Q&A: Synthetic Testing?
Synthetic Testing?
Question
With God’s help,
Hello Rabbi,
Regarding your proof for your approach to the entire synthetic-rational framework in light of David Hume’s objections, you provide a statistical proof in the parable of the actualist-informativist conflict.
There you write that one can easily refute the actualist view by means of an experiment that would confirm the following case, as the informativist predicts correctly. For the probability that the actualist approach will be right the next time approaches zero, in contrast to the informativist approach.
But I wanted to ask: to what extent can statistical proofs really serve one side in your debate with David Hume, when he does not accept the principle of causality at all?
After all, insofar as someone does not accept the principle of causality, it is not correct to say that in his view the probability that X will happen next time is one in infinity. For the statistical assumption itself accepts one of the following three possibilities: either this is a factor with a deterministic cause, or it is randomness, or it is free will. But all of these assumptions are under the rationalist lens.
The empiricist does not claim that rejecting causality leads to the concept of randomness, in which all options are equal (and therefore the probability is one in infinity), but rather that this is a concept so elusive that it is not even within randomness; it is simply a case that is not statistically defined (and even methodologically it is not randomness). So even if your predictions are fulfilled perfectly, that still proves nothing for your claim.
I would be happy to hear the Rabbi’s opinion on the matter.
Answer
I’m not sure I understood the question. Are you asking why the actualist should accept probability as a consideration? In practice, he usually does accept it. If he doesn’t accept that and logic, there’s no point in talking.
Discussion on Answer
As I wrote, factually he does accept it. And he also has no reason not to accept it, just as he accepts logic. What does that have to do with causality?
I am indeed claiming that someone who does not accept the principle of causality (like David Hume) cannot speak about probability as a consideration.
Do you think that someone who does not accept the principle of causality (and perhaps even accepts the possibility of absurdities like something from nothing, etc.) can still accept probabilistic thinking? Why? After all, on his view he is not talking about a random state, where one can say that according to his approach the probability that the prophecy will come true is one in infinity, but about an undefined state.
Just as you elaborate in your book The Science of Freedom to explain that libertarianism is speaking neither about randomness on the one hand nor determinism on the other, but about a third state, so too one who denies causality believes in a fourth state… a state that is not defined at all. I do not think that every undefined state is random.