The thing is, historically we never really had much respect for complexity.
> We talk about complex subjects all the time. Medicine, politics, economics, sociology, morality and more
For our entire history we have being talking about complex subjects we barely understood and, like proud primates, we were always very vocal and cocksure about our view points.
We experienced two cultural revolutions, first in the world of ancient Greece, subsequently in the modern era of scientific enlightenment. One can think of the emergent scientific method as effectively learning to respect complexity. Being humble about assertions that cannot be validated again and again, in different conditions, by different parties etc.
The tangible result of this new trait (respecting complexity) was pretty amazing. But only for a precious few domains. Our default mode, being 100% sure about things we have little clue about (who needs hallucinating AI when you've got humans), continues to be the prevalent one.
Whats worse, we now have what has been called "the pretence of knowledge" [1]. We know that real knowledge is powerful, so why not pretend we have it when we actually don't? This leads to a random mix of (typically self-serving) opinions coupled to the superficial use of scientific tools. A pathology most visible precisely in the above list of really complex topics.
The risk is that as the challenges of our own complex societies mount, we will undo also what we have achieved, and effectively go back to become stochastic parrots, unhinged from complex reality.
Political action is fuelled by beliefs and ideals for the future. As a subjective observer, no one can attain a complete image of reality, or "the thing in itself". All we observe are appearances (phenomena) from our subjective point of view. In the process of a wider societal dialogue, we can exchange these points of view and eventually come to a rough approximation of the objective state of things.
> In the process of a wider societal dialogue, we can exchange these points of view and eventually come to a rough approximation of the objective state of things.
By and large discussion about politics in civil society seems to me riddled with factional language and lenses, with lies and hostile, bad-faith accusations, rather than resemble some Rawlsian disinterested dialogue.
the quality of that exchange is indeed the key catalyst of whether a "convergence" happens. For matters concerning the physical world we have (largely) learned not to let subjectivity stand in the way, even when it concerns very complex phenomena. For anything more directly related to the human condition we are in far more primitive state.
Humans are social creatures, and social dynamics are as important to us as laws of physics. For better or worse, in every-day life, being right is usually less important than being liked. The basics of survival in the real world enter common knowledge, so that e.g. you know you shouldn't eat random mushrooms, or foul-smelling stuff, nor should you swim in pools of funny-colored liquids should you encounter one outside. Beyond that, you're more likely to die from being a contrarian than from common beliefs being wrong.
As people experience it, the truth about objective reality matters only if being wrong can bite you in the ass. It matters when you're working with physical stuff, where being wrong could be dangerous (perhaps indirectly by ruining your boss's profits). There's a reason science and engineering leap forward during times of war - all the social and political games, all the fraud, all the weird beliefs about the world, suddenly stop being important when the enemy is at your gates, and your survival depends on whether your soldiers' rifles can shoot straight, and the missiles they fire can hit their designated targets. At those times, being wrong about complex aspects of reality is deadly, so it's okay to defy preexisting social dynamics and get these things right.
War isn't the only situation like this, of course. The economy sometimes produces such states, however briefly. A new invention delivering real value requires being right to develop and improve... until the point improvements get more expensive than marketing, at which point truth stops mattering again.
Not everyone considers truth as a terminal value. For those of us that do, living in a world where social dynamics are more important than being right, becomes extra challenging.
Not really, that would imply they are pretending. There aren't enough people with a genuine respect for truth for that to be a factor. It is more that any signal of knowledge will be copied mercilessly if it affords any respect. If people with bookshelves get more respect, then everyone will have a bookshelf and nonetheless be confused if they meet someone who reads a lot of books.
The default assumption is that a person has no idea what they are talking about because the base rate success of that stance is rather high.
Its all us, most of the time lol. From the blog post:
> All I can do is continue looking for those people who have that respect for complexity. Some find them boring, or indecisive, or just wrong for not buying into some extreme.
Ignoring complexity and still making decisions is a key survival trait. The trick in modern society is imho to know when complexity really matters.
> One can think of the emergent scientific method as effectively learning to respect complexity.
Which I'm reading like it's the ONLY way we know of how to "respect complexity".
> The tangible result of this new trait (respecting complexity) was pretty amazing. But only for a precious few domains. Our default mode, being 100% sure about things we have little clue about (who needs hallucinating AI when you've got humans), continues to be the prevalent one.
Which means if only everybody in other areas learned to respect complexity as we enlightened scientist do, everything would be great in these other areas too.
And so on...
This is classical enlightenment scientific positivism that is fuelled by technical prowess of the contemporary society.
It's only natural to assume that all these wonders in science can be replicated if we only applied the scientific method for everything, and if it's not working we need to just work harder and eventually find the right set of hypothesis and reductions to prove the necessary theories that will render break through in other areas. What's wrong with this thought?
Well first in philosophy, science is a set of assumptions and simplifications that limit the scope of search to what's measurable and ignores qualia. This is the first simplification. [1]
The second is reduction, which is responsible for the wonders in physics. You break things down, you study the components of reality in an isolated and reproducible way in hopes to understand the larger picture by means of decomposition. It's just that science isn't direct about how to put things together after reduction. In most areas it's ok, things are simple enough we can make do. But it's being catastrophic in areas like quantum physics. In fact the calculations start to skyrocket in complexity so fast that reductionism itself is put in question, specially when geometric objects like the amplituhedron are known to exist that simplify the calculation quite substantially but isn't prone to investigation by reduction. [2]
Which puts in question the assumption that science as you put in your comment is the correct way to manage complexity in all areas. This positivist approach to science is put in question by many other philosophers, including Karl Popper [3].
> Which puts in question the assumption that science as you put in your comment is the correct way to manage complexity in all areas.
One important aspect of the scientific method is that the outcome "we don't know" is perfectly acceptable. Not sure there are other approaches that have this humility built-in but happy to be enlightened (pun :-)
Why are you so sure everybody else's don't accept "we don't know" as an acceptable answer? What makes you think only scientists are humble enough to accept such outcomes.
I believe you are romanticising science. It's done by humans it's prone human error just as much (reputation and money comes to mind). And even if it wasn't, if was done 100% correctly all the time, there are fundamental assumptions and simplifications needed to make the current scientific method work that's known to be incompatible with some domains of study, as I mentioned before.
And to answer your question, philosophers are the other kind of category of thinkers that would fit that description.
So by all means try to apply science to everything. It's been great so far. Just don't put too much expectation on it. It's disrespectful and unfair to science.
> What makes you think only scientists are humble enough to accept such outcomes?
In your previous comment you equated the scientific method with naive positivism that purports to explain "everything". While this is a recurrent pathology, especially during times of major scientific advances that embolden people to make ridiculous assertions (from Laplace to Wolfram), its not really a defining part of science.
I don't see science in any way as adversarial to philosophy. But it does have a track record of having diffused as a working thought framework whereas philosophy is still a rather elitist affair.
> In your previous comment you equated the scientific method with naive positivism that purports to explain "everything".
I never did that. You should try to read what others write with as much care are you employ in writing stuff yourself, including these elitist philosophers you are writing off so easily.
> We talk about complex subjects all the time. Medicine, politics, economics, sociology, morality and more
For our entire history we have being talking about complex subjects we barely understood and, like proud primates, we were always very vocal and cocksure about our view points.
We experienced two cultural revolutions, first in the world of ancient Greece, subsequently in the modern era of scientific enlightenment. One can think of the emergent scientific method as effectively learning to respect complexity. Being humble about assertions that cannot be validated again and again, in different conditions, by different parties etc.
The tangible result of this new trait (respecting complexity) was pretty amazing. But only for a precious few domains. Our default mode, being 100% sure about things we have little clue about (who needs hallucinating AI when you've got humans), continues to be the prevalent one.
Whats worse, we now have what has been called "the pretence of knowledge" [1]. We know that real knowledge is powerful, so why not pretend we have it when we actually don't? This leads to a random mix of (typically self-serving) opinions coupled to the superficial use of scientific tools. A pathology most visible precisely in the above list of really complex topics.
The risk is that as the challenges of our own complex societies mount, we will undo also what we have achieved, and effectively go back to become stochastic parrots, unhinged from complex reality.
[1] https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/1974/hay...