Moderation Questions

It's possible that in some formulations we might be able to "break out" of the simulation but it would require energy levels that would be unattainable in practice. That would make it theoretically falsifiable.

Who said being unfalsifiable makes something worthless?

It was supposed to about me and then the whole point of 'simulation theory' is that if the world is simulatable then we can reduce of all physics etc to computer logic.

Whether we live in a simulation is not the point at all.

Any proposition which is unfalsifiable is scientifically worthless. You should have known this already.

You're a real class act.

Of course. But the whole idea of a visual screen in our mind wouldn't follow from having all the physical facts.

Is the proposition “the laws of nature apply to all places in the universe” falsifiable?

Or how about this one: “any proposition which is unfalsifiable is scientifically worthless” < is that proposition falsifiable?

what about 'survival of the fittest'?

I should imagine so, seems pretty easy to contradict as long as you can agree on the qualities of being "(un)falsifiable" and "(not) scientifically worthless". For example, find an unfalsifiable proposition that is used in science somewhere. Many worlds doesn't really count as it's not really "used" per se. Nothing in quantum mechanics would change if this interpretation ceased to exist, as far as I am aware. It's a fun thought experiment, much like simulation theory. Or, lacking a current example, construct a hypothetical example where an unfalsifiable proposition can be used to make useful (or any) predictions about reality, e.g. in the construction of some sort of physical law. Such an example, even if only hypothetical, would falsify 57's assertion as stated.

I think there is something about many worlds that inherently appeals to the human psyche, or maybe just certain personality types - I remember when I was a small kid, maybe 5 or 6, having many worlds / parallel universes type ideas about different outcomes (like a coin landing heads instead of tails or whatnot) and how a tiny and seemingly irrelevant change might lead to a completely different world somewhere down the line (butterfly effect type stuff). So I understand why it's appealing on a philosophical level, but that doesn't make it scientific.

Are you sure you know what "falsifiable" means?

Ok, I'll take a note for the unlikely event that I care about your opinion.

I suggest you raise it to 10 per hour.

You seem like a rather angry little man, perhaps you should try the turps yourself.

I'm out of my league against you? I am supremely confident that the world is full of people who can run rings around me on this topic. I am equally confident that you are not one of those people.

What does the term 'dictionary' mean?

Yes ty. You?

If you hold it as true in an axiom of your best science that the best science is falsifiable and everything else is not science, then it’s just not the case that it is a proposition that can be falsified. That’s what it means to be an axiom.

Of course if you do that then it just entails a contradiction because you are building in your best science something that cannot be falsified by your best science.

You could just allow for some unfalsifiable propositions to be indispensable, but then it wouldn’t be the case that falsifiability is a necessary criteria that makes a theory scientific. Which I think is fine, since there are logical axioms that are taken as given within logical systems and those seem to work just fine.

Can you give a concrete example (even if hypothetical) of what you mean here?

Sure, the law of noncontradiction is an axiom in formal logic. Or the validity of inductive reasoning itself which is strictly speaking not valid in logical systems.

^ But it’s indispensable for scientific reasoning and is taken as an axiom by most, so it can’t be falsified in principle.

I don't know that axioms in formal logic those are what I'd call unfalsifiable propositions in science. I also doubt it's what 57 was talking about when he said that being unfalsifiable makes a theory scientifically worthless. I'm talking more about many worlds or simulation theory type stuff.

A fully functional 747 appearing in an uninhabited universe, or a cat that is neither alive nor dead, or another you being dealt pocket aces every hand are all reductio ad absurdums.

How is that related to my question? Are you suggesting that these are unfalsifiable propositions? I'd imagine that "it's possible to be dealt pocket aces every hand" is just as falsifiable as "it's possible to be dealt pocket aces at least once". Why wouldn't it be? You just calculate the probability of it happening and show it's nonzero. If it's zero, the proposition is falsified. Same for the 747. I'm not sure where you're going with the cat. Nobody ever suggested that the cat was actually neither alive nor dead - it's a thought experiment designed to show shortcomings in the Copenhagen interpretation.

He didn’t say scientific theory, he said any proposition, which has a particular meaning in a philosophical context. But I guess if he just meant that he finds theories to be scientifically worthless if they are not falsifiable and wants to ignore the unfalsifiable axioms that science needs in order to do scientific work, then I agree it would be a different position that I might not disagree with. I don’t think I buy that position myself but I understand why people might buy it, because they are concerned with categorizing what counts as science and what doesn’t.

Empirically speaking it doesn’t seem possible to falsify that you could get dealt pocket aces every hand in a row for eternity because no matter how many hands are dealt, there’s always another hand that can be dealt. So you’ll never actually find out if you are going to be dealt the next hand.

I don’t know what his comment has to do with you were saying either though, but maybe I’m just dense.