Is nature supernatural? : a philosophical exploration of science and nature / Simon L. Altmann.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Altmann, Simon L., 1924-2022.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Science--Philosophy.

Science.

Physical Description:

680 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Amherst, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 2002.

Contents:

Is Science in Crisis? 29

Metaphysics and Meta-physics 30

Two Views of Nature 33

2. Words and Necessity 37

A Rose Is a Rose: Tautology 38

Analytic Propositions 38

Synthetic Propositions 40

Necessity 41

The A Priori 42

Positional Predicates 43

3. How to Deal with Properties by Logic 47

Toward Laws of Nature: Properties 49

Ravens Are Black: Material Implication 50

Truth Tables and the Logical Functions 51

The Universal Quantifier: Induction 54

Ravens Are Black: Paradoxes of Confirmation 56

What Have We Learned about Induction? 60

Properties 61

Useful Untruths: Counterfactuals 62

4. Of Hume and Poached Eggs: Causality 69

The Sun Heats the Stone 71

Hume the Skeptical 73

Powers, Efficient Causes, and Other Pretty Ideas 74

Causal Chains 76

Dispositions 79

The Poached Egg at Last: Hume on Custom or Habit 82

A Brief History of the World 83

Evolution and the Principle of Natural Selection 85

Back to Hume's Custom or Habit 87

The Anthropic Argument (Anthropic Principle) 89

Necessity Again 91

The Logic of Causal Statements in Science 92

Facts and How to Digest Them 95

Two Great Normative Meta-physical Principles 97

5. Virtuous Circles: Length and Time 113

The Ontology of Time 114

How to Measure Space and Time 116

The Timescale 118

Conventionalism and Virtuous Circles 122

The Causal Timescale 124

6. Virtuous Circles: States 129

What Is a State? 130

Newton on Newton's Second Law 133

Time-Independent States and State Functions 141

Newton's Third Law: Action and Reaction 142

Are Old Laws Dead? 143

The Importance of Being Surprised 145

7. Time Held Me Grue: Projection and Prediction 151

The New Paradox of Induction: Grue and Bleen 152

Virbonos 153

More Terran Worries 155

Resolution of the Paradox: Entrenchment 156

Prediction or Prophecy? 159

8. The Laws of Nature 165

The Formalities of Lawlikeness 167

How to Use Logic to Formulate Laws. Causation 169

More about Logic and Laws. Principle of Symmetry 171

Symmetry: Not Paradoxes but Noble Blunders 176

The Principle of Sufficient Reason 183

The Great Meta-physical Principles 184

Are There Laws of Nature? 189

Are the Laws of Nature True? 191

How to Hallucinate Inexpensively 197

9. Models: How to Handle Space and Time 203

Models and Graining 204

Caution about Limit Taking 208

Infinitesimals Are Not as Small as You Think 208

Not So Much a Paradox as Exquisite Mischief Making 210

How Not to Be Mesmerized by Mathematics 214

The Continuum 216

Envoy. A Dialogue 218

10. Is There A Scientific Method? 223

The Pioneers of the Scientific Method 225

The Visionaries 228

Instrumentalism 231

Popper and After 232

The Real Thing: The Scientist's Aims 241

Methods, Models, and Explanations 242

11. Nature's Tool-Kit: Space, Time, Fields 253

Space: Newton, Leibniz, Mach 255

Waves versus Particles 256

Fields 261

Maxwell and Maxwell's Equations 263

Newton's Equations and Galileo's Relativity Principle 265

Einstein the Conservator 266

The Velocity of Light as a Limiting Case 269

Relativistic Time: Synchronization of Clocks 270

More about Time: Simultaneity of Distant Events 271

Time Scales for Moving Frames 273

Contraction of Lengths 273

Spacetime and Applied Ontology 275

Spacetime and Causality 279

General Relativity and Geometry 281

The Illusions of Conventionalism 284

The Ether Is Dead: Long Live the Vacuum 286

Vacuum and Fields 288

Entrenchment and Common Sense 292

12. Time's Arrow 301

Language and Time 302

Time's Symmetries in Mechanics 303

The Truth about Life: Friction 304

Order and the Arrow of Time 306

More about Friction 308

Heat, Thermodynamics, and Disorder 309

Entropy and the Maxwell Gas Model 312

Identity and Naming 314

Boltzmann's Cup of Tea 316

Entropy, Disorder, and the Second Principle 320

Boltzmann and After 321

The Cosmological Arrow of Time 323

Contra Loschmidt: All Is Revealed 324

The Psychological Arrow of Time 327

13. Nature's Lottery: Probability 333

An Approximation to History 335

Two Views of Probability 336

Is Probability A Priori? 339

D'Alembert's Blunder and Insight 341

The Monte Carlo Fallacy 344

Frequencies 347

The Ergodic Principle: Buridan's Ass Goes Places 350

Random Sequences 353

The Bare Bones of the Mathematics of Probability 355

The Laws of Large Numbers 361

The Frequency Definition of Probability 362

Statistical Probability 363

Probability in Classical Physics 365

14. Mathematical Heavens and Other Landscapes 369

Empiricism and Belief 371

Universals and Platonism 371

Mathematical Platonism 373

Intuitionism and Mathematical Proof 380

Sets and Natural Numbers 384

Formalism 390

Self-Reference and Its Paradoxes 392

Metalanguages 393

The Catalogue Paradox 395

The Godel Theorem: A First Shot 397

Godel Numbers 401

A Second Shot at Godel's Proof 402

Godel and Platonism 405

The Anti-Platonists Contra Godel 406

More Godelian Dreams: Human Mind versus Machines 410

A Case Study: Complex Numbers 414

An Interlude 422

Is There a Largest Integer? 423

A Tale of Two Worlds 427

Mathematics as an Empirical Science 428

The Unreasonable Worries on the Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences 430

A Tail End: Chasing the Infinity 433

15. Peeping Tom Peeping at the Microworld 445

Quanta and the Infirmities of Waves and Particles 449

The Uncertainty Principle 456

Trajectories, Histories, and Complementarity 459

The Two-Slit Experiment. Interference 462

Delayed Choice Experiment 465

Measurements and Eigenstates 468

Variables and Operators 469

Commutation and the Uncertainty Principle 472

The Uncertainty Principle and Probability Distributions 473

16. Quantum States 479

The State Function 480

The Schrodinger Equations 482

The Meaning of the Probabilities 484

Stationary States and Quantization 485

Eigenstates and the Principle of Superposition 487

More about the Physical Meaning of the Superposition Principle 495

Stationary States and Quantum Jumps 497

Identical Particles and the Pauli Principle 498

Back to Philosophy: Identity and Naming 500

17. The Great Quantum Muddle 509

The Beginnings 512

The Interpretation of the Wave Function 513

Why Heisenberg Cried: Bohr's Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics 516

Einstein, Probability, and the Breakdown of Determinism 517

Quantum Mechanics a la Popper 519

Bohr: Complementarity and All That 519

Einstein versus Bohr: First Rounds of the Dogfight 522

The Superposition Principle and the Ignorance Interpretation 522

Schrodinger's Cheshire Cat 525

18. Is the Quantal Description of Reality Complete? 535

The Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen So-called Paradox 536

An Introduction to the New Results about Action at a Distance 539

Crucial Experiment: Two Nonparallel Analyzers. Bell's Inequality 546

Action at a Distance and Metaphysics 552

19. Wave Function Reduction and Dream Quantum Worlds 557

Reduction of the Wave Function. Decoherence 558

Measurement 561

The Time Arrow in Quantum Mechanics 562

Bohm's So-called Ontological Theory of Quantum Mechanics 564

The Many-Worlds Interpretation 567

Postil 569

20. Is Nature Supernatural? 573

Three Views of Nature 575

The Abolition of Matter 579

The Invention of the Mind 581

The Case against Physicalism: Dualism 584

What Dr. Johnson Should Have Said: The Defense of Scientific Realism 591

Where Has the Spirit Gone? 593

Back to Mental States 596

Science and Nature 598

The Present and Future of Science 611

Finale. Science and Belief 613.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 631-655) and index.

ISBN:

1573929166

OCLC:

47746197