Non-existence

[Jon Paul]

As far as I can tell "empirical equivalence" is a term bandied about in purely philosophical circles to deal with metaphysical ideas such as the possibility that the universe around us is in some manner unreal or fake (e.g. a computer simulation) ... as such I feel entirely safe in pointing my finger and the funny performing theist and thinking to myself, "What a [expletive deleted]!"

In short it ("empirical equivalence") appears to be yet another pointless metaphysical device and, as I said to our resident Catholic lunatic, "Metaphysics however exclusively concerns itself with that which cannot be proven, cannot be demonstrated, cannot be directly or indirectly observed by any method and can be somewhat cynically defined as a means of justifying that which cannot be demonstrated empirically. Supporters of metaphysics would like it to be taken seriously however, in order to do so, one has to establish a standard by which to measure it, to demonstrate it as fact and there are no standards by which any metaphysical concept can be measured. Despite its name it is not now and never will be a science and is of no use as a tool in the armoury of the real knowledge seeker."

Empirical equivalence is certainly a valid relation between two different theories in science.

If you have two scientific theories which are empirically equivalent (say, the Copenhagenist interpretation and Bohmist interpretation of quantum mechanics), and for instance, makes the same observational predictions and observations, then the issue of which viewpoint you choose becomes non-empirical.

What is wrong with non-empirical? Nothing. Non-empirical in this context simply means the theory which you apply to the empirii, independently of the other theories that could be equally so applied.

Notice that I, as a Thomist, am a realist; so I believe the universe and our world is, indeed, real. So I am in no way arguing against you, I am just clarifying what I see as a misconception about what "empirical equivalence" would signify.

Indeed it seems you are using the word "metaphysical" or "philosophic" as a straw man to debunk any point your opponent in a discussion raises, just so you don't have to address the actual substance in his argument and point being made.

The real problem here is that science cannot settle it, due to the empirical equivalence. The question of whether reality exists or not lies outside the boundary of determinability by the scientific method. And it lies outside the boundary of what the empirical methods of science can observationally discover. Yet it is important for science, just like the scientific method is important for science. How you interpret science is important for the science you are doing.

What is going to decide whether you will believe reality exists is not the empirii, because realism and arealism can indeed be empirically equivalent. Arealist Bohrism is empirically equivalent to ontologist Bohmism, for instance.

What is going to decide whether you believe reality exists will be the scenario between Bohr and Bohm: it's going to be your empirically equivalent interpretations of the same empirii which will decide it. The empirical data in itself cannot decide it. An interpretation of those data can.