"Naturalism"; Any takers?

[Elixir]

What’s the difference between naturalism and determinism?

One does not entail the other. They are two separate concepts, in fact.

Each at least implies the other. I still don’t understand the separation, other than in habitual application. Outside of that they seem interchangeable FAPP. Not that it matters to any points of discussion here …

 

[pood]

What’s the difference between naturalism and determinism?

One does not entail the other. They are two separate concepts, in fact.

Each at least implies the other. I still don’t understand the separation, other than in habitual application. Outside of that they seem interchangeable FAPP. Not that it matters to any points of discussion here …

I don’t see how each implies the other, especially since determinism might not even be true in this world. We already know it is not fully true because of quantum indeterminism. At any rate, one can easily image a fully naturalistic world that is completely chaotic.

 

[Jarhyn]

So I was bopping around the forum here and I noticed that many of our site sponsors espouse or promote a philosophy called "naturalism". I don't think I have ever paid attention to this particular emanation of Western secularism, and would be curious to know more about it. Does anyone here describe themselves as a naturalist? If so, what does the term mean to you? How is naturalism different from, say, materialism? What is the "nature" part of naturalism meant to refer to exactly? I can look up wikipedia on my own, but I am curious about your personal take.

I do describe myself this way from time to time.

Sometimes I call myself a materialist, but that's not entirely the case?

Essentially, to me, it means "all there is is nature bound to some set of laws".

The laws I see nature as being bound to are not the ones people generally ascribe to as laws, however: I only recognize the law of non-contradiction under the ideas of set theory. As such the laws I recognize as "natural" are not the laws of physics per se, but rather the laws of math.

To that end, I think some "laws" are descriptive, not really universal laws, bound only in the context where they force non-contradiction to hold, and after about 2 solid months studying mathematical universes and number fields, this opinion hasn't changed at all.

For instance, I expect the universe we experience is the consequence of the consistency of a particular kind of math, essentially that the system we experience is a fixed, finite process over a vast but ultimately "finite" window on an evolving system which is itself just one member of a family of a set of such systems whose laws isolate each system from directly experiencing its neighbors (even if some systems feature internal finite simulation of their neighbors).

This is distinct from any "simulation theory" answer, which posits that reality as we experience is a mutable "hackable"/buggy/imperfect/leaky thing that allows direct contact rather with other systems and/or cheeky shit within this one.

To me, it's basically a stance on supernatural magic: if this is a solid universe projected by the underlying laws of consistency within math, the only "magic" is whatever "magic" exists as exploitable physics under those "laws"; of it isn't, then we might be sitting quite "high" above such laws with quite a bit of leeway between us and any such "natural" layer.

 

[DBT]

Cause and effect is observable and verifiable. Do this and that happens, calculate orbits, predict future events, comets, place landers on Venus, Moon, Venus, Mars, Titan.....on a macro scale, the Universe is verifiably deterministic.

 

[pood]

I’d point out that this thread is about naturalism, not determinism. They are not the same thing and one does not imply the other. In any case, determinism is unsupported at the quantum levlel, and we know that quantum effects can propogate to the macro world.

 

[Elixir]

one can easily image a fully naturalistic world that is completely chaotic.

Can you not imagine a totally chaotic world that is also deterministic?
Determinism doesn’t negate chaos, unless there is some mathematical constraint to one or the other that I’m ignorant of …

 

[pood]

one can easily image a fully naturalistic world that is completely chaotic.

Can you not imagine a totally chaotic world that is also deterministic?
Determinism doesn’t negate chaos, unless there is some mathematical constraint to one or the other that I’m ignorant of …

Sure, see chaos theory. But this still has nothing to do specifically with the idea of naturalism.

 

[pood]

You can have supernatural determinism, in which God decides everything in advance.

 

[Elixir]

You can have supernatural determinism, in which God decides everything in advance.

Subject to proof, to be offered at the last supper at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe… be sure to stay for the second set!

 

[bilby]

which does not prove it MUST be that way, or that the inverse-square “law” is a law at all, instead of being a description of how thing go in this (contingent) world.

This is just equivocation. The word "law" in science does not carry the same exact meaning as that word in a political or casual context, and nor does the word "must" in physics carry the same exact meaning as that word in a philosophical or legal context.

A scientific law is a description of how things will ideally be expected to behave under defined conditions. Those conditions need not even exist - they may be entirely hypothetical, such as the "closed system" of the first and second laws of thermodynamics.

As far as I am aware, no system (other than possibly the universe itself) is truly thermodynamically closed, though many systems are closed enough for the laws to be a very useful description of reality.

Laws apply to the infamous spherical cow in a vacuum. They are idealisations of reality.

 

[Politesse]

Can you not imagine a totally chaotic world that is also deterministic?

Indeed, in a strictly deterministic world one expects chaos. But I think the word chaos is wearing different hats here. Chaos to Ian Malcolm is the predictable outcome of the interaction of complex systems. You cannot know what the result will be due to the limitations of our investigative faculties, but the process of phenomena getting increasingly less predictable over time is elegantly, almost ironically predictable in general shape. Whereas chaos to Deepak Chopra means unpredictable to the sciences but manipulable by the Will. Two very different, maybe fundamentally different uses of the word.

Of course, Chaos used to just be the name of a god! A god with no temples, pointedly.

 

[Politesse]

This is just equivocation. The word "law" in science does not carry the same exact meaning as that word in a political or casual context, and nor does the word "must" in physics carry the same exact meaning as that word in a philosophical or legal context.

It shouldn't. But it often does. Not everyone is a scientist.

 

[pood]

which does not prove it MUST be that way, or that the inverse-square “law” is a law at all, instead of being a description of how thing go in this (contingent) world.

This is just equivocation. The word "law" in science does not carry the same exact meaning as that word in a political or casual context, and nor does the word "must" in physics carry the same exact meaning as that word in a philosophical or legal context.

A scientific law is a description of how things will ideally be expected to behave under defined conditions.

I agree with this. It’s just my point. As the philosopher of science Norman Swartz argued, “law” in the scientific context should not be confused with “law” in a legislative context. He argued, and I agree, that conflating the two is a hangover from the idea that there is a universal “lawgiver,” i.e., God.