[ExI] against Many Worlds QT

[Lee Corbin]

Max wrote

 > I can't agree with you on this Jef.
 > Realism can be highly sophisticated.

Well, Jef could retort that it is merely *my*
version of realism that isn't very highly
sophisticated :)

Aware wrote:
> On Sun, May 17, 2009 at 7:13 PM, Lee Corbin <lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote:
>> For realists like me, attempting to uncover the truth,
>> or perhaps just modeling our activities as a pursuit
>> of a (completely) unattainable final goal, is definitely
>> the best approach.
> 
> Lee, my purpose in raising this issue will be served when it's
> recognized that you simply can't "model" an "unattainable final goal."
> What is the behavior of this element?  Precisely how does it
> constrain the behavior of the model as a whole?

Here is what the driving analogies are: our models
(or theories *about*) physical reality. Suppose that
you and I are measuring a temperature or merely the
length of a rod. It is EXTREMELY USEFUL, I contend,
to maintain that our measurements are converging on
something.

Something real, i.e., though the measuring rod we
know to be a host of dancing sub-elementary particles
(again, we "know" as an approximation to something
that somehow really does make up the measuring rod),
the thing we're trying to measure is on average of
our measurements closer and closer to something,
and our rod is (can be measured to be) more and
more exactly some multiple of the one they keep
in Paris.

> Your position is not so much wrong as it is lacking in the
> sophistication necessary for effective reasoning about complex,
> evolving, *open* systems increasingly applicable to our world of
> increasing technological and social change.

On the contrary, to me your position invites
degeneration into vague concepts and doubtful
epistemologies. For example, what I describe
can be easily translated into any language
in the world, and then translated back without
much loss. I'd be far less confident that your
notions would survive that test as well.

Best regards, (not meaning to be "righteous", etc.)
Lee