I think you’re missing something here. Science, and more specifically physics, is built on first theorizing or philosophizing, coming up with a lot of potential worlds a priori, and only looking to see which one you probably fall in after the philosophizing is done. How do you know a tree exists? Well, I bet a good philosopher from a different universe could come up with the concept of trees only knowing we live in 3+1 dimensions:
3+1 dimensions is enough to figure out there are electric and nuclear forces, and thus fusion and interesting chemical reactions going on.
Those interesting chemical reactions are going to eventually form self replicators which are going to harness the cheapest energy available—fusion.
There are only a few phases of matter (percolation theory), one of which is solid, so you’d expect some lifeforms to evolve that harness fusion energy while standing on solid ground.
Evolution is going to make these lifeforms grow taller to be closer to the energy source than their neighbors.
So something like trees will exist.
Looking isn’t needed to know trees really exist, just to know that tree over there really exists. That involves a bit of cyclical reasoning, which is basically because you cannot prove a system consistent within the system. The best you can do is check that the current statement isn’t inconsistent, such as if someone says, “how do you know that tree over there really exists,” while pointing at empty air, and you say, “it doesn’t.”
I think my issue with empiricism is that it does not generalize, at all. A better way to compress sense data is to first come up with several theories, then use a few bits to point out which theory is correct and how it is being applied.
I think you’re missing something here. Science, and more specifically physics, is built on first theorizing or philosophizing, coming up with a lot of potential worlds a priori, and only looking to see which one you probably fall in after the philosophizing is done. How do you know a tree exists? Well, I bet a good philosopher from a different universe could come up with the concept of trees only knowing we live in 3+1 dimensions:
3+1 dimensions is enough to figure out there are electric and nuclear forces, and thus fusion and interesting chemical reactions going on.
Those interesting chemical reactions are going to eventually form self replicators which are going to harness the cheapest energy available—fusion.
There are only a few phases of matter (percolation theory), one of which is solid, so you’d expect some lifeforms to evolve that harness fusion energy while standing on solid ground.
Evolution is going to make these lifeforms grow taller to be closer to the energy source than their neighbors.
So something like trees will exist.
Looking isn’t needed to know trees really exist, just to know that tree over there really exists. That involves a bit of cyclical reasoning, which is basically because you cannot prove a system consistent within the system. The best you can do is check that the current statement isn’t inconsistent, such as if someone says, “how do you know that tree over there really exists,” while pointing at empty air, and you say, “it doesn’t.”
I think my issue with empiricism is that it does not generalize, at all. A better way to compress sense data is to first come up with several theories, then use a few bits to point out which theory is correct and how it is being applied.