Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[ChairmanPoo]

The scientific principle is the process of formulating a concept, predicting it's implications and then verifying that no situations exist in which that concept does not hold.

Not quite, as you cannot prove definitedly that there is no situation in which the concept does not hold. You can, however, try to find specific cases in which it doesn't, and verify them. Insofar as those cases are proven to be false, the concepts "truthiness" is stronger. (it sounds simmilar, I know, but it's actually the contrary. This is Pooper's Popper's take on positivism, btw)

If there is no merit in constructively analyzing a concept to verify it's truth, then I would argue that you're asserting there's no way we would be able to know the truth. That's a fine stance, but in such a case, one would have to draw the eventual conclusion that there is no value in the real truth and that we should instead be focusing on that which works.

In the POV stated above there is ultimatedly no way to know whether a concept is true. However, it does provide information on the likeliness of something being true, to work with

[Shades]

*pokes the thread with a ten foot pole*

There! I'll collect dare money now. Pay up!

I would, but I've not been paid yet, will you accept and IOU

[Virex]

The scientific principle is the process of formulating a concept, predicting it's implications and then verifying that no situations exist in which that concept does not hold.

Not quite, as you cannot prove definitedly that there is no situation in which the concept does not hold. You can, however, try to find specific cases in which it doesn't, and verify them. Insofar as those cases are proven to be false, the concepts "truthiness" is stronger. (it sounds simmilar, I know, but it's actually the contrary. This is Pooper's Popper's take on positivism, btw)

Maybe I should've pointed out that it's an iterative process that does not have to end at all? Also, you can prove some theories completely. If I were for example to claim that the output of a chemical reactor would fall within certain bounds during it's operational period, then I can test that effectively. For most cases it is not viable to do it, but it is not impossible.

[ChairmanPoo]

If I were for example to claim that the output of a chemical reactor would fall within certain bounds during it's operational period, then I can test that effectively.

How so? Insofar as I can gleam from your example, youd be showing that your output calculation method is likely correct insofar as the null hypothesis  hasn't been proven true, but you cannot absolutely disprove it either.

[Virex]

I don't think I'm following you? I claim that from the first of January 2010 until the first of May 2010 my reactor will output 500 liters of acetic acid with a purity of 9% per hour, with a deviation of at most 5%. Now I can just hook the output stream of my reactor up to a flow measurer and a chromatograph during the given time and they show me if my predictions were right. Now if I were to claim that the reactor would always do that, then my scope is of infinite length and I have to measure till infinity to prove it. But as long as the scope is limited, it is in theory possible to prove it completely.

[Shades]

After you that time period, which is when you'd have to be to have the results, then the hypothesis isn't much use as it can't be used to predict anything and it's more an observation of what happened rather (I think).

but you cannot absolutely disprove it either.

Disproof is easy¹, you only have to find a single case the hypothesis doesn't hold true.

¹For a given value of easy.

[ChairmanPoo]

I don't think you can remove your claim from further claims like that.

To clarify: Lets say that Gene Ray and Aristotle Plato are arguing about the shape of the Earth, and GR says something on the lines "The Earth is a cube you educated stupid, eyearms, lol.", to which Aristotle answers something grandiloquent like  "The Earth is spherical because the sphere is the perfect shape in the cosmos..". Now, King Charles enters the discussion and sends Magellan to travel around the world and see who is right. Lo and behold, it turns that the Earth is spherical (or close enough) after all. Nonetheless, AristotlePlato's statement is pure nonsense, and he simply got lucky.

but you cannot absolutely disprove it either.

Disproof is easy¹, you only have to find a single case the hypothesis doesn't hold true.

¹For a given value of easy.

That was what I was going about in that post you quoted. You forget, however that not all statements can be disproven, and in that specific statement I was referring to the null hypothesis


Edit: critical research failure. The second one in 24 hours

[Shades]

null hypothesis

Reading fail sorry

[Shade-o]

Well, Aristotle supported a spheroid Earth due to the changing appearances of constellations due to geographic location, and the way the shadow is cast on the moon during a lunar eclipse. So says Wikipedia.

[ChairmanPoo]

Whatever aristotle supported is not the point. I picked him at random. The *example* is the point.

Trivia: I looked it up and it was Plato who said that the sphere was the perfect shape. If you like I'll change it.

(somehow I'm thinking that adscribing to Aristotle the brainless perfect shape argument is kind of unfairly bashing the man)

[Shade-o]

Spheres sort of are the perfect shape, but Plato probably didn't realise the relationship between them and gravity, area-volume, etc.

[Andir]

Whatever aristotle supported is not the point. I picked him at random. The *example* is the point.

Trivia: I looked it up and it was Plato who said that the sphere was the perfect shape. If you like I'll change it.

(somehow I'm thinking that adscribing to Aristotle the brainless perfect shape argument is kind of unfairly bashing the man)

I'm missing the point here as well... two people had different opinions, and someone answered it.  Now we know the truth, except in Siquo's case where the world is still Cubic, and that's okay with him.

[Starver]

Hmmm. Maybe they can try replacing the mirror with a picture in which the "other cat" is now gone?

Probably ninjaed, I wasn't online yesterday and there's a few pages to read through, but isn't the usual test something along the lines of surreptitiously putting a spot of something on the testee's forehead (or other normally non-visible area, which for a supple cat isn't very many places other than that) so that if the testee recognises it as a reflection (and is bothered, although cats probably would be) it'll try to clean it off/investigate it?

(Urk, long, multi-claused(/'claw'sed?) question there.  Nearly forgot to put the question mark at the end.)

Anyhoo, we've probably moved on.  Again.  In which case you can ignore me.  Again.

[Starver]

More on topic, what kind of advice do you have for when people say 'god bless you' when you sneeze and you don't believe in a god? What do you say?

Around these parts, it's shortened to just "bless you", so is probably non-denominational.  There's a whole discussion about whether blessing has issues incompatible to my kind of position.

But, then again:

Code: [Select]

    bless REF,CLASSNAME
    bless REF
            This function tells the thingy referenced by REF that it is now
            an object in the CLASSNAME package. If CLASSNAME is omitted, the
            current package is used. Because a "bless" is often the last
            thing in a constructor, it returns the reference for
            convenience. Always use the two-argument version if a derived
            class might inherit the function doing the blessing. See
            perltoot and perlobj for more about the blessing (and blessings)
            of objects.

            Consider always blessing objects in CLASSNAMEs that are mixed
            case. Namespaces with all lowercase names are considered
            reserved for Perl pragmata. Builtin types have all uppercase
            names. To prevent confusion, you may wish to avoid such package
            names as well. Make sure that CLASSNAME is a true value.

            See "Perl Modules" in perlmod.




(After a stint working in Germany in-between the turn of the Millennium and the turn of the century, I tend to go for the "gezundheit", with apologies for the doubtless incorrect spelling coming from only speaking the word for so long.

[Jackrabbit]

It's shortened to bless you here too, and nobody actually pays enough attention or is anal enough to care. Not that your question wasn't valid.

Also, you worked in Germany? I love the look of Germany, the history behind Germany, I am going to Germany and will also be spending time as an exchange student in Germany.

What's it like?