Your previous criticism that was specifically directed towards my article
is listed below.
What you propose sounds very much like ad ignorantiam to this logician.
Dave
Your statement provides nothing specific. If there is a flaw in the logic I
would appreciate you specifically mentioning it which you did not. The key
logic of my article is listed below. If you really are aware of a flaw in the
my article's reasoning, you should be able to identify a flaw in the
arguments listed below. If you find a specific flaw, don't just broad brush
it all and claim everything is flawed, be constructive by pointing out what
remains valid logic and what does not. Also, if you will not concede PE is
valid logic for determining something true about reality then explain what
logic can determine something true about reality and then explain why it is
more valid than PE.
> I regret that I must contradict your statements. I presented specific
criticisms of your suggestions that indicated that they ranged from the
dubious to the preposterous. Had you understood my statements you would
recognize that your position is without better foundation than wishful
thinking.
Dave
>On Mon, 1 Jan 2001 09:03:22 EST SHinrichs9@aol.com writes:
>
I would like to summarize my evaluation of the responses to my previous post
which introduced my article http://members.aol.com/SHinrichs9/spntid.htm.
Nobody identified a flaw in the logic of the following paragraph that makes
the cases for proof by elimination (PE) as a key logical principal for
science. Also, nobody presented another logical concept that has the
potential to logically prove something true about reality as PE does.
The two assumptions PE is based upon is that there is a correct theory for
explaining the reality being investigated and that reality follows the law of
no contradiction. Without these two assumptions reason could not determine
the truth about any reality, supernatural or natural. If there is a correct
theory that describes a certain reality and all possible hypothesis for
explaining that certain reality are false except for one hypothesis, then PE
implies that this one non-false hypothesis is true. If the remaining
hypothesis was also false then there would be no correct theory which would
contradict the premise that there is a correct theory. Thus, if the premise
that there is a correct theory is true then the one non-false hypothesis must
be true otherwise the premise would be contradicted. Thus, PE is derived from
the requirement for no contradiction which is a fundamental logical
principal. Since PE is derived from a logical concept PE is also a logical
concept. Science attempts to use PE and other logical concepts to determine
the truth about reality; thus, the scientific procedure has the potential to
logically determine something true about reality.
Nobody identified a flaw in the straight forward extension of the PE logic
for making the case for a supernatural claim as explained below.
The approach for identifying the supernatural proposed in
http://members.aol.com/SHinrichs9/spntid.htm.makes use of this logical PE
principle, by just extending it to the case where there is no plausible
natural hypothesis. If all possible natural hypothesis for explaining a
certain real event are false, then there is a logical argument that the
supernatural was involved with causing the event to occur.
Thus, I believe the basic idea as proposed in
http://members.aol.com/SHinrichs9/spntid.htm that there is a valid scientific
method for substantiating a claim that the supernatural intervened in the
observable world was not refuted by the group discussion.
Quite a few legitimate points were made that it is often impossible to get to
the point of showing all possible hypothesis false except one. I appreciate
and acknowledge this important point. I agree that for especially continuous
phenomenon in most cases it is not possible to determine all the possible
hypothesis nonetheless rule all of them out except for one. However,
especially for discrete phenomenon it is more possible to identify all
possible hypothesis and rule out all except for one. For example, the number
of large moons orbiting earth involves a discrete phenomenon. There are
either 0,1, 2, 3, … I think it is possible to rule out the theory that there
are 2 or more. It is evident there is at least one, thus, PE determines there
actually is only one.
Since I think there is a valid logical concept, I hope to see further
development in developing the valid method for the substantiation of claims
for the supernatural. For example, discussing appropriate criterion for
falsifying natural hypothesis, procedures for determining all possible
hypothesis and identify types of issues where the number hypothesis are few
enough to possibly address all of them. This would be more constructive than
dead ended criticism.
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