The Philosophy Discussion Forum

Hawking [posthumously] with Thomas Hertog published the following book in March 2023.
On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking’s final theory

Typing on the computer-controlled voice system that allowed the cosmologist to communicate, Hawking announced: “I have changed my mind. My book, A Brief History of Time, is written from the wrong perspective.”
........
According to Hertog, the new perspective that he has achieved with Hawking reverses the hierarchy between laws and reality in physics and is “profoundly Darwinian” in spirit.

“It leads to a new philosophy of physics that rejects the idea that the universe is a machine governed by unconditional laws with a prior existence, and replaces it with a view of the universe as a kind of self-organising entity in which all sorts of emergent patterns appear, the most general of which we call the laws of physics.”

https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... k-is-wrong

In his book, The Grand Design, Hawking [Leonard Mlodinow] played down the existence of an independent objective reality.

Model-dependent realism is a view of scientific inquiry that focuses on the role of scientific models of phenomena.[1]
It claims reality should be interpreted based upon these models, and where several models overlap in describing a particular subject, multiple, equally valid, realities exist.
It claims that it is meaningless to talk about the "true reality" of a model as we can never be absolutely certain of anything.
The only meaningful thing is the usefulness of the model.
[url-https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model-dependent_realism#:]WIKI[/url]

Hawking's final theory,
On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking’s final theory
put the last nail in the coffin for his view on Philosophical Realism [mind independent reality].

Note the point re "Emergent Patterns" within the book which I had often written about.
My point is Hawking's view support my view that whatever the reality, facts, truths or knowledge they are conditioned upon a specific human-based FSK.
From here, it follows, a human-based moral FSK which is by default objective is possible.
Therefore Morality is objective*.

* my detailed argument is presented in various threads in this Ethical Theory Section.

On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking's Final Theory,
Closer to Truth
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXxcjJHqDOg

Cambridge Talk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyyOYjssJ6Y
......................

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 4:49 pm If we don't or can't know what reality really is - or if there's no such thing as reality as it really is - then we don't or can't know what reality is not.
For example, we don't or can't know that reality is mind-dependent or mind-independent - given that those descriptions are coherent.

You are begging the question above.
You are assuming there is a 'reality' which "we don't or can't know what reality {assumed] is not"
This is your bottom-up approach, i.e. assume there is a reality "down" there which "we don't or can't know what reality {assumed] is not"

If you read the OP, what Hawking is doing is, he is getting rid of the above assumption of the 'bottom-up' approach to a 'top-down' approach.

Note the OP, in [] = mine;

• "According to Hertog, the new perspective that he has achieved with Hawking reverses the hierarchy between laws and reality in physics [the bottom-up] and is “profoundly Darwinian” in spirit [top-down]."
  
  “It leads to a new philosophy of physics that rejects [the bottom-up] the idea that the universe is a machine governed by unconditional laws with a prior existence,
  and replaces it with [the top-down] a view of the universe as a kind of self-organising entity in which all sorts of emergent patterns appear, the most general of which we call the laws of physics.”

Here are some snippets from Hawking's new book [re Hanna Roberts];

• "With [a] top-down [approach] we put humankind back in the center [of cosmological theory], he said. Interestingly, this is what gives us control. (Hawking, as quoted in Hertog, 2023: p. 207)"
  
  "Top-down cosmology recognizes that, much like biology’s tree of life, physics’ tree of laws is the outcome of a Darwinian-like evolution that can only be understood backward in time. The later Hawking propounded that down at the bottom, it isn’t a matter of why the world is the way it is—its fundamental nature dictated by a transcendental cause—but of how we got where we are. From this viewpoint, the observation that the universe happens to be just right for life is the starting point of everything else. (Hertog, 2023: p. 208,)"
  
  "This observership, the interactive process at the heart of quantum theory that transforms what might be into what does happen, constantly draws the universe more firmly into existence. Observers—in this quantum sense—acquire a sort of creative role in cosmic affairs that imbues cosmology with a delicate subjective touch.
  Observership also introduces a subtle backward-in-time element into cosmological theory, for it is as if the act of observation today retroactively fixes the outcome of the big bang “back then.”
  This is why Stephen referred to his final theory as top-down cosmology; we read the fundamentals of the history of the universe backward—from the top down….
  Top-down cosmology turns the riddle of the universe’s apparent design in a sense upside down.
  It embodies the view that own at the quantum level, the universe bioengineers its own biofriendliness. Life and the universe are in some way a mutual fit, according to the theory, because, in a deeper sense, they come into existence together. In effect, I venture to claim that this view captures the true spirit of the Copernican Revolution."

Btw, Kant also used the same Copernican Revolution analogy in placing the human conditions as primary.

• "The Copernican Revolution did not pretend that our position in the universe is irrelevant, only that it isn’t privileged. Five centuries on, top-down cosmology returns to these roots. (Hertog, 2023: pp. 254-255,)"
  
  One might say that in top-down cosmology, the laws serve the universe, not the universe the laws.
  The theory holds that if there is an answer to the great question of existence, it is to be found within this world, not in a structure of principles outside it. (Hertog, 2023: p. 258 )

For example, we don't or can't know that reality is mind-dependent or mind-independent - given that those descriptions are coherent.

note, mind [modern] = human conditions. Don't bring in your crap, there is no such thing as 'mind'.

I am very certain, you as a normal human being is very certain [maybe absolutely certain] whatever is of reality, it must be related to your mind. Thus cannot be ultimately independent of your mind.
Since, all normal humans are like you, then, reality must be conditioned upon their minds - leading to intersubjective agreement and therefrom degrees of credible and reliable objectivity.
From this perspective, reality cannot be mind-independent of the subject and subject[s] mind.
As such, the best mode of what is reality should be grounded on the mind [top] and digging down to as far as evidence [mind] can support.
This is what Hawking's new theory is involved in.

Therefore, humans must ignore their propensity [desperate psychology] to reify the illusory 'mind-independent' reality as real and recognized it is a merely illusion.
While recognizing this 'mind-independent' reality as an illusion, it can be a useful illusion when used and qualified as an illusion.

And that's the end of so-called anti-realism and constructivism and model-dependent realism, and all the other fashionable isms - all of which depend on realist assumptions. For example, the supposed dichotomy between mind-dependence and mind-independence is itself a realist distinction.

You as a philosophical realist is making the assumption then reifying and insisting that is real reality, i.e. the just-in, being-so feature of reality.

The not-mind-independence [top-down] {so-called anti-realism and constructivism and model-dependent realism} do not make any assumptions of a mind-independent reality.
As I had been insisting, the anti-mind-independence [top-down] approach start from the top with its confidence of the mind's existence, then based on observations and induction dig down as far as the evidence can support [i.e. without assuming there is a fixed bottom mind independent reality]

In the same way, all uses of language depend on agreement on the use of signs. Or what the hell did I just write?

Penny dropped???
You have just FSKed your claim, i.e. 'agreement' which is collective consensus within the linguistic FSK.

Realism does not entail essentialism. And essentialism is what the fashionable isms are designed to refute.

Essentialism is irrelevant to this discussion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essentialism

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 8:22 am Hawking [posthumously] with Thomas Hertog published the following book in March 2023.
On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking’s final theory

Typing on the computer-controlled voice system that allowed the cosmologist to communicate, Hawking announced: “I have changed my mind. My book, A Brief History of Time, is written from the wrong perspective.”
........
According to Hertog, the new perspective that he has achieved with Hawking reverses the hierarchy between laws and reality in physics and is “profoundly Darwinian” in spirit.

“It leads to a new philosophy of physics that rejects the idea that the universe is a machine governed by unconditional laws with a prior existence, and replaces it with a view of the universe as a kind of self-organising entity in which all sorts of emergent patterns appear, the most general of which we call the laws of physics.”

https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... k-is-wrong

In his book, The Grand Design, Hawking [Leonard Mlodinow] played down the existence of an independent objective reality.

Model-dependent realism is a view of scientific inquiry that focuses on the role of scientific models of phenomena.[1]
It claims reality should be interpreted based upon these models, and where several models overlap in describing a particular subject, multiple, equally valid, realities exist.
It claims that it is meaningless to talk about the "true reality" of a model as we can never be absolutely certain of anything.
The only meaningful thing is the usefulness of the model.
[url-https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model-dependent_realism#:]WIKI[/url]

Hawking's final theory,
On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking’s final theory
put the last nail in the coffin for his view on Philosophical Realism [mind independent reality].

Note the point re "Emergent Patterns" within the book which I had often written about.
My point is Hawking's view support my view that whatever the reality, facts, truths or knowledge they are conditioned upon a specific human-based FSK.
From here, it follows, a human-based moral FSK which is by default objective is possible.
Therefore Morality is objective*.

* my detailed argument is presented in various threads in this Ethical Theory Section.

Hawking's change of mind has nothing to do with FSK's. He is shifting from eternal rules, to rules that undergo natural selection in some way. It's actually a lot like Rupert Sheldrake. But he's making no comment in the first quote on mind independent reality. The patterns would include patterns that emerged long before humans were on the scene.

And note Hawking said....

“There is no picture- or theory-independent concept of reality. Instead we will adopt a view that we will call model-dependent realism: the idea that a physical theory or world picture is a model (generally of a mathematical nature) and a set of rules that connect the elements of the model to observations. This provides a framework with which to interpret modern science.”

Not no mind-independent reality itself.

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:12 am The patterns would include patterns that emerged long before humans were on the scene.

You can defend realism till the cows come home, but it doesn't matter in practice because constructivists are ultimately right.

It doesn't matter that the world is independent of human minds, because all knowledge of the world is always a human and social construction.

Pattern-matching and recognition is information processing. It's a branch of computer science, and computer science is recursive/self-referential. It's epistemology, not ontology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattern_recognition

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:15 am Not no mind-independent reality itself.

Since it's impossible to take on the perspective of "mind-independent reality itself" then you can't possibly know what that's like.

You are merely trying to promote your own model to ontological status.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_projection_fallacy

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:18 am

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:12 am The patterns would include patterns that emerged long before humans were on the scene.

You can defend realism till the cows come home, but it doesn't matter in practice because constructivists are ultimately right.

You can misunderstand the context of my posts till cows that no one is looking at now come home...it seems.

I wasn't defending realism. I don't buy his take on Hawking.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:19 am

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:15 am Not no mind-independent reality itself.

Since it's impossible to take on the perspective of "mind-independent reality itself" then you can't possibly know what that's like.

Ibid, and I mean Ibid.
I haven't made a claim about what mind-independent reality itself is like. Which VA has done many a time while at the same time arguing against realism. I don't buy his take on Hawking.

You are merely trying to promote your own model to ontological status.

and you're misreading both my mind and my text.

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:38 am I wasn't defending realism. I don't buy his take on Hawking.

*yawn*

In order to reject his taken on Hawking you must have your own take on Hawking.

Do you buy your own take on Hawking?

Because your own take on Hawking is a model of Hawking's take, and not Hawking's actual take.

BECAUSE model-dependent realism is true.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:41 am

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:38 am I wasn't defending realism. I don't buy his take on Hawking.

*yawn*

In order to reject his taken on Hawking you must have your own take on Hawking.

Do you buy your own take on Hawking?

Because your own take on Hawking is a model of Hawking's take, and not Hawking's actual take.

Oh, well aim that at his appeal to authority then. I'm happy if both posts disappear.

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:43 am

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:41 am

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:38 am I wasn't defending realism. I don't buy his take on Hawking.

*yawn*

In order to reject his taken on Hawking you must have your own take on Hawking.

Do you buy your own take on Hawking?

Because your own take on Hawking is a model of Hawking's take, and not Hawking's actual take.

Oh, well aim that at his appeal to authority then. I'm happy if both posts disappear.

Well, I am only appealing to Hawking's own perspectival take.

Hawking announced: “I have changed my mind. My book, A Brief History of Time, is written from the wrong perspective.”

If you can't say anything from the perspective of reality then what's realism?

Anything anyone says about realism/reality will be written from the wrong perspective.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:45 am Well, I am only appealing to Hawking's own perspectival take.

Hawking announced: “I have changed my mind. My book, A Brief History of Time, is written from the wrong perspective.”

Yeah, I read that. That doesn't halp VA.

If you can't say anything from the perspective of reality then what's realism?

How can you manage to not say something from the perspective of reality unless you are unreal.

Anything anyone says about realism/reality will be written from the wrong perspective.

Well, aim that version of realism at VA's OP. I'm happy for the whole thread to go away.

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:50 am That doesn't halp VA.

Why would you say that?

It seems to strengthen his case against all mind-independence conceptions if “objectivity”.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 10:14 am

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:50 am That doesn't halp VA.

Why would you say that?

It seems to strengthen his case against all mind-independence conceptions if “objectivity”.

That Hawking changed perspective? I think that's real, people changing their minds. I even think it happens without me being around.

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 10:15 am

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 10:14 am

Iwannaplato wrote: ↑Sun Apr 16, 2023 9:50 am That doesn't halp VA.

Why would you say that?

It seems to strengthen his case against all mind-independence conceptions if “objectivity”.

That Hawking changed perspective? I think that's real, people changing their minds. I even think it happens without me being around.

Sounds to me you are taking advantage of the equivocal freedom afforded by the vagueness of “mind-independence”.

Do you think mind independence means “independent of your mind” or “independent of everyone’s minds”?

Philosophers insist it means the latter.

So - independent of everyone’s mind how would anyone know if Hawking changed his mind?