Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Physics vs. philosophy




In the article “A Little Philosophy Is A Dangerous Thing, http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2011/02/04/133363055/a-little-philosophy-is-a-dangerous-thing “, Alva Noë wrote, “... But notice, too, that it is not a problem that physics can solve by simply doing more physics. It's a problem about physics, after all.

And this is the hallmark of philosophical problems, which usually take the form of a distinctive and urgent puzzlement about what we take for granted. Philosophical problems arise when we are not sure how to go on, or not sure what we've been doing all along, and they arise in any domain whatsoever (neuroscience, biology, religion, politics, morality, and, of course, physics).

Can breakthroughs in physics solve the philosophical problem of making sense of the meaning of physics itself? Do the "recent discoveries" and "theoretical advances" of the last few decades enable us to frame new approaches to the question of the apparent incompatibility of common sense and modern physics,... ?”



Indeed, can breakthroughs in physics solve the philosophical problem of making sense of the meaning of physics itself? Obviously, the author did not think so.


“Philosophical problems arise when we are not sure how to go on.” That is, if we know how to go on, then we do not need philosophy at all for physics. Yet, can physics go on with only the gadget physics? The article “LHC, the end of the old physics epistemology, http://prebabel.blogspot.com/2012/04/lhc-end-of-old-physics-epistemology.html “ discusses this issue in detail.


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