tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post1196612316523296845..comments2023-08-29T00:45:54.243-07:00Comments on - the dance of reason: The explanatory reductioSac State Philosophyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17963066908030437925noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post-17677912682535749112014-06-10T09:18:58.445-07:002014-06-10T09:18:58.445-07:00Em, a preference for modus tollens over modus pone...Em, a preference for modus tollens over modus ponens in this case would signal greater confidence in the claim that people do not give vast sums of money to strangers than the claim that you have won ten million dollars. I think explanatory reasoning kicks in when we are conflicted. We have the testimony of the senses (normally quite reliable) that a particular event is in fact occurring, and the wisdom of experience (also normally quite reliable) that it probably is not. To dramatize the situation, imagine that you are in WalMart and just as you get rung up the cashier says: Congratulations you are our 10 billionth customer and you have just won 10 million dollars! after which balloons are flying, sirens are going off, confetti is falling from from the ceiling and an NBC camera crew shows up out of nowhere. Now you are forced to say: How can I explain all this, if I have NOT in fact won 10 million dollars? <br /><br />In general, unlikely things are happening all of the time, and when experience informs us that this is the case, we rely on our explanatory abilities to determine whether to trust our current experience, or our reservoir of knowledge about how the world works. I think explanation may actually be a heuristic we use in lieu of Bayesian updating, however, and it often delivers the wrong answer. For example, if a very reliable blood test indicates that you have an extremely rare condition, the chances are still overwhelming that you do not. But this is something that can only be appreciated in probabilistic terms, not in explanatory terms. Our explanatory impulse will be to say: If I do not have this condition, then how am I to explain the results of this highly reliable test? G. Randolph Mayeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18285281186698499962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post-57225297636717624662014-06-10T08:43:33.704-07:002014-06-10T08:43:33.704-07:00Brad, absolutely. You've anticipated the seque...Brad, absolutely. You've anticipated the sequel to this post. And, as to your question, I can't imagine any thoughtful person disagreeing with me on this :). My hope is that this is the sort of thing that might strike some readers as "Oh, yes, well that's obviously true isn't it, but I never quite noticed it before." G. Randolph Mayeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18285281186698499962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post-74138493990749642852014-06-10T08:25:55.147-07:002014-06-10T08:25:55.147-07:00Randy, Would I be saying the same thing if I descr...Randy, Would I be saying the same thing if I described our reasoning process as a simple use of modus tollens? e.g.: If I've won ten million dollars, then someone is handing out vast sums of money to strangers. People don't hand out vast sums of money to strangers. Therefore I haven't won a million dollars. I'm not sure whether this is different reasoning or just a different description of the same reasoning.Emryshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00448652563818459358noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post-52388607859285760882014-06-09T23:22:50.584-07:002014-06-09T23:22:50.584-07:00Randy, your presentation is very clear. Is there i...Randy, your presentation is very clear. Is there is a camp of people out there who disagree with the points you are making? <br /><br />Let’s consider the clever, but crude idea of paradigm change that was presented by Thomas Kuhn in his book Structure of Scientific Revolutions. A paradigm is, among other things, a standard way of creating explanations, and a collection of “what is so.” Would you agree that the revolutionary change from the pre-Darwin paradigm to the post-Darwin paradigm was caused by scientists eventually realizing that what we supposedly knew within the old paradigm just ain’t so?<br />Bradley Dowdenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03398822652849338607noreply@blogger.com