Theory Observation Distinction

Is on that point a genuine singularity mingled with observable and unobservable entities? Why does it progeny? How, and why, might one distinguish betwixt theoretical and ceremonyal allegements in knowledge? I have decided to tackle both these questions because they feed into and relate to one a nonher. They emphasize different aspects of a prevalent debate, all aspects of which I wish to touch on. Whether the question of a bankers bill among observable vs unobservable entities is synonymous to the question of a bill mingled with theoretical vs non-theoretical statements is itself a matter of debate.Quine advocates semantic ascent, the shift in which the run-in we use to refer to the world becomes more or lessthing we talk about in its accept right. Semantic ascent is a shift from questions about objects to questions about words or statements. He claims we should drop the talk of observation and talk instead of observation sentences, the sentences that ar said to re port observations (The roots of Reference). So obviously Quine thinks the two questions be equivalent. They have often been treated as equivalent questions, or at least non distinguished too c argonfully.I tot up with Van Fraassen that we should at least note and respect the differences between the two ways of talking about what might be the same issue, and not make the category mistake of talking about theoretical entities, just for clarities sake. At any event capital of Minnesota M Churchland disagrees with Quine that the two debates are parallel , He says we agree (Churchland and Van Fraassen) that the observable/unobservable distinction is entirely distinct from the nontheoretical/theoretical distinction.This variant / confusion as to the very terrain, layout of the questions of the debate, arises because there is the ordinary language question of how do we naturally apply the terms accompanyd and observation, as thoroughly as the question of whether a principled O/T dist inction buns or should be drawn as Gerry Fodors Granny says unfeigned there is an epistemologically important distinction, that its reasonable to call the observation inference distinction, and that is surmisal relative.And, also true, it is this theory-relative distinction that scientists usually use the terms observed and inferred to mark. notwithstanding that is quite compatible with there being another distinction, which it is also reasonable to call the observation /inference distinction which is also of central significance to the doctrine of learning, and which is not theory relative. It is this second principled O/T distinction that I will focus on as opposed to the ordinary language distinction, I do not think ordinary language arguments succumb on the question of whether there is or should be a principled distinction.Although examining what inclines us one way or another in ordinary language usage may clarify featureors that also influence us in an boilers suit di stinction, such as naturalness, entrenchment, flexibility and plasticity. After semantic ascent the question of whether there is an O/T dichotomy becomes one of whether all observation reports suppose many theory. This slightly ignores the question of the ontological view of the entities, whether observed or unobserved, but this will come up when I tackle the subsidiary severalise of each question the why make a distinction, for what purpose? or why does it matter if a distinction presents itself? I think the strategy of semantic ascent is useful and justified since the debate takes place in at least two domains, the perceptual/cognitive (internal) and the empirical/inferential (public)The strategy of semantic ascent is that it carries the discussion into a domain where both parties are better agreed on the objects (viz. , words) and on the main terms connecting them. Words, or their inscriptions, unlike points, miles, classes and the rest, are tangible objects of the size so p opular in the marketplace, where men of unlike conceptual schemes communicate at their best.The strategy is one of ascending to a gross part of two fundamentally disparate conceptual schemes, the better to discuss the disparate foundations. No wonder it helps in philosophy. Quine word and object. still it is a second base confusing and difficult to translate debates or points between the two, and certain debates are clearer at the ground level rather than the meta-level. There are three classes of arguments that bear on the T/O distinction 1. Meaning holism arguments. Which tend to work against the distinction 2.Ordinary language arguments. Which tend to work for the distinction 3. Psychological arguments. Which can work for or against As well as a specific argument by Grover Maxwell from the continuity of observation with inference which works against the T/O distinction. There are two extant modes for making the theory observation distinction Fodors and Van Fraassens. Fodor stand fors the distinction against the implication from cognitive science that perception is continuous with intuition. VanFraassen defends the distinction against Maxwells challenge that it is impossible to draw the line between what is observable and what is only detectable in some more roundabout way. Fodor and Van Fraassen have different reasons for drawing a distinction, Fodor, to defend realism, Van Fraassen to attack realism, strangely enough. Fodor to defend realism against Kuhnian relativism, and Van Fraassen to defend constructive empiricism, a form of anti-realism, against incoherence, and so pit it against realism.As Andre Kukla notes It is not surprising that a realist and an anti-realist should agree on something but it is curious that van Fraassens and Fodors defenses of the theory-observation distinction play diametrically opposite roles in their philosophical agendas. Andre Kukla the theory observation distinction. But should we be driven by a philosophical agenda in debating a question? Or should we resolve the question and then decide on a position which accords with our coif? Shouldnt we be immaterial when we make philosophical decisions?Unfortunately in philosophy there is so little evidence making up your mind is more a matter of achieving coherence, it is legitimate to allow justification to flow in all directions. The question of whether there is a T/O distinction is relevant to the debate between realists anti-realists and relativists in the following manner. So far as realists debate with anti-realists is concerned, the T/O distinction is optional for realists. They have everything to gain and nothing to lose by making it unravel.They have everything to gain, because the constructive empiricist position is incoherent without a T/O distinction. But so far as realists debate with relativists goes, realists have conversely everything to gain and nothing to lose by defending a distinction, they would defeat relativists. Kuhnain Relati vism requires the lack of a theory neutral language with which to adjudicate our differences, so we buy off incommensurability, incommensurability leads to the irrationality of theory choice thus we get relativism. But realists cannot have an easy victory against both parties.I suggest that the realist denies the T/O distinction and so wins against the constructive empiricist. The lack of a T/O distinction does not entail relativism a theory laden observation can still tryout a theory. To return to the question of whether we should be driven by a philosophical agenda in deciding a point, it must be remembered that we are concerning ourself with the question of whether there is a significant or principled O/T distinction. Its significance comes from its position within a larger debate.Frankly, everyone can let there is some sort of distinction or difference between direct and indirect observation, the question really is how significant the difference is, whether a distinction can be drawn at a position significant enough to support any theory, the significance depends on the work it is made to do by larger theories. Paul M. churchland defines his scientific realism as a realism entirely in terms of his side towards the T/O distinction. He believes any attempt to draw the distinction, particularly Van Fraassens, is arbitrary.By any skepticism our observational ontology is rendered exactly as dubious as our non-observational ontology He is not an Jewish-Orthodox scientific realist he is skeptical about the overall truth of our beliefs, the reference of scientific terms, and the convergence of theory towards truth. But he is skeptical about the victor of all our theories, cognition at large, from a low to a high level not just scientific theories, and thus does not distinguish between the integrity of observables and the integrity of unobservables. He states that global excellence of theory is the ultimate whole tone of truth and ontology at all levels of c ognition.Although churchland has exactly the same attitude to observables and unobservables, a cautious skeptical attitude, relative to his peers he has a slightly pro attitude to unobsevables, and a negative attitude to observables. This pro attitude to the unobservables of science makes him a realist and his slightly negative attitude to the observables of everyday life make him a scientific realist the function of science, therefore, is to provide us with a superior and (in the ache run) perhaps profoundly different conception of the world, even at the perceptual level.I agree with Churchland as to the theoretical character of perceptual judgments, I agree that perception consists in the conceptual exploitation of the natural teaching contained in our sensations or sensory states . Having done part of a module on the humour as a statistician I know that our perceptual judgments are statistical decision problems akin to gambling or any decision base on uncertain evidence.Beca use inputs are noisy the external world and inefficient transduction creates noise- the question of whether a signal is present or not will take a hop the relative probability that a signal is drawn from distribution A(noise only) or distribution B(signal + noise). Biasing factors are the probability of occurrence of a member of each category, information on which is drawn from memory. Perceptual decisions rely on perception and memory, or evidence and prior knowledge, prior knowledge being essentially a theory about the world. provided I disagree with Paul Churchland as to the possibility of our being trained to make systematic perceptual judgments in terms of theories other than the ballpark horse sense theory we learnt at our mothers knee For one, I dont think we learn our common sense theory rather it is built into our genetics. I do not think we are nearly as plastic as he makes out, on this point I go with Gerry Fodor, perception and cognition are not continuous, and perce ption can never make judgments in terms of grand theories which we can barely conceive. The boundary between what can be observed and what must be inferred is largely determined by fixed architectural features of an organisms sensory / perceptual psychology Gerry Fodor Observation Reconsidered. Paul Churchland directly contradicts this formulation our current modes of conceptual exploitation (perception) are rooted, in substantial measure, not in the nature of our perceptual environment, nor in the innate features of our psychology, but rather in the structure and content of our common language.How plastic the brain may be is an empirical point, and I think Gerry Fodor wins the debate with his analysis of the ponderer-lyer illusion. Fodor says the robustness of the muller lyer illusion at interrogatorys to the imperviousness of perception by cognition. There are both perceptual plasiticities and implasticities. Kuhn was impressed by the plasticities, but it is time to dwell more on the implasticities. To the best of my knowledge, all the standard perceptual illusions exhibit this curious refractory character knowing they are illusions doesnt make them go away However I dont think Fodor is being entirely empirically accurate.Some illusions such as the concave convex illusion, in which heavily shaded circles appear as concave when the shadow is at the top of the circle, and convex when the shadow is at the infiltrate of the circle, which occurs because we have a strong prior belief / prior given that light falls from above, can be reversed or at least nullified if you really try. The famous duck rock rabbit can in spades be flipped at will. And the old hag, young girl illusion, personally I can never overtake the old hag unless it is explained to e, then I can. But anyway Fodor makes his point, we cannot always see just what we want to see or think we should see. I agree with Gerry Fodor that perception is fairly modular, and is not (probably) affected (mu ch) by conscious explicit knowledge. Certainly the muller lyer illusion is fairly robust And I think far too much is made of the duck rabbit illusion Kuhn says it is as elementary prototypes for these transformations of the scientists world sight that the familiar demonstrations of a switch in gestalt prove so suggestive.But I do not think they are anything more than just that suggestive because a scientist, does not, cannot form an image or representation of quarks and leptons in any way analogous to a duck or a rabbit, so this image cannot flip. Paul Churchland seems to think we can form such images, but personally I cannot. I see the western sky redden as the sun sets not the wavelength distribution of incoming solar radiation shift towards the longer wavelengths.However I would say our inability to alter our perception does not damage churchlands essential point which was that perception relies on theory, implicit theory. A very entrenched imbed theory, but theory all the s ame. Churchland thinks the distinction between the theoretical and the non-theoretical is just a distinction between freshly minted theory and thoroughly thumb-worn theory whose ethnical assimilation is complete.I think some thumb-worn theory is actually entrenched in our biology. But maybe individual differences come into play here, maybe some people are more plastic than others, or innately sensitive to some aspects of reality than others, maybe our biology is not universal. Paul Churchland says that the person with blameless pitch is not a physiological freak but a practiced observer. But I think it most likely that there is something strange about them.Maybe I am closed minded in the sort of visualization Churchland encourages, maybe thats just me, I had no luck with visual perception in the fourth dimension even after reading Flatland and speculations on the fourth dimension whereas other people (the authors) claim to have, still Im a bit skeptical. Paul Churlands thought exp eriments where he gets us to imagine various other beings, with radically different physiology, beings that can visually see infra-red heat for example, raises the idea of the possibility of other sensory modalities.And although we cannot communicate with them, so they are not part of our epistemic community, there are animals on our planet who presumably sense different things to us, such as bats and dolphins. Van Fraassen insists that is observable must be observable to us unassisted, and as we currently are, an anthropocentric conception the limitations to which the able in observable refers are our limitations qua human beings. It could be argued that Van Fraassens anthropocentric conception of the observable is not just anthropocentric, but parochial.Alternatively it could be argued that van fraassen draws the line arbitrarily according to Van Fraassen we can observe planets using a telescope, but we cannot observe viruses using a microscope, because planets are something we could observe without any augmentation of the senses, where we close enough to them, and indeed some of them we can observe from earth, our natural position, (venus) whereas under normal conditions viruses cannot be seen.I do not agree with this remonstration to Van Fraassen, I think where he draws the line is one natural place to draw it if it has to be drawn, but it is just that I dont agree with him that the drawing of the line here is very significant. I am a realist and I believe unobservables are generally as real as observables. From his drawing of the line, van Fraassen only believes in observables.Fodor lightly passes over the fact that perceptual analyses are undetermined by sensory arrays and are only firm by Bayesian reasoning from previous evidence / experience, and that the appeal to background theory is inherent to the process of perceptual analysis Fodor Observaiton reconsidered. I think this fact is indisputable, and it is in this respect that perception and cogni tion are similar as Paul churchland maintains, both are theories and global excellence of theory is the ultimate measure of truth and ontology at all levels of cognition .The impossibility of our being trained to make systematic perceptual judgments in terms of theories other that the common sense theory we learnt at our mothers knee, the implasticity of actual human perception, is irrelevant in drawing a theory observation distinction, both perception and cognition are theory dependent. But Granted as Fodor points out against Kuhn scientific knowledge doesnt actually percolate down to affect the perceptual. Kuhnian perceptual theory cargo does not occur. There is some natural barrier. Is this barrier the location of the O/T distinction? I think it probably is if there is one.It is significant, but not significant for the anti-realist, it does not decide our ontology. It is significant in the realists fight with relativism since observations are theory laden, but are not necessaril y laden with the high level theories that they must adjudicate between. So perceptions are laden with perceptual theory, but not laden with quantum theory. Fodor makes the O/T distinction in such a way that it is significant for realists against relativism, but not significant for anti-realists. Fodor isnt looking for a notion of observationality that underwrites our granting epistemic privilege to observation statements.Hes looking for a notion that will ward off the incommensurability arguments. And for that purpose anything that produces consensus will do Andre Kukla The theory observation distinction. Now to explicitly tackle the questions, why make a distinction, for what purpose? or why does it matter if a distinction does or does not present itself? . I have already touched on the answer to these questions when outlining the role of the distinction (or lack of) in larger debates between anti-realists, and relativists.The question of the O/T distinction has epistemological sig nificance it concerns the epistemic bearing of observational evidence on theories it is used to evaluate. This is part of the debate between realists and relativists. The relativists holding that observation is an inadequate basis for choosing between rival theories, the realists claiming it is an adequate basis, or there is at least something which is an adequate basis. Observational evidence also plays important and philosophically interesting roles in other areas including scientific discovery and the application of scientific theories to practical problems.But we will concentrate on theory testing. It seems that if all observations are theory laden then there is no objective bedrock against which to test and justify theory. The classic or common view of science is that scientific knowledge is derived from the facts or observations. Two schools of thought that involve attempts to formalize this common view of science are the empiricists and the positivists. An extreme interpretat ion of the claim that science is derived from the facts implies that the facts must first be ceremonious, and subsequently a theory built to fit them.This is the baconian rule building a case from the ground up. This is not how science actually proceeds. our search for relevant facts needs to be guided by our current state of knowledge, which tells us for example that measuring the ozone concentration at various locations in the atmosphere yields relevant facts whereas measuring the average hair length of the youths in Sydney does not A F chalmers What is this thing called Science?. But the fact that science is guided by paradigms does not support kuhnian relativism.Kuhnian relativism can only be established if incommensurability is, that is if high level theory- warhead of observation were established. As I have already argued along with Fodor, observation may be loaded with low level perceptual theory but not with high level conscious and elaborate theory. Proponents of competin g theories often produce impressively similar observational data, this indicates perceptual theory loading is not that great. If science were blinded by paradigms that would be a different matter. Against semantic theory loading Often observations reported non-linguistically, pictorially with tables of numbers etc.Late twentieth century philosophers may have exaggerated the influence of semantic loading because they thought of theory testing in terms of inferential relations between observational and theoretical sentences. Against Salience or attentional loading scientists under different paradigms attend to different things. Yes, but doesnt always happen. And scientists may cherish the significance of data that is brought to their attention that had not been noticed. Attentional loading is not inevitable and not irredeemable. So observation is and adequate basis for adjudicating between theories (unless the theories are underdetermined by data).In conclusion I would say there is no absolute T/O distinction, but there is enough of a difference, enough bottom up flow of justification, to defeat relativism. A. F. chalmers what is this thing called science? Paul M Churchland Scientific realism and the plasticity of the mind Paul M churchland The ontological status of obsservables In praise of superempirical virtues Gerry Fodor observation reconsidered Andre Kukla the theory observation distinction W. V. O Quine Word and Object Bas Van Fraassen the scientific image