Many times discussing here at TSZ I was told that evolution of language was an prooved example of darwinistic evolution. What do you think about this article?
http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00401/full
Some of the discussion on the “Edward Feser and Vincent Torley” thread seems to have drifted way off topic. So I’m starting a new thread for further discussion on realism.
I’ll just quote part of a recent comment by BruceS:
1. A complete description of the world is a scientific description (or has a large component that is a scientific description).
2. Science is in principle reducible to physics.
3. Physics requires mathematics.
4. Mathematics is “unreasonably effective” when used in physics, which is saying that somehow the world is describable by mathematical concepts.
5. The (parts of the) any two separate complete description of the world (eg by us and some alien species) in mathematical physics will hence involve the same (or at least mathematically equivalent) concepts.
I realize all of these statements are quite questionable, although I would have thought that #3, the need for mathematics in physics, would have been among the least questionable premises!
I was hoping some of you experts could tell me whether this article is any good. Thanks in advance.
XXOXXOX
W
At UD StephenB stakes his claim:
Support the claim that one must always understand the context of a message in order to know that it is, indeed, a message.Describe a specific context, the absence of which would make it impossible to know if a meaningful message consisting of 100 characters was designed by an intelligent agent.
I’m kind of busy, and negligent in posting here, but I simply couldn’t resist starting this discussion. We touched on it a while back, and it pushes a lot of my buttons. I think it lies behind most disagreements. (All disagreements on this site, because we assume honesty.)
Based on her work, and that of others, Tavris shows three ways that different people can present conflicting narratives of the same event—not because any of them are lying, but because they are presenting what she calls “honest false testimony.” That is, their views of what really happened aren’t made up, but are tinged by several factors that makes them believe they are telling the truth.
http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2014/08/07/carol-tavris-on-accusations-vs-skepticism/
I have been following Vincent’s spat with Edward Feser (A Catholic philosopher with some reactionary views – his blog) over whether Feser’s own “cosmological argument” has the merit Feser seems to think. Here’s Vincent’s latest post on the matter.
Not being able to post at Uncommon Descent, I thought I might catch up with Vincent at Feser’s blog but I seem to have worn out my welcome. In case anyone decides to pop in from Feser’s blog, I thought I’d offer this thread for discussion. And please regard it as an open thread. Nothing will be considered off-topic. Usual rules apply!
