There was a wonderful article, a classic case of a circular argument, published in the Skeptical Inquirer some years ago - well, actually, a few decades ago - sometime in the 1970s or 80s it would have been, when woolly mammoths still roamed the earth . . . The Skeptical Inquirer is, of course, the monthly magazine published by the old Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal, or CSICOP, which later changed its name to the much less interesting Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, or CSI - a move which seemed to me, at the time, a tacit admission that what they were engaged in was no longer either scientific or investigational, if it ever was, and, I thought, something of a COPout . . . .
Anyway, the relevant article - I forget the author's name - - began with the claim that we are so lucky that we live at a time when we know all the laws of physics ( this was pre-dark matter, pre-dark energy, pre-string theory. . . ). It was quite a long article, but the gist of it can be summed up in a kind of question-and-answer format, as follows.
"We are lucky to live at a time when all the laws of physics are known."
"But how can we be sure that we know all the laws of physics?"
"Well, because we can explain all known phenomena"
"But what about phenomena we can't explain, like UFOs or ghosts?
"Well, we know that they aren't real."
"How do we know they aren't real?"
"Because they contravene the known laws of physics."
"But perhaps there are laws of physics we don't know yet?"
"Oh no, we know all the laws of physics."
"So how do we know that we know all the laws of physics?"
"Because we can explain all known phenomena."
. . . . And round, and round, and round . . . .
I wrote to the publishers, pointing this out, but didn't even receive the courtesy of an acknowledgement. I wonder why not . . .
Anyway, the relevant article - I forget the author's name - - began with the claim that we are so lucky that we live at a time when we know all the laws of physics ( this was pre-dark matter, pre-dark energy, pre-string theory. . . ). It was quite a long article, but the gist of it can be summed up in a kind of question-and-answer format, as follows.
"We are lucky to live at a time when all the laws of physics are known."
"But how can we be sure that we know all the laws of physics?"
"Well, because we can explain all known phenomena"
"But what about phenomena we can't explain, like UFOs or ghosts?
"Well, we know that they aren't real."
"How do we know they aren't real?"
"Because they contravene the known laws of physics."
"But perhaps there are laws of physics we don't know yet?"
"Oh no, we know all the laws of physics."
"So how do we know that we know all the laws of physics?"
"Because we can explain all known phenomena."
. . . . And round, and round, and round . . . .
I wrote to the publishers, pointing this out, but didn't even receive the courtesy of an acknowledgement. I wonder why not . . .