Helsinki’s 12–13 June 2025 workshop marked the first international Philosophy of Science Advice gathering, hosted by the Finnish Academy and the Scientific Advice Mechanism. Experts debated ethics, legitimacy, stakeholder values, and funding to strengthen scientific advice in democracy. https://scientificadvice.eu/events/philosophy-of-science-advice-workshop/
#Science4Policy #PhilosophyOfScience #EthicsInScience #PolicyMaking
Book presentation at IHPST – June 19
On June 19 at 11:00 AM, the IHPST will host a presentation of the volume The Mathematical and Philosophical Legacy of Alexander Grothendieck (Birkhäuser, 2025), edited by Marco Panza, Jean-Jacques Szczeciniarz, and Daniele Struppa.
Location: IHPST, conference room (13 rue du Four, 75006 Paris, 2nd floor)
Programme:
– 11:00–11:15 – Marco Panza (IHPST, UMR 8590): General presentation of the volume
– 11:15–11:45 – Olivia Caramello (Università dell’Insubria & Institute Grothendieck): Topoi, from Grothendieck to the present
– 11:45–12:00 – Coffee break
– 12:00–12:45 – Jean-Jacques Szczeciniarz (SPHERE, UMR 7219): Presentation of three contributions:
(i) Tohoku 45 years after
(ii) My view on the experience with Grothendieck’s Anabelian Geometry (by Mohamed Saidi)
(iii) Grothendieck’s use of equality (by Kevin Buzzard)
An occasion to revisit Grothendieck’s legacy from both mathematical and philosophical perspectives.
#Grothendieck #PhilosophyOfMathematics #HistoryOfMathematics #ToposTheory #AnabelianGeometry #Mathematics #PhilosophyOfScience #IHPST
Getting ready for @beccajackson.bsky.social 's talk at our School. Activating all the brain cells ☕😅
#Cofaidh #Coffee #Philosophy #PhilosophyOfScience #Psychometrics #Measurement
Here's one way of expressing Illich and Latour's challenges to modernism, as interpreted by Cayley;
The Science(TM) is modernism's totalitarian claim of unchallengeable correctness. But the sciences are not so much bodies of certain knowledge, as ways of finding and mapping the limits to what we know, and what can be known. Undermining and eroding any and all systems of totalitarian certainty, in favour of contingent if/then claims.
Today and tomorrow I am in Potsdam, participating in this symposium on Roman Frigg's book Models and Theories. It should be fun!
Many-worlds without necessarily many worlds?
IAI has a brief interview of David Deutsch on his advocacy for the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. (Warning: possible paywall.) Deutsch has a history of showing little patience with other interpretations, and this interview is no different. A lot of the discussion centers around his advocacy for scientific realism, the idea that science is actually telling us about the world, rather than just providing instrumental prediction frameworks.
Quick reminder. The central mystery of quantum mechanics is that quantum systems seem to evolve as waves, superpositions of many states, with the different states interfering with each other, all tracked by a mathematical model called the wave function. But when measured, these systems behave as localized particles, with the model only able to provide probabilities on the measurement result. Although the measurement results as a population show the interference patterns from the wave function. This is often called the “wave function collapse”.
Various interpretations attempt to make sense of this situation. Many deny the reality of what the wave function models. Others accept it, but posit the wave function collapse as a real objective event. Some posit both a wave and particle existing throughout. The Everett approach rejects wave function collapse and argues that if we just keep following the mathematical model, we get decoherence and eventually the same observations. But that implies that quantum physics apply at all scales, meaning that it’s not just particles in superpositions of many states, but measuring equipment, labs, people, planets, and the entire universe.
Reading Deutsch’s interview, it occurred to me that my own structural realist outlook, a more cautious take on scientific realism, is reflected in the more cautious acceptance I have of Everettian quantum mechanics. People like Deutsch are pretty confident that there is a quantum multiverse. I can see the reasoning steps that get them there, and I follow them, to a point. But my own view is that the other worlds remains a possibility, but far from a certainty.
I think this is because we can break apart the Everettian proposition into three questions.
My answer to 1 is yes, with a moderately high credence, maybe around 80%. I know people like Deutsch and Sean Carroll have this much higher. (I think Carroll says his is around 95% somewhere on his podcast.) And I think they have defendable reasons for it. Experimentalists have been stress testing bare quantum theory for decades, with no sign of a physical wave function collapse, or additional (hidden) variables. Quantum computing seems to have taken it to a new level.
But there remain doubts, notably about how to explain probabilities. I personally don’t see this as that big an issue. The probabilities reflect the proportion of outcomes in the wave function. But I acknowledge that lot of physicists do. I’m not a physicist, and very aware of the limitations of my very basic understanding of the math, so it’s entirely possible I’m missing something, which is why I’m only at 80%.
(Often when I make the point about the mathematical structures, it’s noted that there are multiple mathematical formalisms: wave mechanics, matrices, path integrals, etc. But while these are distinct mental frameworks, they reportedly always reconcile. These theories are equivalent, not just empirically, but mathematically. They always provide the same answer. If they didn’t, we’d see experimental physicists trying to test where they diverge. We don’t because there aren’t any divergences.)
If our answer to 1 is yes, it’s tempting to jump from that to the broader implications, the quantum multiverse. (Or one universe with a much larger ontology. Some people find that a less objectionable description.)
But then there are questions 2 and 3. I have to say no to 2. The history of science seems to show that any claims that we’ve found the final theory of anything is a dubious proposition, a point Deutsch acknowledges in the interview. All scientific theories are provisional. And we don’t know what we don’t know. And there are the gaps we do know about, such as how to bring gravity into the quantum paradigm. It seems rational to wonder what kind of revisions they may eventually require.
Of course 3 is difficult to answer until we get there. I do doubt any new discoveries would drive things toward the other interpretations people currently talk about, or overall be less bonkers than the current predictions. Again given the history of science, it seems more likely it would replace the other worlds with something even stranger and more disconcerting.
So as things stand, there’s no current evidence for adding anything to the structure of raw quantum theory. That does imply other worlds, but the worlds remain untestable for the foreseeable future.
To be clear, I don’t buy that they’re forever untestable. We can’t rule out that some clever experimentalist in the future won’t find a way to detect interference between decohered branches, to recohere them (which has been done but only very early in the process), or some other way we haven’t imagined yet.
My take is the untestability of the other worlds means that Everettian quantum mechanics, in the sense of pure wave mechanics, shouldn’t be accepted because we like the worlds, or rejected because we dislike them. For now, the worlds should be irrelevant for a scientific assessment. The only question is whether anything needs to be added to the bare theory, a question, it should be noted, we can ask regardless of whether we’re being realist or antirealist about any of this.
All of which means that while my credence in austere quantum mechanics is 80%, the credence for the other worlds vacillates somewhere around 50%. In other words I’m agnostic. This resonates with the views I’ve seen from a number of physicists, such as Stephen Hawking, Sidney Coleman, John Preskill, and most recently, Brian Cox, which accept the Everett view but downplay the other worlds. Even Sean Carroll notes in one of his AMAs that he doesn’t really care so much about the other worlds, but the physics at the core of the theory.
But maybe I’m missing something. Are the questions I raised above as easy to separate as I’m thinking? Or are there problems with pure wave mechanics I’m overlooking?
#InterpretationsOfQuantumMechanics #ManyWorldsInterpretation #Philosophy #PhilosophyOfScience #QuantumMechanics #Science
"The "Correlation" Between Statistics and Eugenics" (2024) 2/2
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-correlation-between-statistics-and-eugenics/
#statistics
#philosophy
#philosophyofscience
#mathematics
#appliedmathematics
#eugenics
@philosophy@a.gup.pe
@philosophy@newsmast.community
I cannot think of an applied mathematics that is more beautiful and far-reaching, or philosophically wilder, than probability. No, nonlinear dynamics and chaos people, it’s not even close 🤣
#probability
#mathematics
#appliedmathematics
#philosophy
#philosophyofscience
@philosophy@newsmast.community
@philosophy@a.gup.pe
"the level of confidence we in fact adopt must be determined by something that is irrelevant to the reliability of the testimony on which it’s based. After all, everything that is relevant to reliability is already included in the evidence."
#PhilosophyOfScience #PhilSci #Philosophy #Epistemology #Evidence
IRIS Insights I Nico Formanek: Are hyperparameters vibes?
April 24, 2025, 2:00 p.m. (CEST)
Our second IRIS Insights talk will take place with Nico Formanek.
🟦
This talk will discuss the role of hyperparameters in optimization methods for model selection (currently often called ML) from a philosophy of science point of view. Special consideration is given to the question of whether there can be principled ways to fix hyperparameters in a maximally agnostic setting.
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This is a WebEx talk to which everyone who is interested is cordially invited. It will take place in English. Our IRIS speaker, Jun.-Prof. Dr. Maria Wirzberger, will moderate it. Following Nico Formanek's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. We look forward to active participation.
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Please join this Webex talk using the following link:
https://lnkd.in/eJNiUQKV
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#Hyperparameters #ModelSelection #Optimization #MLMethods #PhilosophyOfScience #ScientificMethod #AgnosticLearning #MachineLearning #InterdisciplinaryResearch #AIandPhilosophy #EthicsInAI #ResponsibleAI #AITheory #WebTalk #OnlineLecture #ResearchTalk #ScienceEvents #OpenInvitation #AICommunity #LinkedInScience #TechPhilosophy #AIConversations
New in our electronic #collection:
➡️ Levels of Explanation
🔗 https://academic.oup.com/book/59296
#OpenAccess #OpenScience #PhilosophyOfScience #philosophy #methodology #reductionism #metaphysics
@sarahdalgulls I know that generative AI applies a set of rules , and is just a "text rearranger". However, I don't see that as necessary precluding intelligent results, as there are many examples of emergent complexity in mathematics. One example the Mandelbrot set has infinite complexity, yet arises from applying a simple rule to each point. A classic example is the [game of life https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life], where different starting states can give different complex outcomes.
So, I would not be surprised if a complex system produced more than you'd expect by just rearranging words. When and if we do create real artificial intelligence it won't be something planned and programmed but an emergence from a complex system, just as our intelligence is an emergence from neurons that fire depending on complex rules. It is likely to be quite different from anything we predicted the system would do, and possibly not obvious as intelligence at first.
If you are aware of curious and critical students looking for a unique interdisciplinary #MSc Programme which combines #PhilosophyOfTechnology, #PhilosophyOfScience, #EthicsOfTechnology, #HistoryOfTechnology and #STS , please point them to #Philosophy of #Science , #Technology , and #Society. At the Open Day, they learn about our dedicated tracks on #TechnologyAndValues (in collaboration with 4TU.Centre for Ethics and Technology), #AI , and #Sustainability. https://www.utwente.nl/en/education/study-choice-calendar/master-open-day/#
Back in the day as a wee undergrad majoring in philosophy, I attended a symposium on theology of science. I asked one of the speakers how could anyone falsify theological data. He simply said this: "Falsification is not as transparent as once believed."
Classic philosopher move. When backed into a corner, redefine the terms.
Avoiding the structural gaps
A long standing debate in quantum physics is whether the wave function is real. A quick reminder: quantum entities appear to move like waves, including portions interfering with each other. These waves are modeled with the wave function. But once measured, quantum objects manifest as localized points or field excitations. The wave function can’t predict the measurement outcome, only probabilities on what the result will be.
A popular move here is to decide the wave function isn’t real, that it’s just a mathematical contrivance. Doing so seems to sidestep a lot of uncomfortable implications. But it leaves us trying to explain the statistical outcomes of measurements that show patterns from portions of the wave interfering with itself. Those effects, along with entanglement, are heavily used in quantum computing. If the wave function isn’t modeling something real, then it’s usefulness in technology starts to look like a magic incantation.
Of course, accepting wave function realism leaves us with something that seems to operate in a higher dimensional “configuration space.” And we end up having to choose between unsettling options, like an objective wave function collapse on measurement, a pilot wave guiding the particle in a non-local manner, or just accepting pure wave mechanics despite its implications.
Valia Allori has an article at IAI arguing against quantum wave function realism. (Warning: you might hit a paywall.) The main thrust of her argument, as I understand it, is that we shouldn’t allow ourselves to be lured farther away from the manifest image of the world (the world as it intuitively appears to us) when there are viable alternatives.
Her argument is in opposition to Alyssa Ney’s argument for wave function realism, which touts as one of the benefits that it reclaims locality. Allori argues that this is aiming to satisfy an intuition we develop in three dimensional space, that there aren’t non-local effects, “spooky actions at a distance”. But wave function realism only preserves locality across configuration space, which Allori views as a pyrrhic victory.
Overall, Allori seems to view this as a conflict between two different sets of intuitions. On one side, we have views that are closer to the overall manifest image of reality, one with three dimensions, but at the cost of non-local phenomena. She doesn’t view this as ideal, but deems it preferable to the idea of a universal wave function existing in near infinite dimensions. In her view, embracing theories too far away from the manifest image puts us on the path that leads to runaway skepticism, where nothing we perceive can be trusted.
But I think looking at this in terms of intuitions is a mistake. When it comes to models of reality, our intuitions have historically never been particularly useful. Instead they’ve often led us astray, causing us to insist the earth was the center of the universe, humans were separate from nature, or that time and space were absolute, all ideas that had to be abandoned in the face of empirical realities. The reason to prefer locality isn’t merely to privilege one intuition over others, but to prefer theories that provide a structurally complete accounting.
A while back I described this as a preference for causally complete theories. But causation is a relation across time that is made asymmetrical by the second law of thermodynamics, that entropy always increases. The more fundamental reality are the structural relations. A theory which can account for all (or at least more of) those relations should, I think, be preferred to theories that have larger gaps in their accounting.
By that standard, I perceive wave function antirealism to have huge gaps, gaps which proponents of the idea seem comfortable with, but I suspect only because, as Allori does, they deem it a lesser evil than the alternative. Of course, objective collapse and pilot-wave theories also have gaps, but they seem smaller, albeit still weaknesses that I think should make them less viable.
Pure wave mechanics seems like the option with the fewest gaps. Many would argue that accounting for probabilities remains a crucial gap, but that seems like more of philosophical issue than a scientific one, how best to talk about what probabilities mean. In many ways, it highlights issues that already exist in the philosophy of probability.
Overall then, my take is that the goal isn’t to preserve the manifest image of reality, but to account for it in our scientific image. Preferring theories that are closer to the manifest image just because they are closer, particularly when the theories have larger gaps than the alternatives, seems to amount to what is often called “the incredulous stare”, simply rejecting an proposition because it doesn’t comport with our preexisting biases.
But maybe I’m overlooking something? Are there reasons to prefer theories closer to the manifest image? Is there a danger in excessive skepticism as Allori worries? Or is preferring a more complete accounting itself still privileging certain intuitions over others?
#InterpretationsOfQuantumMechanics #ManyWorldInterpretation #Philosophy #PhilosophyOfScience #QuantumMechanics #Science
Workshop: Large Language Models for the History, Philosophy & Sociology of Science
April 2–4, 2025
TU Berlin, Germany & Online
16 contributed talks on LLM use cases & implications
Free and open to the public—registration encouraged!
#AI #HistoryOfScience #PhilosophyOfScience #LLMs
Workshop "LLMs for HPSS" - TU ...
Workshop: Large Language Models for the History, Philosophy & Sociology of Science
April 2–4, 2025
TU Berlin, Germany & Online
Exploring how LLMs can address challenges in HPSS research
Keynotes by Iryna Gurevych, Nina Tahmasebi & Pierluigi Cassotti
16 contributed talks on LLM use cases & implications
Free and open to the public—registration encouraged! More info: https://www.tu.berlin/hps-mod-sci/workshop-llms-for-hpss](https://www.tu.berlin/hps-mod-sci/workshop-llms-for-hpss
#AI #HistoryOfScience #PhilosophyOfScience #SociologyOfScience #LLMs
Df. "clinical #equipoise describes a situation of evidentiary uncertainty among experts"
Opel et al. argue such equipoise is neither necessary nor sufficient for #SharedDecisionMaking.
Rather SDM is most useful where tradeoffs between options are KNOWN.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11606-025-09410-z
#medicine #decisionScience #bioethics #epistemology #philosophyOfScience #socialPsychology #edu #SciComm
