Planck: Miscellaneous Comments

(1) The Planck chapter comes from the 1936 Norton Library book "The Philosophy of Physics" which was translated from the German. It's likely these were originally public lectures since they're quite repetitive. The other chapters are "Causality in Nature," "Scientific Ideas: Their Origins and Effects," and "Science and Faith."

(2) Here's a link to a great lecture by Stephen Hawking on determinism, the uncertainty principle, and whether or not God plays dice with the universe. His answer is: "Not only does God definitely play dice, but He sometimes confuses us by throwing them where they can't be seen."

http://www.hawking.org.uk/lectures/dice.html

(3) The other chapters of Planck's book throw a little more light on the discussion we had in the reading group about the possible spiritual aspect of his ideas. It turns out that his "ideal spirit" is a way of thinking about a underlying rational order of the universe and why we should have "faith" in it, much like a religious faith or devotion. As human beings, we have limited knowledge and limited ability to observe causality at the deepest level because of the uncertainty principle and the overpowering amounts of information involved (bubbles in the waves breaking on the shore). However, we can posit a mind without these limits: "The most perfect harmony and consequently the strictest causality in any case, culminates in the assumption that there is an ideal spirit having a full knowledge of the action of the natural forces as well as of the events in the intellectual life of men; a knowledge extending to every detail and embracing present, past, and future."

He goes on to argue that great scientists have only been able to achieve insight into nature by "surrendering to our belief in a philosophy of the world based upon a faith in the rational ordering of this world."

So we can never truly know how the universe works, although we can keep on zig-zagging towards better descriptions of it if we believe in its underlying rationality. Although Planck doesn't fully connect his discussion of the "ideal spirit" with the paragraphs on ethics at the end of the chapter we read for the group, I think he sees the underlying rational order as a moral order as well, and can thus argue that "a pure mind and good will" lead to the highest happiness and peace of mind, and are also the "essential of every genuine science and ...equally a sure standard by which to measure the ethical value of every individual."

It might seem surprising that Planck's spiritual ideas aren't more comforting, given that at the time he wrote the chapters he had lost three of his five children (they all died as young adults) as well as his wife. In World War II another son was executed by the Nazis for taking part in a failed attempt to assassinate Hitler. He has been described as bearing his losses "stoically," and his philosophical outlook does actually seem close to the Stoics in some aspects. They too saw an underlying rational order to the universe (the logos) and a strict causality and determinism at work.

Why Does Planck reject the claim that statisticals laws & the uncertainty relation make the causality of individual physical events meaningless?

How can an intellectual experiment lead to new laws that do not permit direct measurement?

Does Planck prove that scientific progress toward a better understanding of the world is not "an aimless zigzag" (p. 174)?

How does Planck's argument about free will (p. 175) lead to the conclusion that no scientific ethics is possible?

If science is inevitably tied to the personality of the scientist, does this tie help or hinder scientific progress?

Does the "single interconnected system" (p. 175) of natural science and "intellectual sciences" mean that everything has a scientific explanation?

Is the introductory quotation (p. 251) from Adam Smith illustrative of "Planning & Democracy?"

Is there such a thing as "collectivism?"

Is Hayek arguing that central economic planning is impossible, or undesirable?

Is ethical pluralism the chief barrier to the construction of durable socialist or fascist societies?

Would Hayek approve of a national health plan?