Re: [Phys-l] God as an explanation (WAS: Darwinism underattack?andthephysicsclassroom)

["David Whitbeck" <dwhitbeck@sotc.org>]

Actually it is perfectly fine for an introductory course.  Well obviously not a discussion of classical field theory, but in the honors introductory course that I took as a freshman we were exposed to the idea that the conservation laws go hand in hand with symmetries.

Ah but saying something to the effect of "there is symmetry in the laws of physics" trumps "god built our brains to make it seem that way" because the latter is not more fundamental, it moves the wrong way up the chain of causal explanations.  We're left open with the possibility that god created our brains to merely perceive symmetry *where none exists*.  At least the former explanation asserts a property of the universe, the latter is closer to being the absence of an assertion, being much closer to a metaphysical argument with no substance that can't be argued for or against.

I agree that at any level you can just ask "why?" and answer with the g word.  And somewhere in the process eventually science will stop being able to produce explanations.  It's like reaching the surface of last scattering, the truth is opaque beyond a certain point.  But if at that point what you finally reach is intuitively obvious, shouldn't that be acceptable?  I thought the point is to be able to explain processes (and of course make predictions) in terms of simple principles that we hold to be true.  If we question our ability to even perceive truth and falsify claims, we would be forced to decide that the scientific enterprise is a waste of time, because the whole endeavor is predicated on our assumed ability to make these kind of judgments.

David Whitbeck

-----Original Message-----
From: phys-l-bounces@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu on behalf of John Clement
Sent: Fri 8/1/2008 11:05 AM
To: 'Forum for Physics Educators'
Subject: Re: [Phys-l] God as an explanation (WAS: Darwinism underattack?andthephysicsclassroom)
 
Easy to swallow?  Not in an introductory course, which is where I assume the
God as an explanation is likely to occur.  And of course one can always push
the explanation back to God ordained symmetry, and build our brain to make
it obvious.  So one comes back to the answer depends on the question.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX


> But momentum conservation is a Noether Current associated with spatial
> translation invariance.  Spatial translation invariance is a very
> intuitive, natural and easy to swallow axiom.  There's really nothing
> strange or mystical about momentum conversation, it's simply a reflection
> of symmetry.
>
> David Whitbeck