Re: investigation, definitions & logic

Third message

If this layman has appeared to dangle something about empiricism, and then
to snatch it away, then let us recall the example of the baby seeing most
things fall "toward" the floor, if not prevented from doing so, while on
occasion some things fly or float upward. This is an *APPARENT PARADOX* if
one has no underlying experience wherewith to figure out that flies have
apparati that enable them to go upward as well as in other directions... and
to figure out that ONE of the differences among the various items on the
Periodic Table of Elements is their variable specific gravity and duhhhh,
there's this stuff called "air" which, at certain elevations in relation to
sea level has an aggregate specific gravity among its constituents which is
greater than that of the aggregate of the parts of a thin-skinned rubber
balloon with helium or hydrogen in it. (And we even know today that it is
not a good idea
to fill toys with the latter, because it is so flammable. Then, too, we
humans have some sort of opinionation about babies that we should nurture
and protect them... although there is no empirical PROOF that we should.

So do we have a paradox when we combine the following two assumptions:

1. That we humans get our notions experientially, from our "exposure to
reality"; AND,

2. Our sensory capabilities are INSUFFICIENT for us to measure each and
every iota of the small intersection we
have with reality as an entirety?

It does not require -- it seems to this layman -- that we need to be a
"genius" of the Bertrand Russellian variety to
see that this is NOT a juxtaposition of irreconcilables but a combining of
two viable ideas in accordance with some understanding of what are some, at
least, of the pertinent underlying facts... no less so than for us to
reconcile the fact that some things seem to fall while some things appear to
rise, sometimes.

Forgive me if I seem to border on an unprovable assumption when I insert
here (it would be a footnote, if this were a formal paper) that I,
personally, assume that when MORE DETAILS have been exposed in the matter
of the
"APPARENT PARADOX" between Newtonian and Quantum physics, then someone who
is not a Bertrand Russellian-style genius will not have to see those two as
irreconcilable, either. However, as this layman tries consistently to
preach others should do, this layman both RECOGNIZES AND EMBRACES the
possibility that,
such details shall not be attained, or not in my lifetime and yours, or not
ever... and ALSO the possibility that there simply is a levels-based
difference in how things work.

Not wishing to get too far off into physics and photographical realism, but
let us consider the very REAL fact that we could commission an artist to
place a grid over a picture that we in the U. S. normally consider to be a
recognizable picture of George Washington and -- using those pictures of
Abraham Lincoln as pixesl, arrange them on that grid. From high up in the
air, we would "see" the face of George Washington, although when we came
down to Earth we would see thousands of pictures of Abraham Lincoln. Now
some who would deem themselves to be logical, encounter situations such as
this and discern them to present a *PARADOX*, as would be implied by the
question, "Who IS it a picture of, then?" ... followed perhaps by the
question, "How can it be both the one and the other, when they are not the
same.

In EITHER SCENARIO, this layman does not perceive that there NECESSARILY
consists in the difference between Newtonian and Quantum mechanics an
unfathomable mystery. But, if a highly touted physicist were to wish to
perceive it so, I would not feel guilty about saying I respectfully
disagree, and am more than willing to be persuaded when, and after, more
underlying details are on the table... if I should live so long.

My studied (far from casual) *STANCE* then -- and only tentatively so -- is
that there are no paradoxes in reality... but only *APPARENT PARADOXES*
arising from our human propensity (and reasonably as it is) to plug into
some formal logic models... or impressionistic (Kentucy Windage-type models)
the best we can come up with at any given time. And, at THIS particular
given time, the models grind, and grunt, and remain consistent, and crank
out a "picture" that, for us, is an *APPARENT PARADOX* (or a gross
contradiction of nature, by nature, and for nature... which somehow is
not -- for this dumb old layman -- "intellectually satisfying."

Okay... enough, once again, for one message.

(To be continued...)

g


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