Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
The Atlantic is running an interview with Tim Maudlin about the philosophy of cosmology.
In May of last year Stephen Hawking gave a talk for Google in which he said that philosophy was dead, and that it was dead because it had failed to keep up with science, and in particular physics. Is he wrong or is he describing a failure of philosophy that your project hopes to address?
Maudlin: Hawking is a brilliant man, but he's not an expert in what's going on in philosophy, evidently. Over the past thirty years the philosophy of physics has become seamlessly integrated with the foundations of physics work done by actual physicists, so the situation is actually the exact opposite of what he describes. I think he just doesn't know what he's talking about. I mean there's no reason why he should. Why should he spend a lot of time reading the philosophy of physics? I'm sure it's very difficult for him to do. But I think he's just . . . uninformed.
I asked my father what he made of the interview. He replied:
The article is rather flabby, but Tim Maudlin is a terrific philosopher of physics, and what he has to say is always worth reading. He is surely correct in observing that the physicists have not been much occupied in asking or answering the obvious and natural philosophical questions that their theories suggest. He is also correct in implying that when the physicists do talk about philosophy, they generally make themselves look ridiculous. The philosophers doing philosophy of physics are the best of the best. They know a lot of physics and a lot of mathematics and they have the self-confidence of men who know both. What they lack is any kind of daring. There are institutional constraints in play in philosophy as well as evolutionary biology. The philosophers know better than to take on the physicists as rivals.
He also said, "I'll be happy to babble on further if anyone asks a question or two."
Anyone care to ask a question or two?
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May '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
Somebody said, "Philosophy is what you do until you understand something well enough to do science."
Feb '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
How is it possible for a something into come to being from nothing? This question is as old as the pre-Socratics. Do you think this question is intelligible, or an example of the moribund philosophical inquiry that Hawking dismisses? What are the answers to this question from leading physicists--not philosophers--and do you find them persuasive?
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
Keep the questions coming--I'll make sure he sees them all.
Mar '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
Philosophy is for those who don't understand mathematics.
I myself am nowhere near the level of mathematics that Hawking lives at, but I know enough to appreciate that, at his level, words are a very poor substitute, which is probably why he doesn't spend so much time on 'em. Words fail even for something as relatively mundane as Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, let alone the origin of (this) Universe, and what was before it, whatever "before" means.
Oh, and I'd be suspicious of philosophers of physics with a lot of self-confidence and many words.
Edited on January 23, 2012 at 12:56pmMay '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I confess my ignorance as to the nature of "philosophy of physics" is. I can't picture much room between "Dancing Wu-Li Masters" mysticism (very enjoyable book nonetheless) and philosophy of science at large.
Am I being too literal in composing a meaning for the phrase? Is it philosophy which incorporates physics? I would like that a great deal, and much of modern philosophy (in my mercifully limited exposure) seems like so much re-chewing of the cud, like drum solos which are interesting only to other drummers, and not to many of those at any rate.
May '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
Hmmm. Einstein weighed in (Wikipedia):
There's more there from Einstein at the bottom of the page. The majority of the entry seems more like definitions of things in science. Perhaps the page is not well-edited.
So I suppose my question is what does Mr. Berlinski think of the Wikipedia page on Philosophy of Physics? Is that a good starting point, or is the page lost in an inconsistent state?
Nov '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
People might want to check out John Haldane's criticism of Hawking. I'd be curious, too, what Claire's father thinks of it.
May '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
Am enjoying the paper.
Nov '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I have a question that has been bugging me for years that I would very, very much appreciate you asking your father about. The article is titled "What Happened Before the Big Bang." If time started at the big bang, which I believe the mathematics, based on observations, says is an empirical fact, then how is it not simply nonsensical to ask what came before it? Causation is a temporal phenomenon: no time, no causation. If it's not that simple, what am I missing? Is there a philosopher of physics who agrees with me on this? I would be interested in buying their book(s).
May '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I think you're exactly right, but philosophers are not big on just throwing their hands up in the air and giving up. The history of philosophy is littered with guys who argue "there must be a first cause but there can't be a first cause, therefore [fill in the blank]." Usually the blank is "God exists". Sometimes it is "God doesn't exist." In the case of Kant, it is "I can eat my own tail a disappear into it." Well, more or less.
Sep '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
From the Atlantic article:
At face value, this begs the question of why the universe exists--it just pushes it back to a bigger universe which has no explanation.
I wonder if Dr. Berlinski suspects, as I do, that these speculations are just glib attempts to evade what "standard cosmology" strongly suggests--that our universe was created at a single moment.
Sep '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I'd like your father's take on the implications of Hawking's statements. On my blog, I've suggested that if Hawking is right, then the proper course of action would be to get drunk and scr...
May '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I'm a little puzzled as to what philosophy adds to physics. Isn't it always just following whatever the physicists say?
Do physicists ever stop and say, "Wait, before we proceed with the next experiment or calculation, what do the philosophers think?"
Nov '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I have absolutely nothing to contribute other than my enthusiasm and interest. Science fiction, of which I am much more familiar, could be seen as the laymen's attempt to reconcile the two, for what its worth. And in that regard, I love when the grandiosity of the subject spins down to earth in conversation like this. It ends up reading like real life science fiction, as fascinating as it is exciting. And I say that with a very straight face and absolute sincerity.
Jan '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
If you portray philosophy as a sub-branch of physics, then nothing. But philosophy isn't a sub-branch of physics.
Jan '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
Sure - it was someone who doesn't do philosophy very well.
Apr '11
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I still have my same question. Science frames its rules solely in terms of what Aristotle called Material and Efficient causes. And yet the language of science is redolent with terms suggesting goal directedness such as calling genes "selfish" or describing DNA as a "Blueprint" or a "Computer Program." What Aristotle would have labeled evidence of Final Causes, the "That for the sake of which."
Is there a place in science for postulates that are True because they follow necessarily from a sequence of propositions and must be accepted as true whether or not they can be perceived by the sense?
I guess what I'm asking is should science embrace metaphysics as a source of interesting questions to explore rather than simply dismissing it out of hand? As Giambattista Vico pointed out, we understand mathematics because mankind itself made up the rules of mathematics. It may,in the end. turn out that the biggest obstacle in our understanding the Cosmos may be that we didn't make it.
Edited on January 23, 2012 at 7:58pmMay '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
Imagine two clouds. one marked (1) and the other marked (-1). Let the two clouds drift together. What do you get? (0). Nothing. Now play that video in reverse.
Nov '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I'm not entirely qualified to answer this, but I did take a Physics/Philosophy class titled "The Direction of Time," so I'll give it a shot and hopefully Old Man Berlinski will give me a pat on the head.
Basically the direction of time is defined by whichever direction leads to the total entropy of the universe increasing. Before the big bang, entropy was randomly decreasing and then it reached a global minimum we designate t=0. That is to say that before the big bang, the universe was sort of a backwards version of what it is now. Of course, if there were conscious beings around, it didn't appear to be backwards to them, since they were also moving backwards.
Sorry for vagueness. 200 word limit and all.
Edited on January 24, 2012 at 1:32pmSep '10
Re: Big Bang Bashup: Are the Philosophers Afraid of the Physicists?
I have 2 authors who I'm curious about: Wolfang Smith and Robert J Spitzer, SJ:
Links here. I'm merely wondering if David Berlinski (why do I always want to call him Sir?) is familiar with or has read any of their works