Date: Fri, 03 Dec 2004 12:02:48 +0000
From: "Iolo Savill" <ppyxis-AT-nottingham.ac.uk>
To: <feyerabend-driftline.org-AT-lists.driftline.org>
Subject: [PKF] NOT SO IMPORTANT:


NOT SO IMPORTANT:
-some 'science' has in important ways reached further than astrology
-thanks matt - showing that some scientists are being dogmatic is probably part of the reason why he defends astrology this way
-however the scientists objection is not purely dogmatic - it is a question of the basis on which astrologers support their claims to knowledge
MORE IMPORTANT:
-Doesn't astrology have the same or a similar logical framework to science? Is there not the possibility of what the astrologer predicts being wrong, and is this not decided in a similar way (perhaps not in all cases, given ambiguous predictions and failsafe predictions, but in some)? Even more importantly the astrologer assumes a meaning for what he writes that is communicable to most people, even scientists, and some scientific work is also like this. It seems that people deliberately present theories in opposition to each other - so that there is a choice to be made. Are people mistaken in this? To take a popular example - the Newton-Einstein shift in mechanics. Einstein's theory engaged with Newton's by setting a limit to the speed of light - a term that Newton would fully of understood, and stating something of it that is impossible given the Galilean transformations of reference frames that Newton used. The objection is at a point of contact of logic. The point is that Einstein used the Newtonian logic , but supposed a different,  but possible, postulate (i.e. conceivable postulate to Newton). This is possible because the scientific method has the concept of the primitiveness of propostions.
What do you think?
Iolo


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