Perhaps this is not central to the post, but I have always found that bit from Pratchett to be unbelievably inane. Truly, it grinds my gears to see it quoted, in wise tones, as if it expresses some profound truth; and doubly so, to see it quoted on Less Wrong.
Consider the following substitution:
Take the universe and grind it down to the finest powder and sieve it through the finest sieve and then show me one atom of apples, one molecule of chairs.
Right? There aren’t any chair molecules, are there? You won’t find apples on the Periodic Table, will you? So what? Do chairs and apples not exist? Are they somehow not real, or less real than… well, than what…? Hydrogen? Methane? Should we adjust our attitude toward apples, or chairs, or paintings, or tigers, on the basis of this insight? What, actually, is to be concluded from this?
Anyway, this is old news. The point, if you like, is that of course ‘physics’ ‘contains’ ethics, and improvements in ethics; these things are facts about people, and the goings-on in people’s brains—which are (dualistic views aside) very much “contained in physics”. Of course, you could argue otherwise[1], but you must do it without recourse to any such “greedy-reductionist”, “grind down the universe” arguments…
E.g., non-cognitivism, or error theory. I am sympathetic to certain arguments in this broad class; but note that they have nothing much to do with the question of whether [fundamental] ‘physics’ ‘contains’ ethics or not.
I mean that chairs and apples are less universal than the Universal Law of Gravitation. Similarly, ethical fashions are not fundamental to the universe. They are, as you put it “facts about people”. Though old news to you, this idea is not obvious to many of the people I interact with in real life, including some who love to talk about ethics.
I mean that chairs and apples are less universal than the Universal Law of Gravitation.
In what way?
That the law of gravitation holds is a fact about the universe. That chairs exist is also a fact about the universe.
What does “less universal” mean? Does it mean something like “is applicable or relevant in a smaller volume of the observable universe”? If humanity spreads throughout the cosmos, and if we bring chairs with us everywhere we go, will chairs and gravitation thereby become equally “universal” (or, at least, more equal in “universality” than they are now)?
In any case this comparison is a red herring. The relevant comparison is not “chairs vs. gravity”, it’s “chairs vs. ethics”—or, more to the point, “guns vs. ethics”, “tanks vs. ethics”, “food vs. ethics”, “laws vs. ethics”, “governments vs. ethics”, “money vs. ethics”, “prestige vs. ethics”, etc. No vague allusion to “universality” will help you in any of these cases, since all of the things I’ve just listed are (so far as we know, anyway) approximately equally localized—namely, they are all facts about what exists and happens on the surface of one particular planet.
I mean that chairs and apples are less universal than the Universal Law of Gravitation.
In what way?…What does “less universal” mean? If humanity spreads throughout the cosmos, and if we bring chairs with us everywhere we go, will chairs and gravitation thereby become equally “universal” (or, at least, more equal in “universality” than they are now)?
Gravity is present everywhere in the universe. Apples and chairs are not and will never be present everywhere in the universe.
Perhaps this is not central to the post, but I have always found that bit from Pratchett to be unbelievably inane. Truly, it grinds my gears to see it quoted, in wise tones, as if it expresses some profound truth; and doubly so, to see it quoted on Less Wrong.
Consider the following substitution:
Right? There aren’t any chair molecules, are there? You won’t find apples on the Periodic Table, will you? So what? Do chairs and apples not exist? Are they somehow not real, or less real than… well, than what…? Hydrogen? Methane? Should we adjust our attitude toward apples, or chairs, or paintings, or tigers, on the basis of this insight? What, actually, is to be concluded from this?
Anyway, this is old news. The point, if you like, is that of course ‘physics’ ‘contains’ ethics, and improvements in ethics; these things are facts about people, and the goings-on in people’s brains—which are (dualistic views aside) very much “contained in physics”. Of course, you could argue otherwise[1], but you must do it without recourse to any such “greedy-reductionist”, “grind down the universe” arguments…
E.g., non-cognitivism, or error theory. I am sympathetic to certain arguments in this broad class; but note that they have nothing much to do with the question of whether [fundamental] ‘physics’ ‘contains’ ethics or not.
I mean that chairs and apples are less universal than the Universal Law of Gravitation. Similarly, ethical fashions are not fundamental to the universe. They are, as you put it “facts about people”. Though old news to you, this idea is not obvious to many of the people I interact with in real life, including some who love to talk about ethics.
In what way?
That the law of gravitation holds is a fact about the universe. That chairs exist is also a fact about the universe.
What does “less universal” mean? Does it mean something like “is applicable or relevant in a smaller volume of the observable universe”? If humanity spreads throughout the cosmos, and if we bring chairs with us everywhere we go, will chairs and gravitation thereby become equally “universal” (or, at least, more equal in “universality” than they are now)?
In any case this comparison is a red herring. The relevant comparison is not “chairs vs. gravity”, it’s “chairs vs. ethics”—or, more to the point, “guns vs. ethics”, “tanks vs. ethics”, “food vs. ethics”, “laws vs. ethics”, “governments vs. ethics”, “money vs. ethics”, “prestige vs. ethics”, etc. No vague allusion to “universality” will help you in any of these cases, since all of the things I’ve just listed are (so far as we know, anyway) approximately equally localized—namely, they are all facts about what exists and happens on the surface of one particular planet.
Gravity is present everywhere in the universe. Apples and chairs are not and will never be present everywhere in the universe.