Date:          Thu, 9 Jan 1997 08:23:21 GMT +0200
Subject:       BHA: Re: the possibility of naturalism


Hello again,

First some chunks of thread, then some comments.

A] CHUNKS

>> = Colin
>  = Tobin

>> Much as I agree with the general thrust of Tobin's remarks, I have 
>> one serious quibble. i would object to seeing the TD/ID as 
>> basically a temporal
>> distinction. For, a given theory, say theory X, is still a set of
>> transitive
>> objects of another set of intransitive objects Y1, Y2---Y8. Such a 
>> theory,
>> that is theory X, only  itself becomes an intransitive object when it
>> itself
>> becomes an object for discussion or scientific appraisal (this 
>> doesn't mean
>> that the theory does not exist or have real effects). But even 
>> though our
>> theory of theory X - theory Z - has as its object of inquiry theory 
>> X, theory X is still a set of transitive objects in relation to 
>> the objects
>> Y1, Y2-----Y8 and no amount of temporal distortion makes it 
>> otherwise. This
>> distinction is needed if we are to retain our fallibility. Confused? 
>> join the club.
 
> I think what you're saying is this: let's pretend I'm a sociologist 
> (and here I thought I gave up acting years ago--I'm such a liar!).  
> I'm studying the
> current practice of Dr Frankenstein, a noted microbiologist.  For me, 
> Dr F's
> scientific activity and theories are intransitive; for Dr F, they're
> transitive.  Yes?  Okay, now you say this does not involve a temporal
> distinction, correct?  Hm.  For Dr F, of course, what he's done and 
> what he's
> thought are still part of what he is *doing*, in the present, and 
> thanks to
> the prospect of discovery, are capable of transformation at any 
> moment (more
> or less).  But *I* can only study what Dr F has actually *done*, and 
> that's in the past (even if the very recent past, say two 
> milliseconds ago).  If Dr
> F suddenly gets devoured by his monstrous pet skin-eating virus, I 
> still have
> an object of study.  The unfortunate Dr F, of course, no longer has 
> an object
> of study at all.  (Bela Lugosi laugh here, and in the background, 
> Mick Jagger
> singing "T-i-i-i-ime is on my side--yes it is!")  Anyway, my point is 
> that nothing can be an object of study until it enters the past.  
> One cannot study the absolute present moment.

B] COMMENTS

I must admit my first reaction was to agree with Colin, and support the 
quibble. In fact I had half written a reply yesterday on that very 
point. I still agree, but when I got in this morning and saw Tobin's 
response my attitude to the details changed somewhat. 

Point 1: I agree with Colin, insofar as I do not think that the TD/ID 
distinction should be understood as a temporal one. What the 
distinction marks is the difference between things which are 
independent of humans (or some particular humans) and things which are 
not.

Point 2: I agree with Tobin that _in general_ we can expect a 
transitive object which is "about" some intransitive one to come into 
being, if at all, only after the intransitive. (I am not so sure that 
the two could not exist simultaneously, though, and can imagine cases 
where some mechanism is proposed in a theory at some time T, where at 
time T no such mechanism really operates, but by virtue of people 
believing the theory changes in behaviour take place such that at some 
time after T the mechanism is really effective. I am told that there is 
a proper name for a version of this phenomena in economics. Here the 
transitive _in a sense_ comes first.)

Point 3: The words "in a sense" in the last point are very important, 
and I think that we are all in danger of eliding two senses of object 
in our discussion here. It is crucial to remember that the generative 
mechanisms contained in a theory, which would have to be intranstive 
for the theory to be "true" in any simple sense are not themselves 
intransitive. Put another way the "real" mechanisms in the full sense 
of real will not in general be a part of our theory. [This is not 
necessarily the case, although there are no extra-transitive identity 
criteria which would settle the question even if we were correct...]

So returning to Tobin's example:

> I'm studying the current practice of Dr Frankenstein, a noted 
> microbiologist.  For me, Dr F's scientific activity and theories 
> are intransitive; for Dr F, they're transitive.

Well, up to a point. Still, at least two things need to be said.

Thing one: Major parts of Doctors F's (please, call me 
Victor) work must be relatively intransitive otherwise he would not be 
engaged in science at all. This applies both to his experiments which 
must combine intervention and non-interference so as to hold out the 
chance of being informative, and to his theories which he must 
formulate in such a way as to become objects about which he (and other 
scientists) can think, which gives them a kind of intransitivity as 
well.

Thing two: We need to be careful when we say Doctor F's activity and 
theories are intransitive for our thespian sociologist. This is because 
these phenomena are not given to us raw as data for study, but as we 
all know are partly constituted as objects of thought by our existing 
outlook and expectations. We don't "have" the intransitive objects, but 
as critical realists we recongise that there are such things even 
though we do _not_ have them. All the objects we have are transitive, 
otherwise we would be naive realists.

Cheerio,
David
Department of Philosophy, UND
--------------------------------------------------------
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