[Wittrs] Re: Indeterminism
- From: "SWM" <swmirsky@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 14 Apr 2011 05:03:57 -0000
This, it seems to me, is extremely well put. -- SWM
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Jeremy Bowman <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
> I don't think it's a great idea to allow one's views on human
> agency/freedom to direct one's interpretation of a scientific
> formalism. But it seems to me that something like that lies behind
> Bob's insistence on a "metaphysical" sort of indeterminism.
>
> Quantum theory proper does not tell us that the world is
> indeterministic. Rather, one interpretation of quantum theory takes
> the world to be that way. That interpretation was created by
> non-philosophers who were unfamiliar with Hume's analysis of
> causation. They reflected little on the often quite tricky
> relationship between language (including scientific laws, the wave
> function, etc.) and reality. They were rather fond of the aura of
> mystery and power that the twentieth-century public felt surrounded
> physics. They actively encouraged a mind-bending, time-warping,
> "information"-measuring image of physicists as impenetrable men of
> mystery. (And power.) Niels Bohr chose the yin-yang symbol to adorn
> his coat of arms. Rigorous purveyors of the spiritual! (And the
> powerful.) Or so they'd like us to think.
>
> Outside of showbiz, it's remarkably hard to say what determinism
> really is. Traditional causal determinism supposes that the future
> unfolds like a train running on railway tracks, so that things
> "couldn't happen any other way" as a matter of "natural necessity".
>
> But Hume's analysis of causation calls the very idea of "natural
> necessity" into question. When we say something "must" happen because
> it is caused, all we really mean is that it does happen, and
> furthermore it happens according to a pattern that we have managed to
> discern -- so we expect it to happen. According to Hume, the "must"
> was nothing more than reality agreeing with our expectations. Looked
> at from that perspective, determinism is little more than the doctrine
> that things happen according to discernible patterns, even though we
> might not yet have discerned them.
>
> And from that same perspective, indeterminism is little more than the
> doctrine that not everything fits discernible patterns. Which isn't a
> very big deal, really, and it has not much bearing on human agency or
> human freedom. It might have some bearing on future science, however,
> as it seems to set limits on what can reliably be described by laws.
>
> As things stand today, no one can say whether determinism or
> indeterminism is true. But we can learn a lesson from history.
> Newtonian physics was so successful and impressive that some claimed
> it was not only the correct account of reality -- in addition, it
> simply could not be wrong! Let us learn from our forbears, not just
> that Newtonian physics is incorrect, but that it is a mistake to think
> any theory cannot be wrong.
>
> The most recent physics trades in statistical laws, but it does not
> follow that we have finally "hit the rock-bottom of reality", so our
> current account of reality is the fullest and most complete there can
> be. That would be the same arrogance that inspired earlier fools to
> say that Newton could not be wrong. Not only can we not claim that
> current physics is certain, it is a stretch to claim even that it is
> literally true, because we cannot judge-as-true formalisms that we do
> not fully understand. And no one fully understands the formalisms of
> quantum theory, despite immodest claims made by the occasional
> blowhard. There are rival interpretations of the formalisms, and none
> of those interpretations are complete.
>
> Bob wrote:
>
> > I find Wittgenstein understands possibility and contingency,
> > which is essential to understanding science today, and its
> > irreducible probabilistic nature. Before quantum mechanics,
> > probability was epistemic - human ignorance, since Heisenberg,
> > chance is ontological and real, the stuff of freedom from
> > mathematical equations and causal chains.
>
> "Irreducible probabilistic nature"? -- Are we talking about nature
> itself here, or a theory that purports to describe nature? If the
> former, I wonder what could be "irreducible" about the "probabilistic"
> nature of nature itself? -- The word 'irreducible' here seems a bit
> like banging one's fist on the table for emphasis. On the other hand,
> if we are talking about a theory that purports to describe nature, who
> are we to say whether or not current statistical laws will be the
> "final word" in physics? Past experience suggests that
> as-yet-undreamt-of future theory will eventually reduce it -- and
> probably contradict it at the same time, as normally happens.
>
> But in any case, not all current physical laws are statistical. Strict
> laws of conservation in conjunction with statistical laws entail
> "quantum entanglement". The bafflement often felt in the face of
> entanglement can be dissolved, to some extent anyway, not by rejecting
> determinism but by embracing a more robust form of determinism (in
> which causally isolated, non-classically correlated events are linked
> in a larger way than by mere causation, so that the "discernible
> patterns" I mentioned above don't just extend from past to future but
> vice versa).
>
> Your phrase 'chance is ontological', if I understand it, sounds as if
> you are trying to say more than that nature itself reflects the
> statistical aspects of the scientific laws that describe it (which
> would say nothing, because it would be true of everything). I think
> you're trying to say that our current description of nature is
> "complete", in the sense that it leaves nothing out.
>
> If so, I think you're wrong, and that your claim here is as arrogant
> as the claims of earlier philosophers who said that Newtonian physics
> "could not be mistaken".
>
> Best wishes to all -- Jeremy
>
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