationary theory, you are quite right in what you say above. As the universe continues to expand, everything will move farther and farther apart. Lawrence Krauss puts this as follows:

 

“In 5 billion years, the expansion of the universe will have progressed to the point where all other galaxies will have receded beyond detection. Indeed, they will be receding faster than the speed of light, so detection will be impossible. Future civilizations will discover science and all its laws, and never know about other galaxies or the cosmic background radiation. They will inevitably come to the wrong conclusion about the universe......We live in a special time, the only time, where we can observationally verify that we live in a special time.” (A Universe From Nothing: Why There is Something Rather Than Nothing).

 

Inflationary theory, then, seems to entail that at some point in the future science will no longer be able to provide us with an accurate picture of the universe as a whole. It will be possible, in this time, to do science correctly, and from valid observations, form an entirely incorrect model of the universe. But if this is possible in principle, then it seems to demand that we ask how we can know that we have not already reached that point. And here we are back at the center of my objection: science, evidently, can be done correctly and still produce incorrect results regarding the universe as a whole. Hence, I am very distrustful of any scientific claims about what lies beyond the observable universe. Inflationary theory calls its own efficacy into question, because it leads to the conclusion that it will, one day, of necessity, be unable to provide the answers it is looking for. Perhaps we have already reached that day. There is simply no way to know.

 

Indeed!  And it is the meaning the of word, 'know' that is pivotal to this debate.

While we agree with what Krauss says about the far future, I must point out that he's using the word, 'know' in a very particular way.  He refers to future civilizations undertaking activities such as detecting, discovering, concluding, observing and verifying - the very same activities we currently employ to 'know' what the universe is.  He then goes on to differentiate between them and us on the basis of what the future universe will permit them to know versus what the present universe permits us to know.   However, he leaves much unsaid about the way he's using the word, 'know' when he writes like this.  This is not a mistake on his part, nor is it some kind of semantic sleight-of-hand.  No.  Instead, his usage of the word is the result of his training as a scientist and his chosen career path as a cosmologist and theoretical physicist.  

 

He doesn't mean that we can ever know anything about the universe in real time.  

Because of the speed of c, everything we say we know about the universe is based upon observations of it's past, not it's present.  We can only ever know about the way the universe was.  We can never say that we know something about the way it is now without making a logical extrapolation from the past, to the present.   This extrapolation requires us to assume things that we cannot directly know, cannot confirm with experiment and cannot investigate in real time.  Our knowledge of the universe is forever a thing of the past.  So it's not too sweeping a statement to say that we know nothing of how the universe is today.  When (like Krauss) we say that we know about the universe, there's an explicit understanding involved in our usage of the word, know.   It's understood that we're taking what we've observed and understood about the past universe and extrapolating that knowledge forward to the present day.  Similarly, there are a number of necessary scientific assumptions being made by us when we declare what we "know" about the universe.  When it comes to astronomical, astrophysical and cosmological science, whatever we say that we know always rests on a foundation of certain assumptions, working practices and working principles.  

 

Here are some relevant ones.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uniformitarianism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor (aka Parsimony)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_principle

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copernican_principle

 

Yet it is tacitly acknowledged that when it comes to cosmology, we can never directly test any of these things in real time.  

Because of the finite speed of c, all of the data we might use to test these principles and assumptions comes to us from the very distant past.  For example, Bhim, a fellow member of this forum, is a scientist specializing in galactic astrophysics.  Yet the timescales and distances involved in his work are of the order of thousands, millions and billions of years and light-years.  So he will only ever study the past.  Whatever papers he writes will always be about past phenomenon, even if he (like Krauss) frames his arguments and statements in present-day or future terms.  He may say that he knows about the universe, but when he does so (like Krauss) he's making his statements on the back of the necessary assumptions that nature itself obliges him to make.   What he (and Krauss) are actually saying is that he knows how the present-day universe works, based upon his understanding of how he believes it worked in the past and then extrapolating that understanding forward to the present day by taking the above assumptions into account.

 

The main thrust of my argument D, concerns what you refer to as having 'an accurate picture of the universe as a whole'.

With what you refer to as doing science correctly, making valid observations and forming correct/incorrect models of the universe.  I submit that if you hold these activities as examples of correct science, then you are already making exactly the same kind of assumptions that Krauss and Bhim make, when they talk about 'knowing' the universe.  Like them, when you talk about having an accurate picture of the universe, you take it as read that you cannot know anything about today's universe and can only extrapolate from what is understood about yesterdays universe, assuming that what held good then holds good now.  That all of what you consider true knowledge about the universe is based upon necessary assumption, logical inference and deduction.

 

I therefore further submit that if you do indeed occupy the same ground as Krauss and Bhim, you should also acknowledge the following;

 

 *  That there has never been a means of knowing and having an accurate picture of the universe without making the necessary assumptions, the necessary extrapolations and holding to certain fundamental principles.  

 

 *  That all models we have of the universe are necessarily past models and are not subject to real-time investigation.

 

 * That, in the light of the two above points and in the absence of any other or any better options, it's necessary to hold to our basal assumptions until there is a good reason not to do so.

 

The pertinent question, is when to do so.

 

 

The rest of your argument turns on the efficacy of inflationary cosmology. And I don’t mean to say that inflationary theory is entirely useless. It provides us with some interesting ideas, and it allows us to make accurate predictions about the observable universe. But where it moves from the observable universe to a discussion of a possible infinite multiverse beyond the possibility of detection, I grow distrustful of it. It seems to me to push the bounds of credibility.

 

Yet I submit D, that your distrust is based on a matter of degree, not of kind.

You already make the same kind of assumptions when you speak about having an accurate model of the universe.  All such understandings of the universe require assumptions.  The point of contention between us seems to be about the degree to which we're prepared to take these assumptions to.

 

Returning to our hydrogen atom, I’m quite content to grant that I may have been in error with respect to my assertion that it can have an infinite number of interactions. I still think that even with a finite number of particles to interact with, if the time-frame is infinite, then the number of possible interactions may be infinite as well. Perhaps there is no way to know this for sure. But this is, now, beside the point. Unless I'm mistaken, the universe cannot be demonstrated to be infinite by science. The science which claims to demonstrate that it is so calls its own efficacy into question along the way. It is possible, therefore, that the universe is infinite, but this cannot be concluded. It must either be assumed, or not. I make no such assumption. I don’t, in other words, attempt to take the “God’s-eye” view.

 

Once again, the issue is not of kind, but of degree.  Assumptions are required, but how far do we take them?

 

Logic therefore requires that anything of finite potential, within the wider context of an infinity, must repeat it's finite number of permutations and do so, over and over again.  There is no viable physical mechanism for resetting this cosmic asymmetry.

I’m not sure that this is correct. It rests on a very significant assumption--namely, that the type of things which exist in the various undetectable sections of the speculative multiverse are the same as the type of things which exist here, in the observable universe. Consider the following analogy. Suppose I’m tossing a regular, six-sided die here, in my living room. There are a finite number of outcomes that I can get (6, in this case). If I toss the die an infinite number of times, then each of these outcomes will repeat itself an infinite number of times. This is analogous to the argument you make for repetition within an infinite multiverse. But suppose now that my die can only be thrown once, and after each throw it is replaced with something entirely different, and the possible number of things it can be replaced with is infinite. So first I toss the die, but when I go to pick it up to throw it again I find that it is now a coin. So I flip the coin, then I pick it up and it is now a deck of cards. I draw a card, but when I replace it I find that the deck of cards is now a die with 72 sides, on each of which is inscribed a different word. You get the picture. In this sort of situation I will never be able to obtain the same results twice, because the things I am working with are never the same twice. Surely this could also be true of an infinite multiverse. Could it not be possible that whatever exists in the undetectable regions is somehow fundamentally different from that which exists here? This is, of course, wildly speculative, but so is the opposite assumption: that it must all be fundamentally the same.

 

 

To properly discuss these variable outcomes D, I'd need to delve in quantum physics to demonstrate that an infinite variety of outcomes is not possible in a causally finite region of the universe.

And since my contention (that Inflation divided the universe in causally-separate regions) rests on further, empirically-unverifiable assumptions, we're back at square one again!  How far do we take what we assume?

 

Please note that my assertion that causally distinct areas of the multiverse may contain fundamentally different things is not in any way a claim that we occupy a special, privileged place in the multiverse. Rather, it is a claim that it is possible that every place in the multiverse is uniquely special. But in either case, it seems to me that if we are discussing the nature of things which cannot in principle be observed, then I think we would do well to restrain ourselves from speaking as if we know what we are talking about. But this entails that we cannot draw the conclusion of infinite repetition, even in an infinite multiverse (which we also cannot know exists).

 

 

Agreed.  We cannot know.  We can only assume.  How much we assume seems to be the issue.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[disillusioned]

Thank you for this, Disillusioned.

 

As usual, you require me to marshal my thoughts, organize them and to set them down in as clear a way as possible.   I value this!  

I also value this discussion, BAA. This sort of discourse is a welcome distraction from the tedium of daily life, and it also helps me to remain intellectually sharp. It's very valuable indeed!

 

I agree with the vast majority of what you say in your latest post. I have no disagreement at all with anything you wrote about Krauss (or Bhim, or other astronomers/cosmologists), their assumptions, and the way they do their science. You are correct, their work rests on assumptions and, if they are intellectually honest, they will be happy to admit this.

 

The main thrust of my argument D, concerns what you refer to as having 'an accurate picture of the universe as a whole'.

With what you refer to as doing science correctly, making valid observations and forming correct/incorrect models of the universe.  I submit that if you hold these activities as examples of correct science, then you are already making exactly the same kind of assumptions that Krauss and Bhim make, when they talk about 'knowing' the universe.  Like them, when you talk about having an accurate picture of the universe, you take it as read that you cannot know anything about today's universe and can only extrapolate from what is understood about yesterdays universe, assuming that what held good then holds good now.  That all of what you consider true knowledge about the universe is based upon necessary assumption, logical inference and deduction.

I have a very slight quibble here, and it is of a semantic nature. When I say "doing science correctly", I mean following the scientific method without making any errors. I do not mean to imply that I think the scientific method is somehow correct in and of itself. There may be another, better way of obtaining knowledge about the universe. But if there is, I don't know what it is. So I am content to take the pragmatic approach, which is to say, I trust it as long as it works (which, incidentally, is more or less the essence of the scientific method).

 

I agree with the rest of what you say though. I share the assumptions of the astrophysicists in this.

 

I therefore further submit that if you do indeed occupy the same ground as Krauss and Bhim, you should also acknowledge the following;

 

 *  That there has never been a means of knowing and having an accurate picture of the universe without making the necessary assumptions, the necessary extrapolations and holding to certain fundamental principles.  

To the best of my understanding, this is correct.

 

 *  That all models we have of the universe are necessarily past models and are not subject to real-time investigation.

 

This is also correct, although some things can be investigated in something which almost resembles real-time. Even on the small scale, there will always be some delay, but it is much less than on the very large scale. If we speak of the universe itself, then again, I'm happy to acknowledge this.

 

 * That, in the light of the two above points and in the absence of any other or any better options, it's necessary to hold to our basal assumptions until there is a good reason not to do so.

 

The pertinent question, is when to do so.

 

 

Yes. This is the crux of the issue.

 

I have no disagreements with anything else that you wrote above. Our disagreement is simply one of degree, not of kind. This is very aptly put.

 

My inclination is to answer the question of how far we should take our assumptions by saying that we should take them until either (a) they lead to a contradiction (perhaps by calling their own efficacy into question) or ( they cease to do useful work. My contention is that inflationary cosmology, when it extends itself beyond the observable universe, violates both of these conditions. It certainly seems to violate the second, and I think it also violates the first since it leads to the conclusion (as I argued above) that there will come a time when it will no longer be efficacious, and it does not provide any sort of mechanism for determining whether or not we are already in that time.

 

There is another possibility. If it is true, as I argue, that inflationary cosmology has has called its own efficacy into question, it could be the case that the assumptions are alright, but the methodology followed when making extrapolations is somehow flawed. Unfortunately I just don't know enough about this extrapolation to call it into question. I am not an astrophysicist, but I have known and studied under some. I'm inclined to trust that they probably haven't made a mistake in this, but I could be wrong. If I'm not, though, then I think the problem must lie with the assumptions. Where precisely in the assumptions it lies, I'm not sure.

[bornagainathiest]

Hello again, D. 

 

Three points concerning your last reply, if I may.

 

First, I'm somewhat saddened to hear that your days are tedious and that our discourse therefore provides you with a welcome distraction.  Would that you could join me in the way I spend a good portion of my working day!  

 

Being a gardener, I find that certain tasks (weeding, mowing, etc.) can be performed in an almost autopilot-like way, allowing me to mull over such things as Inflationary cosmology while earning my daily bread.  Some of my clients note that I appear to be entirely absorbed in deep thought, rather than listening to music, singing or whistling to myself.  A few have asked me what I think about.  Erring on the side of discretion, I don't reveal that I'm considering how negative gravitational energy inflated the space-time continuum.  That would freak them out!  No.  Instead I say something harmless like , "Oh... my mind's someplace else" and leave it at that.

 

Returning to your post...on the plus side, I'm pleased that I can play a role in keeping you intellectually 'sharp'.  It's mutual, btw.

 

Secondly, we seem to be in general agreement about science and it's assumptions and I fully accept your semantic 'quibble'. 

My bad for not being sufficiently clear on that.  So, if we do differ, then it's agreed that we do so in terms of degree and not in kind.  Good.  That feels very satisfying.  I note and generally agree with your points about the efficacy of our assumptions and the efficacy of inflationary cosmology.  If we do differ about these things, then the nature of our differences will be as mentioned earlier, ones of degree and not of kind.  Having realized this, it gives us the opportunity (should we wish to take it) to explore further, in the secure knowledge that our investigations will be about the degree to which we take our assumptions.  Perhaps that should be deferred to another time?

 

Lastly, even if Inflation and the simplest form of multiverse require degrees of assumption that you aren't comfortable with D, I contend that these two things still have the capacity to do 'useful work'... within the context of this forum.   So, with your agreement and with Llwellyns' permission, I'd like to go on to explain and elaborate what this useful work is and submit these ideas for your consideration and constructive criticism.  

 

I ask, so that you can keep me... sharp.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[disillusioned]

If we do differ about these things, then the nature of our differences will be as mentioned earlier, ones of degree and not of kind.  Having realized this, it gives us the opportunity (should we wish to take it) to explore further, in the secure knowledge that our investigations will be about the degree to which we take our assumptions.  Perhaps that should be deferred to another time?

 

Lastly, even if Inflation and the simplest form of multiverse require degrees of assumption that you aren't comfortable with D, I contend that these two things still have the capacity to do 'useful work'... within the context of this forum.   So, with your agreement and with Llwellyns' permission, I'd like to go on to explain and elaborate what this useful work is and submit these ideas for your consideration and constructive criticism.

 

By all means. Let's see what Llwellyn thinks, but I'm happy to move in this direction for now.

[Llwellyn]

To be honest, it seems to me that the focus on scientific laws is not so different from the Christian's focus on religious doctrine.  It's true, so far as it goes, but it doesn't get to the root of things and it potentially distorts a person's thinking.  I think that learning about scientific law is a really worthwhile inquiry -- I have taken university level mathematics, biology, physics, and economics.  BUT, I tend to be more interested in the questions about how scientific law is developed and how scientific law changes.  I know that the answers to these questions are necessarily speculative, and any experiments in this realm likely can be limited to thought experiments.  Christians mockingly say that we believe "The universe just happened by chance" -- this must be true, and I think it is interesting to consider how it is true.  I think that Charles Peirce's guess at the riddle is the one that is most illuminating to me.

 

I don't mind the two of you continuing the discussion of scientific law on this thread -- I certainly don't want to throw a wet blanket on your interests, as I don't like it when that happens to me.  But again, I do think that there is a kind of blinkered scientific outlook that is equally as false as the blinkered Christian outlook.  What they have in common is a kind of absolutism which reaches way beyond the extension of human thought.  This absolutism tries to close the door to chance, and tries to cast about for other gods, such as Yahweh or causation.

[bornagainathiest]

 

To be honest, it seems to me that the focus on scientific laws is not so different from the Christian's focus on religious doctrine.  It's true, so far as it goes, but it doesn't get to the root of things and it potentially distorts a person's thinking.  I think that learning about scientific law is a really worthwhile inquiry -- I have taken university level mathematics, biology, physics, and economics.  BUT, I tend to be more interested in the questions about how scientific law is developed and how scientific law changes.  I know that the answers to these questions are necessarily speculative, and any experiments in this realm likely can be limited to thought experiments.  Christians mockingly say that we believe "The universe just happened by chance" -- this must be true, and I think it is interesting to consider how it is true.  I think that Charles Peirce's guess at the riddle is the one that is most illuminating to me.

 

I don't mind the two of you continuing the discussion of scientific law on this thread -- I certainly don't want to throw a wet blanket on your interests, as I don't like it when that happens to me.  But again, I do think that there is a kind of blinkered scientific outlook that is equally as false as the blinkered Christian outlook.  What they have in common is a kind of absolutism which reaches way beyond the extension of human thought.  This absolutism tries to close the door to chance, and tries to cast about for other gods, such as Yahweh or causation.

 

 

Thank you, Llwellyn.  

 

Look, seeing as the pace of this thread is relaxed and seeing as Disillusioned and I have bounced stuff back and forth for a while now, how about looking again at the subject of chance?

I remain interested and open-minded about your views on chance and also interested to hear more about Charles Peirce.  I'd imagine that D would be the same.  Perhaps you'd like to present an argument or thought experiment to us concerning how we can consider the statement... the universe happening by chance ...to be true?  I submit that there's fun to be had in the testing of these things and also there's the potential of rich rewards in a wider and deeper understanding about matters that are clearly of great interest to us.

 

Does that sound ok?

 

With kind regards,

 

BAA. 

[disillusioned]

Llwellyn, I'm also interested to hear more about your views on chance. If there is anything you'd care to share on this, I'm happy to discuss it. I agree with you, by the way, about absolutism. Science is not the be-all and end-all of knowledge. It's very useful, and it helps us to do some wonderful things, but we need to be careful that we don't become so enamored of it that we get carried away.

[Llwellyn]

If we are going to ask about exactly how regular the laws of science are, then it should be because we have reasons to wonder about its regularity.  Likewise, if we are going to consider the history and the future of scientific law, it should be because of concrete reasons to believe that it may have a trajectory which is different from exactly how it exists at the present moment.  As I understand it, the biggest reason to throw into doubt the "absolute" character of scientific law is what we know about the evolution of biological life.  Biological life shows increasing complexity, variety and diversity -- it shows variescence, to use one of Peirce's coined words.  How can these features be explained by strictly determined physical law?  I'm not sure that they can.  It seems more likely that Darwinian evolution shows that something genuinely new can come into this world.  

 

When we see biological life, we believe it to be a sign that absolute chance is feeding new elements into the universe.  Just as biological life is genuinely original (rather than apparently original), so too the laws of physics must be genuinely original too (rather than apparently original but really preordained).  Charles Peirce called this thesis "Tychism."  He says that "tychism must give birth to an evolutionary cosmology, in which all the regularities of nature and of mind are regarded as products of growth."  This seems to be a very fruitful thesis -- proven, even.  "Uniformities in the modes of action of things have come about by their taking habits. At present, the course of events is approximately determined by law."  Below is a Wikipedia article that does a fair job of putting Peirce's conjecture:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tychism

 

 

[disillusioned]

Llwellyn, from what I understand of Peirce’s work (and I by no means claim to have a thorough understanding of it), he argues that Universe evolves in much the same way that biological life evolves. The laws of the Universe are, therefore, the product of a process of evolution, which is guided by random chance and something akin to natural selection. This leaves us with the conclusion that the laws of the Universe are not fixed and may, as you say, have a future trajectory which is different from how they now appear. I don’t disagree with this in principle, but I do think that the language we use here is somewhat deceptive. To treat the universe and its laws as if they are evolving is to behave precisely as if there are laws which govern the universe: namely, the laws of chance and natural selection. These laws are different from what we usually think of as the “laws of the Universe”, but they are not incoherent. Complete disorder is, in itself, a type of order.

 

A similar phenomenon occurs when we move from the study of classical thermodynamics to a statistical approach. When we make this shift, the classical laws of thermodynamics (such as, for example, the ideal gas law) are not considered as starting points for our treatment of physical systems. Rather, systems are treated statistically, following the rules of chance. When this approach is taken, the ideal gas law “falls out” of the analysis as a result rather than a starting point. But statistical mechanics is a systematic way of studying different types of physical systems. It is a way of doing science. To treat thermodynamic systems statistically is not to do away with law; it is to treat these systems precisely as if they are governed by laws: the laws of probability and statistics (chance). When this is done, we eventually get the classical laws of thermodynamics back. We just don’t start with them.

 

My approach would be to quote Haldane and say that I think it is very probable that “the universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose.” We are, after all, products of the universe. Our minds are very likely not capable of comprehending it as it truly is. When we do science, what we do is observe nature and try to describe it in the best way we can. We produce models which allow us to make predictions and look for confirmation. What we usually call the laws of the Universe are actually, therefore, the laws of our models of the Universe. “There is no quantum world. There is only an abstract quantum physical description. It is wrong to think that the task of physics is to find out how nature is. Physics concerns what we can say about nature.” (Niels Bohr). Our models are imperfect. They are the products of our minds, which are the products of the Universe. To think that our minds should be capable of fully transcending the Universe to arrive at a complete understanding of it seems to me to be somewhat incredible. Rather, I think that our models have always been, and will always be imperfect. As they evolve, and as the Universe itself evolves, so too will what we call the laws of the Universe. There is no theory of everything. There is only the best theory that we have at the moment. And, whatever this theory is, it is our theory, not the Universe’s.

[bornagainathiest]

Interesting stuff, Llwelynn. Thanks! 

 

However, I have a question concerning Peirce's use of evolutionary biology on Earth as a model for cosmological evolution.

 

We have directly measured the chemistry of certain planets, asteroids and comets.

The chemical elements present are the same as those here on Earth.  We have also indirectly measured the chemistry of the stars and found their elemental make-ups to be the same too.  This agrees with the principles of Uniformitarianism and gives us confidence to logically infer and extrapolate that when it comes to Chemistry, what holds good on Earth also holds good elsewhere.  But what about evolution?   Are there any other examples of biological evolution to be found elsewhere in the cosmos?  Not to my knowledge.   So, I feel I have to ask these questions.

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On what empirical basis does Peirce infer that Earth's example of evolutionary biology must apply across the whole cosmos?

 

On what empirical basis does he infer that unliving matter must evolve in the same way as living matter?

 

Which is stronger... a position unsupported by empirical means or one supported by said means?

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Thanks,

 

BAA.

 

 

[Llwellyn]

I have a question concerning Peirce's use of evolutionary biology on Earth as a model for cosmological evolution.

 

I don't think that Peirce uses the model of biological evolution as the model of cosmological evolution.  In fact, I kind of cringed when I read Disillusion's assertion that Peirce's position was that "Universe evolves in much the same way that biological life evolves."  It seems obvious that this is not true and more akin to the logic being applied in the "Ex-Christian Spirituality" subforum.  Instead, Peirce uses life as part of the evidence for ontological chance.  If this chance is causing cosmological evolution, this evolution would be different from any biological model.  

 

Peirce thought that law is somewhat regular today, but that chance was making law more regular as time passes.  "In the past that approximation was less perfect;  in the future it will be more perfect.  The tendency to obey laws has always been and always will be growing."  "At any assignable date in the past, however early, there was already some tendency toward uniformity;  and at any assignable date in the future there will be some slight aberrancy from law."  

 

But I'm not sure that there is a good reason to think that law is becoming more rather than less regular.  I just don't think there is a basis in observation to pick one guess rather than another about the trajectory.  Neither is there a practical need to speak a verdict.  Either guess would be not based on a reason.  We can know that at this time there is chance, fact, and law ("firstness, secondness, and thirdness," to use Peirce's categories).  There are observations that prove the existence of ontological chance -- biological life proves it.  But there are no facts that would hint to us about whether the gyre is widening or narrowing.  To say that law is the accretion of chance does not commit us to a view that law is presently accreting, decreting, shifting by direction, or even stable.

[disillusioned]

I don't think that Peirce uses the model of biological evolution as the model of cosmological evolution.  In fact, I kind of cringed when I read Disillusion's assertion that Peirce's position was that "Universe evolves in much the same way that biological life evolves."  It seems obvious that this is not true and more akin to the logic being applied in the "Ex-Christian Spirituality" subforum.  Instead, Peirce uses life as part of the evidence for ontological chance.  If this chance is causing cosmological evolution, this evolution would be different from any biological model.

I do apologize if I've misunderstood or misrepresented what Peirce argues. Please feel free to elaborate. I was under the impression that he argues that "absolute chance" plays a key role in both cases (that of the Universe and that of biological life). It seems to me that if randomness is to result in the accretion of anything, then there must also be some kind of selection mechanism. In the case of biology, we have natural selection. In the case of the Universe, perhaps there is something analogous. This is what I was referring to when I framed Peirce's position as I did above. But perhaps this is not truly representative of his position. I don't claim to have studied his work in any detail. If you would care to clarify, I would be grateful.

[Llwellyn]

it as it truly is.

 

There is no way in which the world "truly is."  With chance at large, there is no given.  It's not just that our minds are limited, it's also that the world has no limit.  Stochastic scientific truth is a goal and is recognizable when achieved;  there is a "possibility of an indefinite approximation toward a complete explanation of nature."  But the world as such exists plus chance.  

 

The "Law of Chance" is a contradiction in terms.  Certainly we can use probability and statistics to describe some generalities that have fallen out of the work of chance, but that work itself is subject to no law.  The law of evolution is a law that can be applied both in retrospect and in prospect;  we are able to make fruitful projections of the application of chance.  But none of this means that chance itself is governed by law.  Law is the result and not the cause of chance, which itself has no cause and no logic.  Law does not bootstrap itself to regulate its own issue.  Existence precedes essence.  In the Latin phrase, the first is free from law -- "Princeps legibus solutus est."  

 

A disbelief in the absolute character of law is not unscientific.  In fact, the opposite is true -- to leave room for chance is to set aside assurances that are simply pious without basis in evidence.  It is to offer an explanation for law rather than to assume that it is unexplainable.  What tychism does is to do away with the dogma, to allow us to freshly draw truer conclusions from original experience.  However to say that law is the accretion of chance does not deny the reality of what is accreted, which is why I don't disagree with the knowledge of Born Again Atheist.  I don't expect laboratory work to focus attention on the chance, but on fact and law.  I don't expect this conjecture to change much of our practice.  Even the use of the phrase "ontological chance" is a known contradiction in an effort to speak the unspeakable -- this will not affect the labors of the lab assistant.  But it does shift our viewpoint in subtle but important ways.  For example, it sets aside the belief in "infinitely repeating" Llwellyns.  It makes Darwinian evolution less surprising.

 

We apply ourselves to the tasks and facts at hand as humans do.  But everybody does need to consider their metaphysics on occasion -- there is no escape from the need of a critical examination of first principles.  And I think that the challenge of Christianity, and especially the Transcendental Argument for the existence of God (TAG), requires us to critically examine and explain our metaphysics.  We can't allow our science to self-destruct by crude, circular, uncriticized and unwitting metaphysics.  We must philosophize, said the great naturalist Aristotle, if only to avoid philosophizing.  Now we need more than our old dogmas, just as Christians need more than theirs.  What is needed now most of all in scientific metaphysics is to acknowledge that "God does play dice."  And we have to bite the bullet and accept its hair-raising implications...  Without any hidden variable theories...  Truly accept it...  for real this time!

 

As for Yahweh, I think he is a scoundrel's version of Tyche.  They both stand above the Goddess Themis -- the goddess of law.  Both Tyche and Yahweh are Gods of arbitrary destruction.  As the fiend John Calvin correctly said:  "When it is asked why the Lord did so, we must answer, Because he pleased. But if you proceed farther to ask why he pleased, you ask for something greater and more sublime than the will of God, and nothing such can be found."  Yahweh is a God of creation followed by later destruction.  Tyche is a Goddess of destructive reconstruction, with mind, matter, and law as the resultant deposit.  Yahweh is not altogether untrue, but the truth of Yahweh is knowledge driven by narrow values -- to return to the theme of the original post.

 

What is the mechanism of selection in cosmology?  Very interesting question -- it's got to be different from the mechanism of selection in Darwinian biology.  This will be the subject of a future post!

 

[bornagainathiest]

Hmmm...

 

In the light of these posts L, I can see that you have a belief in something (currently undefined by you) related to the notion of chance.

 

But I still don't understand why you are persuaded that your belief is a reasonable or rational one.

 

Perhaps that will emerge when you present us with a worked example of the mechanism of selection of Peirce's cosmology?

 

Then we will see the reason and rationality underpinning it.

 

I hope so.

 

Thank you,

 

BAA.

[Llwellyn]

It seems like predation and reproduction which are powerful agents of biological selection could not be involved in cosmological selection -- unless worlds are being birthed and eaten -- which seems unlikely.  Selection must operate on some different terms.

 

Here is one of Peirce's thought experiments concerning natural selection of gravitation by survival:  "Why, for instance, do the heavenly bodies tend to attract one another?  Because in the long run bodies that repel or do not attract will get thrown out of the region of space leaving only the mutually attracting bodies."  The idea is that there is nothing mandatory about gravitation -- either that it exists or its magnitude.  Instead, some environments are just more or less cogent because of the existing increments of this variable.  He seems to be imagining a universe morphing where all of the physical laws are in flux by infinite increments.  The ones that are grotesque mutations blink in, blink out.

 

I can't say if I believe or disbelieve in this, but it's worthy of consideration, especially if you are able to imagine strange and uncanny possibilities.  As I said, I'm happier believing the more stable expression that "an element of pure spontaneity or lawless originality mingles, or at least, must be supposed to mingle, with law everywhere."  Chance can look, viewed from the inside, like necessary laws.  Every law of nature can be traced back to another less defined regularity from which it is emergent:   "All known laws are due to chance and repose upon others far less rigid themselves due to chance and so on in an infinite regress, the further we go back the more indefinite being the nature of the laws."

 

If there is a torrent of chance at different gradients across different dimensions, then it seems to me that the most powerful agent of selection is probably the living being.  The selection is ours.  Chance offers us random alternatives, leading to a choice which selects one alternative and transforms an equivocal ambiguous future into an unalterable determined past.  Life sparks at some felicitous place, size and time in the flux. The living being then swims upstream into phases of chance, or downstream out of them in order to take advantage of resources that it can work in a suitable habitat.  Generations upon generations scale, shift, and transform into a position where every touch of unworkable chance feels like law, and every crush of hazard has its happy function in some context.

 

[TextualCritic]

I agree that logic is an act of love. I heard a Rabbi once say that love is the product of what you give to somebody else. I think love is having somebody's best interests in mind. You need logic to achieve that. For example, if you had a Child that was sick and dying you would take him to a doctor who would use logic, science and reason to try and save him. Or if somebody was homeless and you wanted a long-term solution for that person we would need to use logic and reason to find out number one why is this person homeless and number two what can we do in the realm of reality to give this person a hand up so that they can earn a living and provide for themselves.

 

Christianity basically says, let's either pray for you or see what the Bible has to say and proceed accordingly. Problem being as we all know the Bible has utterly failed to bring about solutions to the world's problems.

[disillusioned]

Hmm. Interesting ideas.

 

Llwellyn, I don't have any reason to think that what you have posited here is incorrect; it certainly seems as if it could be an accurate description of reality. But I also don't have any reason to think that it is correct, and therein lies the problem that I'm having. Peirce was, after all, a pragmatist first and foremost. This sort of wild speculation about cosmological selection seems to me to have no useful applications, and to be unverifiable. Furthermore, does it not constitute a direct violation of the pragmatism to which Peirce was committed? It doesn't seem to me to be testable, and it doesn't seem to get us anything that we don't already have. We still end up with precisely the same laws of nature. We are where we are.

 

In light of this, it seems to me that Peirce's pragmatism would render his speculations about cosmological evolution meaningless. If I'm wrong about this, then please illuminate me!

[bornagainathiest]

deleted.

[bornagainathiest]

Llwellyn,

 

Sorry about that deleted post!  I hit the wrong button (again!).

 

Anyway, I'm going thru your last posting and here's my progress so far.

 

1.

I must be misreading your statement about gravitation..!??!

There is nothing mandatory about it?  Actually, every particle that is considered to be 'matter' is considered to be in a gravitational relationship with every other particle in the universe.  No particle is considered to be exempt from this.  Therefore, this condition of mutual attraction is mandatory.  There are no 'opt out' options.  Your qualification concerning gravity's existence and magnitude must be where I'm tripping up.  Perhaps your points are too subtle and nuanced for me?  Maybe you could couch what you mean in simpler, more direct terms?  Thanks.

 

2.

"He [Peirce] seems to be imagining a universe morphing where all the physical laws are in flux by infinite increments."

Ok, so that's what he was imagining.  But can you please present a specific worked example of this happening, so that we can see how what was imagined becomes what is actual?  I believe that would be helpful.

 

3.

Could you please explain (or again, used a worked example to show) how chance can look like necessary laws?

 

4.

Disillusioned asked you about a selection mechanism and you've written that...

"...it seems to me that the most powerful agent of selection is probably the living being.  The selection is ours."  But then, having selected the specific example of the human race you don't go on to show him and me how humans actually do this.  Instead of staying in tight focus, you revert back to the widescreen scale and talk about things cosmic.  You fail to specify and in generalizing, you don't give us the details of the worked example of the selection process we both desire to see and understand.

 

Having said that, I do see what you mean about choice transforming ambiguity into a determined past.

This parallels my use of the light-cone diagram, earlier in this thread.  But please note the difference in our approaches.  Rather than using that diagram to deal with generalities, I used it to closely examine a specific example.  From Disillusioned's positive response, I conclude that this approach was successful.  I therefore submit, that it would be very helpful if you could do likewise and pick one specific example of Peirce's selection process and then to talk us thru it, so that we can see how what is ambiguous becomes what is determined.

 

Ok, call me hopelessly reductionist if you will, but I reckon that if you did that, it would at least help me!

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As before L and in the continued spirit of this thread, I hope you find my criticisms to constructive and logical.

 

Many thanks,

 

BAA.

 

 

 

p.s.

It might also help for you to quote this message and then place your responses between my numbered points.  Thanks again.

[Llwellyn]

I'm tracking a lot of concerns that cry out to be answered.  Here are a few.  Even listing the objections turns this post into a "Too Long, Didn't Read" post:

 

Isn't Peirce's scientific metaphysics just wild speculation with no possible way of being verified, and no possible upshot in our experience?  How can it be worthwhile to believe in chance rather than law in executing the tasks of a human and even a scientist?  From what concrete observations does Peirce's tychism actually come?  Is this a conclusion generated by some actual evidence, or is this the fevered dream of a seminary mind?  What can possibly be the connection between Peirce's pragmatic maxim and Peirce's scientific metaphysics?  Is one suggested by the other?  Isn't one defeated by the other?  Isn't scientific metaphysics just as unacceptable as religious metaphysics?  Does science need a metaphysics?

 

Why is it that it is so hard to identify some actual specific worked examples of the things that Peirce describes?   Why shouldn't we complain about the idea of biological choice of physical law?  Shouldn't pragmatism be lampooned like End3 who would say "Everything is Subjective"?  Why must all discussion of these matters be in such vague and abstract language -- "scaling" "shifting" "flux" etc.?  Why must Peirce coin so many new words to even express his thoughts?  Wasn't Peirce just crazy?  If you are persuaded, you are likely to be persuaded the way Peirce was persuaded after doing a lifetime of doing laboratory chemistry and physics.  Ian Hacking wrote:  

 

"I end with Peirce because he believed in absolute chance, but that is not my focus. His denial of the doctrine of necessity was incidental to a life permeated by statistics and probabilities. Somebody had to make a first leap to indeterminism. Maybe it was Peirce, perhaps a predecessor. It does not matter. He 'rejoiced to find' himself in the company of others, including Renouvier. He did argue against the doctrine of necessity, but it was not an argument that convinced him that chance is an irreducible element of reality. He opened his eyes, and chance poured in — from a world which, in all its small details, he was seeing in a probabilistic way."

 

I'll also quote Susan Haack who talks about the relationship between the pragmatic maxim and scientific metaphysics:  "Scientific philosophy, as Peirce conceives it, is an observational science, differing from the other sciences not in its method but in its reliance on aspects of experience so familiar, so ubiquitous, that the difficulty is to become distinctly aware of them." 

 

Definitely more to follow, because obviously this post doesn't do the necessary work to persuade you.  I hope you appreciate that I appreciate the concerns that are in your mind -- they are in my mind as well.  They were in Peirce's mind, too -- he warned about Tychism that:  "A serious student of philosophy will be in no haste to accept or reject this doctrine; but he will see in it one of the chief attitudes which speculative thought may take, feeling that it is not for an individual, nor for an age, to pronounce upon a fundamental question of philosophy. That is a task for a whole era to work out."'

[disillusioned]

 

Definitely more to follow, because obviously this post doesn't do the necessary work to persuade you.  I hope you appreciate that I appreciate the concerns that are in your mind -- they are in my mind as well.  They were in Peirce's mind, too -- he warned about Tychism that:  "A serious student of philosophy will be in no haste to accept or reject this doctrine; but he will see in it one of the chief attitudes which speculative thought may take, feeling that it is not for an individual, nor for an age, to pronounce upon a fundamental question of philosophy. That is a task for a whole era to work out."'

 

 

I would love to spend some more time examining this. As you say, your post above is rather summary. But this is not a problem. As I've said before, I'm not in any rush here. Please continue to post as you will. I'm much more interested in taking the time to consider these issues carefully than I am in rushing to conclusions. These are big issues indeed, and conclusions should not be jumped to without careful consideration. I do appreciate your taking the time to indulge my skepticism. I often find myself frustrated by people who respond to an expression of skepticism by just agreeing to disagree. I'm interested in learning, and in examining things in some detail. It's refreshing to find others who share my interest in this.

[bornagainathiest]

Hello Llwelynn.

 

I'd like to echo what Disillusioned wrote about time pressure.

Please don't be under the misapprehension that you are under any from either of us.  The only point I'd add to his message is this.  Your latest post listed many questions.  Why not prioritize them and deal with a few, rather than burden yourself down with many?

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.