References to lectures

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asked 5 years ago

Dear Mickey, Hello,
I eagerly listen to your lectures on free will and choice, and an introduction to philosophical thinking. I feel the need to express my gratitude. For your honest stance, intellectual integrity, and success in making complexities accessible without compromising depth. Although the rabbi works during the lectures, listening to them is learning and enjoying.
Four notes I have chosen regarding Introduction to Philosophical Thinking so far –
I wanted to contribute to the discussion of logic the useful observation of Pinchas Noy.
Models and Theories P. Noy.pdf
Between a model and a theory. I have attached a photo of the pages from his book that present it.
Regarding the lack of expression for causal causation in the mathematical formulation of the laws of physics, the example given is Newton’s second law. You argued in your lecture that, according to intuition, in reality, force causes acceleration. I wanted to point out that there are cases in which intuition is reversed, for example when it comes to centrifugal force, or even the force of inertia in a system with linear acceleration (for example, when a vehicle stops suddenly). Therefore, the lack of the direction of causation in the mathematical formulation is perhaps not a lack, but a formulation that is appropriate for all possibilities.
You chose to present Kant’s axes of classification (analytic-synthetic and a priori-a posteriori) in relation to propositions (I don’t know how it is originally). Isn’t it more correct to apply them to claims instead of to propositions (which are the verbal representation of claims)? Then we can say that for analytic claims, the analysis of the verbal representation is sufficient to determine their truth value, while for synthetic claims, the analysis of the verbal representation is not sufficient to determine their truth value (observation is required).
It seems to me that it is useful to distinguish between the truth value of a claim (whether it is accessible to us or not) and the degree of our belief in it. The first is metaphysical, the second is epistemic/psychological. It is accepted that the truth value is based on some kind of proof/refutation. The degree of belief may be influenced by the attributed truth value, but also by other factors such as the pragmatic/adaptive value (it is worth believing because it improves my situation/survival), and perhaps also by the character traits of the believer (for example, the degree of skepticism that characterizes him).
Have a wonderful week.

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מיכי Staff answered 5 years ago

Hello. Thanks for the words. I quickly read the first part of his words and I disagree. The distinction he makes is well-known and I have written about it several times in the past. But I disagree with the approach that separates the model from the theory. To say that all theoretical entities (in physics or psychology) are just our forms of organizing the information we have accumulated is a completely unreasonable claim. According to this, the model was not supposed to work and give predictions (the chance of a reliable prediction is 0). You should see my argument in the article on studying Occam’s razor and razor (especially in the appendix): https://mikyab.net/%D7%9B%D7%AA%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%A2%D7%95%D7%93-%D7%91%D7%A2%D7%A0%D7%99%D7%99%D7%9F-%D7%AA%D7%A2%D7%A8%D7%95-%D7%A9%D7%9C-%D7%90%D7%95%D7%A7%D7%94%D7%90%D7%9D Regarding your comments: Even in a rotating body, the relationship is from force to acceleration and not vice versa. Something has to cause the acceleration. Beyond that, even if you were right and the equation describes the common denominator for all situations, it is still true that equations cannot and do not describe causation, or a causal relationship. Regarding the distinction between sentences and claims, I disagree with your distinction. By the accepted definition, this is certainly not true. A claim is a special type of sentence: a sentence that can take on a true or false value. It is not the relationship between a sentence and its object (meaning). A sentence and a claim have no existence in the world. Their object and meaning is some relationship between the subject and the predicate. This relationship is a fact, not a sentence. In short, both a sentence and a claim belong to the linguistic realm. The fact that the claim describes belongs to some world or state of affairs in the world. I completely accept the difference between the truth value of a claim and the degree of our confidence in it. But this does not concern the Kantian discussion. It deals with the relationship between the epistemic axis, the way I recognize the fact described in the claim (a priori-a posteriori), and the linguistic-logical axis, the structure of the sentence and its analysis (analytic-synthetic). Incidentally, the truth value of a claim is not related to metaphysics. On the contrary, in claims this fact is physics. Truth values are a matter of comparing the content of the claim to the state of affairs in the world that it describes. The degree of my confidence in the claim depends on many parameters (on the reliability of the tools with which I made this comparison). All the best,

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