Newsgroup sci.philosophy.tech 20923

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is anything happening on this list? 
thc

I dont know what this news grp supposed to include but this seems to be
relevant:
I observe that most products increase in complexity as they evolve over
the product lifetime.
This fact is not inevitable but seems like an emprical law of
engineering. Televisions and Automobiles  are typical examples; initial
designs are simple but elegant, materials are used with full
exploitation of their characteristics, implict design functions.
In my opinion early designs are the most subtle and "intelligent"
Evolved designs rely on complexity to achieve functions that were
previously achieved by simple means.
If in doubt plot the number of components in a typical car versus time.
Interesting to note that life on earth follows the same pattern,
information in DNA increases with time (millions of years) .  
Douglas Dwyer Frequency Precision Ltd. I design/advise on Xtal osc TCXO OCXO 
SAWc etc Reply via demon or 101505.3427@compuserve.com phone/fax: 
+44(0)1837810590 http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Frequency_Precision/

Jim Balter wrote:
> In article <58n43m$692@lastactionhero.rs.itd.umich.edu>,
> John M. Lawler  wrote:
> > But then I think Feyerabend's position is superior to either of
> > those.
> 
> By what method would you support that claim?
> 
> I think the philosopher Joseph Agassi's treatment of Feyerabend, as
> in his "Feyerabend's Defense of Voodoo: how to get away with murder" > gives Feyerabend the treatment due him.  A.F. Chalmers in his
> outstanding philosophy of science overview, _What is This Thing
> Called Science?_, treats Feyerabend more politely but sharply > nonetheless.
Hearsay! Agassi's rantings and ravings hardly count as arguments against
Feyerabend. He simply lets his fertile - and surprisingly helpful from
the point of view of his intentions - imagination run wild with very
little attention to Feyerabend's actual words - not to speak of
understanding them.
Now, unlike Agassi's, Chalmers' intentions are certainly not malicious.
In the preface to the second edition of his book he writes: "My friends
Terry Blake and Denise Russell have convinced me that there is more of
importance in the writings of Paul Feyerabend than I was previously
prepared to admit. I have given him more attention in this new edition
and have tried to separate the wheat from the chaff, the anti-methodism
from the dadaism." I hope that some sunny day his friends will convince
him that the chaff or "dadaism" he perceives is of his own (or, rather,
of his profession's) invention. The actual positions defended by
Chalmers and Feyerabend are almost indistinguishable, the differences
being mainly rhetorical.
Cheers,
Marko
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Marko Toivanen _/_/_/_/_/ co-moderator of bourdieu & feyerabend on
marko@joyl.joensuu.fi _/_/_/  majordomo@lists.village.virginia.edu
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ http://www.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/feyerabend/
For the modern mind doctrine and influence suggest heroes and cults.
Any persistent opinion gets traced back to a personal origin, and we
depend upon history to explode or inflate the myth that results. 
 - Scott Buchanan