Your claim: “Everything that exists only exists by virtue of being made up of something else that’s more basic” is inadequate.
A better formulation would be: Everything except the most fundamental components, whatever they ultimately turn out to be, exists only by virtue of being made up of something else that’s more basic.
Right, but I’m specifically talking about those most fundamental components, whatever they happen to be. It seems that we cannot give an account of what quantum amplitude is made up of, pending some highly speculative theories. And, in fact, large swaths of physicists and philosophers suggest there is good reason to think that quantum amplitude may indeed be that fundamental concept.
I use the term “ontologically basic” to refer to what you call the “most fundamental concept.” Basically, an eigenvector of the “decompose into smaller parts” operation, with eigenvalue 1. I am curious whether inside of physics we can have reason to think we have found such an ontologically basic concept (quantum amplitude).
Is it falsifiable to claim that X is ontologically basic yet really does exist, for some X? If X = the Christian God, for example, we say that with high probability the answer is no and we can ignore it. And because any anticipated experience yielded by this ontologically basic God doesn’t constrain experience, we can have a real evidence-based way to reject that X exists. But what if X=quantum amplitude?
Your claim: “Everything that exists only exists by virtue of being made up of something else that’s more basic” is inadequate.
A better formulation would be: Everything except the most fundamental components, whatever they ultimately turn out to be, exists only by virtue of being made up of something else that’s more basic.
Right, but I’m specifically talking about those most fundamental components, whatever they happen to be. It seems that we cannot give an account of what quantum amplitude is made up of, pending some highly speculative theories. And, in fact, large swaths of physicists and philosophers suggest there is good reason to think that quantum amplitude may indeed be that fundamental concept.
I use the term “ontologically basic” to refer to what you call the “most fundamental concept.” Basically, an eigenvector of the “decompose into smaller parts” operation, with eigenvalue 1. I am curious whether inside of physics we can have reason to think we have found such an ontologically basic concept (quantum amplitude).
Is it falsifiable to claim that X is ontologically basic yet really does exist, for some X? If X = the Christian God, for example, we say that with high probability the answer is no and we can ignore it. And because any anticipated experience yielded by this ontologically basic God doesn’t constrain experience, we can have a real evidence-based way to reject that X exists. But what if X=quantum amplitude?