Outline - Thursday, January 29, 1998

I. Questions from previous assignment:

I don't really understand the theory of determinism....Would we be able to predict our own death because it is a law of nature, but a law we have no control over? I am not predistined to eat a cheeseburger on September 28th at 3:00, 1999.

Why would we believe the epistemology of rationalism to be correct?

[It allows connections and meeting points for individuals.]

Let's hold off on this for a bit...

( the positive arguments for rationalism are many, ranging from Plato through Descartes (ca. 1637), Kant (ca. 1791), and contemporary physics. I'd rather start with physics and then return to the more strictly philosophical arguments.)

Can you provide a few examples of metaphysical assumptions found in the natural and social sciences?

Metaphysics/ontology

materialism (the only reality is material reality)

determinism (at least at the atomic/macro-atomic level) - all events are the result of cause-effect interactions

"local reality" (at least at the atomic/macro-atomic level)

--> "metaphysical atomism" - the first "facts" about Reality are

a) that it is made up of discrete/individual pieces ("atoms")...

b) whose difference(s) from one another comes first: connection - needed to build the atoms/individuals up into larger units - comes second, and is often problematic.

-->

Epistemological assumptions:

A) it is possible to make a sharp distinction between
 

i) discrete domains of (material) reality - so as to separate out, for example, what directly/immediately affects/effects (causes) something in one place, totally divorced from other domains/processes/causal relations, etc.

ii) the knowing subject ("observer"/human being/perceiver)

and

the object to be known ("observed")

so that with proper methods, etc. we can develop a body of

objective knowledge (knowledge about the object/s we seek to know, as they really are [!]),

- knowledge that will be universal, necessary, and have predictive power

as distinct from

subjective knowledge (knowledge "infected" with the individual and partial perspectives of any single individual observer/subject),

- knowledge that will be individual, arbitrary, and inadequate for predicting future events.

Nota bene: these assumptions are directly refuted - on the basis of both mathematics and experiments - by (i) quantum mechanics and (ii) relativity theory. In particular, these developments in physics demonstrate
 

a) there can be no "either/or" between subject and object (and thus, no simple dichotomy between "subjective knowledge" and "objective knowledge") - rather, the knowing subject always and inevitably affects the object to be known in the very process(es) of attempting to "know" the object.

As a result -

what we "know" of the world through the sciences is always "the world as it appears to us" (i.e., as shaped by the knowing subject),

not "the world as it really is" (i.e., as radically distinct from the knowing subject).

[Examples: Heisenberg's indeterminacy principle (q.m.); the relativity of time/space to the observer (Einstein).]

b) over against the atomistic metaphysics of modern (Newtonian) models of science, including the assumption of discrete "local reality" -

at its most fundamental levels, the universe is more "connected" with itself than the atomistic picture would suggest.

[For details, see Section VI of the overview page for the History and Philosophy of Science course

<http://www.drury.edu/faculty/ess/philsci/philsciov.html>

and the page on "Bohm, Bell - and Boom! The End of Modern Dualism,"

<http://www.drury.edu/faculty/ess/philsci/bell.html>]

Is there a combination of thoughts that rely on both metaphysics and empiricist schools of thought?

Yes - several (especially after we clarify our terms).

1) It is arguable that no one can be a complete empiricist in any case (e.g. Descartes' wax example; Hume's critiques of identity, self-hood, etc.)

2) The natural sciences always involve more than just empirical collections of sense-data - insofar as they seek to move to
 

a) general laws that "cover" particular phenomena, especially as these laws are expressed in

b) mathematical terms.

3) as should be clear by now - quantum mechanics and relativity theory arguably cohere with the idealist metaphysics and epistemologies of Plato and Kant.

The idea that morality is relative is justified [in] that different conditions exist not only from country to country, but also from person to person. This idea can easily fall into doublethink when a person believes that even though morality isrelative, their own morality is more correct than others.

Doublethink: ...most students believe that everyone should have the freedom to believe whatever they want but everyone has to believe that every person is equal."

===

On fallacies:

Boss's list:

equivocation

appeal to force (ad baculum)

abusive fallacy (ad hominem)

circumstantial fallacy

appeal to inappropriate authority

popular appeal ("bandwagon")

hasty generalization

fallacy of accident

fallacy of ignorance (appeal to ignorance)

begging the question

irrelevant conclusion (irrelevance)

naturalistic fallacy (is --> ought)

appeal to tradition (related: common practice)

In addition:

fallacy of affirming the consequent

For Tuesday, Feb. 3, 1998:

Boss, ch. 3, "Ethical Subjectivism"

Exercises, 83-84, Questions 1-4

Exercises, 88, Questions 1-3

Exercises, 93, Questions 1, 2

(Thursday:

Exercises, 95, Questions 1-2

Exercises, 97f., Questions ___

Exercises, 102, Questions 1-3)