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From: mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers,talk.philosophy.misc
Subject: Re: Impossibilities
Message-ID: <3556@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 24-Sep-86 02:04:26 EDT
Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.3556
Posted: Wed Sep 24 02:04:26 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 24-Sep-86 05:23:08 EDT
References: <15763@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Organization: University of Maryland, Dept. of Computer Sci.
Lines: 46
Xref: mnetor net.sf-lovers:8671 talk.philosophy.misc:69

Bill Gallmeister writes:
>>
>>2. Man has rules and the universe -- just kind of works.  In reality, there
>>   is no E, or M, or C, and certainly no "squaring".  These are
>>   labels man uses to define our universe.  They are only true so
>>   far as we can see today.

>   There is a name for the opposite belief -- that the behavior of the
>universe can be understood.  It is called 'science.'  Understandably,
>therefore, those of us who consider ourselves 'scientists' don't go
>along with your opinion as expressed above.

I disagree.  There is no contradiction between the practice of science and
Gallmeister's statement; his statement isn't about the possibility of
scientific knowledge, but rather one of what that knowledge means.  If one
accepts the premise, then one can draw two conclusions:

1: That the universe must be trusted before the models, and

2: that a theory claiming that something is impossible must be read with all
   the implications about the permanence and structures of physical law kept
   in mind.

There is an argument about the possibility of communication with FTL
particles (Tachrons) which claims that it is impossible, because of TT
paradoxes.  The problem is that any such argument is based on a lot of
speculation about what time-travel really means.  More fundamentally, it is
based upon a whole network of notions about causality.  But if the universe
does in fact have tachrons going from place to place, then the new theory
need not honor those notions (although it must explain their apparent
macroscopic truth).

>>3. The universe is uncharacterizable in its entirety by Man, because
>>   we are only Man, and when we characterize a thing, we
>>   bring our own bias into the matter.

>   There is no evidence to support your statement (that the universe is
>uncharacterizable), and there is substantial evidence to the contrary
>(every successful prediction of science provides such evidence).

That merely shows that we can model some portion of the universe which we
experience.  I think the statement is a bit extreme, but it is a question
again of what scientific models mean.  I happen to believe that they for
almost all purposes satifactory as models.

C. Wingate