NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #1/NN_1993_1.iso/spool/sci/philosop/tech/4748

Text File | 1993-01-11 | 2.8 KB | 63 lines

Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Path: sparky!uunet!usc!rpi!utcsri!psych.toronto.edu!christo
From: [e-mail] (Christopher Green)
Subject: Re: Which theory before observation ?
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Organization: Department of Psychology, University of Toronto
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <schiller.726741489@hpas5>
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 03:01:11 GMT
Lines: 52

In article <schiller.726741489@hpas5> [e-mail] (schiller c) writes:
>[e-mail] (Christopher Green) writes:
>
>>>In article <schiller.726487694@hpas5> [e-mail] (schiller c) writes:
>>>>My position as a scientist is that facts, i.e. the  results of observation,
>>>>are the basis of theories. There are no "well-known" flaws of this position.
>>>>
>>I'm afriad that this is simply ill-informed. The observation-theory distinction
>>has long been a matter a controversy in philosophy of science. The best-known
>>"flaws" are put forward in Putnam's "What theories are not."  The position
>>outlined there is a little technical, but the central example is that one
>>cannot establish, through obsevation, that a thing is red unless one has
>>a conceptual scheme for colors that includes red in advance.
>
>You are right: one needs a concept of red. But a concept and a theory
>are two different things.

In what way? I didn't say you need a *theory* of red, anyway. I said
you need a conceptual scheme for colors that includes red (actually Putnam
said it). This sounds to me like a color theory, and certainly Putnam meant
it that way.

>Red is a concept formed by children
>before they are six months old, and it gives a name to certain class
>of colours.

I can only say that I think this is an indefensibly simplistic theory of
color-name development. But even if it weren't, your statement is compatible
with the idea that six-month old children develop such a theory of colors.
(Note that many cultures do not have the same color scheme as us.)

>When a child says: "it is red", it just says, "it has a similar
>look than all the previous things I have observed, which I call red".

"Similar" is a notoriously slippery term that does *all* of the work here.
Moreover, for any finite set of data (e.g., a finite number of observed
things called "red") there are infinitely many theories which are perfectly
confirmed by it (e.g., it could be that they are all made of wood, or not
elephants, or contain carbon).  Thus "red" could mean one of these things.

>The statement "It is red" therefore just compares different observations.
>Not much of theory there.

Noth much a theory indeed. But a theory nonetheless.
>


--
Christopher D. Green                [e-mail]
Psychology Department               [e-mail]
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario M5S 1A1