Two separate (but related) issues have recently received a lot of attention in the philosophical literature around laws. Neither has much to do with what it means to be a law. Instead, they have to do with the kind of generalizations scientists are trying to discover. First, does a science, in its attempt to discover laws, seek to discover extraordinary laws? Second, even if one science – fundamental physics – does this, others do? Going back to Armstrong (1983, 40), there have been challenges for those with a humane representation of laws, and whether the Humee laws are explanatory. More recently, Maudlin has posed the challenge succinctly: a popular response is related to tying a law to deductive systems. The idea dates back to Mill (1843, 384), but has been defended in one form or another by Ramsey (1978 [f.p. 1928]), Lewis (1973, 1983, 1986, 1994), Earman (1984) and Loewer (1996). Deductive systems are individualized by their axioms. The logical consequence of axioms are theorems. Some true deductive systems will be stronger than others; Some will be simpler than others. These two virtues, strength and simplicity, compete.
(It is easy to make a system stronger by sacrificing simplicity: include all truths as axioms. It is easy to simplify a system by sacrificing power: it is enough to have the axiom that 2 + 2 = 4.) According to Lewis (1973, 73), the laws of nature belong to all true deductive systems with a better combination of simplicity and strength. For example, the idea that it is a law that all uranium balls are less than a mile in diameter is because it is probably one of the best deductive systems; Quantum theory is an excellent theory of our universe and could be among the best systems, and it is plausible to think that quantum theory plus truths describing the nature of uranium would logically mean that there are no uranium balls of this size (Loewer 1996, 112). It is doubtful that the generalization that all golden balls are less than a mile in diameter would be among the best systems. It could be added as an axiom to any system, but it would bring little or nothing of interest in terms of strength and it would sacrifice something in terms of simplicity. (Lewis subsequently made significant revisions to his narrative to solve problems of physical probability (Lewis 1986, 1994). What happens next? How can philosophy overcome current debates about natural laws? Three topics are particularly interesting and important. The first concerns the question of whether legality is part of the content of scientific theories. This is a question that is often asked after causality, but less frequently after legislation. Roberts offers an analogy to support the idea that this is not the case: it is a postulate of Euclidean geometry that two points determine a line. But it is not part of the content of Euclidean geometry that this theorem is a postulate. Euclidean geometry is not a theory of postulates; It is a theory about points, lines and planes.
(2008, 92). This could be a plausible first step in understanding the absence of certain nomic terms in formal statements of scientific theories. The second question is whether there are contingent laws of nature. The Needers continue to work to complete their point of view, while Humeans and others pay relatively little attention to what they do; The new work must explain the source of the underlying obligations that divide these camps. Finally, more attention needs to be paid to the language used to account for what laws are and the language used to express the laws themselves and whether laws explain. It is clear that recent controversies over generalizations in physics and the specialized sciences revolve precisely around these questions, but their exploration can also bear fruit in key questions related to ontology, realism versus antirealism, and supervenience. From this point of view, necessitarianism is therefore perceived as intertwined with a certain conception – very controversial – of the essence of the explanation itself, namely that one can only explain the occurrence of an event if one is able to quote a generalization that is not logically necessary. Few philosophers today are willing to insist on this view of explanation, but many still cling to the belief that there is such a thing as nomologically necessary truths. Regulators consider this belief superfluous. Goodman believed that the difference between natural laws and accidental truths was inextricably linked to the problem of induction. In his “The New Riddle of Induction” (1983, [f.p.
1954], 73), Goodman says, perhaps more surprisingly, that not all physicists and philosophers of physics believe that such events are truly indeterministic, even if they may seem so. The question depends on the interpretation of the theory that is advocated. For example, if you decided (!) to raise your arm, then there would be a true timeless universal description (let`s call it “D4729”) of what you did. However, if you choose not to raise your arm, then there would be another true timeless universal description (we can call it “D5322”) of what you did (and D4729 would be timelessly wrong). The suggestion here is that there is the possibility of a universe without matter with the laws of general relativity and another with the laws of a contradictory theory of gravity. (For other examples, see Carroll 1994, 60-80). What Maudlin sees as a consequence of usual scientific reasoning, Humeans will see as an example that exposes the absurdity of non-supervenience. A number of needy people (see, for example, Wright) have tried to describe experiments whose results would justify a belief in physical necessity.
But these thought experiments are powerless. At best, as Hume had clearly seen, such an experiment could show nothing more than an ever-present regularity in nature; No one could prove that such regularity resulted from an underlying necessity. The crucial point here is that the creation of different universes is a deterministic process. In this interpretation, there are no measurement events with random results. Instead, everything that could happen quantum happens somewhere in many worlds. The result is that if new versions of this view continue to gain popularity, there may come a day when physicists once again believe that nature is completely deterministic. See David Wallace The Emergent Multiverse: Quantum Theory According to the Everett Interpretation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012). If it is not to be considered that “there is a flow of coke” physically impossible, one or more other conditions must be added to the conditions necessary for legality. Physical necessity seems to be the other condition.
This is precisely the perplexity experienced by quantum physicists. You have found many examples of two completely different descriptions of the same physical system. In the case of physics, instead of meat and sauces, ingredients are particles and forces; Recipes are mathematical formulas that encode interactions; And the cooking process is the process of quantization that turns equations into probabilities of physical phenomena.
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