The Present Phase of Stagnation in the Foundations of Physics Is Not Normal

Good.  Then they should stop opining on the topic (metaphysics) since their profession has, literally, nothing to say about it and their personal perspective is neutral or even negatively biased.

I agree with this, but it should probably go both ways. I think that if others weren't trying to make the case that there is such a thing as "non-physical" phenomena (e.g. consciousness, God or Mind At Large, ghosts, love, etc.) which can't be addressed by science, then popularizing scientists probably wouldn't opine on the issue of metaphysics in response. 

Please note, I'm not saying that there is no such thing as these phenomena, only that capriciously separating them off from other phenomena and calling them "non-physical" or "immaterial" seems to be specious.

Linda

Linda,

If laypeople want to make claims about "non-physical" phenomena that can't be addressed by science, I would argue scientists should not opine on the issue at all.  Same rules apply for any cohort of subject matter experts opining on areas outside their specific expertise: they are simply other laypeople in that regard and not authoritative.

So, I'm not sure I'm following your point about it going both ways.

Now, if you intended to point out the hypocrisy of the stereotypical religious fundamentalist denying science I would fully agree.  You just have to stay in your lane.  Something the fundamentalist seems to have been particularly poor at doing.

No I wasn't saying I thought it was alien. The point was how he talked about it and how he conveyed himself. Besides, there's many other much better cases to point to about alien craft such as Japan Airlines flight 1628 from 1986 as one of the most cited examples where craft were reported by both the pilots as well as sighted on radar.

Tyson does mention there's better evidence garnered from military radar encounters. He also said enthusiastically he wants it to be aliens while talking to Colbert.

Good.  Then they should stop opining on the topic (metaphysics) since their profession has, literally, nothing to say about it and their personal perspective is neutral or even negatively biased.

Ah but then we'd also miss the nice metaphysical things scientists have said, of which this is just a small sample:

The closer you look, the more the materialist position in physics appears to rest on shaky metaphysical ground

"Adam Frank is professor of astronomy at the University of Rochester in New York and the co-founder of NPR's blog 13.7: Cosmos & Culture where he is also a regular contributor. He is the author of several books, the latest being About Time: Cosmology and Culture at the Twilight of the Big Bang (2011)."

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The neuroscientist Raymond Tallis:

What Neuroscience Cannot Tell Us About Ourselves

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The Wholeness of Quantum Reality: An Interview with Physicist Basil Hiley

GM: Because you shouldn’t think of it in terms of a mechanistic motion of particles?

BH: Yes, it’s nothing like that. It’s not mechanism. It organicism. It’s organic. Nature is more organic than we think it is. And then you can understand why life arose, because if nature is organic, it has the possibility of life in it.

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Smolin from his book Time Reborn:


'The problem of qualia, or consciousness, seems unanswerable by science because it's an aspect of the world that is not encompassed when we describe all the physical interactions among particles. It's in the domain of questions about what the world really is, not how it can be modeled or represented.

Some philosophers argue that qualia simply are identical to certain neuronal processes. This seems to me wrong. Qualia may very well be correlated with neuronal processes but they are not the same as neuronal processes. Neuronal processes are subject to description by physics and chemistry, but no amount of detailed description in those terms will answer the questions as to what qualia are like or explain why we perceive them.'

'We don't know what a rock really is, or an atom, or an electron. We can only observe how they interact with other things and thereby describe their relational properties. Perhaps everything has external and internal aspects. The external properties are those that science can capture and describe - through interactions, in terms of relationships. The internal aspect is the intrinsic essence, it is the reality that is not expressible in the language of interactions and relations. Consciousness, whatever it is, is an aspect of the intrinsic essence of brains.

On further aspect of consciousness is the fact that it takes place in time. Indeed, when I assert that it is always some time in the world, I am extrapolating from the fact that my experiences of the world always takes place in time. But what do I mean by my experiences? I can speak about them scientifically as instances of recordings of information. To speak so, I need not mention consciousness or qualia. But this may be an evasion, because these experiences have aspects that are consciousness of qualia. So my conviction that what is real is real in the present moment is related to my conviction that qualia are real.'


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Henry Stapp on Quantum Mechanics and Human Consciousness

Henry Stapp, How Free Will Affects the Universe

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Physicist George Ellis Knocks Physicists for Knocking Philosophy, Falsification, Free Will


PHYSICS AND THE REAL WORLD

George Ellis
Mathematics Department, University of Cape Town

Consequently physics per se can't causally determine the outcome of human creativity, rather it creates the possibility space allowing human intelligence to function autonomously. The challenge to physics is to develop a realistic description of causality in truly complex hierarchical structures, with top-down causation and memory effects allowing autonomous higher levels of order to emerge with genuine causal powers."

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“In the new pattern of thought we do not assume any longer the detached observer .. . but an observer who by his indeterminable effects creates a new situation, theoretically described as a new state of the observed system. In this way every observation is a singling out of a particular factual result, here and now, from the theoretical possibilities, thereby making obvious the discontinuous aspect of the physical phenomena.”
- Wolfgang Pauli

“Like an ultimate fact without any cause, the individual outcome of a measurement is, however, in general not comprehended by laws. This must necessarily be the case . .. ”
- Wolfgang Pauli

It is my personal opinion that in the science of the future reality will neither be “psychic” nor “physical” but somehow both and somehow neither.
- Wolfgang Pauli

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There's more, for example Einstein and the Noble winning physicist Brian Josephson endorsing Psi....Bernardo having been one of the engineers at CERN before he put together his Idealist philosophy...really the list gets quite extensive.

Fair points Sci.  My caveat would be for any scientist making metaphysical claims that fall outside their ability to "prove" scientifically; that they acknowledge they are simply philosophizing or even just plain old reflecting.  That puts them on the proper foundation; a foundation not of authority.

Linda,

If laypeople want to make claims about "non-physical" phenomena that can't be addressed by science, I would argue scientists should not opine on the issue at all.  Same rules apply for any cohort of subject matter experts opining on areas outside their specific expertise: they are simply other laypeople in that regard and not authoritative.

The application of science would likely be within a scientist's area of expertise, though. So I'm not suggesting that scientists opine outside their area of expertise. It's reasonable to point out that it is incorrect to say that science distinguishes between "physical" and "non-physical" (or "natural" and "supernatural") a priori.

So, I'm not sure I'm following your point about it going both ways.

Those who make claims about "supernatural" or "non-physical" entities, could also refrain from doing so, so that no one would feel obliged to jump in and correct them from a scientific perspective.

Now, if you intended to point out the hypocrisy of the stereotypical religious fundamentalist denying science I would fully agree.  You just have to stay in your lane.  Something the fundamentalist seems to have been particularly poor at doing.

No, that's not what I meant.

Linda

Fair points Sci.  My caveat would be for any scientist making metaphysical claims that fall outside their ability to "prove" scientifically; that they acknowledge they are simply philosophizing or even just plain old reflecting.  That puts them on the proper foundation; a foundation not of authority.

I think part of this issue lies in different conceptions of "physical". Some see this as referring to what is amenable to scientific investigation, others to a specific grouping of entities (matter, forces, energy, fields, natural laws) and varied properties of these entities. These entities apparently can have any kind of property so long as these properties don't count consciousness as Fundamental.

Regarding the former, whether something is "immaterial" is only to say it requires adding mental or proto-mental properties [or kinds] to the "material" entities or that it underlies those aforementioned entities.

For example Mind@Large, as in the Idealist conception, is amenable to scientific investigation. That will be a significant part of Bernardo's upcoming book, The Idea of the World: A Multi-Disciplinary Argument for the Mental Nature of Reality.

I also think Phillip Goff is coming out with a book on how to scientifically investigate Panpsychism, and there is of course the Platonic/Panpsychic theory of Orch-OR. And [I suspect] all the "Information is Fundamental" theories which seem to posit something underlying both mind & matter but being neither are also scientifically testable. [Because these theories are coming from scientists involved w/ physics.] Even some of the potentially dualist or idealist Simulation Hypothesis theories make predictions for what scientific investigation should bring to light. (I know Arvan's does.)

Similarly anyone who has an interest in Psi or NDEs would say this is scientific investigation of that which is [possibly] "immaterial", but they likely mean this in the way a layperson understands dualism or extended mind. I mean a Morphic field is asking for additions to the lexicon based on scientific arguments, rather than proposing something that cannot be studied by science.

Also believers in Intelligent Design also think that God can be found in the details, so clearly even if the case of the arguably "most immaterial" entity, God, there is a place for science investigation.

Now there is a class of arguments that do suggest that whatever the case, no amount of scientific investigation can disprove them as they are based in that which would be necessary for science - Change, Observation, the Universals of Math & Logic. These would be the Proofs of God, and perhaps proofs relating to Platonic Mathematical structures.

Sabine's new article on the subject:

The Uncertain Future of Particle Physics

Ten years in, the Large Hadron Collider has failed to deliver the exciting discoveries that scientists promised.

I used to be a particle physicist. For my Ph.D. thesis, I did L.H.C. predictions, and while I have stopped working in the field, I still believe that slamming particles into one another is the most promising route to understanding what matter is made of and how it holds together. But $10 billion is a hefty price tag. And I’m not sure it’s worth it.

In 2012, experiments at the L.H.C. confirmed the discovery of the Higgs boson — a prediction that dates back to the 1960s — and it remains the only discovery made at the L.H.C. Particle physicists are quick to emphasize that they have learned other things: For example, they now have better knowledge about the structure of the proton, and they’ve seen new (albeit unstable) composite particles. But let’s be honest: It’s disappointing.