attended the lecture on Science and Philosophy by Dr. Ravi Gomatam on Friday, November 16, 2001. Dr. Gomatam specializes in Consciousness Studies, which is a fairly new title of this area of study. He started off by asking us how many are students, and how many are faculty, and who has training in physics. Then he asked us what is philosophy, no one had an answer, and he informed us that there probably is no definite answer. The question, What is Science, is just as difficult to answer. He then said that this lack of answer means we're anti-relativists. Relativists think a scientifically accepted theory is elected, like the presidency.
ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ Dr. Gomatam also asked us what we think common sense is. He thinks common sense is not reliable. He traced the logic of Descartes' method of doubt. He gave us an analogy of a chair. Decartes would say we don't see the chair, we see the light reflected, but then, we don't see the light reflected in reality, we see something else, and so on and so forth.
We see something, we're talking about what's in our head.
ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ Dr. Gomatam defines realism as the move we make from our experience to the structure of the world. ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ ÃÂÃ As a philosopher, Decartes may have doubted the chair, but as a person, obviously he used one. Technology, according to Dr. Gomatam, is the opiate of the masses. Science goes beyond common sense. He wants to show us that science needs philosophy. Science has reached a stage where it requires both philosophy and common sense. It depends on them. He gave an example o the Quantum theory, which is very successful, and very accurate, but even though we can't understand it, it fully works. We have three choices. First we can fit it in...