🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Oct14.064942.43833@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
>In article <1992Oct13.192242.157437@Cookie.secapl.com>, frank@Cookie.secapl.com (Frank Adams) writes:
>> The second example is one without which scientific research cannot proceed
>> (although "which we are capable of understanding" might be qualified; we
>> need not believe in perfect or even asymptotically perfect understanding
>> in order to do research).
>
>I'm going to ignore for the moment the issue of describing the
>first three minutes in the existence of the universe and other late
>20th-century scientific utterances that I'm having trouble
>classifying, in favor of developing what we agree on.
>
>Finally we have something that we agree is a clear example of a
>scientific assumption.  I will modify it as you suggested:
>
>     There is a reality outside ourselves that we are capable of in
>     some sense understanding.
>
>Now, what I claim is that this sort of statement is fundamentally
>different from ordinary assertions (whether these are scientific or
>not).  You do not disagree with this either.

I don't think there is anything particularly scientific about this
statement (to try to choose a neutral term), either.  It is an assumption
that most people make, at least implicitly, in living their daily lives.

As to classifying it, depending on my mood, I might call it a philosophical
position, a religious statement, or a statement of a point of view.  (On odd
numbered Tuesdays I think that "there is a reality outside ourselves" is a
meaningless statement.)

Settling for the first of these, I will note that philosophical statements
often don't admit of verification in the sense that "ordinary" assertions
do.

There is another class of statements which are superficially assertions, but
are treated much differently: moral judgements.  How do you classify these?