"Dewey Dykstra, Jr." wrote:
[snip]
> In addition I do not base my argument on Kuhn despite the fact that some
> might relate it to things that have been said about him.
>
> Dewey
>
> +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> Dewey I. Dykstra, Jr. Phone: (208)426-3105
> Professor of Physics Dept: (208)426-3775
[snip]
> "As a result of modern research in physics, the ambition and hope,
> still cherished by most authorities of the last century, that physical
> science could offer a photographic picture and true image of reality
> had to be abandoned." --M. Jammer in Concepts of Force, 1957.
>
> "If what we regard as real depends on our theory, how can we make
> reality the basis of our philosophy? ...But we cannot distinguish
> what is real about the universe without a theory...it makes no sense
> to ask if it corresponds to reality, because we do not know what
> reality is independent of a theory."--S. Hawking in Black Holes
> and Baby Universes, 1993.
> +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
If anyone needs any further convincing that the quotes in
Prof. Dykstra's email sig file are, if not "objectively true",
at least determinative of the place of "objectivity" in contemporary
human individual and social life, at least among educated segments of the
populace in Western and Westernized countries,
all one needs to do is to look at the current process
of counting votes from the November 7 U.S. Presidential
election, in Florida.
The number of votes cast, and who they were cast for, is
simply not "a simple, objective theory-neutral fact about
how the world really is apart from our experience" (or whatever the
advocates of hypostatized reification of partial-aspects of lived human
experience choose to call it on any given occasion).
The Florida election raises such ontological issues as: what
is a real ballot (as opposed to things that bear some
secondary-qualities resemblances to ballots but are not really)?
It also raises deep methodological issues: When does a recount
serve to at least attempt to try to get a more accurate
count of votes [according to whatever transcendental
scheme of categories]? And when does a recount simply
introduce new errors into the already achieved results?
If the Florida vote counting process doesn't convince
people that Kant, and others like Kuhn and
Norwood Hanson, were right, then probably they
didn't get the message of the movie "The Truman Show" (also
set in Florida), either, namely that, in the wise words
Plato put into Protagoras' mouth in the hope they
would make the latter look like a fool instead of
making the former look like a "weasel" (Plato is to Bush, as
Protagoras is to Gore?):
What seems to a man is to him.
The solution to the straw man problem of "relativism"
this statement is claimed by some to put
before us (although, surely, not, e.g., Hegel among them...),
is not to "get behind the phenomena" to the votes-an-sich,
but to *reflect* on what we are doing, whatever it is,
and to do this in a universalizing intersubjective way.
As Habermas put it: "in conversation aimed at reaching
mutual agreement based only on the unforced force
of the better argument" -- where "better" means not
only "having the numbers correct", whatever that means,
but also having the human motivations behind the numbers right,
and we *know* what that can mean.
"Yours in discourse..."
+\brad mccormick
--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [log in to unmask]
914.238.0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua NY 10514-3403 USA
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