what's that theory called??????????

hey the other day my philosophy teacher mentioned a theory where you believe that the true answer is the one which is simplest/easiest to believe...what's it called??????????? help GREATLY appreciated xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Reply 1

Cocoa

12

A) why don't you go back to class tomorrow and ask you philosophy teacher what the name of the theory is, or call/msn your classmates and ask them??

Otherwise here's what i THINK you're talking about :
"Occam's razor states that the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory. Furthermore, when multiple competing theories have equal predictive powers, the principle recommends selecting those that introduce the fewest assumptions and postulate the fewest hypothetical entities. It is in this sense that Occam's razor is usually understood." ~wikipedia.com

it's the one that sounds the most like what you described...

Reply 2

Calvin

14

Yeah sounds like Occams Razor, but just to be precise, its a principle, not a theory. There is no account given of it, its just held up as good practice.

Reply 3

wanderer

2

Calvin

Yeah sounds like Occams Razor, but just to be precise, its a principle, not a theory. There is no account given of it, its just held up as good practice.

Give me time, give me time.

Reply 4

Calvin

14

I wouldn't bother if I were you. We should have a talk about Gruesome predicates sometime. I would like to hear what you think about the idea that simplicity is entirely relative to the semantic primives you start with - and the idea that which primitives we use is ultimately entirely arbitrary.

Reply 5

wanderer

2

Calvin

I wouldn't bother if I were you. We should have a talk about Gruesome predicates sometime. I would like to hear what you think about the idea that simplicity is entirely relative to the semantic primives you start with - and the idea that which primitives we use is ultimately entirely arbitrary.

Sounds like a formalised version of my rather vague ideas. Why Gruseome? Are they horrific or was that a philosopher's name?

Reply 6

Calvin

14

Nelson Goodman? New Riddle of Induction? A little like that Wittgenstein Rule Following thing we were talking about a while ago, but I'm more interested in the response this time.

It's the idea that for every hypothesis I might generate based on experience, there is another hypothesis which fits with experience but makes different predictions.
So up until now all emeralds I've observed have been green. So I predict that all emeralds I observe in the future will be green.
But similarly lets introduce a new predicate, Goodman calls it 'Grue'

[INDENT]'Grue' - for any object, it is Grue iff either it is first observed before today and is green, or is first observed after today and is blue. [/INDENT]

Then the idea is that all my evidence for emeralds being green is evidence for their being grue as well. So I have no more reason to believe the emeralds I see tomorrow will be green, than I do that they will be blue.

Now the point I was mainly interested in. The obvious response is to say that 'grue' and other predicates like it 'Gred' 'Grellow' 'Bleen' 'Emer-raven' (emerald if observed before today, raven if observed after today) etc etc don't count as real predicates because they are positional.

That is, they make use of this sort of 'observed before today' kind of idea (similarly you can make up other predicates which use positional clauses like 'in this room' 'in london' 'to my left' etc). The suggestion then is real predicates shouldn't be positional.

But Goodman responds that what counts as positional depends on the semantic primitives you start with. So because we speak a language where green and blue are primitives, 'grue' and 'bleen' are positional. But if we spoke a language where our primitives where grue and bleen (and he thinks there is no reason we shouldn't), then 'green' and 'blue' would be positional.

[INDENT]'Green' - Something is 'green' iff it was observed before today and was grue or else is observed after today and is bleen.
[/INDENT]So he claims all predicates are essentially equal. The reason we like 'green' and don't like 'grue' isn't because one predicate is better than the other. It's just that we commonly use the predicate 'green' and rarely if ever use the predicate 'grue'. So 'green' becomes entrenched in our language, whereas 'grue' doesn't. And he claims that's the only reason we use the predicates we do - chance. Or as one philosopher said, 'chance sanctified by habit'.

So we use certain predicates, often the simplest kind. But which predicates are the the simplest ones depends on which semantic primitives we use. Whether we speak a blue/green language or a grue/bleen language.

I've got a response, but I'll leave it there for the moment.

Reply 7

wanderer

2

Change the kind of language we have to the kind of mind we're born with and I think I could go for that. But I'm mildly drunk so take anything I type with a pinch of salt.

what's that theory called??????????

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Trending

Articles for you