Motion and Empiriological Physics (part 1) O Creator ineffable, who of the riches of Thy wisdom didst appoint three hierarchies of Angels and didst set them in wondrous order over the highest heavens, and who didst apportion the elements of the world most wisely: do Thou, who art in truth the fountain of light and wisdom, deign to shed upon the darkness of my understanding the rays of Thine infinite brightness, and remove far from me the twofold darkness in which I was born, namely, sin and ignorance. Do Thou, who givest speech to the tongues of little children, instruct my tongue and pour into my lips the grace of Thy benediction. Give me keenness of apprehension, capacity for remembering, method and ease in learning, insight in interpretation, and copious eloquence in speech. Instruct my beginning, direct my progress, and set Thy seal upon the finished work, Thou, who art true God and true Man, who livest and reignest world without end. Amen. Regina Cœli Academy Natural Philosophy – Physics Lecturer: Mr. Alan Aversa (St. Thomas Aquinas Oratio ante studium) 03/07/12 A.M.D.G. 1 Empiriological Physics is Marked by Experiment ● ● ● ● Positivism = “empirical [experimental] test” “last tribunal of truth” ● ¿Is empiriological physics a science in the traditional sense of scientia (science): ● ● 03/07/12 “certain knowledge through causes” “certain, evident knowledge obtained by reasoning only from indisputable principles.” A.M.D.G. 3 Empiriological Physics is Marked by Experiment ● Bodies inert (Law of Inertia) ● Bodies are to the forces exteriorly acting on it. Does experiment or the application of mathematics distinguish empiriological from philosophical physics? Croce & Vico agree “that man can truly know only what he makes,” as in experiments he makes. Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason: “They [great experimenters] learned that reason has insight only into that which it produces after a plan of its own, … constraining nature to give answer to questions of reason’s own determining.” 03/07/12 ● ● ● 03/07/12 ● “Every body continues in a state of rest or of uniform motion in a straight line, except in so far as it is compelled by forces to change that state.” “Change of motion is proportional to the force and takes place in the direction of the straight line in which the force acts.” “To every action there is always an equal and contrary reaction; or, the mutual actions of any two bodies are always equal and oppositely directed along the same straight line.” A.M.D.G. A.M.D.G. 4 “Einstein asked: ‘What is observable, i.e., experimental?’” This is encapsulated in Newtons 3 Laws: ● 2 Empiriological Physics is Marked by Experiment “Galileo’s method of control”: ● A.M.D.G. Empiriological Physics is Marked by Experiment Logical empiricism: “whatever cannot be known by the method of empiriological physics is not knowable.” ● ● 03/07/12 ● Heisenberg: experimenter always interferes with experiment ● 5 Relativity theory (which Einstein preferred to call the “theory of invariances”) purified “experiment from the non-experimental which Newtonians projected into it.” 03/07/12 Heisenberg’s idea the basis of quantum mechanics A.M.D.G. 6 Empiriological Physics is Marked by Experiment Empiriological Physics is Marked by Experiment Philosophical physics: “[T]he order is to know first and to control in the light of what one knows.” ● ● Empiriological physics: control first, know later ● Control is not knowledge. The empiriological physicist must not forget about his prior cenoscopic knowledge ● ● ● 03/07/12 A.M.D.G. 7 Empiriological Physics is Not Strict Science ● ● ● 03/07/12 ● It took centuries for philosophers to identify what philosophy is, so it’s not surprising that after at least 3 centuries, modern science “is still awaiting a satisfactory diagnosis of itself.” ● ● Two types of knowledge: ● ● Practical (applied knowledge) 03/07/12 A.M.D.G. ● 9 03/07/12 Naturalism’s definitions of knowledge: – – ● ● Knowledge: “becoming another while remaining yourself” (V. E. Smith says: “being become”) – Dewey: “having” Alexander: “enjoyment” Whitehead: “feeling” ● A.M.D.G. Any experiment can test a theory; ∴, theories are not the final word. Theories have a transient character. A.M.D.G. 10 11 Northrop: method is only constant throughout intellectual history. The study of method began with Descartes’s famous discourse. ● Kant’s “pure reason” a “method without content” ● Method is an ens rationis (being of the mind). ● Knowledge in empiriological physics comes from philosophy, which “has a right to interpret empiriological data.” 03/07/12 Theories should predict new phenomena. Pure Empiriological Physics Tends to Subjectivity V. E. Smith: “A theory is timely rather than timeless, provisional rather than certain, dynamic rather than settled, questionable rather than apodictic.” ● Duhem: a physical theory is an “economizer of thought” or “classification of laws” – Empiriological Physics is Not Strict Science ● 8 Measurement ⇒ experimental law ⇒theory (“hypothetical background”) ● Speculative (knowledge for its own sake) A.M.D.G. Philosophy is a science, but is empiriological physics? Something is known scientifically if we know its What? and Why? ● There is a “science before science.” Empiriological Physics is Not Strict Science Modern philosophy has tried to answer the question: “What is modern science?” ● Cenoscopic (as opposed to ideoscopic) knowledge is that obtained from philosophical physics. Aristotle: “It is absurd to seek at the same time knowledge and the way of attaining knowledge [method]!” (Met. 995a13) 03/07/12 A.M.D.G. 12 Pure Empiriological Physics Tends to Subjectivity ● ● Pure Empiriological Physics Tends to Subjectivity Thus, an emphasis on method leads to a study of the subjective, logical, formal, and non-real. If “real” = “entities empiriological physics studies,” and ∵ empiriological method is one of control, then what is real must have pure passivity or receptivity to control. This is prime matter, which is not ontologically real; ∴, empiriological physics does not study the ontologically real. ● Law of Inertia implies a passive universe ● ● ● ● A.M.D.G. 13 Dewey: “evidence is always extrinsic” 03/07/12 Pure Empiriological Physics Tends to Subjectivity ● ● If causa æquat effectum (“cause equals effect”) or effectus integer causam plenam vel ejus gemellum reproducere potest (“The whole effect can reproduce the full cause or its exact equal”), – then effect = pure passivity. ● Newton equated causes and effects. ● ● ● ● Empiriological physics “is more method than matter.” 03/07/12 A.M.D.G. ● ● ● 15 03/07/12 Pure Empiriological Physics Leads to Nihilism ● ● ● ● ● ● Descartes wanted physics: “to render us masters and possessors of nature.” (Oeuvres) Quantum mechanics unifies radiation theory and mechanics. Einstein’s theory unifies electromagnetic and gravitational theories. A.M.D.G. 16 ● We cannot control everything; we cannot “make or break,” e.g., act or being. ● 17 Kurt Gödel: “empiriological method must contain a certain number of undefined terms,” “the undecidables.” Grelling: The empiriological method is heterological (OED: “not having the property it denotes,” like the word “silent” when spoken) ● Bacon, who said Knowledge is Power, “wanted a science of works rather than of thoughts.” A.M.D.G. Maxwell’s theory unifies electric and magnetic theory. Empiriological Method Implies Undefined Terms Fate of empiriological physics one meaningless equation? 03/07/12 14 Empiriological physics tends toward unity. E.g.: One of his “rules for philosophizing” (Scholium of his Principia): “We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain the appearances.” Thus, “nothing could ever be an effect.” A.M.D.G. Nihilism = “Philos. The belief or theory that the world has no real existence; the rejection of all notions of reality.” (OED) He said “Hypotheses non fingo.” (“I do not fake hypotheses.”) when he wanted to avoid “occult (unknown) causes.” ● Kant: We can’t know a thing-in-itself (Ding an sich) Pure Empiriological Physics Leads to Nihilism Leibniz: ● Thus, no intrinsic causes implies only prime matter remains. Law of Inertia = empiriological preference for control ● 03/07/12 “The only way of formulating this principle,” Kant agrees, “is to admit that every material change has an extrinsic cause.” Thus it cannot verify itself with itself. V. E. Smith: “A yardstick [in empiriological physics] is known to be a yard long ultimately because it is seen to be so, not because it is measured by something outside itself.” Science must begin with what is self-evident, not with what is “undecidable” or “indeterminate.” 03/07/12 A.M.D.G. 18 References ● V. E. Smith’s Philosophical Physics ● Please read first half of ch. 5 (Motion and Empiriological Physics). – 03/07/12 We will send out a scanned PDF of this required reading. A.M.D.G. 19