[MD] S/O and Morality

[Jorge Goldfarb]

     From the various subjects that merit discussion in Platt's Digest of  Jan 10 th, I'd like to select the question of  the role of facts in Science. This because, IMO, that role is largely misunderstood  by the public outside Science, because it is implicit in Pirsig's saying: 
  "Subject-object science is only concerned with 
  facts. Morals have no objective reality. You can look through a microscope 
  or telescope or oscilloscope for the rest of your life and you will never 
  find a single moral. There aren't any there."
   
   and also because it has something to do with the interpretation of the various reports on global warming, one of which is currently being discussed here. 
   ====== 
   
    I wrote in Jan 5:
   
  Science is not primarily concerned with facts; its main concern is
  with theories; new  facts are   a concern insofar as, when  confronted with existing theories, better ones may be formulated.In other language, scientists main concern is 'weaving'   various intellectual patterns; patterns that are essentially dynamic and
   that (hopefully) will some day merge into one. It might be said that a theory is primarily a form of insight, i.e. a way of looking at the world , and not a form of knowledge of how the world is (David Bohm).
   
  ======== 
  To which Platt commented on Jan 10: 
   
   I disagree. Theories are indeed important in science. But without facts to test the theories, the theories are useless. The two go together like subjects and objects -- theories being subjective, facts objective.   
   
  ========== 
   
    I wouldn't say that "facts are objective" but rather that scientists presume that facts may be objectively observed. This is indeed a sweeping assumption. 
   
   A countless number of things is constantly happening in this world of ours, from this countless number a scientist may select one and proceed to observe it in detail; only then it might become "a fact". The key word here is ' selection'. By ways of example:
   
     An astronomer is busily looking through his telescope. He's not just looking around haphazardly to see whatever is happening in the sky that particular night, he's 'looking for' something specific, something that could be relevant to the theory or topic that interests him. If he's lucky enough to find one of those phenomena, he'll observe it carefully and record it.   After this selection and recording, and after painful corroboration, whatever he thought he observed, could be called a fact.
   
       Pretty much the same could be said about a fellow that busies himself observing into a cloud chamber. From the countless things that his elementary particles may be doing at any time, he 'selects'    
  just the one that interests him, say two positrons colliding enthusiastically, and again, after painful corroboration, it may become a fact. 
   
       From this two examples I hope it is clear that the astronomer or nuclear physicist, or any other scientist,is conscious that establishing a fact is a process in which they have actively mingled, so that the process of some event becoming a fact can hardly be thought as 'objective'. 
   
    Where objectivity really enters into the picture is in the scientists belief that whatever happened (and, if it happened) was not altered, modified, because of being observed. This is another sweeping assumption which, as we all know, was criticized from within (another good point for Science) largely by 'the facts' on which Quantum Theory was proposed, nearly a century ago. 
   
      Interestingly enough, Prof. Collingwood used to express the same views about the so-called 'historical facts': Among the countless events that happened at a particular moment in time, the historian, 'selects' just the one that interests him; only when fitted inside his narrative, whatever happened and, if it happened,becomes an historical fact. 
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  To Platt: I apologize for being so slow in answeing your posts. I'll comment on your latest in my next one. 
   
            
   
   


       
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