From: "Greg Hall" <gregoryjayhall-AT-hotmail.com>
Subject: Devil's critic
Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2001 22:35:30 -0700



I would like to respond to the devil's advocate argument.  Hopefully, good 
will prevail.

It is important to first establish what we mean by an ontological 
distinction.  Correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding is that 
ontology deals with the nature of existence.  An ontological distinction 
between A and B would then be a difference between the way A and B exist.  
An example of an ontological distinction would be and idea of an apple and 
an apple.  The former exists in the mind of the person with the idea and the 
latter (barring epistemological skepticism) exists in matter.

The original question that I set out to answer was how Bhaskar gets from 
showing that there is an influence by the experimenter on the experiment to 
the idea that there is a ontological difference between scientific laws and 
patterns of events.

Dr. Ehrbar adeptly presents the following counterexample that casts doubt on 
my explanation of this ontological difference:

>I'd like to play the devil's advocate here.  If one says,
>colloquially, "there is a law of physics that" (for instance
>that water boils at 100 centigrades), then one usually means
>that there is an event regularity, that whenever water is
>heated up to 100 centigrades then it starts to boil.
>
>I'd like to argue here that this naive view is correct.
>Of course, the laws of physics are not quite as simple as I
>just made it out.  Water only boils at 100 centigrades if
>the pressure is the normal air pressure on the surface of
>the earth.  At different pressures it boils at different
>temperatures, but there are mathematical formulas which say
>how boiling temperatures and pressure are related.  And
>water must be pure; if there are other materials dissolved
>in the water, then they may evaporate before the water
>itself boils, etc.
>
>
>All this is very regular and well understood, and the only
>reason Bhaskar does not see this as constant conjunctions of
>events is because the initial conditions are different every
>time.  The experimenter controls these initial conditions in
>order to be able to verify those laws.
>
>I see no reason to distinguish between scientific laws and
>patterns of events.  I say that scientific laws are valid in
>and out of the laboratory, they are patterns of events,
>although they are more complex patterns of events than
>Bhaskar is envisioning.
>
>Is this different than what you were saying, and if so, how
>would you argue against it?  (This question is of course not
>only directed at Greg but at everyone).

This does seem like what I meant from what I wrote.  However, I found it 
difficult to express what I meant when I wrote my last submission.  Let me 
try to clarify and see if I can improve.

I was trying to show the scientific laws exist is some universal way 
independent of their actually leading to patterns of events.  A scientific 
law would be some sort of uncaused cause that is a 'brute' fact about the 
universe to borrow from Plato and Hume.  In Hans' example, I would say that 
the scientific law about water boiling existed in a potential form even in a 
part of the universe where there is no water or heat.  At least there, we 
don't observe the conjunction of any events.  There are no events being 
caused by this scientific law.  Hence, the scientific law has an ontological 
nature that does not require anything to actually happen or anyone to 
observe what happens for the law to function.

A pattern of events differs in its existential qualities in two ways.  
First, the events have to actually happen.  They can't remain potential.  
Second, the constant conjunction implies some third party observing the 
occurrence of the events from a particular spatio-temporal position.  It 
implies that this third party observation is somehow accurate or right in 
its particular perspective.  Hence, the term "pattern" is used to associate 
the events.  Therefore, the ontological basis for patterns of events is not 
universal, but rather dependent on having conducive conditions to make them 
actually occur and be associated by some third party.

The ontological distinction would then seem to be that scientific laws are 
uncaused causes while patterns of events are the results of causes.

 >
>Of course, I do not really hold the view I just argued for,
>just playing the devil's advocate.  What is wrong with the
>argument I just made?
>

The problem with the argument seems to be that in saying that scientific 
laws and patterns of events are the same thing is that you are conflating 
the cause of events with the results of the cause.  The former has a primary 
ontological status while the latter is dependent on the former for its 
existence.  Its seems like the their nature is different as well.  Perhaps, 
Bhaskar means that scientific laws are tendencies for things to happen while 
patterns of events are actually things happening.

Am I hitting any nails on the head?

Greg
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