Laws of Nature

[another1]

That I did understand

 

[fromderinside]

When someone says the term, "laws of nature" refers to a human made formula, they are mistaken even though the term, 'laws of nature' might very well do that very thing.

sigh ....... chirp .......... chirp ............ chirp ...........

 

[fast]

When someone says the term, "laws of nature" refers to a human made formula, they are mistaken even though the term, 'laws of nature' might very well do that very thing.

sigh ....... chirp .......... chirp ............ chirp ...........

When someone uses a term in an unusual or alternative manner, it's customary to signify such usage by single quotes. For instance, when Loretta Lynn in her song sings that her husband might 'cat' around with a 'kitty', she is neither talking about cats nor kittens. People can (and often do) denote special meaning to words that is not consistent with lexical usage.

 

[Speakpigeon]

That we can successfully communicate with improper word usage is no good reason to deny that improper word usage has been employed.

So you are from the department of education insisting that people should speak the language properly? In other words, improper for whom? It's also funny since most people don't even start by claiming they are speaking properly, or even English. They just say things and stuff happens. I've learnt English as a second language so I sort of know the value of good English, but you are addressing parochial issues. Start by defining "proper English" properly. I believe no one has done that and I also believe that most authorities in that respect couldn't even routinely and consistenly speak the proper English as they would have defined it, and they themselves would tell you that.
EB

Disclaimer: sometimes my text editor changes my spelling French-wize.

 

[fast]

That we can successfully communicate with improper word usage is no good reason to deny that improper word usage has been employed.

So you are from the department of education insisting that people should speak the language properly? In other words, improper for whom? It's also funny since most people don't even start by claiming they are speaking properly, or even English. They just say things and stuff happens. I've learnt English as a second language so I sort of know the value of good English, but you are addressing parochial issues. Start by defining "proper English" properly. I believe no one has done that and I also believe that most authorities in that respect couldn't even routinely and consistenly speak the proper English as they would have defined it, and they themselves would tell you that.
EB

Disclaimer: sometimes my text editor changes my spelling French-wize.

Oh noooos! I would never stoop that low--and I' a low stooper.

It's like this. If a game warden tickets a hunter for shooting a deer instead of a squirrel, then the hunters defense could be a single picture of the warden handing the ticket to the hunter holding a squirrel (aka, the wardens idea of a 'deer'--which is everyone else's idea of a squirrel). It's an improper (as in incorrect) identification.

 

[Speakpigeon]

It's like this. If a game warden tickets a hunter for shooting a deer instead of a squirrel, then the hunters defense could be a single picture of the warden handing the ticket to the hunter holding a squirrel (aka, the wardens idea of a 'deer'--which is everyone else's idea of a squirrel). It's an improper (as in incorrect) identification.

Incorrect? What would be incorrect in using the word "squirrel" to refer to a deer? In French, we use the word "cerf" to refer to a deer. Do you think the French are incorrect? Not to mention the Russian, the Chinese (鹿), the Italians and people in other galaxies? And you can do it, it works. Wait, you are doing it.

Improper use is bad like, say, bad table manners, but just the fact of being improper can't stop you eating at that table and is therefore not incorrect as you claim. Nothing incorrect in using "squirrel" for deers (although in French, to be "incorrect" is also to behave impropery).
EB

 

[untermensche]

There is the inherent grammar that grows and matures in our minds as we develop our language capacity in childhood.

And there is the artificial grammar we have to be taught.

Humans can get all kinds of ideas across and do perfectly fine without the artificial grammar.

It is superfluous.

 

[fast]

It's like this. If a game warden tickets a hunter for shooting a deer instead of a squirrel, then the hunters defense could be a single picture of the warden handing the ticket to the hunter holding a squirrel (aka, the wardens idea of a 'deer'--which is everyone else's idea of a squirrel). It's an improper (as in incorrect) identification.

Incorrect? What would be incorrect in using the word "squirrel" to refer to a deer? In French, we use the word "cerf" to refer to a deer. Do you think the French are incorrect? Not to mention the Russian, the Chinese (鹿), the Italians and people in other galaxies? And you can do it, it works. Wait, you are doing it.

Improper use is bad like, say, bad table manners, but just the fact of being improper can't stop you eating at that table and is therefore not incorrect as you claim. Nothing incorrect in using "squirrel" for deers (although in French, to be "incorrect" is also to behave impropery).
EB

Seriously? You're gonna make me spell this out?

 

[fromderinside]

Incorrect? What would be incorrect in using the word "squirrel" to refer to a deer? In French, we use the word "cerf" to refer to a deer. Do you think the French are incorrect? Not to mention the Russian, the Chinese (鹿), the Italians and people in other galaxies? And you can do it, it works. Wait, you are doing it.

Improper use is bad like, say, bad table manners, but just the fact of being improper can't stop you eating at that table and is therefore not incorrect as you claim. Nothing incorrect in using "squirrel" for deers (although in French, to be "incorrect" is also to behave impropery).
EB

Seriously? You're gonna make me spell this out?

What is correct is a matter of context. Context can be something like time where one meaning exists at one time and another exists at another time. What was once 'clinch' is now 'cliche' and likely to change soon enough as are the meaning of single and double quotes bounding words or phrases. Speakpigeon is ridiculous of course, but, quite correct when he speaks of 'cerf' and 'deer'. He's ridiculous because it is obvious you were giving an example of English speakers when you used deer and squirrel. This discussion is getting both boring and ridiculous.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Incorrect? What would be incorrect in using the word "squirrel" to refer to a deer? In French, we use the word "cerf" to refer to a deer. Do you think the French are incorrect? Not to mention the Russian, the Chinese (鹿), the Italians and people in other galaxies? And you can do it, it works. Wait, you are doing it.

Improper use is bad like, say, bad table manners, but just the fact of being improper can't stop you eating at that table and is therefore not incorrect as you claim. Nothing incorrect in using "squirrel" for deers (although in French, to be "incorrect" is also to behave impropery).
EB

Seriously? You're gonna make me spell this out?

Go on, please. Why haven't you already! This here website isn't for thespian.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

Seriously? You're gonna make me spell this out?

What is correct is a matter of context. Context can be something like time where one meaning exists at one time and another exists at another time. What was once 'clinch' is now 'cliche' and likely to change soon enough as are the meaning of single and double quotes bounding words or phrases.

Yes. Here context matters.

Speakpigeon is ridiculous of course, but, quite correct when he speaks of 'cerf' and 'deer'. He's ridiculous because it is obvious you were giving an example of English speakers when you used deer and squirrel. This discussion is getting both boring and ridiculous.

Or, just maybe, you missed the point entirely.

Fast used the term "incorrect". This suggests there must be an objective way one could assess whether a particular word refers necessarily to a particular something. We all know that's not the case.

What remains are different conventions assumed by different groups of people. Table manners. Use of a word to refer to some thing will be seen as improper by some people, just as some but not other will see as improper to talk with your mouth full.
EB

 

[Alcoholic Actuary]

The discoverable regularities that exist in nature independent of our observations of them is one thing, hereby denoted as something (regularities) belonging to the left hand.

The human invented observation dependent explanations that describe the regularities is a second thing, hereby denoted as something (explanations) belonging to the right hand.

So, in the left hand, we have regularities, and in the right hand, we have explanations.

The question being posed in this thread is simple. Does the term, "Laws of nature" refer to the regularities that exist in nature or our explanations of the regularities?

My belief is that the three worded term refers to the regularities.

But what if something happens in nature and no one is there to describe or explain it?

aa

 

[untermensche]

But what if something happens in nature and no one is there to describe or explain it?

aa

If it is something that can be modeled with human mathematics it is something that can be modeled with human mathematics even if no human models it.

Obviously if something can be modeled and predictions can be made off the model then something "real", something that exists, is being described with the model.

 

[Speakpigeon]

But what if something happens in nature and no one is there to describe or explain it?

aa

But we are here now you see (you do ) and we do describe (correctly or incorrectly).

If we are to debate any issue related to this we have to be here to debate it and therefore we can always describe whatever we think there is out there.

Let's suppose, counterfactually, that we are not here. Well, that's impossible. Because, in our reality, which is whatever it is, the only thing we know for sure is that we are part of it. So the kind of reality we know is pregnant with us and our ability and proclivity to describe things. This aspect of reality cannot be removed without contradiction. So, instead, we have to assume, in the abstract, a fictional reality incompatible with us (i.e. where we couldn't be, ever). In this case, it is conceivable that there could be no description of this reality, i.e. it doesn't contain any description of itself or part of itself. It's just that kind of reality. So, it would happen without being described from within. Yet, I just described it, from without. So, we can't even conceive of something that would exist that we couldn't describe at all. Which of course is not surprising, really.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

On the question of the putative correctness of terms...

Most of us have used a moving walkway at least once in our life. Even to disagree with that you need to understand what the term "moving walkway" is supposed to refer to. However, how many (English) synonyms of the term "moving walkway" do you actually know? If you think you know all of them I have a surprise for you.

But first, which ones do you know?
EB

 

[Alcoholic Actuary]

But what if something happens in nature and no one is there to describe or explain it?

aa

If it is something that can be modeled with human mathematics it is something that can be modeled with human mathematics even if no human models it.

Obviously if something can be modeled and predictions can be made off the model then something "real", something that exists, is being described with the model.

But we are here now you see (you do ) and we do describe (correctly or incorrectly).

If we are to debate any issue related to this we have to be here to debate it and therefore we can always describe whatever we think there is out there.

Let's suppose, counterfactually, that we are not here. Well, that's impossible. Because, in our reality, which is whatever it is, the only thing we know for sure is that we are part of it. So the kind of reality we know is pregnant with us and our ability and proclivity to describe things. This aspect of reality cannot be removed without contradiction. So, instead, we have to assume, in the abstract, a fictional reality incompatible with us (i.e. where we couldn't be, ever). In this case, it is conceivable that there could be no description of this reality, i.e. it doesn't contain any description of itself or part of itself. It's just that kind of reality. So, it would happen without being described from within. Yet, I just described it, from without. So, we can't even conceive of something that would exist that we couldn't describe at all. Which of course is not surprising, really.
EB

What the OP refers to as regularities, I understand to exist with or without us. But the OP is more specifically asking about the term "Laws of Nature". I think that Laws can only contain and transfer knowable information. Aren't laws descriptions in and of themselves? How do we codify things we haven't observed or don't understand yet?

aa

 

[Speakpigeon]

What the OP refers to as regularities, I understand to exist with or without us.

It depends what one means by "regularities". Usually, people will mean something objective, i.e. something that exists independently of us. But there is nothing to force this interpretation and it seems conceivable that the regularities you may feel exist are all inside your mind.

But the OP is more specifically asking about the term "Laws of Nature". I think that Laws can only contain and transfer knowable information.

There is a temptation to read "laws" in "laws of nature" by analogy to human and divine laws. But I think the original idea is that of laws made by, or part of, nature itself and as such there no particular reason to think of laws either as information or as knowable.

The way scientists may think of the laws of physics, however, may be that of human-discovered formulae describing regularities present in nature. As such they are knowable information.

Aren't laws descriptions in and of themselves? How do we codify things we haven't observed or don't understand yet?

If we think of laws are "knowable information" as you suggested just now then it's Ok. There may be laws we don't know yet, may be that we will never know, but they could still be knowable information, somehow discoverable as contained in the fabric of reality.
EB

 

[untermensche]

What the OP refers to as regularities, I understand to exist with or without us. But the OP is more specifically asking about the term "Laws of Nature". I think that Laws can only contain and transfer knowable information. Aren't laws descriptions in and of themselves? How do we codify things we haven't observed or don't understand yet?

aa

But if we derive the "laws" and they can be used to predict then there is something there that the "laws" are describing. Even if it is not described perfectly by the models.

Humans do complex things, fly spaceships to Pluto.

They do it because they understand how things work. They know the "laws", the rules of the game.

And what humans know some other being trapped in this universe existing on the same scale as the human has the potential to know also.

 

[fast]

If it is something that can be modeled with human mathematics it is something that can be modeled with human mathematics even if no human models it.

Obviously if something can be modeled and predictions can be made off the model then something "real", something that exists, is being described with the model.

But we are here now you see (you do ) and we do describe (correctly or incorrectly).

If we are to debate any issue related to this we have to be here to debate it and therefore we can always describe whatever we think there is out there.

Let's suppose, counterfactually, that we are not here. Well, that's impossible. Because, in our reality, which is whatever it is, the only thing we know for sure is that we are part of it. So the kind of reality we know is pregnant with us and our ability and proclivity to describe things. This aspect of reality cannot be removed without contradiction. So, instead, we have to assume, in the abstract, a fictional reality incompatible with us (i.e. where we couldn't be, ever). In this case, it is conceivable that there could be no description of this reality, i.e. it doesn't contain any description of itself or part of itself. It's just that kind of reality. So, it would happen without being described from within. Yet, I just described it, from without. So, we can't even conceive of something that would exist that we couldn't describe at all. Which of course is not surprising, really.
EB

What the OP refers to as regularities, I understand to exist with or without us. But the OP is more specifically asking about the term "Laws of Nature". I think that Laws can only contain and transfer knowable information. Aren't laws descriptions in and of themselves? How do we codify things we haven't observed or don't understand yet?

aa

One of the things that has caught my attention and has interested me for awhile stems from the idea that the meaning of multi-worded terms evolve independently of the meaning of the individual terms making up the multi-worded term. Consider the term "unidentified flying object." People have a strong tendency to treat multi-worded terms as individual terms, as if the current meaning ought to be derived by the meaning of the individual terms--as they often were when originally coined. Let an alien craft land on the whitehouse lawn: you will see usage of the abbreviation UFO, and that's because of the underlying alternate meaning that treats the entire term as a noun phrase-and not as a composite of different parts of speech.

If you treat "laws of nature" as a single term (which it is a single term, a three-worded term in fact), then the door is opened not to use the term, "laws" in the same manner as we might use it as found in the sentence, "we are a nation of laws."

Thinking out loud for a moment with only a trace of sanity, let me mumble that laws of nature is laws by nature, not a man made law created by nature but a law of different sorts--more like a truth (as in fact)- not truth, as in an utterance corresponding with reality--and most of us has heard the two different uses of that word. So, a law of nature is more like a truth derived by the facts of reality, and a spoken truth of such a truth are our descriptions of the first kind of truth. So, water boils, a truth of nature, and our utterance that water boils is a spoken truth about a truth of nature.

Back to a sense of rational thought, I am not inclined to think of the meaning of "laws of nature" as being particularly tied to what the term, "laws" mean. I don't think a "white lie" is white.

 

[fast]

What is correct is a matter of context. Context can be something like time where one meaning exists at one time and another exists at another time. What was once 'clinch' is now 'cliche' and likely to change soon enough as are the meaning of single and double quotes bounding words or phrases.

Yes. Here context matters.

Speakpigeon is ridiculous of course, but, quite correct when he speaks of 'cerf' and 'deer'. He's ridiculous because it is obvious you were giving an example of English speakers when you used deer and squirrel. This discussion is getting both boring and ridiculous.

Or, just maybe, you missed the point entirely.

Fast used the term "incorrect". This suggests there must be an objective way one could assess whether a particular word refers necessarily to a particular something. We all know that's not the case.

What remains are different conventions assumed by different groups of people. Table manners. Use of a word to refer to some thing will be seen as improper by some people, just as some but not other will see as improper to talk with your mouth full.
EB

There are referring terms, and there non-referring terms. The terms, "cat" and "unicorn" are referring terms, and the terms, "if" and "although" are non-referring terms. The term, "cat" is a referring term that successfully refers, and the term, "unicorn" is a referring term that fails to refer. The reason the term, "unicorn" is a referring term and not a non-referring term despite reference failure is because a unicorn is the kind of thing that would be instantiated if it existed. No such instantiation for "if" and "although" is logically possible.

There is (perhaps) nothing about a word in and of itself that makes it a referring term, as it is at heart our usage that paves way for it to be consider so, but how can it not be proper for an elementary school teacher to regard a child as not correctly matching pictures to corresponding words when they don't match up? We can objectively determine whether the answer is correct or incorrect. Being predicated on current convention does not make it non-objective--even if the underlying origin of convention is arbitrary.