[extropy-chat] Where have you been?

[Ian Goddard]

Dan Clemmensen wrote:

>Hi Ian! Glad to hear from you!
>
>I just posted a response to your comment in which I 
>included a lot of philosophical claptrap, just as if 
>I knew what I was talking about, BEFORE reading your 
>post quoted above.
>
>Please feel free to make actual informed comments 
>on my previous post. My last formal exposure to 
>philosophy was when I audited a course at the 
>University of Tennessee in 1969.


Your comments on Occam's razor sound right and in the
direction of quantify Occam's razor as more than a
principle of aesthetics. Along that line I believe a
(if not the) purpose of scientific theories is to
create a reliable efficient model of the real world
with which we can run real-world simulations that
allow us to plan our next moves in the real world. If
we have a theory/model X+P and we eliminate P and by
itself X is exactly as effective a model as when
conjoined with P, then P does not demonstrate that its
inclusion is necessary for creating a model of the
world. Moreover, there may therefore be no reason to
believe P represents a feature of the world. 

In that way Occam's razor is not so much a merely
aesthetic principle as it is an inherent part of the
art of the scientific rendering of the world (ie, the
art of sculpting an accurate model of the world).


http://iangoddard.net

Inductive inference underlies all empirical thought:
"All inferences from experience suppose, as their
foundation, that the future will resemble the past,
and that similar powers will be conjoined with similar
sensible qualities. If there be any suspicion, that
the course of nature may change, and that the past may
be no rule for the future, all experience becomes
useless, and can give rise to no inference or
conclusion." David Hume 


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