Truth, Reason, Logic

Kantian Naturalist: You simply have not provided any account of truth, reason, and logic. Until you do, there is no reason for me to believe that a correct understanding of these concepts has anything at all to do with God.

Some initial first thoughts.

What would it mean to provide an account of truth, reason, and logic? Don’t all of us take all three of these for granted?

Can science settle the question of what would it take to provide an account of truth, reason, and logic?

If science cannot settle the question of what would it take to provide an account of truth, reason, and logic, what does that tell us about the question?

If science cannot settle the question of what would it take to provide an account of truth, reason, and logic, what does that tell us about science?

Who were the first scientists to ask and attempt to answer these questions and what answers did they offer?

Who were the first philosophers to ask and attempt to answer these questions and what answers did they offer?

Is the argument that because someone has not provided an account of truth, reason, and logic there is therefore no reason to believe that a correct understanding of these concepts has nothing at all to do with God a non-sequitur?

What is true. What is logical. What is reasonable. Are these not all inter-twined? Which of these can we dispense with while retaining the others?

675 thoughts on “Truth, Reason, Logic

  1. Mung,

    Infer a tree from the data using method A. Infer a tree using independent method B.
    Calculate the number $N$ of all possible arrangements of the data. Calculate how many of those arrangements form a nested tree.
    Now if the tree found by method A was a mere artifact, what are the odds of obtaining pretty much the same tree with method B? pretty close to $1/N$, or astronomically low

  2. dazz:
    Mung,

    Infer a tree from the data using method A. Infer a tree using independent method B.
    Calculate the number of all possible arrangements of the data. Calculate how many of those arrangements form a nested tree.
    Now if the tree found by method A was a mere artifact, what are the odds of obtaining pretty much the same tree with method B? pretty close to , or astronomically low

    I’m afraid that isn’t a very good method of deciding whether the data fit a tree. First, “arrangements of the data” doesn’t make sense to me. How are the data being arranged? Second, almost every method of phylogenetic analysis will produce a single best tree, no matter what data you put into them. Third, many different methods of analysis may return similar trees from similar data, even if the data have no phylogenetic signal. Fortunately, there are better ways.

    The most commonly used is the phylogenetic bootstrap: resample the data many times, with replacement, to produce replicate data sets of the same size. If a great majority of analyses (using the same method) of those replicates produce similar trees, that shows that the data are at least internally consistent. More generally, phylogenetic hypotheses can be tested by analyzing new data. If independent data sets produce similar trees, there is reason to suppose they are inferring a real tree.

  3. Neil Rickert: Excellent work, phoodoo.You are a demonstrated master at quote mining.

    Quote mining??

    Because I quoted your reply word for word?

    Is TSZ having a smoke hash round table party tonight, and I wasn’t invited?

  4. Neil Rickert: You are a demonstrated master at quote mining.

    For a moment there I thought you were praising keiths, but then it occurred to me that keiths goes far beyond master level.

  5. dazz,

    Regardless of mechanisms: how many times do we need to tell you that the absence of a mechanism would not be problematic for UCD? and that the mechanisms are actually known?

    Why is the absence of a mechanism not a problem for UCD?

  6. John Harshman,

    Thanks John. By arrangement I mean something like this, let me know if it makes sense:

    B descends from A, D descends from A, forms a nested tree
    A descends from B, B descends from C, C descends from A, doesn’t form a nested tree

    We could find species with no homology whatsoever with other species, we could find no homology at all. Given the size of the sequence space, I don’t see why we should see any homology at all unless CD was true

    Thanks again for the bootstrap reference, I remember looking up Prof. Felsenstein paper on it, but never got round to reading it

  7. colewd:
    dazz,

    Why is the absence of a mechanism not a problem for UCD?

    For the same reason one can know there are stars in the firmament without knowing how they got there

    Oh, and we have the mechanisms.

  8. dazz,

    For the same reason one can know there are stars in the firmament without knowing how they got there

    Can you send me some videos of a few evolutionary transitions 🙂

  9. phoodoo: Is TSZ having a smoke hash round table party tonight, and I wasn’t invited?

    You can come if you come up with those examples of molecular phylogenies which contradict morphological taxonomy.

  10. colewd:
    dazz,

    Can you send me some videos of a few evolutionary transitions

    You keep doubling down on your standards for evidence, clear sign that no amount of evidence would convince you.
    Remember my parody about the shape of the stars, of your hyper-skepticism?

    Well, all the stars are round, and that must be because the Flying Spaghetti Monster kneads them very much like meat balls. How else would you explain that ALL the stars are spherical? Gravity? don’t make me laugh. Do you have a video?

  11. dazz: You keep doubling down on your standards for evidence, clear sign that no amount of evidence would convince you.
    Remember my parody about the shape of the stars, of your hyper-skepticism?

    Well, all the stars are round, and that must be because the Flying Spaghetti Monster kneads them very much like meat balls. How else would you explain that ALL the stars are spherical? Gravity? don’t make me laugh. Do you have a video?

    I think your examples are particularly effective against colewd because they point up that he uses “cause” in several ways. Sometimes billiard ball causation is in play. Sometimes he means bringing something into existence. With the spherical shape, we’re talking about causal conditions sufficient to produce some property rather than another. If one says that gravity is the cause of the spherical shape, must we now give a “cause for gravity” or be scolded?

  12. dazz,

    You keep doubling down on your standards for evidence, clear sign that no amount of evidence would convince you.
    Remember my parody about the shape of the stars, of your hyper-skepticism?

    Just evidence that supports your claim that these transitions occur as the theory says. Same standard as observing stars in the sky as direct evidence of their existence.

    One video of one transition and I am all in 🙂

  13. dazz:
    John Harshman,

    Thanks John. By arrangement I mean something like this, let me know if it makes sense:

    B descends from A, D descends from A, forms a nested tree
    A descends from B, B descends from C, C descends from A, doesn’t form a nested tree

    We could find species with no homology whatsoever with other species, we could find no homology at all. Given the size of the sequence space, I don’t see why we should see any homology at all unless CD was true

    Thanks again for the bootstrap reference, I remember looking up Prof. Felsenstein paper on it, but never got round to reading it

    I think you should read something basic about how phylogenetic analysis works. First, almost no method allows known sequences to be ancestral to other known sequences. Taxa are located at the tips of trees only. Almost no methods will allow non-trees to be tested. Loops and non-connections are not considered. In a set of four taxa, (AB)(CD), (AC)(BD), and (AD)(BC) are the only possibilities.

    Second, for almost all methods it’s necessary to postulate homology by aligning the sequences, i.e. deciding which sites are homologous to which other sites (though the contents of those sites may not be homologous).

    So, having aligned the various sequences, you decide on some optimality criterion, that is some measure of the fit of the data to a given tree. Then you try out a whole bunch of trees and pick the one that the data fit best. Almost all methods do that. As I’ve said, even if the data are random there is probably one tree that the data fit best; you also have to have some test of signal. Do the data fit that tree significantly better than they fit other trees? Do different partitions of the data fit the same tree? If the answer is yes, then you have something. And if the data actually have nested hierarchical structure, the answer will be yes. If they don’t, probably not.

  14. dazz: By arrangement I mean something like this

    One more thing. Trees aren’t arrangements of the data; they’re arrangements of the taxa. The data are attached to taxa, but they aren’t the same thing. The sequence of beta fibrinogen in a chicken isn’t a chicken, nor is it Gallus gallus.

  15. colewd,
    Bill,

    I have presented you with considerable evidence of transitions. Do you recall the paper I linked for you, the one you promised to read and get back to me on? That was evidence. Remember this?:

    Harshman J., Braun E.L., Braun M.J., Huddleston C.J., Bowie R.C.K., Chojnowski J.L., Hackett S.J., Han K.-L., Kimball R.T., Marks B.D., Miglia K.J., Moore W.S., Reddy S., Sheldon F.H., Steadman D.W., Steppan S.J., Witt C.C., Yuri T. Phylogenomic evidence for multiple losses of flight in ratite birds. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 2008; 105:13462-13467.

  16. John Harshman,

    Thanks again. I knew that all we have to test now are the upper “leafs” of the tree, but I definitely need to do a lot of learning on the subject.

  17. colewd,

    For the same reason one can know there are stars in the firmament without knowing how they got there

    Data like comparing DNA is direct evidence like observing stars. UCD is a claim of HOW life evolved.

    If you modify your claim to shared molecules among organisms then I agree you have adequate supporting evidence.

  18. colewd:
    dazz,

    Just evidence that supports your claim that these transitions occur as the theory says.Same standard as observing stars in the sky as direct evidence of their existence.

    One video of one transition and I am all in

    One video of plate tectonics starting up, and I’ll believe it wasn’t specially designed.

    Glen Davidson

  19. John Harshman,

    I have presented you with considerable evidence of transitions. Do you recall the paper I linked for you, the one you promised to read and get back to me on? That was evidence. Remember this?:

    Yes, i do remember. Thank you. Do you have any evidence of the amount and type of changes to DNA that occurred? Could this be extrapolated to larger transitions?

  20. colewd: Data like comparing DNA is direct evidence like observing stars. UCD is a claim of HOW life evolved.

    If you modify your claim to shared molecules among organisms then I agree you have adequate supporting evidence.

    Data like comparing the shapes of the stars is direct evidence. Gravity is a claim of HOW they formed.

    If you modify your claim to Kneaded by the FSM then I agree you have adequate supporting evidence

  21. dazz,

    Data like comparing the shapes of the stars is direct evidence. Gravity is a claim of HOW they formed.

    Exactly: I can model gravity and directly test the model. A testable mechanism of how it happened.

  22. colewd:
    dazz,

    Exactly:I can model gravity and directly test the model.A testable mechanism of how it happened.

    Like computer models? Those are man made just like meat balls. Meatballs don’t knead themselves, just like stars can’t arrange themselves in perfect spherical forms! You need to smuggle the sphericity into the the model for it to work! And where’s the evidence that gravity can produce spherical stars, where that video? Gravity doesn’t explain where the original nebula came from! And if stars come from nebulas, why are there still nebulas?

  23. dazz,

    Like computer models? Those are man made just like meat balls. Meatballs don’t knead themselves, just like stars can’t arrange themselves in perfect spherical forms! You need to smuggle the sphericity into the the model for it to work! And where’s the evidence that gravity can produce spherical stars, where that video? Gravity doesn’t explain where the original nebula came from! And if stars come from nebulas, why are there still nebulas?

    A mathematical model like Newton’s or Einsteins. The model is to predict the outcome then it is repeatably tested to validate.

    Since when did I make a claim about star shapes, nebulas or meatballs 🙂

  24. colewd:
    John Harshman,

    Yes, i do remember.Thank you. Do you have any evidence of the amount and type of changes to DNA that occurred?Could this be extrapolated to larger transitions?

    Yes, I do indeed have such evidence. To find it you would have to download the data and run it through an analysis program that optimizes the data onto the tree, and look at the changes along the branches. The data, fit to the tree, tell you what changes happened. Not sure what sort of extrapolation you are looking for, or what you are thinking of as “larger”.

    But would you now agree that common descent of all paleognath birds is a strongly supported hypothesis?

  25. colewd:
    dazz,

    A mathematical model like Newton’s or Einsteins.The model is to predict the outcome then it is repeatably tested to validate.

    Since when did I make a claim about star shapes, nebulas or meatballs

    You must embrace meatballs and reject gravitational fairy tales, or live an eternity of stale beer and strippers with STDs

  26. John Harshman,

    But would you now agree that common descent of all paleognath birds is a strongly supported hypothesis?

    Let me look at this more. All palegnath birds is a large diverse group. At this point I am completely open to this conclusion base on confirmation of the data and a reasonable inference that the genetic changes are probable through breeding.

  27. colewd: The model is to predict the outcome then it is repeatably tested to validate

    Kneading produces meat_balls_. Repeatably. I have videos!

  28. dazz: You must embrace meatballs and reject gravitational fairy tales, or live an eternity of stale beer and strippers with STDs

    I’ve taken that plunge, and I can testify that my life has really improved as a result. The strippers in particular are healthier.

  29. walto: I’ve taken that plunge, and I can testify that my life has really improved as a result.The strippers in particular are healthier.

    Ramen brother!

  30. KN,

    Perceptual knowledge is secured just in case I have adequate reasons to believe that I have done all I can reasonably be expected to do in issuing a perceptual report.

    That won’t fly as a criterion for justification. See this comment.

  31. keiths,

    I generally agree with that comment: I think it shows problems with KN’s approach. The problem is that it also shows problems with your own. [See my response there.]

  32. colewd:
    John Harshman,
    Let me look at this more.All palegnath birds is a large diverse group.At this point I am completely open to this conclusion base on confirmation of the data and a reasonable inference that the genetic changes are probable through breeding.

    How would you confirm the data? And whatever does “probable through breeding” mean?

  33. keiths:

    An unjustified true opinion is an opinion. According to you,

    What distinguishes “knowledge” from “opinion” is truth.

    That ‘s obviously wrong, because an unjustified true opinion and a justified true opinion are both true. Truth does not distinguish one from the other, as is obvious to anyone who is able to compare the word “true” in the first phrase to the word “true” in the second phrase.

    fifth:

    OK

    To rephrase yet again for the sake of appeasing the nitpickers

    We aren’t picking nits, fifth. Justification is crucial, and your confusions regarding justification lie at the heart of your presuppositional errors.

    You have yet to justify your claim that you receive revelations from God, as opposed to merely believing that you do.

    When comparing the very special case of unjustifed true opinions and knowledge the distinguishing factor is knowledge of the truth instead of truth alone.

    No, the distinguishing factor is justification, as already explained. Truth, alone or in combination with anything else, is not a distinguishing factor. Knowledge and true opinions have truth in common, so truth cannot be a distinguishing factor. The distinguishing factor is justification.

  34. newton: Something that is false is not necessarily a lie.

    I would agree. I overgeneralized.

    let me rephrase

    I wonder if there ever are good reasons for believing a falsehood?

    walto: One might have many good reasons for believing something that’s false. Heard it on TV, saw it in the newspaper, heard it from a trusted friend, etc. Could still be false.

    I think it’s good practice to not trust anything you hear on TV or read in the newspaper unless you have checked it out. Of course the amount of trouble I take when verifying depends on the perceived impact the claim has on my life.

    As far a a trusted friend goes if he misleads me perhaps my trust is misplaced.

    walto: And it may not be that anybody was lying. The reporter could have made a mistake, or her transmission might have been garbled, etc.

    It does not matter if the misleading is intentional if I’m mislead I do not have knowledge in that area

    let me be clear that I think there can be good reasons for misleading someone but I’m not sure there are “good” reasons for allowing myself to believe what is not true.

    peace

  35. colewd: I can model gravity and directly test the model. A testable mechanism of how it happened.

    Can you? Can you tell me if gravity behaves in the same way over small and very large distances?

  36. Mung: We’ll make an IDer out of you yet dazz!

    I may or may not have a book in the works… Ungravitatible: or how our intuition that the moon is made of cheese (Parmiggiano Reggiano) and the stars are shiny meatballs is confirmed by science. A case for the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

    You’re gonna love it

  37. colewd,

    And evolution can produce them because?

    Tell me what they are first. How can one discuss the unevolvability or otherwise of a particular DNA sequence if we don’t even know what the heck it is we are discussing? Important Sequences. Very Important Sequences. They are a serious problem for evolution, doncha know.

  38. Allan Miller,

    Tell me what they are first. How can one discuss the unevolvability or otherwise of a particular DNA sequence if we don’t even know what the heck it is we are discussing? Important Sequences. Very Important Sequences. They are a serious problem for evolution, doncha know.

    Identifying all the base pairs involved in building and maintaining a vertebrate respiratory system is above my pay grade 🙂

  39. Mung,

    dazz: Meatballs don’t knead themselves

    We’ll make an IDer out of you yet dazz!

    The theory of intelligent kneading 🙂

Leave a Reply