How far can inductive reasoning take us?

I'm aware that there are 2 types of reasoning, i.e inductive and deductive.

I understand how both work, but what my worry is that inductive reasoning may have some flaws that are just taking advantage of modern science.

Take a look at the big bang theory, I know it has 3 compelling evidence to suggest an expanding universe. The first and the best is galaxies exceeding away from us at a constant rate(hubble constant).. but what I'm worried about is, the theory ASSUMES that if galaxies are moving away from us than in the past they must of been alot closer and at some point in the past(14-15 billion years ago), they would of all been so close that the law of physics/nature just break down.

My question is HOW DO WE KNOW, that this is the case... that in the past it followed the condition to what we see today?

Also hubble constant does not apply to other cluster of galaxies, only our galaxies right? just correct me on this one.

The theory is the best among all the other theories, and I don't deny galaxies expanding and cosmic microwave background etc..

But my problem is inductive reasoning only works if we assume certain things.

:detective:

Thanks

I'm aware that there are 2 types of reasoning, i.e inductive and deductive.

I understand how both work, but what my worry is that inductive reasoning may have some flaws that are just taking advantage of modern science.

Take a look at the big bang theory, I know it has 3 compelling evidence to suggest an expanding universe. The first and the best is galaxies exceeding away from us at a constant rate(hubble constant).. but what I'm worried about is, the theory ASSUMES that if galaxies are moving away from us than in the past they must of been alot closer and at some point in the past(14-15 billion years ago), they would of all been so close that the law of physics/nature just break down.

My question is HOW DO WE KNOW, that this is the case... that in the past it followed the condition to what we see today?

Also hubble constant does not apply to other cluster of galaxies, only our galaxies right? just correct me on this one.

The theory is the best among all the other theories, and I don't deny galaxies expanding and cosmic microwave background etc..

But my problem is inductive reasoning only works if we assume certain things.

:detective:

Thanks

I don't deny galaxies expanding and cosmic microwave background etc..

What, do you think, would it be like to know that the unobserved and even unobservable (in this case, the future) is like the observed (in this case, the past) if what we have is not knowledge?

The fact that we have to assume certain things does not matter as long as what we assume is true. I don't know of anything that we know without assuming some other things. Do you?

As you look further way, you look far to the past. Scientists are able to piece a picture of the average distance between objects to our time. They found that they are moving away at a constant rate.

there are not many galaxies that they can eliminate as the source of micro-waves , however , very few actually

That's the problem.. how do we know it's true?

How do we know that 10billion years ago, galaxies were expanding? what if they were not? what if the universe goes through a series of expansion and contraction?

There will always be some true statements that we will never be able to prove them as true!

Your last question, is what bothers me.. is that we ASSUME it to be true! What reason/evidence do you have to suggest that's the case?

---------- Post added 04-04-2010 at 01:05 PM ----------

Hubbles law does NOT apply to far away galaxies, only to the cluster of galaxies that the milky way belongs to.

Huh?? I don't get what your trying to say?

Quote:
Originally Posted by north
there are not many galaxies that they can eliminate as the source of micro-waves , however , very few actually



that microwave evidence is not evidence of the big-bang

This is cheap.
Hubble law is v=h*d.

This implies that for a object a distance d away from us are moving with relative velocity v.

Also, space is isotropic, so this implies that every two object a distance d away will move at relative velocity v.

WMAP- Big Bang Expansion: the Hubble Constant (have a little read where hubble law breaks down)

In modern physical cosmology, the cosmological principle is the working assumption that observers on Earth do not occupy any restrictive or distorted observational location within the universe as a whole. As astronomer William Keel explains:
The cosmological principle is usually stated formally as 'Viewed on a sufficiently large scale, the properties of the Universe are the same for all observers.' This amounts to the strongly philosophical statement that the part of the Universe which we can see is a fair sample, and that the same physical laws apply throughout. In essence, this in a sense says that the Universe is knowable and is playing fair with scientists.[1]

Cosmological principle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


The point of this thread was, how is inductive reasoning that experts in the field use can decieve us.

I'm aware that there are 2 types of reasoning, i.e inductive and deductive.

I understand how both work, but what my worry is that inductive reasoning may have some flaws that are just taking advantage of modern science.

Take a look at the big bang theory, I know it has 3 compelling evidence to suggest an expanding universe. The first and the best is galaxies exceeding away from us at a constant rate(hubble constant).. but what I'm worried about is, the theory ASSUMES that if galaxies are moving away from us than in the past they must of been alot closer and at some point in the past(14-15 billion years ago), they would of all been so close that the law of physics/nature just break down.

My question is HOW DO WE KNOW, that this is the case... that in the past it followed the condition to what we see today?

Also hubble constant does not apply to other cluster of galaxies, only our galaxies right? just correct me on this one.

The theory is the best among all the other theories, and I don't deny galaxies expanding and cosmic microwave background etc..

But my problem is inductive reasoning only works if we assume certain things.

:detective:

Thanks

My only point is that hubble is v=hd. There is no reference to galaxies, or cluster galaxies. To say that the law makes reference to specifics objects is wrong.

That equation you speak of is referenced to galaxies.. and galaxies only in our cluster.

..... hence it is referring to galaxies and what i'm trying to say is that law does not apply outside our cluster of galaxies i.e the virgo cluster.

This makes no sense at all.

There are no preferred location in space. To say that the law does not apply to outside our cluster galaxy is to say that there is something special about our location is our cluster galaxy.

What you say violates symmetry principles.

Science is funny that way. As far as I know science and reality don't match up. Thats why CERN is so hot to find their imaginary Higgins Boson. But following your line of thought, how would we use science to determine if the "laws" of physics we observe today have remained constant throughout the life of the universe? everything we know of the universe suggests constant change, I suppose the same should be applied to how the universe behaves.

No, i'm wasn't implying our cluster of galaxy is special.. I'm just saying that the hubble law does not apply to galaxies outside our cluster of galaxies.

I would recommend you to look up HOW hubble discovered this, and see where this particular law breaks down.

Hence it brings me back to my thread as to how far can inductive reasoning take us? How certain are we with our assumptions?

Hi Ikurwa89,



The secret to inductive reasoning is to outgrow the philosophically-childish need for "proof" and "certainty", and replace it with the question "does this appear to lead somewhere constructive?"