What Makes Science Subjective?

[Heyo]

Accepting, for the sake of this discussion that the material world exists, has the physical properties and follows the laws of physics as has been observed repeatedly/consistently. Basically, the material world is not a simulation of some kind being run by a mega-computer or in God's mind.

Let say we have a computer that analyzes the mineral content and physical properties of a rock. It provides a precise list of every physical element that is part of the rock and measured physical properties. Is this list of information objective?

You can do experiments on the rock. Heat it, cool it, apply pressure to it. shoot it with gamma rays etc... and allow the computer to reanalyze the material content/physical properties of the rock under different conditions. Is this information all objective evidence?

If this is still subjective, what makes it subjective.

If you think the information is objective to this point, at what point in the process of science does this information become subjective?

One measurement is subjective. Repeated, independent (made by different entities) measurements, that agree, are objective.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Solipsism is the idea that reality is purely based on your subjective experience. I would refute it by pointing out that the world doesn't disappear when you close your eyes.

Well, there are 4 variants of solipsism. Yours is one, but there are 3 other ones.
Ontological, epistemological and methodological.

Stop doing philosophy if you haven't learned the basics.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Ok, but initially we are not involving a human. So the question, is it objective until a human gets involved?

No, because the words "the material world" involves humans, because words involve humans

Your sentence is nonsense: "but initially we are not involving a human". Because we is a case of humans. You are thinking as a human, that you don't have to involve a human, but if you check the idea of not involving a human, then that requires a human having the idea of not involving a human. So you are doing a self-referring absurdity.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Let say we have a computer that analyzes the mineral content and physical properties of a rock. It provides a precise list of every physical element that is part of the rock and measured physical properties. Is this list of information objective?

You can do experiments on the rock. Heat it, cool it, apply pressure to it. shoot it with gamma rays etc... and allow the computer to reanalyze the material content/physical properties of the rock under different conditions. Is this information all objective evidence?

If this is still subjective, what makes it subjective.

If you think the information is objective to this point, at what point in the process of science does this information become subjective?

The first point at which subjectivity (or, more accurately, intersubjectivity) enters into the picture is with the idea that there are classes or categories of objects we might call rocks. By “we” I mean humans, who, by virtue of being equipped with particular sensory organs but lacking others (e.g., the ability to “see” thermal radiation) as well as other evolutionary advantages and limitations, tend to categorize certain objects according to particular properties as somehow the same while excluding other objects. This is not as trivial as it sounds. Had we other senses than we do, it would be hard to imagine us being capable of thinking of “rocks” as entities that could themselves possess properties but perhaps easy to think of them e.g., as properties themselves, of as members of a different class of objects (e.g., those objects of the “ground” or “earth” that can be removed with “grock” level of ease, compared to “groot” levels that are required by the same kinds of objects in this scheme but which humans think of as consisting of trees, bushes, etc.).

More problematic is that the assumption that there exists a list of physical properties that we can measure. Here you have assumed as unproblematic that which we cannot currently carry out even supposing that our best theories are actually true, objective descriptions of a truly objective and objectively existing reality. But even under this assumption, there exists and infinite list of what might be called physical properties. These run the gamut from those that seem to be natural given our experiences (but which would be unfathomable to humans in certain past cultures, in which certain things that to us are alien were taken as natural or even “obvious” objective properties of nature) to those which are seemingly bizarre and pointless (a subset of which have turned out to be, or to be similar to, properties vital to modern fundamental physics and the structure of physical theories).

Thus, for example, one might consider as a physical property the tendency for a rock to resemble in shape a cloud, or its use as a writing implement, its degrees of symmetry, its ability to perform like a football/soccer ball in suitable experimental conditions (i.e., a playing field), etc. But we (inter-)subjectively rule out the vast majority of possible physical properties. There was a time not long ago, however, when this kind of issue was a very real problem for a particular take on scientific objectivity, scientific progress, and the nature of science following the advent of special relativity in particular.

We have tended to take as given that objects have properties such as lengths and that these do not depend up things such as the time at which we measure one end or upon time at all (barring changes due to e.g., contraction or expansion from environmental conditions and suchlike). But if the invariance of the speed of light is taken as given (i.e., as a postulate or axiom), then it follows from the assumptions of equivalences of the laws of physics in different equivalent (inertial) reference frames that differing measurements of lengths can be the “same” in the sense that they are equivalent under the appropriate transformations.

What this meant for influential philosophers and some scientists even today, following primarily in the footsteps of Bridgman, was that we should approach theory-construction in science as well as objectivity to operationalism, or the carrying out of specified procedures. Bridgman was impressed in particular with the manner in which Einstein was able to redefine fundamental physical properties in terms of a theory by examining the manner in which they were measured. Why not define, therefore, physical properties in terms of the way(s) in which they are measured? The first and ultimately impossible hurdle was to decide what to include in any given operational prescription of measurement. This was true in particular because Bridgman and sundry were building off of the advance of a theory that triumphed in part by overthrowing what had seemed to be self-evident and obvious (physical properties such as length and what went into measuring it).

Some of the above objections and many more like them can be addressed at least in part by digging more deeply. It matters not, for example, if we cannot perceive something we currently call a “rock” as an entity that can have physical properties or indeed many of our perceptual biases and their influences, extensions, etc., when we can ask about the “fundamental” constituents that make up physical reality. But here we enter into a new set of problems.

From the perspective of the OP’s question, one answer would be to adopt a common, popular approach found among physicists concerned with quantum foundations and accept subjectivity to be at the heart of reality in some sense (e.g., as in QBism). Another answer would be that the fundamental constituents, according to our best theories, are not independently existing entities (and indeed in some cases are not really entities at all even in the extended sense required when it comes to HEP and quantum theoretical systems more generally). They are organizing principles and patterns that result with some probability amplitudes according to certain organizational schemes based upon the selection of certain symmetries and their corresponding groups given certain interpretations of HEP data over the years and the exclusion of others (e.g., the bootstrap S-Matrix approach that was a contender to QFT before the quark model and QCD ultimately triumphed).

“The doctrine that the world is made up of objects whose existence is independent of human consciousness turns out to be in conflict with quantum mechanics and with facts established by experiment”
d'Espagnat, B. (1979). The quantum theory and reality. Scientific American, 241(5), 158-181.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Accepting, for the sake of this discussion that the material world exists, has the physical properties and follows the laws of physics as has been observed repeatedly/consistently. Basically, the material world is not a simulation of some kind being run by a mega-computer or in God's mind.
...

I only accept one of your axioms. That we start by generally trusting our experiences.
I don't accept that the world is material nor from God. I can do it in 3rd way.

You are in effect doing an invalid deduction:
P1: We start by generally trusting our experiences.
Therefore the world is material.

It don't follow from that we generally trust our experiences, that the world is material.

 

[HonestJoe]

If this is still subjective, what makes it subjective.

If you think the information is objective to this point, at what point in the process of science does this information become subjective?

You've kind of answered your own question. You presented a set of (hypothetical) facts, which are objective, but then asked people to use those facts to reach conclusions, which are subjective.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Meaning consciousness told me. .. Self mind thinker possessed by his own human science thoughts as a fake God

That is quite a small post, Rational Experience. How did you manage that?

One measurement is subjective. Repeated, independent (made by different entities) measurements, that agree, are objective.

Perhaps no measurement is objective.

 

[Orbit]

Well, there are 4 variants of solipsism. Yours is one, but there are 3 other ones.
Ontological, epistemological and methodological.

Stop doing philosophy if you haven't learned the basics.

Rude.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Rude.

Yes, you are right. But solipsism is still not just one version. And as a solipsist I am tied of people misrepresenting my belief system. So rude right back to you.

Now I will try to be nice. It is like assuming that for a given religion/ideology/what not that all believers are fundamentalists. But yes, I apologize. It was rude and I could have done it differently. But still educate yourself, now that I have told you, it is not that simple.

 

[Orbit]

Yes, you are right. But solipsism is still not just one version. And as a solipsist I am tied of people misrepresenting my belief system. So rude right back to you.

Now I will try to be nice. It is like assuming that for a given religion/ideology/what not that all believers are fundamentalists. But yes, I apologize. It was rude and I could have done it differently. But still educate yourself, now that I have told you, it is not that simple.

What I said was a perfectly appropriate response to the query about subjectivity in the OP. It did not require further specificity or pedantry.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

What I said was a perfectly appropriate response to the query about subjectivity in the OP. It did not require further specificity or pedantry.

Yes, that is your subjective opinion. I am off a different one.
It wasn't perfect, because it left out 3 other versions of solipsism.

Now I accept that you have your opinion, but that doesn't mean that it is more than an opinion. If we describe objectively the world including how different humans understand solipsism, there are 4 versions.
But off course something as irrelevant as for how the world is, doesn't require further specificity or pedantry. Well, I am off a different opinion. But don't let facts, stop you, right?

 

[Nakosis]

You've kind of answered your own question. You presented a set of (hypothetical) facts, which are objective, but then asked people to use those facts to reach conclusions, which are subjective.

So. as soon as humans are involved?

 

[Nakosis]

I only accept one of your axioms. That we start by generally trusting our experiences.
I don't accept that the world is material nor from God. I can do it in 3rd way.

You are in effect doing an invalid deduction:
P1: We start by generally trusting our experiences.
Therefore the world is material.

It don't follow from that we generally trust our experiences, that the world is material.

What would be required for the world to be material?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

So. as soon as humans are involved?

Well, yes. So far for all recorded history that has been so. Even science is in limited sense subjective, and the only strong requirement most people can agree on(subjectively), is that science must be rational, but even that is always within a given cultural contexts.

If you want it as fancy sociology, it is here:

"Thomas Theorem

QUICK REFERENCE
A concept formulated by the American sociologist William Isaac Thomas (1863–1967) that ‘“*facts” do not have a uniform existence apart from the persons who observe and interpret them. Rather, the “real” facts are the ways in which different people come into and define situations’. Famously, as he and his research assistant and wife Dorothy Swaine Thomas (1899–1977) put it in 1928, ‘If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences’. Such a ‘subjective’ definition of the situation by a social actor, group, or subculture is what Merton came to call a self-fulfilling prophecy (as in cases of ‘mind over matter’). It is at the heart of symbolic interactionism. See also constructionism; frame of reference; framing; perspectivism. "
https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803104247382

That connects to science. If you want a scientist word for it, you get this:
"Science, since people must do it, is a socially embedded activity. It progresses by hunch, vision, and intuition. Much of its change through time does not record a closer approach to absolute truth, but the alteration of cultural contexts that influence it so strongly. Facts are not pure and unsullied bits of information; culture also influences what we see and how we see it. Theories, moreover, are not inexorable inductions from facts. The most creative theories are often imaginative visions imposed upon facts; the source of imagination is also strongly cultural. [Stephen Jay Gould, introduction to "The Mismeasure of Man," 1981]"
science | Origin and meaning of science by Online Etymology Dictionary

Regards
Mikkel

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

What would be required for the world to be material?

That everything humans do in effect are not depend on their brains. I.e. that all of the world is objective as independents of brains/minds.

In short and we can nitpick: The closest you can get is non-reductive emergent mental properties, that supervenes on the material world, but can't be reduced to the material world.

 

[Nakosis]

Well, yes. So far for all recorded history that has been so. Even science is in limited sense subjective, and the only strong requirement most people can agree on(subjectively), is that science must be rational, but even that is always within a given cultural contexts.

If you want it as fancy sociology, it is here:

"Thomas Theorem

QUICK REFERENCE
A concept formulated by the American sociologist William Isaac Thomas (1863–1967) that ‘“*facts” do not have a uniform existence apart from the persons who observe and interpret them. Rather, the “real” facts are the ways in which different people come into and define situations’. Famously, as he and his research assistant and wife Dorothy Swaine Thomas (1899–1977) put it in 1928, ‘If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences’. Such a ‘subjective’ definition of the situation by a social actor, group, or subculture is what Merton came to call a self-fulfilling prophecy (as in cases of ‘mind over matter’). It is at the heart of symbolic interactionism. See also constructionism; frame of reference; framing; perspectivism. "
https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803104247382

That connects to science. If you want a scientist word for it, you get this:
"Science, since people must do it, is a socially embedded activity. It progresses by hunch, vision, and intuition. Much of its change through time does not record a closer approach to absolute truth, but the alteration of cultural contexts that influence it so strongly. Facts are not pure and unsullied bits of information; culture also influences what we see and how we see it. Theories, moreover, are not inexorable inductions from facts. The most creative theories are often imaginative visions imposed upon facts; the source of imagination is also strongly cultural. [Stephen Jay Gould, introduction to "The Mismeasure of Man," 1981]"
science | Origin and meaning of science by Online Etymology Dictionary

Regards
Mikkel

Ok, what is wrong with humans? I understand the symptoms. What about the cause? What feature/property do we have that prevents of from being objective?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Ok, what is wrong with humans? I understand the symptoms. What about the cause? What feature/property do we have that prevents of from being objective?

That is a deep one. Honest there are some many ways to answer that, but it involves logic and causality.

Everything is the universe is assumed causal in some sense except maybe for some aspects of QM. Okay, so aside from QM, humans can't be objective, because in some cases the causality is subjective.
In biological terms the fittest gene give rise to subjectivity, because you as a chain(causality) of replicating genes are in effect subjective. I can unpack that for you.
And you can't reduce the world down to being logical, because the law of non-contraction only applies to something in a given sense at a given limited time and space, so for humans as I am at different time and space than you I can do differently in a different sense in some cases.

 

[Nakosis]

That is a deep one. Honest there are some many ways to answer that, but it involves logic and causality.

Everything is the universe is assumed causal in some sense except maybe for some aspects of QM. Okay, so aside from QM, humans can't be objective, because in some cases the causality is subjective.
In biological terms the fittest gene give rise to subjectivity, because you as a chain(causality) of replicating genes are in effect subjective. I can unpack that for you.
And you can't reduce the world down to being logical, because the law of non-contraction only applies to something in a given sense at a given limited time and space, so for humans as I am at different time and space than you I can do differently in a different sense in some cases.

Sorry, didn't expect an argument from causality. Don't have a direct response. Just rolling the idea over in my subjective mind.

 

[rational experiences]

That is quite a small post, Rational Experience. How did you manage that?Perhaps no measurement is objective.

Science is a liar an even smaller post

 

[Aupmanyav]

Science is a liar an even smaller post

I wonder whether you were born in 20th Century or in the First.