the problem with these 2 examples is your statment "each of these universes is experimentally identical".

you basically are saying universe A and universe B are different then you go on to say universe A and universe B are the same.

it's a contradiction. If universe A is different from universe B by the fact that in universe A things CANNOT go faster than the speed of light and in universe B things just don't go faster than the speed of light then they would be experimentally different. You can't just arbitrarily say, "well world1 is X while world2 is not X but they are both experimentally the same" anymore than I can say well I'm a bachelor and I'm married. I mean I can say that but the phrase is meaningless

It is correct that experimentally they are the same. But you seem to be disregarding the burden of proof. The natural position is that B is correct while A needs validation but as you have already stated experimentally they are identical so there is no reason to believe it. I could claim to be omnipresent or omniscient and then say that I am excercising these attributes in way that makes it appear as though I am neither. Scenario B is that I have neither of the attributes. Use Occam's razor. Experimentally they are both the same but which one has the burden of proof???(Rhetorical question)

An important subtext in the dispute between Necessitarians and Regularists concerns the very concepts we need to 'make sense' of the universe.

For Regularists, the way-the-world-is is the rock bottom of their intellectual reconstruction. They have reconciled themselves to, and embraced, the ultimately inexplicable contingency of the universe.

But for Necessitarians, the way-the-world-is cannot be the rock bottom. For after all - they will insist - there has to be some reason, some explanation, why the world is as it is and is not some other way. It can't simply be, for example, that all electrons, the trillions upon trillions of them, just happen to all bear the identical electrical charge as one another - that would be a cosmic coincidence of an unimaginable improbability. No, this is no coincidence. The identity of electrical charge comes about because there is a law of nature to the effect that electrons have this charge. Laws of nature "drive" the world. The laws of physics which, for example, describe the behavior of diffraction gratings (see Harrison) were true from time immemorial and it is because of those laws that diffraction gratings, when they came to be engineered in modern times, have the peculiar properties they do.

Regularists will retort that the supposed explanatory advantage of Necessitarianism is illusory. Physical necessity - nomicity if you will - is as idle and unempirical a notion as was Locke's posit of a material substratum. Locke's notion fell into deserved disuse simply because it did no useful work in science. It was a superfluous notion. (The case is not unlike modern arguments that minds are convenient fictions, the product of "folk" psychology.)

At some point explanations must come to an end. Regularists place that stopping point at the way-the-world-is. Necessitarians place it one, inaccessible, step beyond, at the way-the-world-must-be.

The divide between Necessitarians and Regularists remains as deep as any in philosophy. Neither side has conceived a theory which accommodates all our familiar, and deeply rooted, historically-informed beliefs about the nature of the world. To adopt either theory is to give up one or more strong beliefs about the nature of the world. And there simply do not seem to be any other theories in the offing. While these two theories are clearly logical contraries, they are - for the foreseeable future - also exhaustive of the alternatives.

Actually, I'm taking the Regularist position so I'm the one that gets to appeal to Occam's Razor. By just biting the bullet I am only left with a single mystery, the amazing regularity in something that's random. You on the other hand have to posit the existence of a necessary law which is untestable but somehow forces everything not to accelerate faster than the speed of light.

No, there is nothing wrong with my example. Each of those universes is logically possible. We can imagine either case being our universe but the problem is we could never test which one we are in.

How is it simpler to posit that random chance reoccurs so many times as to make the odds pretty much infinite vs. positing there is natural laws of nature?

How is it simpler to posit that random chance reoccurs so many times as to make the odds pretty much infinite vs. positing there are physical laws of nature?

---------- Post added 03-29-2010 at 11:30 PM ----------

I think there most certainly is something wrong with your example but I'll move on.

I have yet to see the contradiction that makes it "logically impossible to test for physical impossibility."

you seem to think that since we can't rule out pure happenstance it becomes logically impossible. Yet it would seem the odds of such happenstance would be so astronomical as to be, for all practical purposes, impossible.

The question then becomes why this set of laws and not another? The problem is, you can't even test that there are laws. So, asking why they are the way they are is even more hopeless.

If you flip a coin an infinite number of times, you will produce every possible string of heads and tails, including both an infinite string of heads and an infinite string of tails.

Likewise, if we are selecting from every possible universe then there is a possible universe where, things that are very unlikely, happen anyways.

Read that article. It explains it better than I can.

I'll summarize though. We're each positing something; either the universe is just random or there has to be a reason that it's the way it is. Yet, your reason is just another mystery. The question then becomes why this set of laws and not another? The problem is, you can't even test that there are laws. So, asking why they are the way they are is even more hopeless. No, it's simpler to just say the universe is the way it is, end of story. We can at least observe that. Science doesn't even need to blink an eye because it's untestable and beyond the realm of science anyways.



If you flip a coin an infinite number of times, you will produce every possible string of heads and tails, including both an infinite string of heads and an infinite string of tails.

Likewise, if we are selecting from every possible universe then there is a possible universe where, things that are very unlikely, happen anyways.

Whatever laws imply that people cannot jump 100 feet into the air, of course.

Physical possibility or impossibility tells us something about the physical universe. For it to be meaningful to talk about something being physically possible or impossible it must already be logically possible. To say that a four-sided triangle is physically impossible is to say absolutely nothing about the physical universe.

That's ad hoc. Which law is that?

Yes it does. It tells us that it is impossible to construct a four-sided triangle. In any case, that it "tells us nothing about the universe" (whatever you mean by that) does not mean it is not true.

We need not throw out the baby (scientific explanation) with the bath-water of hard determinism. So why do so?

No, it means that logical impossibility says nothing about physical impossibility.



You can appeal to consequences all you like but in the end, your claim is untestable. So, it doesn't affect science at all.

Nothing of value was lost.

You believe that if a four-sided triangle is a logical impossibility, it is still an open question whether it is possible to construct a four-sided triangle?

That is the claim I made. Is that what you are talking about?

No, I'm saying the question is nonsense. That's like asking if it's possible to construct a Prep Gwarlek. The answer is undefined because the question isn't clear.



Of course it is. I quoted it directly. That applies to my argument as well. We aren't throwing it out.

No, I'm saying the question is nonsense. That's like asking if it's possible to contruct a Prep Gwarlek. The answer is undefined because the question isn't clear.



Of course it is. I quoted it directly. That applies to my argument as well. We aren't throwing it out.

You have not sufficiently explained why your position appeals to occam's razor and not mine.

My position presupposes that the basis for science is of a factual and a testable manner. This is by far more simpler than saying, "it is all random and happens to fit into the appearance of laws."

If what you say is true than there is no such thing as science in really any sense.

But why is it nonsense to ask whether what is logically impossible can be physically impossible? Or, more specifically, why someone who believes that a four-sided triangle is a logical impossibility (like you) could believe it was possible to construct a four-sided triangle with pencil and paper, and a straight-edge. A 12 year old would understand that question since he has (or is) probably taking plane geometry.

That's an appeal to consequences and also false. Science is about making predictions. It's not about proving that things have to happen. I can still make predictions. I can still do science the same as ever.

Yes, I have. I linked to an article and summarized it: Laws of Nature[The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy]

All you're doing now is saying that I haven't explained my position but I have. Read it again if you didn't understand it. If you disagree then quote something and I'll defend it. Otherwise, I'm not just going to go back and forth with "you didn't explain it!", "yes I did!", "nuh uh!", ad infinitum.=QUOTE]

I stated why you hadnt right after i said this sentence. You must know this because you responded. Again it isn't having something extra is about how if something always happens the same way it is very apparent that it isn't random. Stating it is random demands explaining. I am not the one who needs to explain the laws because it is a more likely scenario.

PS I would also like to point out that things that are logically incoherent are that way because it is physically impossible not vice versa.

But you don't think that science is only about making predictions, do you? Doesn't theoretical science explain why the predictions made are correct and not incorrect predictions. For instance, if it is predicted that water will freeze at 0 centigrade, and that turns out to be true, don't we also understand why water freezes at 0 centigrade. And doesn't science tell us why? That isn't a prediction, is it? It is an explanation.

Stating it is random demands explaining.

Science only explains one thing in terms of another which itself requires explanation and so on. Nothing is ever really explained. The difference between an explanation and a description is purely psychological.



.

And, there is a clear difference between, "the plate shattered" and "the plate shattered because it was dropped on a hard surface".

I wonder why you say these things when they are obviously not true.

Science only explains one thing in terms of another which itself requires explanation and so on. Nothing is ever really explained. The difference between an explanation and a description is purely psychological.



Stating that laws control the universe also demands explaining. Where do these laws come from? Why these laws and not others? The problem is, you can't even test for the laws existence so you can't possibly explain them. You are only raising additional questions by postulating the existence of something untestable. You haven't solved any mystery. The existence of complete randomness is actually less mysterious then untestable laws that come from who knows where.

For anything to be contingent then it can't possibly be random since random implies no contingency