🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <102936.2005.14241@kcbbs.gen.nz> Hakki_Kocabas@kcbbs.gen.nz (Hakki Kocabas) writes:
>  
>>  Science *is* the study of basic facts, ....  
>   (science, basic-facts)  
>  
>>  ..time, space, matter, interactions, motion, change. All of these are   
>>  basic facts.   
>   (basic-facts)  
>  
>>  Science is to be judged by facts...  
>   (science, facts)  
>  
>However My Son!  
>'fact' is not a fact unless it is prescribed by a theory...in other words  
>there are NO facts in science unless we prescribe one by a theory...and when  
>you withdraw the theory away, all the facts attached to it disappear into the 
>thin air....

This is pure, unadulterated nonsense.  Theories arise in reaction to
facts discovered beforehand (not by "induction", certainly, but there
are facts before the theory).  It's true that some facts framed in
terms of a theory depend heavily on the theory itself for their sense,
but not all of them.

it is like this; if we didn't invent QM then we wouldn't have   
>electrons..but, of course, if electrons are _some_ facts for you :-> then  
>what would you do without QM, you would look like a fish out of pond
:-)

The discovery of the electron predates formal QM :-) :-)

  
>  
>as you say, fortunately, the middle-ages are over with all their bogeys called
>- scientific-facts...:-)

There is a world, and some statements about it are true and known to
us.  The term "scientific facts" is unfortunate; "scientific" refers
to the way the facts were uncovered, not any feature of the facts
themselves.


..now we can live happily here-after without clinging 
>to some theories as if they were revealed words of the God...

Such clinging would not be proper scientific methodology.

and also  
>we don't confuse the revealed words of the God with
scientific-facts....

God reveals Its (real) Word only to those whose methodology is
properly scientific :-)

  
>:-)....happy ending....:-)  

If you say so.


>  
>> Christoph Schiller                         


-- 
The opinions expressed		|     --Sincerely,
above are not the "official"	|     M. Randall Holmes
opinions of any person		|     Math. Dept., Boise State Univ.
or institution.			|     holmes@opal.idbsu.edu