HPS250H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Logical Positivism, Radioactive Decay, Radium
7 Apr 2018
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Infallibilism- absolute certainty of empirical knowledge is attainable. There can be absolute certain synthetic propositions. Infallibilism was accepted up till the early 20th century. Einstein: all our empirical knowledge is, in principle, fallible. Fallibilism- absolute certainty of empirical knowledge is unattainable. There can be no absolutely certain synthetic propositions. Universal causation (determinism/strict determinism): all events have their causes and the same initial conditions always produce the same effects. In some cases, there is an infinite number of possible outcomes. Probabilistic determinism: all events have their causes, but the same initial conditions may produce different effects. The half-life of radium is 1601 years, there is a 50% probability that an atom of radium-226 will decay in 1601 years. Quantum physics tells us that there is a certain probability for a decay to happen, but does not say when exactly a given atom will decay. There can be no synthetic a priori propositions.
