Re: What's the Science of Dinosaurs?

>I am a positivist, the question `Do extra dimensions really exist?' has no meaning. All one can ask is whether mathematical models with extra dimensions provide a good description of the universe."

>In other words, if the experiments come out right, it doesn't matter. This could be considered jarring if you cling to the notion that science is the search for a reality that is deeper than the measurements on a laboratory table.

But isn't this just comparing "six and six" to a "dozen"?

You can say exactly the same thing about the Earth orbiting the Sun as you can about the extra dimensions, or even about the theory that the reason you see a blocky shape with a glowing word-filled square in front of you is because there's a computer in front of you.

I think we're getting too close to Socrates here - i.e. the observation that we can't "know" anything, that i personally see as more of a play on the definition of the words "know" and "fact" (or at the most a comment on the usefulness of various definitions of those words) than as a truly useful philosophical realisation - maybe one of those situations where language makes philosophical problems appear from nowhere.

Um.... oh yeah: Archaeopteryx - woo! (Sorry moderators!)

David Elliott