Post #134,507
1/9/04 11:42:35 AM
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I think that you misunderstood me then
Using your terms, I'm claiming that it is reasonable to believe that if the scientific approximations eventually converge to a good enough approximation of what is true, then they will start saying things that agree with what has been The Truth all along. Science cannot, of course, ever prove The Truth in all details, but it should eventually confirm parts of it.
This statement is unobjectionable so far. In fact beliefs like this one motivated scientists from start to finish. For all that we technically only have improving provisional knowledge, every scientist believes that they are trying to find out something more about what really happens, what is really true. And scientific theories with enough backing tend to get described, by professionals and laypeople alike, as true.
But I took this farther. I said, I took the statement to mean that Wade believes that the models produced by science will someday come into agreement with things that his religion claims. Which ascribes to Wade the belief both in the statement that I made above about The Truth (which I also believe), and adding the fact that Wade has faith that he already has hold of a piece of The Truth. And what is true won't contradict itself, so if the scientific process comes to its natural confirmation, it has to converge on what Wade believes.
I disagree with this belief, of course. But I don't say that he is trivially wrong, that he is expecting science to reach a point that it can never reach.
This is my interpretation. I have projected my own belief structure on what Wade actually said and come up with an interpretation that I then worked with. This is necessary, I can't read anyone's mind, and so have to come up with interpretations of what they likely mean to understand what they say. This is doubly true when, as with Wade, those people start with assumptions that differ sharply from mine.
However I have to point out that it is my interpretation simply because I could be wrong! I think that this is what Wade thinks. I don't really know. And I'm not going to go around putting words in his mouth if I can avoid it.
Cheers,
Ben
"good ideas and bad code build communities, the other three combinations do not"
- [link|http://archives.real-time.com/pipermail/cocoon-devel/2000-October/003023.html|Stefano Mazzocchi]
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Post #135,473
1/13/04 1:44:11 PM
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What we can agree to disagree on.
For me, science is the study of Plato's cave shadows and religion is the way out of the cave.
Several times over the past you've scolded me about the Choice Axiom having no consequence on the certain relationship between the laws of mathematics and reality. I don't buy it, and without proof I won't.
Your more recent claim that everything in science can be done with integers - I guess only the biology dependent upon e is gone with this view, as well as the insignificant impact pi has on scientific models, does not address the implications of Goedel's work (that was integer math he was talking about).
So, in summary, I will leave you to your shadows.
bcnu,
Mikem
I don't do third world languages. So no, I don't do Java.
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Post #135,475
1/13/04 2:06:05 PM
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If you need actual proof...
then you are going to have to learn some logic than I have not. I've merely quoted an often-quoted fact from logic.
The result that I am quoting is a consequence of Goedel's "constructible universe" construction. The purpose of that construction was to prove that if ZF is consistent, then ZFC is consistent. A side-effect of the construction is that every arithmetical statement provable in ZFC turns out to be provable in ZF.
However I haven't personally been through that construction, so I can't give you any details other than "ask a logician". If you post what I said above on sci.math and ask for recommendations on where you can learn about the construction, it is likely that someone will have a good answer.
As for the sufficiency of integers for questions of physical interest, integers are sufficient to model classical computers. Any aspect of reality that can't be modelled with a good scientific theory and a good enough computer is unlikely to ever be amenable to scientific analysis. That is a statement of belief on my part, but it is a belief that I think most will accept.
Cheers,
Ben
"good ideas and bad code build communities, the other three combinations do not"
- [link|http://archives.real-time.com/pipermail/cocoon-devel/2000-October/003023.html|Stefano Mazzocchi]
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Post #135,540
1/13/04 8:27:55 PM
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Ah...
I've merely quoted an often-quoted fact from logic.
So you do take some things on faith.
I'm only kidding, Ben. But it does remind me of something I heard long ago. I was watching Asimov being interviewed on television and, although I can't quote him exactly now, he said something along the lines of "Science is of higher moral ground than religion. If science discovers something that does not agree with its most valued theories, the theories are thrown out - or modified. When religion discovers something inconsistent with its dogma, the evidence is destroyed." So, you'd be right, imho, to be more willing to accept at face value a "widely held scientific/mathematical truth" than any religious truth.
IMO, there is damned little sacred about organized religion. The religion I spoke of in this thread is a personal religion, which can neither be taught, explained, nor discussed. True religion comes from within. Even discussing religion is a fool's errand. There's an old Taoist saying, "Those who know do not speak. Those who speak freely do not know." That'd apply to darned near every "professional" religious zealot (preachers,priests,mullahs,rabbis,etc.) I know.
bcnu,
Mikem
I don't do third world languages. So no, I don't do Java.
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Post #135,581
1/14/04 12:42:54 AM
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Depends on which mathematical truth...
I'm willing to take on faith something which is a widely known theorem in logic, the proof of which I know is understandable and has been widely examined.
However something like the classification of finite simple groups which I know is big, complex, and has not been reviewed? Well when the authors publically say that they don't believe their own proof, I'm not inclined to believe it either.
Incidentally Asimov was being seriously unfair to religion. Yes, there are religious groups which act like he described. There are also groups of religious people who definitely don't. Religion itself doesn't act in any consistent way.
Cheers,
Ben
"good ideas and bad code build communities, the other three combinations do not"
- [link|http://archives.real-time.com/pipermail/cocoon-devel/2000-October/003023.html|Stefano Mazzocchi]
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Post #135,625
1/14/04 8:07:49 AM
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IMO 'religion' is oft a sub-set: religiosity
As practised in these parts, anyway. It's a language problem because 'metaphysics' arguably -- needs no such social construct. (And most Murican 'religion' is far more a social experience than, anything resembling solitary contemplation)
I believe most of the interminable threads from IW --> zIWE + the fulminations of Nick et al: derive from this very confusion of er aims, methods and imagined 'results'. Language problems.
ie Not all cultures suffer in the way our locals do; why some.. manage almost the sublime, with some regularity.
Now as to whether Asimov was 'unfair' to relig(iosity)? Nahhh.
(But he ascribed to science wrongly, anyway - that which science is unsuited to deal with, by definition. Bad Isaac.)
Ashton
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Post #135,757
1/14/04 5:05:32 PM
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Einstein's thought on that:
The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge. Alex
The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled. -- Plutarch
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