edit: Then there's the whole "what is a cow" thing. Like if you you stuffed a cow carcass with a robot and no one could tell the difference, would that still be a cow? Or what if you came across a horrifying cow-horse hybrid, what would you call that? Or if the cow in question had a unique mutation possessed by no other cow - does it still fit the cow archetype? For example, what if the cow couldn't produce milk? Or was created in lab? Which features are required to inherit cow-ness? This is an ambiguity covered by language, too. For example, "cow" is a pejorative not necessarily referring to a bovine animal.

edit: And also the whole "is knowledge finite or infinite?". Is there ever a point at which we can explain everything, science ends and we can rest on our laurels? What then? Will we spend our time explaining hypotheticals that don't exist? Pure theoretical math? Or can that end too?

You've called J and T into question, so let's do B as well. Physicists know that QM and relativity can't be true, so it's fair to say that they don't believe in these theories, in a naive sense at least. In general anyone who takes Box' maxim that all models are wrong (but some are useful) to heart, doesn't fully believe in any straightforward sense. But clearly we'd say physicists do have knowledge.

Sure we'd say physicists have knowledge of quantum mechanics and general relativity. And we can also say physicists have knowledge of how to make predictions using quantum mechanics and general relativity. In this sense, general relativity is no more wrong than a hammer is wrong. Relativity is simply a tool that a person can use to make predictions. Strictly speaking then relativity is not itself right or wrong, rather it's the person who uses relativity to predict things who can be right or wrong. If a person uses general relativity incorrectly, which can be done by applying it to an area where it's not able to make predictions such as in the quantum domain, then it's the person who uses relativity as a tool who is wrong, not relativity itself.

As a matter of linguistic convenience, it's easier to say that relativity (or theory X) is right means that people who use relativity to make predictions make correct predictions as opposed to relativity itself being correct or incorrect.

My point is that QM and GR make very different claims about what exists. Perhaps it's possible to unify the descriptions. But more likely there will be a new theory with a completely different description of reality.

On small scales, GR and Newtonian mechanics make almost the same predictions, but make completely different claims about what exists in reality. In my view, if the theories made equally good predictions, but still differed so fundamentally about what exists, then that matters, and implies that at least one of the theories is wrong. This is more a realist, than an instrumentalist position, which perhaps is what you subscribe to, but tbh instrumentalism always seemed indefensible to me.

If you are aware that "Maxatar's conjecture is that 1 + 1 = 5", then it's correct to say that you have knowledge about "Maxatar's conjecture", regardless of whether the conjecture is actually true or false. Your knowledge is that there is some conjecture that 1 + 1 = 5, not that it's actually true.

In that sense, it's also correct to say that physicists have knowledge of relativity and quantum mechanics. I don't think any physicist including Einstein himself thinks that either theory is actually true, but they do have knowledge of both theories in much the same way that one has knowledge of "Maxatar's conjecture" and in much the way that you have knowledge of what the flat Earth proposition is, despite them being false.'

It seems fairly radical to believe that instrumentalism is indefensible, or at least it's not clear what's indefensible about it. Were NASA physicists indefensible to use Newtonian mechanics to send a person to the moon because Newtonian mechanics are "wrong"?

What exactly is indefensible? The observation that working physicists don't really care about whether a physical theory is "real" versus trying to come up with formal descriptions of observed phenomenon to make future predictions, regardless of whether those formal descriptions are "real"?

If someone choses to engage in science by coming up with descriptions and models that are effective at communicating with other people observations, experimental results and whose results go on to allow for engineering advances in technology, are they doing something indefensible?

Yes, it's correct to say that I have knowledge of your conjecture, and in the same way that physicists have knowledge of QM and GR regardless of their truth status, but beyond just having knowledge of the theory, they also have knowledge of the reality that the theory describes.

>Were NASA physicists indefensible to use Newtonian mechanics to send a person to the moon because Newtonian mechanics are "wrong"?

No, it was defensible, and that's exactly my point. Even though they didn't believe in the content of the theory (and ignoring the fact that they know a better theory), they do have knowledge of reality through it.

I don't think instrumentalism makes sense for reasons unrelated to this discussion. A scientist can hold instrumentalist views without being a worse scientist for it, it's a philosophical position. Basically, I think it's bad metaphysics. If you refuse to believe that the objects described by a well-established theory really exist, but you don't have any concrete experiment that falsifies it or a better theory, then to me it seems like sheer refusal to accept reality. I think people find instrumentalism appealing because they expect that any theory could be replaced by a new one that could turn out very different, and then they see it as foolish to have believed the old one, so they straight up refuse to believe or care what any theory says about reality. But you always believe something, whether you are aware of it or not, and the question is whether your beliefs are supported by evidence and logic.

A robot in a cow carcass is not a cow, it's a "robot in a cow carcass". Someone might believe it's a cow because they lack crucial information but that's on them, doesn't change the fact.

A cow-horse hybris is not a cow, it's a cow-horse hybrid.

A cow with a genetic mutation is a cow with a genetic mutation.

A cow created in a lab, perhaps even grown 100% by artificial means in-vitro is of course still a cow since it has the genetic makeup of a cow.

The word cow is the word cow, its meaning can differ based on context.

Things like this is why philosophers enjoy zero respect from me and why I'm an advocate for abolishing philosophy as a subject of study and also as a profession. Anyone can sit around thinking about things all day. If you spend money on studying it at a university you're getting scammed.

Also knowledge is finite based purely on the assumption that the universe is finite. An observer outside the universe would be able to see all information in the universe and they would conclude; you can't pack infinite amounts of knowledge into a finite volume.

While I tend to also wave away philosophers as it always boil down to unclear definitions, I don’t think your argument answers the question at all.

From “it has the genetic makeup of a cow”, you’re saying that what make a cow a cow is the genetic makeup. But then part of that ADN defines the cow? What can vary, by how much, before a cow stops being a cow?

The point is that you can give any definition of “cow”, and we can imagine a thing that fits this definition yet you’d probably not consider a cow. It’s a reflection on how language relates to reality. Whether it’s an interesting point or not is left to the reader (I personally don’t think it is)

I have this pet theory that Philosophy is kind of the Alternative Medicine of intellectual pursuits. In the same way that Alternative Medicine is doomed to consist of stuff that doesn't work (because anything proven to work becomes "Medicine"), Philosophy is made entirely of ideas that can't be validated through observation (because then they'd be Science), and also can't be rigorously formalized (because then they'd be Math).

So for any given claim in Philosophy, if you could find a way to either (a) compare it to the world or (b) state it in unambiguous symbolic terms, then we'd stop calling it Philosophy. As a result it seems like the discipline is doomed to consist of unresolvable debates where none of the participants even define their terms quite the same way.

Crazy idea, or no?

From Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy:

"Some ungentle reader will check us here by informing us that philosophy is as useless as chess, as obscure as ignorance, and as stagnant as content. “There is nothing so absurd,” said Cicero, “but that it may be found in the books of the philosophers.” Doubtless some philosophers have had all sorts of wisdom except common sense; and many a philosophic flight has been due to the elevating power of thin air. Let us resolve, on this voyage of ours, to put in only at the ports of light, to keep out of the muddy streams of metaphysics and the “many-sounding seas” of theological dispute. But is philosophy stagnant? Science seems always to advance, while philosophy seems always to lose ground. Yet this is only because philosophy accepts the hard and hazardous task of dealing with problems not yet open to the methods of science—problems like good and evil, beauty and ugliness, order and freedom, life and death; so soon as a field of inquiry yields knowledge susceptible of exact formulation it is called science. Every science begins as philosophy and ends as art; it arises in hypothesis and flows into achievement. Philosophy is a hypothetical interpretation of the unknown (as in metaphysics), or of the inexactly known (as in ethics or political philosophy); it is the front trench in the siege of truth. Science is the captured territory; and behind it are those secure regions in which knowledge and art build our imperfect and marvelous world. Philosophy seems to stand still, perplexed; but only because she leaves the fruits of victory to her daughters the sciences, and herself passes on, divinely discontent, to the uncertain and unexplored."

Thanks, that's a hell of a quote! Though one suspects that Alternative Medicine would describe itself in similar terms, given the chance..

Science and Math started as part of Philosophy. They just split out and became large specializations of their own. Schools for Math and Science still graduate Doctors of Philosophy for a reason.

Even the Juris Doctor is a branch of philosophy. After all, what is justice?

Sure, I hoped it might go without saying that I meant Philosophy as the term is used now - post-axiomatic systems and whatnot, not as the term was used when it encompassed the two things I'm comparing it to.

> for any given claim in Philosophy, if you could find a way to either (a) compare it to the world or (b) state it in unambiguous symbolic terms…

Not a crazy idea – that is called logic. Which is a field of philosophy. Philosophy and math intersect more than many people think.

My pet peeve is that a lot of people who have never studied an hour of philosophy think that this is what people who study philosophy do.

"Anyone can sit around thinking about things all day" is like saying "anybody can sit and press keys on a keyboard all day".

I took a semester of philosophy at uni, perhaps the best invested time during my years there and by far more demanding than most of what followed. 100 % recommend it for anyone who wants to hone their critical reasoning skills and intellectual development in general.

Oh, this is a fun Gettier, with some language ambiguities, and some ship of Theseus sprinkled in! Let's say some smart-aleck travels back in time to when the English language was being developed and replaces all cows with robot cows such that current cows remain biological. So technically the word "cow" refers only to robot cows. What then?

You're view is more inline with the philosophy of science which holds nothing an ever be justified.

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/Karl_Popper

read The problem of induction and demarcation: https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/Falsifiability

Basically to some it all up because we aren't "omniscient" nothing can in actuallity ever be known.

Does the philosophy of science theorize anything about the end or limits of science and knowledge? I find that topic fascinating.

Yes. It says nothing can be proven in science and therefore reality as we know it. Things can only be falsified. But proof is the domain of mathematics… not of reality.

Read the example of the black swan in the wiki link.

Seems contradictory but you can clarify. If a proposition can be falsified then that is knowledge that said proposition is false, and the negation is true. If nothing can be proven or known then it must follow that nothing can be falsified.

First you need intuition on what's going on.

"All swans are white."

This statement cannot be proven because it's not possible to observe all swans. There may be some swan in some hidden corner of the earth (or universe) that I did not see.

If I see one black swan, I have falsified that statement.

When you refer to "Not all swans are white" This statement can be proven true but why? This is because the original statement is a universal claim and the negation is a particular claim.

The key distinction between universal claims and particular claims explains why you can "prove" the statement "Not all swans are white." Universal claims, like "All swans are white," attempt to generalize about all instances of a phenomenon. These kinds of statements can never be definitively proven true because they rely on inductive reasoning—no matter how many white swans are observed, there’s always the possibility that a counterexample (a non-white swan) will eventually be found.

In contrast, particular claims are much more specific. The statement "Not all swans are white" is a particular claim because it is based on falsification—it only takes the observation of one black swan to disprove the universal claim "All swans are white." Since black swans have been observed, we can confidently say "Not all swans are white" is true.

Popper's philosophy focuses on how universal claims can never be fully verified (proven true) through evidence, because future observations could always contradict them. However, universal claims can be falsified (proven false) with a single counterexample. Once a universal claim is falsified, it leads to a particular claim like "Not all swans are white," which can be verified by specific evidence.

In essence, universal claims cannot be proven true because they generalize across all cases, while particular claims can be proven once a falsifying counterexample is found. That's why you can "prove" the statement "Not all swans are white"—it’s based on specific evidence from reality, in contrast to the uncertain generality of universal claims.

To sum it up. When I say nothing can be proven and things can only be falsified... it is isomorphic to saying universal claims can't be proven, particular claims can.

Is 1=1 disputed in philosophy of science?

Probably only inasmuch as 1 is a theoretical framework. While 1*N dollars is nice to have, I'd probably have more dollars without fractional rounding.

Well, nothing can be truly known on _inductive_ basis but we surely can know things on _deductive_ basis

Deduction does not exist in reality.

Read this dialogue with ChatGPT to see why:

https://chatgpt.com/share/670e7f9e-d1d0-8001-b1ef-3f4cbc85b9...

It’s a bit long winded and gets into much more detail but I will post ChatGPT’s most relevant response below:

   You’re right to point out that complexity alone doesn’t necessarily rule out deduction. Deduction can, in principle, work even in highly complex systems as long as the premises are perfectly known and logically valid. So the real issue with why deduction fundamentally does not exist in reality comes down to the nature of human knowledge and the way we interact with reality itself. Here’s why deduction struggles at a more fundamental level:

   1. The Problem of Incomplete Knowledge

   In mathematics and formal logic, deduction works because the premises are often abstract, well-defined, and complete within a given system (e.g., “All triangles have three sides”). In contrast, human knowledge of reality is never complete. We can never be sure we have all the relevant facts, laws, or variables. Even with the most advanced observational tools, there are always things we don’t know or can’t foresee.

 • In mathematics: Premises like “All even numbers are divisible by 2” are universally true within that system.
 • In reality: We might observe many instances of a phenomenon and think we know the rules, but there could always be exceptions or unknown factors (as in the Black Swan problem).

   Because we cannot ever have perfect, complete premises about the world, any deductions we make based on our observations are always vulnerable to being undermined by new information.

   2. Reality is Unbounded and Open-Ended

   Mathematical systems and formal logic operate in closed systems with clearly defined rules. Reality, on the other hand, is open-ended and continuously evolving. There’s no fixed “set” of all knowledge about the universe. What we take to be the laws of nature today might change tomorrow with new discoveries, so the premises we use for deductive reasoning in the real world are inherently uncertain.

   For instance, before the discovery of quantum mechanics, classical mechanics seemed to perfectly describe the physical world. Once quantum theory emerged, the premises on which classical deductions were made had to be re-examined.

 • In a closed system (like math): You can set the premises and they remain stable.
 • In reality: The premises are constantly subject to change or reinterpretation as we learn more.

   3. The Problem of Infinite Regress (Uncertainty in Premises)

   Even if you think you have solid premises to base deduction on, those premises themselves depend on other premises, which in turn depend on further premises. This infinite regress means that you can never be certain that your foundational premises are truly, absolutely correct.

   For example:

 • You might reason deductively that “all swans are white” because all observed swans have been white.
 • But this premise itself is based on inductive observation, which is inherently fallible.
 • Even if we had observed all swans ever seen by humans, we still couldn’t deduce that “all swans are white” without being omniscient, since future discoveries could prove otherwise.

   In the end, any attempt to apply deduction to reality rests on premises that ultimately cannot be guaranteed to be perfectly, universally true, leading to a breakdown in the validity of deduction in real-world scenarios.

   4. The Distinction Between Reality and Abstraction

   Mathematics and logic are abstract constructs—they exist independently of the physical world and follow internally consistent rules. Reality, on the other hand, is not an abstract system; it is something we experience, observe, and interact with. This creates a fundamental mismatch:

 • Abstractions (like mathematics) allow us to create premises and rules that are certain, because we define them.
 • Reality doesn’t conform to these strict, definable rules—it involves uncertainty, chance, and emergent properties that abstractions can’t fully capture.

   Because reality is not abstract, we cannot reduce it to a system of premises and rules in the same way we can with mathematics. Any attempt to do so will always miss something essential, undermining the validity of deduction in practice.

   5. Chaos and Uncertainty in Physical Systems (ChatGPT is wrong here, I deleted it… it references chaos theory which is technically still deterministic, only quantum theory says things are fundamentally unknowable so ChatGPT is right from the perspective of fundamental uncertainty but he used chaos theory wrongly here in his reasoning) 

   Conclusion: Fundamental Uncertainty and Incompleteness

   The fundamental issue with deduction in reality is that human knowledge is inherently incomplete and uncertain. Reality is an open, evolving system where new discoveries and unforeseen events can change what we thought we knew. Deduction requires absolute certainty in its premises, but in reality, we can never have that level of certainty.

   At its core, the reason deduction doesn’t fully apply to reality is because reality is far more complex, open-ended, and fundamentally uncertain than the closed, abstract systems where deduction thrives. We cannot create the perfect, unchanging premises needed for deduction, and as a result, deductions in the real world are always prone to failure when confronted with new information or complexities we hadn’t accounted for.

Biology makes it even more complicated. If you see your mother, you consider her to be imposter. While if you hear your mother's voice, you consider her to be real.

Ramachandran Capgras Delusion Case

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xczrDAGfT4

> On the flip side, even if the knowledge is wrong, if everyone agrees it is true, does it even matter?

This is case of consensus reality (an intuition pump I borrowed from somewhere). Consensus reality is also respected in Quantum realm.

https://youtu.be/vSnq5Hs3_wI?t=753

while individual particles remain in quantum superposition, their relative positions create a collective consensus in the entanglement network. This consensus defines the structure of macroscopic objects, making them appear well-defined to observers, including Schrödinger's cat.

Bayesian epistemology is indeed one of the developments in the field that avoids Gettie.

> I'm not sure I see the big deal.

Tumblr is loginwalled now, so I can't find the good version of this, but I'll try and rip it:

Philosophical questions like "what is knowledge" are hard precisely because everyone has an easy and obvious explanation that is sufficient to get them trough life.

But, when forced to articulate that explanation, people often find them to be incomparable with other people's versions. Upon probing, the explanations don't hold at all. This is why some ancient Greek thought experiments can be mistaken for zen koans.

Yeah, you can get by in life without finding a rigorous answer. The vast majority of human endeavor beyond subsistence can be filed under the category "I'm not sure I see the big deal."

To say that about the question of knowledge and then vamp for 200 words is not refusing to engage. It's patching up a good-enough answer to suit a novel challenge and moving on. Which is precisely why these questions are hard, and why some people are so drawn to exploring for an answer.