Ken & Don,
Ken, I appreciate the explanations. I certainly welcome the
opportunity to learn and I thank you (and all the others) for their
explanations.
I would suggest that we haven't really a clue how our minds work, but
we do have a variety of alternative models.
It is certainly true that there are many tasks that require human
cognition for now.
All I'm suggesting is that there's a difference between saying on the
one hand that human cognition is required, period - and on the other
that it's required for the time being.
In case it's not obvious, I'm in the 'for the time being' camp. :)
Don,
Couldn't one say that it's induction that has allowed us to understand
that theories are only as good as the facts on which they're based?
That is, if we look at how science has progressed - noting of course
that sometimes human frailty has been at least as responsible for
scientific advancement or regression as the scientific method itself -
could we not see an inductive loop that runs: make a theory, test it
till it breaks due to new facts that contradict old ones, revise the
theory, wash, rinse, repeat?
I've always thought of it that way - I welcome being corrected.
Cheers.
Fil
On 20 June 2011 08:36, Ken Friedman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Dear Fil,
>
> Don's point -- and that of Mercier and Sperber -- is that human thought
> and reasoning do not arise from logic. Logic has its uses. Don's assertion
> is that we do not use logic to invent, innovate, design, or conduct science.
>
> In writing, "science advances by induction and abduction. Good luck with
> that. new facts sometimes contradict old ones (hence the requirement for
> non-monotonicity)," Don is making an argument for the way that people
> think in practice. Philosophy of science addresses these by speaking of the
> logic of discovery and the logic of justification.
>
> The logic of discovery is not really a logic, and it includes such non-logics
> as abduction, intuition, and pure creation as well as induction. The logic of
> justification includes different ways of finding out whether the hypotheses
> and claims we assert based on discovery, imagination, or invention are
> justifiable or warrantable.
>
> Without mixing into the discussion of whether we can automate design
> processes, I'd assert that the hermeneutical horizon of human existence and
> experience precludes automating many aspects of thinking and invention.
> This is why machinery and processes emerging from first-order predicate
> logic don't function for doing design or science any more than one can
> do science or even mathematics with machines. I'd agree that you can
> automate some processes, while other processes require human beings.
>
> There is another way to think of it: if human beings were logic machines,
> we would not have inputs sufficient to create the new futures we continually
> envision and create.
>
> Yours,
>
> Ken
>
> Fil Salustri wrote:
>
> Sorry, but from what I recall, all forms of logic, including epistemic
> logics, logics of knowledge, etc, depend foundationally on 1st order
> pred logic in terms of soundness, etc.
> Is that not the case?
>
> Don Norman wrote:
>
> Logic covers deductive reasoning. But science advances by induction and
> abduction. Good luck with that. new facts sometimes contradict old ones
> (hence the requirement for non-monotonicity). You are preaching a very old
> fashioned view of science.
>
> I, as a card carrying cognitive scientist, firmly believe that logic is a
> form of mathematics, not to be confused with human reasoning.
>
--
\V/_
Filippo A. Salustri, Ph.D., P.Eng.
Mechanical and Industrial Engineering
Ryerson University
350 Victoria St, Toronto, ON
M5B 2K3, Canada
Tel: 416/979-5000 ext 7749
Fax: 416/979-5265
Email: [log in to unmask]
http://deseng.ryerson.ca/~fil/
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