Quote:
Originally Posted by TGS
To take the first part second: if "everything" means something like "all that is known" then there is no a priori reason why science - the individual sciences operating within their regional ontologies - should not explain this, nor, so far as I can see, why science should not also describe it. However, if "everything" means all that is known plus some stuff we don't know, then to expect science to explain and/or describe this is to set science up for failure. Only metaphysicians and religious people have either the time or the inclination to fret about whether that of which we know nothing is describable or explainable.
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everything without a qualifier, like in everything that is contained in my pocket, means literally everything.
You are getting very close to what I think is correct with your second statement:
However, if "everything" means all that is known plus some stuff we don't know, then to expect science to explain and/or describe this is to set science up for failure.
That I would modify as if "everything" means all that is known plus
its complement, then to expect science to explain and/or describe this is to set science up for failure.
Otherwise,
some stuff we don't know is again quite fuzzy, and it poisons the strength of everything.
It is the word everything the gives trouble, like the word always, like the word everywhere. They are simply not applicable to reality, they are applicable only to logic, or to axiomatic sest, that is, if things are done correctly, to a closed formal system.