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Re: Back to basics – testing your hypothesis.
Posted by: Gerald Hurst (IP Logged)
Date: January 22, 2007 01:41PM
In philosophy, nothing can ever be proved because the world and any observations made in it may be only a dream.
Philosophy lacks axioms beyond "I think therefore I am." In the "real" world, if such actually exists, we hold certain common shared perceptions to be true. We rely on certain ideas which we hold to be correct by mutual agreement based on our shared perceptions.
Mathematical proofs begin with an hypothesis which is "proved" by a series of logical steps beginning with concepts which we have agreed to be axiomatic.
If I have been unable to find a lost sock by looking in every nook and cranny of my house save one dresser drawer, I may hypothesize that the missing item is in that last unsearched repositiory. I test my hypothesis by looking in the drawer. If the sock is there, I have proved my hypothesis to everyone but the philosopher, who will say that I only "think" I see the sock but cannot prove it is really there (context).
Similarly, the philosophopher will argue that I cannot prove" that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line and therefore cannot prove even the simplest hypothesis in Euclidian geometry.
Sure, there are no absolute truths. But within the context of our daily lives, the shortest distance between two points is a straight line, and I can prove all sorts of hypotheses as long as I don't subject my proofs to peer review by philosophers.
Philosophy lacks axioms beyond "I think therefore I am." In the "real" world, if such actually exists, we hold certain common shared perceptions to be true. We rely on certain ideas which we hold to be correct by mutual agreement based on our shared perceptions.
Mathematical proofs begin with an hypothesis which is "proved" by a series of logical steps beginning with concepts which we have agreed to be axiomatic.
If I have been unable to find a lost sock by looking in every nook and cranny of my house save one dresser drawer, I may hypothesize that the missing item is in that last unsearched repositiory. I test my hypothesis by looking in the drawer. If the sock is there, I have proved my hypothesis to everyone but the philosopher, who will say that I only "think" I see the sock but cannot prove it is really there (context).
Similarly, the philosophopher will argue that I cannot prove" that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line and therefore cannot prove even the simplest hypothesis in Euclidian geometry.
Sure, there are no absolute truths. But within the context of our daily lives, the shortest distance between two points is a straight line, and I can prove all sorts of hypotheses as long as I don't subject my proofs to peer review by philosophers.
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