Okay, so on reflection, I think the idea that it all adds up to normality is just junk. It doesn’t mean anything. I’ll try to explain:
A: MW comes into conflict with this ethical principle.
B: It can’t come into conflict. Physics always adds up to normality.
A: Really? Suppose I see an apple falling, and you discover that there’s no such thing as an apple, but that what we called apples are actually a sub-species of blueberries. Now I’ve learned that I’ve in fact never seen an apple fall, since by ‘apple’ I meant the fruit of an independent species of plant. So, normality overturned.
B: No, that’s not an overturning of normality, that’s just a change of explanation. What you saw was this greenish round thing falling, and you explained this as an ‘apple’. Now your explanation is different, but the thing you observed is the same.
A: Ah, but lets say science discovers that the green round thing I saw isn’t green at all. In fact, green is just the color that bounces off the thing. If it’s any color, it’s the color of the wavelengths of light it absorbs. Normality overturned.
B: But that’s just what being ‘green’ now means. What you saw was some light your receptors in way that varied over time, and you explained this as a green thing moving. The observation, the light hitting your eye over time, is the same. The explanation has shifted.
A: Now say that it turns out that (bear with me) there is no motion or time. What I thought was some light hitting my retina over time is just my own brain co-evolving with a broader wave-function. Now that’s overturning normality.
B: No, what you experienced qualitatively is the same, but the explanation has changed.
A: What did I experience qualitatively?
B: If you’re willing to go into plausible but hypothetical discoveries, I can’t give it any description that is basic enough that it can’t be ‘overturned’. Even ‘experience’ is probably overturnable.
A: That’s why ‘it all adds up to normality’ is junk. By that standard, nothing is normal. If anything I can describe as a phenomenon is normal, then it can be overturned under that description.
Okay, so on reflection, I think the idea that it all adds up to normality is just junk. It doesn’t mean anything. I’ll try to explain:
A: MW comes into conflict with this ethical principle.
B: It can’t come into conflict. Physics always adds up to normality.
A: Really? Suppose I see an apple falling, and you discover that there’s no such thing as an apple, but that what we called apples are actually a sub-species of blueberries. Now I’ve learned that I’ve in fact never seen an apple fall, since by ‘apple’ I meant the fruit of an independent species of plant. So, normality overturned.
B: No, that’s not an overturning of normality, that’s just a change of explanation. What you saw was this greenish round thing falling, and you explained this as an ‘apple’. Now your explanation is different, but the thing you observed is the same.
A: Ah, but lets say science discovers that the green round thing I saw isn’t green at all. In fact, green is just the color that bounces off the thing. If it’s any color, it’s the color of the wavelengths of light it absorbs. Normality overturned.
B: But that’s just what being ‘green’ now means. What you saw was some light your receptors in way that varied over time, and you explained this as a green thing moving. The observation, the light hitting your eye over time, is the same. The explanation has shifted.
A: Now say that it turns out that (bear with me) there is no motion or time. What I thought was some light hitting my retina over time is just my own brain co-evolving with a broader wave-function. Now that’s overturning normality.
B: No, what you experienced qualitatively is the same, but the explanation has changed.
A: What did I experience qualitatively?
B: If you’re willing to go into plausible but hypothetical discoveries, I can’t give it any description that is basic enough that it can’t be ‘overturned’. Even ‘experience’ is probably overturnable.
A: That’s why ‘it all adds up to normality’ is junk. By that standard, nothing is normal. If anything I can describe as a phenomenon is normal, then it can be overturned under that description.