Proof

[Cavernio]

What makes something proveable? Is seeing believing? Is feeling believing? Is mathematically proving something mean you believe its true, its factual?

[Windscarredfaith]

Re: Proof

If someone else AAAs something like FotBB besides Shash, bill, and Bahamut, it's basically not believable.

[T0rajir0u]

Re: Proof

Proof of statements about the physical world relies entirely on the definitions of the words you use to formulate your statements.

Ultimately, words can only be defined by reference to the physical world.

[Squeek]

Re: Proof

Reproduced results.

End of story. This is the division between pseudoscience and science.

Science = test can be repeated with similar or same results.

Pseudoscience = test cannot be repeated, or results are not the same with every test.

[T0rajir0u]

Re: Proof

You can't call a scientific statement "proven." It's either supported by physical evidence (i.e. it is a useful generalization about the physical world), or it isn't (i.e. it is not a useful generalization about the physical world). We can only have evidence of a scientific statement's predicting power, and evidence does not constitute proof.

[Squeek]

Re: Proof

Ok, so how would you prove something.

I want to prove 2+2 is 4.

I have two apples and add two more. I got four.

Maybe apples are weird, so I use oranges. I add two oranges to two oranges and I get four.

Combination! I add two apples with two oranges... I still got four.

I reproduced the results of the experiment, and if I keep doing it thousands and thousands of times, I will still get the same answer.

In fact, anyone who adds two tangible objects with two other tangible objects will always get four!

Reproduced results!

If you were so inclined, you COULD take scientific facts and test them for yourself. Go ahead. If it's supposedly proven and you follow the experiment with the parameters given, you will get the same result.

[studmuffin51306]

Re: Proof

Ok, so how would you prove something.

I want to prove 2+2 is 4.

I have two apples and add two more. I got four.

Maybe apples are weird, so I use oranges. I add two oranges to two oranges and I get four.

Combination! I add two apples with two oranges... I still got four.

I reproduced the results of the experiment, and if I keep doing it thousands and thousands of times, I will still get the same answer.

In fact, anyone who adds two tangible objects with two other tangible objects will always get four!

Reproduced results!

If you were so inclined, you COULD take scientific facts and test them for yourself. Go ahead. If it's supposedly proven and you follow the experiment with the parameters given, you will get the same result.

You're mixing Math with Science. In Math, we create the rules. 1+1 will always be 2, unless we alter the rules. Math is imaginary and infinitely changable. Science is guessing at what might be right. We do not make the rules in Science. God does (or nature, I don't want another religious argument). And while there seem to be patterns, nothing can truly be proven because we aren't in a position to know what will always happen.

Basically, to know anything, you have to know everything.

[Windscarredfaith]

Re: Proof

If you guys really are getting into this... just say that nothing can be proven, because nothing exists.

[T0rajir0u]

Re: Proof

nothing exists.

Define existence.

[studmuffin51306]

Re: Proof

If you guys really are getting into this... just say that nothing can be proven, because nothing exists.

But nonexistant things like numbers can be proven.

[Windscarredfaith]

Re: Proof

No. What if everything is just nonexistant, so what you think exists is actually nonexistant because what you think is nonexistant?

I don't actually believe this. Just proving the point.

[T0rajir0u]

Re: Proof

The question of whether numbers exist is moot. Mathematical objects are characterized entirely by their function, not their substance.

The question of whether real objects exist depends on your definition of "exists," which is a subtletly that centuries of philosophers failed to grasp.

The concept of existence, in absence of language, can only be understood in terms of the senses. Something exists if you can sense it. (You will disagree with this definition. Keep reading.)

The obvious disagreement people will raise: A hallucination, for example, constitutes a sensory experience that is "not real." That is, the objects in that hallucination "do not exist."

What do we mean by that? If we hallucinate a chair in the corner of the room, it means that "that chair" is "not there."

What do we really mean by that? It just means that our experience is incomplete. We associate the visual perception of a chair with a corresponding perception in terms of touch. When we hallucinate a chair, we have the visual perception without the corresponding touch perception.

When we say that "that chair" is "not there," what we really mean is that a visual stimulus isn't being accompanied by other expected stimuli. What is "that chair"? It is nothing beyond its visual stimulus. The mistake in our cognition that produces a sense of unreality is thinking that every such stimulus is always paired with other corresponding stimuli.

"That chair," as far as being a pattern of signals in your visual cortex, exists in your brain. It does not exist as a regular chair because it cannot be touched (unless you hallucinate that too) and/or because it disappears once the hallucination is over (other chairs do not exhibit this behavior). What we have here is a mistake in our mental grouping. We assume that the visual chair we see belongs to the cognitive network of "chairs" in our head, when it doesn't.



In short: Everything that you can perceive exists as a perception.

(This is the way you counteract retarded Matrix arguments about reality.)



ps

No. What if everything is just nonexistant

DEFINE EXISTENCE.

[studmuffin51306]

Re: Proof

The question of whether numbers exist is moot. Mathematical objects are characterized entirely by their function, not their substance.

The question of whether real objects exist depends on your definition of "exists," which is a subtletly that centuries of philosophers failed to grasp.

The concept of existence, in absence of language, can only be understood in terms of the senses. Something exists if you can sense it. (You will disagree with this definition. Keep reading.)

The obvious disagreement people will raise: A hallucination, for example, constitutes a sensory experience that is "not real." That is, the objects in that hallucination "do not exist."

What do we mean by that? If we hallucinate a chair in the corner of the room, it means that "that chair" is "not there."

What do we really mean by that? It just means that our experience is incomplete. We associate the visual perception of a chair with a corresponding perception in terms of touch. When we hallucinate a chair, we have the visual perception without the corresponding touch perception.

When we say that "that chair" is "not there," what we really mean is that a visual stimulus isn't being accompanied by other expected stimuli. What is "that chair"? It is nothing beyond its visual stimulus. The mistake in our cognition that produces a sense of unreality is thinking that every such stimulus is always paired with other corresponding stimuli.

"That chair," as far as being a pattern of signals in your visual cortex, exists in your brain. It does not exist as a regular chair because it cannot be touched (unless you hallucinate that too) and/or because it disappears once the hallucination is over (other chairs do not exhibit this behavior). What we have here is a mistake in our mental grouping. We assume that the visual chair we see belongs to the cognitive network of "chairs" in our head, when it doesn't.



In short: Everything that you can perceive exists as a perception.

(This is the way you counteract retarded Matrix arguments about reality.)



ps



DEFINE EXISTENCE.

agreed.

[Patashu]

Re: Proof

If nothing exists, how the heck are we here debating this?

[Squeek]

Re: Proof

Math correlates perfectly with my argument, so why did you throw it out the window?

Two apples with two apples ALWAYS makes four apples.

SIMILARLY, you can prove that as a result of an invisible force called gravity, dropping those apples off of a table will ALWAYS make them go down. WHY can we prove this? If we REMOVED gravity, they DON'T fall down. If we make the gravity NEGATIVE, they fall UP. THEREFORE, WE CAN DISCERN THAT GRAVITY IS THE FORCE THAT PULLS THINGS DOWN, THUS, PROOF.

I don't see what is so difficult to understand about my argument. Proving something is simple. Set forth the rules of the experiment, make a reproductive result, and allow anyone else in the world to do that experiment following your guidelines. If they don't get the same result, either they didn't follow your guidelines or there's something wrong with your guidelines; something you didn't account for.

Prove to me that gravity doesn't exist. Jump in the air unassisted and don't fall back down while on the surface of Earth. Show judge and ini.