forum for week of 2 October

In Chapter Two: Perception, of Dr Morton's book A Guide Through the Theory of Knowledge, Section 3 Empiricism, has the inclusion: To the question “What qualities could our beliefs have?” it answers “We could, potentially, have only beliefs that are based on perceptual evidence.” Empiricism is thus both a very down to earth and a very idealistic philosophy. It is down to earth because it aims to base all our beliefs on what we can see, hear, and touch. And it is idealistic because it thinks that human beings are capable of reforming their beliefs so that they are all based on perception.

I would like to relate three excerpts on Dr. Richard Feynman.

1. The late, great physicist Richard Feynman wrote, "It's quite wonderful that we can 'see,' or figure it out so easily. Someone who's standing at my left can see somebody who's standing at my right - that is, the light can be going this way across, or that way across, or this way up, or that way down; it's a complete network. Some quantity is shaking about, in a combination of motions so elaborate and complicated the net result is to produce an influence which makes me see you, completely undisturbed by the fact that at the same time there are influences that represent the guy on my left side seeing the guy on my right side. The light's there anyway....it bounces off this, and it bounces off that - all this is going on, and yet we can sort it out with this instrument, our eye." Source: Google entry = physicist richard feynman on perception - number 8 posting titled Introduction to Perception.

2. In the book titled Quantum Man, 2011, by Lawrence M. Krauss, page 313 includes the entry attributed to Dr. Feynman that "...we seem to be hard wired to find that what happens to each of us naturally appears to take on a special significance and meaning, even if it is an accident."

3. On page 318 Krauss includes the observation of Dr. Feynman that "We have to guard against this [theory misperception], and the only way to do so is by adhering to the straight jacket of empirical reality."

On the basis of Dr. Feynman's contribution to the advancement of quantum physics, I think an emphasis of philosophy based on experiment is accurate.