Comments for Steven Landsburg | The Big Questions: Tackling the Problems of Philosophy with Ideas from Mathematics, Economics, and Physics

Comment on Rock On by Roger Schlafly

Roger Schlafly — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 22:01:21 +0000

No, I do not think that either math is based on physics, or physics is based on math. They are separate fields.

Comment on Rock On by Al V.

Al V. — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:41:34 +0000

@Roger, Could you explain your views? Are you saying that math and physics are unrelated to each other? I would argue that either math is based on physics, or physics is based on math, but I’m unclear how you could argue that they are unrelated to each other.

Comment on Rock On by Al V.

Al V. — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:39:06 +0000

@Todd, do you say that Positing a God does not solve the problem of establishing objective morality because “our duties to others … were arbitrarily willed by God and are within his power to revoke and replace”? That would seem to argue that ethics are subjective, but subjective to God alone.

Comment on Rock On by Todd

Todd — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:21:01 +0000

Al V.: I don’t see how one could argue that ethics are objective, unless they posit a God that establishes those ethics

Positing a God does not solve the problem of establishing objective morality, check out the Euthyphro Dilemma:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euthyphro_dilemma

Comment on Rock On by Neil

Neil — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:05:52 +0000

I do have to laugh at the idea that belief in god is anything like belief in numbers. Only a christian believes the equation 1+1+1=1 (holy trinity).

Comment on Rock On by Marcelo

Marcelo — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 20:01:52 +0000

Totally agree w/Jonathan Kariv here. The term “existence” has a common sense definition for physical objects but not for abstract ones. Until the term is defined more precisely, commenters will be arguing past each other.

Comment on Rock On by Roger Schlafly

Roger Schlafly — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 19:08:23 +0000

Al V.: I think there are four possible views

All of your possibilities are variations on your favorite, that “Mathematics and physics are the same thing”. I don’t agree with any. Math and physics are very different things.

Comment on Rock On by Andy Wood

Andy Wood — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 18:53:24 +0000

Steve:

“Our sense of morality is a product of evolution, and would surely have been very different if the history of evolution had been different. In that sense, morality — unlike, I think, mathematics — is very much a human invention.”

Thanks for this. That’s my view. But I now have a couple of supplementary questions:

Have you ever argued about this with David Friedman?

If so, was the outcome consistent with Aumann’s Theorem?

Comment on Rock On by Al V.

Al V. — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 18:48:52 +0000

While we’re talking about ethics and the more philosophical side of mathematics and physics, I have a question about the anthropic principle. The anthropic principle seeks to answer the question, “why is this universe so perfectly tuned to support life?” For example, that the mass and rate of expansion of the universe are so perfectly tuned that the universe didn’t immediately collapse back into a point after the big bang, and at the same time didn’t expand so rapidly that matter couldn’t coalesce into stars and planets. The principle being that, if the universe wasn’t perfectly tuned to our existence, we wouldn’t be here to observe it.

Makes sense to me. And yet, I often read physicists appear to have the view that having to resort to the anthropic principle is somehow a failure; that we need to have a better explanation. I don’t understand why we need a better explanation.

Comment on Rock On by Ken B

Ken B — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 18:22:59 +0000

” Ethics are purely a cultural product that change as culture changes.” i wonder if that is really Steve’s view. It’s not mine, but substitute “biological” for culture, as biology embraces culture as well as culture-independent features …

Sam Harris’s latest book is on just this point