VA: Knowledge & Descriptions CANNOT Produce Facts

[Veritas Aequitas]

ETA: to include 'knowledge' in the OP and elsewhere.

Despite 'thousands of times' I had insisted "Descriptions & knowledge CANNOT Produce Facts" PH keep insisting that I assert "Therefore, any kind of description can 'produce' facts" as below;

VA agrees that descriptions cannot produce facts.
But knowledge cannot produce facts either. For example, it wasn't and isn't our knowing that water is H2O that made or makes water H2O. That's a very strange idea.

Here's the big fallacy.
[VA's] Conclusions:
1 Therefore, there are no facts 'outside' descriptions - 'outside' agreement on the use of signs.
2 Therefore, any kind of description can 'produce' facts. (So there can be moral facts.)

Strawman!!!
The millionth time.
I have never claimed any kind of knowldge or description can 'produce' facts.

What you termed as fact i.e. a feature of reality that is 'just-is' is a noumenon, illusory, empty, nothing, meaningless and nonsensical.
You have never been able to demonstrate how to realize your 'just is'.

Here is how I defined 'what is fact'.
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=29486
which imperatively is conditioned to a specific FSK.

Before a 'fact' is known [epistemologicall] and described [linguistically], that 'fact' is already entangled with the human conditions of reality within a 4 billion years old of conditionings and dynamically emerging and must be realized within a specific human based FSK.
Note this;
All Human-Based FSKs are 4 Billion Years Old
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39918

Take the example of 'water'.
"What is supposedly water" as experienced within the primordial soup is embodied within all organisms including humans with up to a 4.0 years of conditioning via evolution.
As such, different organisms will have their specific version of the reality of what is 'supposedly water' i.e. that specific cluster of particles and atoms.

Within human common sense FSK, 'what is water' is what is experienced by the common man, i.e. a liquid that has a quality of wetness with all other features related it 'what is water'.

Now when there is a shift to the science-chemistry FSK, there must be a shift from common sense to chemistry sense, i.e. one need to view that 'what is supposedly water' with atomic eyes, i.e. sensing in terms of atoms, electrons and quarks and not as 'water'.

When we view the reality of 'what is supposedly water' with atomic eyes it is conditioned within the science-chemistry-FSK.
But what is 'that is supposedly water'?
It is cluster of the following;


or this;


The fact is there is no absolute or fixed thing that is 'what is supposedly water'.
To insist like PH that 'what is supposed water' as a fact, feature of reality which is 'just is' is delusional.

This is why Hawking concluded the following;

• Model-dependent realism is a view of scientific inquiry that focuses on the role of scientific models of phenomena.[1] It claims reality should be interpreted based upon these models, and where several models overlap in describing a particular subject, multiple, equally valid, realities exist.
  It claims that it is meaningless to talk about the "true reality" of a model as we can never be absolutely certain of anything.
  The only meaningful thing is the usefulness of the model.[2]
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model-dependent_realism#:

In Hawking case, he refer to 'the model' which is very restricted.

What is more realistic is to take into account the 4.0 billion years old human FSK and human -based science-chemistry FSK.

That is the ONLY reality we can realized [prior to being known and described].

This is why
Humans are the Co-Creators of Reality They are In [3]
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=35227
as conditioned to the specific human-based FSK.
There is no other way.
PH's way in opposite to the above is delusional.

Descriptions CANNOT Produce Facts!
The only way that facts of reality can emerge is via its 4.0 billion years of human conditions via evolution in entanglement within a primordial soup that enable the realization of reality within a specific human-based FSK as a fact that is known and described subsequently.

[Veritas Aequitas]

Notes:

[Iwannaplato]

The fact is there is no absolute or fixed thing that is 'what is supposedly water'.

But there is an absolute fixed thing that is the oughtness not to kill. We've seen it in mirror neurons.

And yes, VA will say that the oughtness-not-to-kill is not an absolute fixed thing. But it manages, unlike the Moon, to exist when we are not looking at it.

It has a more durable ontological existence.

[Iwannaplato]

This is why Hawking concluded the following;

• Model-dependent realism is a view of scientific inquiry that focuses on the role of scientific models of phenomena.[1] It claims reality should be interpreted based upon these models, and where several models overlap in describing a particular subject, multiple, equally valid, realities exist.
  It claims that it is meaningless to talk about the "true reality" of a model as we can never be absolutely certain of anything.
  The only meaningful thing is the usefulness of the model.[2]
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model-dependent_realism#:

Which is of course interesting. Here we have Hawking's meta-model, or a heuristic based on a model. IOW it is just another model or dependent on one.

The ironic thing is that talking about and using a model where there is a 'true reality' works very well. So, if usefulness is the criterion, then it's a good model.

How useful is Hawking's model and how do we test it to see?

[Flannel Jesus]

It's worth noting explicitly that Stephen Hawkings model dependent realism is not synonymous with VAs approach to FSKs, and he would almost certainly disagree with most of what VA says here in these conversations.

Stephen Hawking, if you read his works, quite clearly believes in mind independent reality. He believes the universe has a mathematical structure, he believes that's true whether we know it or not. He talks about scientific facts about the universe, in the present, future and past, without first saying anything resembling VAs "FSK yada yada" magic words that VA thinks is required before you can talk about, say, the chemical basis of abiogenesis or the existence of h2o.

There's a superficial similarity between VAs fsk approach and Stephen Hawkings model dependent realism, but it's only superficial. I actually think model dependent realism goes in the OPPOSITE direction to VAs FSK approach.

[Iwannaplato]

It's worth noting explicitly that Stephen Hawkings model dependent realism is not synonymous with VAs approach to FSKs, and he would almost certainly disagree with most of what VA says here in these conversations.

Stephen Hawking, if you read his works, quite clearly believes in mind independent reality. He believes the universe has a mathematical structure, he believes that's true whether we know it or not. He talks about scientific facts about the universe, in the present, future and past, without first saying anything resembling VAs "FSK yada yada" magic words that VA thinks is required before you can talk about, say, the chemical basis of abiogenesis or the existence of h2o.

There's a superficial similarity between VAs fsk approach and Stephen Hawkings model dependent realism, but it's only superficial. I actually think model dependent realism goes in the OPPOSITE direction to VAs FSK approach.

Good to hear. I semi-assumed that, given what I remember of not recent readings of Hawking.
But I think it's interesting, and perhaps a short cut, to just accept some X that VA throws out for support, and then see if it holds anyway. This sidesteps the discussion of whether VA is interpreting SH correctly - and I can easily imagine endless posts and threads on that subject. But a 2 pronged approach is better.

I mainly wanted to focus on what is essentially an appeal to authority here.

Stephen Hawking said it, he's got a great rep, so......

But his great rep is not for philosophy. And here his claim is not the result of research, SH's claim, but the presentation of a meta-model or a heuristic based on some model SH has.

So, how did he test this model following his own criterion: usefulness?

If he didn't, why should we accept it?

And then, can one test it?

And further, can one then have a moral antirealist model that is also true, entailing that PH is not a primitive idiot?

[Veritas Aequitas]

It's worth noting explicitly that Stephen Hawkings model dependent realism is not synonymous with VAs approach to FSKs, and he would almost certainly disagree with most of what VA says here in these conversations.

Stephen Hawking, if you read his works, quite clearly believes in mind independent reality. He believes the universe has a mathematical structure, he believes that's true whether we know it or not. He talks about scientific facts about the universe, in the present, future and past, without first saying anything resembling VAs "FSK yada yada" magic words that VA thinks is required before you can talk about, say, the chemical basis of abiogenesis or the existence of h2o.

There's a superficial similarity between VAs fsk approach and Stephen Hawkings model dependent realism, but it's only superficial. I actually think model dependent realism goes in the OPPOSITE direction to VAs FSK approach.

Hawking did mention somewhere 'something like' he still believe there is an independent objective reality but I believe this is merely personal and psychological rather than scientific.

What is critical is when he stated,
"It claims that it is meaningless to talk about the "true reality" of a model as we can never be absolutely certain of anything."

Thus for a philosophical realist to insist there is an absolute independent objective reality without any reference to a FSK is meaningless and nonsensical.

For Hawking, whatever the scientific fact it is conditioned upon a model which is a FSK in a way. To state otherwise is meaningless, and I add nonsensical.

Note scientists like Dawkins believes he is a 6/7 on the scale of the atheist-theist continuum. Being a scientist he cannot claim certainty, but surely he has 'zero' relation with theism.

I read Hawking's Grand Design quite some time ago, here are some notes I highlighted which drown Hawking's idea of believing in an independent external objective reality;

1.Today most scientists would say a law of nature is a rule that is based upon an observed regularity and provides predictions that go beyond the immediate situations upon which it is based. C2

2. Because it is so impractical to use the underlying physical laws to predict human behavior, we adopt what is called an effective theory. In physics, an effective theory is a framework created to model certain observed phenomena without describing in detail all of the underlying processes. C2

2a No External World
-the universe itself has no single history, nor even an independent existence. C1
-There is no way to remove the observer—us—from our perception of the world, which is created through our sensory processing and through the way we think and reason. Chap 3
-Quantum physics is a new model of reality that gives us a picture of the universe.
-We form mental concepts of our home, trees, other people, the electricity that flows from wall sockets, atoms, molecules, and other universes. These mental concepts are the only reality we can know. 8
-There is no model-independent test of reality. It follows that a well-constructed model creates a reality of its own. 8
-As in our universe, in the Game of Life your reality depends on the model you employ. 8

3. If a goldfish formulated such a theory, we would have to admit the goldfish’s view as a valid picture of reality. C3

4. So which is real, the Ptolemaic or Copernican system? Although it is not uncommon for people to say that Copernicus proved Ptolemy wrong, that is not true. As in the case of our normal view versus that of the goldfish, one can use either picture as a model of the universe, for our observations of the heavens can be explained by assuming either the earth or the sun to be at rest.

5. These examples bring us to a conclusion that will be important in this book: There is no picture- or theory-independent concept of reality. Instead we will adopt a view that we will call model dependent realism: the idea that a physical theory or world picture is a model (generally of a mathematical nature) and a set of rules that connect the elements of the model to observations. C1

Although we are puny and insignificant on the scale of the cosmos, this makes us in a sense the lords of creation.


Realism difficult to defend.

6. But his act did illustrate the view of philosopher David Hume (1711–1776), who wrote that although we have no rational grounds for believing in an objective reality, we also have no choice but to act as if it is true.

7. But this wave/particle duality—the idea that an object could be described as either a particle or a wave—is as foreign to everyday experience as is the idea that you can drink a chunk of sandstone.
8. In that view, the universe does not have just a single existence or history, but rather every possible version of the universe exists simultaneously in what is called a quantum superposition.

9. Quantum physics provides a framework for understanding how nature operates on atomic and subatomic scales, but as we’ll see in more detail later, it dictates a completely different conceptual schema, one in which an object’s position, path, and even its past and future are not precisely determined.
- Bodies such as stars or black holes cannot just appear out of nothing. But a whole universe can. Because gravity shapes space and time, it allows space-time to be locally stable but globally unstable. On the scale of the entire universe, the positive energy of the matter can be balanced by the negative gravitational energy, and so there is no restriction on the creation of whole universes.
Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing in the manner described in Chapter 6. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.
- But quantum physics agrees with observation. It has never failed a test, and it has been tested more than any other theory in science. Chap 4
-That is, quantum physics recognizes that to make an observation, you must interact with the object you are observing. Chap 4

The universe would start as a point at the South Pole, but the South Pole is much like any other point. To ask what happened before the beginning of the universe would become a meaningless question, because there is nothing south of the South Pole. In this picture space-time has no boundary—the same laws of nature hold at the South Pole as in other places. C6
The histories that contribute to the Feynman sum don’t have an independent existence, but depend on what is being measured. We create history by our observation, rather than history creating us. C6
The idea that the universe does not have a unique observer-independent history might seem to conflict with certain facts we know. C6

-Bodies such as stars or black holes cannot just appear out of nothing. But a whole universe can. c8
-Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going. c8



- M-theory is the most general super-symmetric theory of gravity.
For these reasons M-theory is the only candidate for a complete theory of the universe.
-Free Will: Do people have free will? If we have free will, where in the evolutionary tree did it develop? For example, a study of patients undergoing awake brain surgery found that by electrically stimulating the appropriate regions of the brain, one could create in the patient the desire to move the hand, arm, or foot, or to move the lips and talk. It is hard to imagine how free will can operate if our behavior is determined by physical law, so it seems that we are no more than biological machines and that free will is just an illusion.
-In the case of people, since we cannot solve the equations that determine our behavior, we use the effective theory that people have free will.
-Some people claim that self-awareness is something unique to humans.
It gives them free will, the ability to choose between different courses of action.
How can one tell if a being has free will? We would therefore have to say that any complex being has free will—not as a fundamental feature, but as an effective theory, an admission of our inability to do the calculations that would enable us to predict its actions.

[Flannel Jesus]

When Hawkings talks about the big bang, he doesn't prefix everything he says with your "fsk yada yada" ritual. If you were to speak to hawking about the chemical basis of abiogenesis, he wouldn't prefix his statements with "bio chemistry fsk yada yada" and he wouldn't expect you to either.

His philosophy is one where models and observations are our only contact points with reality - he's not saying reality isn't out there, like you frequently do, he's just saying we don't have direct contact with it. Which is true.

I disagree with his phrasing of "meaningless", but I think he also further clarifies that what he means by "meaningless" is just that we can't have certainty precisely because we don't have direct unfettered access to the deep truths of reality. I agree that we don't have that kind of access, but that doesn't mean there isn't a reality, and it doesn't mean our methods of science and our models aren't at least trying to make contact with it in some sense (whether they succeed at that and how well is another story).

Your fsk approach is restrictive, while his model based realism is the opposite, it's about allowances. You use fsk-speak to say all sorts of things we CAN'T say are true, while he uses his model based realism to make extra allowances for more things we can say are true. That's why I say his philosophy goes in the opposite direction of yours.

[Flannel Jesus]

Central to his view of models is the difference between the raw truths of reality (which again we don't have direct access to and will almost certainly never know), and the emergent truths of reality - emergent truths that we can try to reverse engineer like Chemistry.

If you were to press him about what he thinks the nature of the raw truth of reality is, I've read enough of his words to think that he thinks our reality is a mathematical construct, a function essentially with an uncountable number of variables. Time and space and matter aren't raw pieces of that function, but, he would say I believe, they are to be found in the interactions between various pieces of the function. They're emergent. There's no variable in the source code that refers to them, but if you look you can find them in the output of the function all the same.

I've asked you before, va, if your whole philosophy here hinges on the difference between reductive raw truth and emergent truths - as in, do you only think the TRUE truths are the fully reduced ones, and emergent features of our reality aren't that kind of truth? You said no to that, which I found disappointing, because if you had said yes your philosophy would have suddenly made a lot more sense to me. Hawkings philosophy is more similar to that kind of approach, he thinks (correctly) that we don't and can't know the fully reduced truths, and that we can know only the emergent truths that we do our best to reverse engineer. But he's fully comfortable calling those emergent truths "true". He doesn't need the boiler plate "fsk yada yada" to say, for example, "abiogenesis chemically happened approximately xbillion years ago, and probably it happened something like this..."

[Veritas Aequitas]

When Hawkings talks about the big bang, he doesn't prefix everything he says with your "fsk yada yada" ritual. If you were to speak to hawking about the chemical basis of abiogenesis, he wouldn't prefix his statements with "bio chemistry fsk yada yada" and he wouldn't expect you to either.

Have you read Hawking's Grand Design and grasp his main theme.
Did you even read the highlights I posted?
Note Hawking alluding to 'Framework' and human interactions which are brought up throughout the book, note from the highlights I posted earlier;

2. Because it is so impractical to use the underlying physical laws to predict human behavior, we adopt what is called an effective theory. In physics, an effective theory is a framework created to model certain observed phenomena without describing in detail all of the underlying processes. C2

2a No External World
-the universe itself has no single history, nor even an independent existence. C1
-There is no way to remove the observer—us—from our perception of the world, which is created through our sensory processing and through the way we think and reason. Chap 3
-Quantum physics is a new model of reality that gives us a picture of the universe.
-We form mental concepts of our home, trees, other people, the electricity that flows from wall sockets, atoms, molecules, and other universes. These mental concepts are the only reality we can know. 8
-There is no model-independent test of reality. It follows that a well-constructed model creates a reality of its own. 8
-As in our universe, in the Game of Life your reality depends on the model you employ. 8

3. If a goldfish formulated such a theory, we would have to admit the goldfish’s view as a valid picture of reality. C3

4. So which is real, the Ptolemaic or Copernican system? Although it is not uncommon for people to say that Copernicus proved Ptolemy wrong, that is not true. As in the case of our normal view versus that of the goldfish, one can use either picture as a model of the universe, for our observations of the heavens can be explained by assuming either the earth or the sun to be at rest.

Although we are puny and insignificant on the scale of the cosmos, this makes us in a sense the lords of creation.


Realism difficult to defend.

6. But his act did illustrate the view of philosopher David Hume (1711–1776), who wrote that although we have no rational grounds for believing in an objective reality, we also have no choice but to act as if it is true.

7. But this wave/particle duality—the idea that an object could be described as either a particle or a wave—is as foreign to everyday experience as is the idea that you can drink a chunk of sandstone.
8. In that view, the universe does not have just a single existence or history, but rather every possible version of the universe exists simultaneously in what is called a quantum superposition.

9. Quantum physics provides a framework for understanding how nature operates on atomic and subatomic scales, but as we’ll see in more detail later, it dictates a completely different conceptual schema, one in which an object’s position, path, and even its past and future are not precisely determined.
- Bodies such as stars or black holes cannot just appear out of nothing. But a whole universe can. Because gravity shapes space and time, it allows space-time to be locally stable but globally unstable. On the scale of the entire universe, the positive energy of the matter can be balanced by the negative gravitational energy, and so there is no restriction on the creation of whole universes.
Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing in the manner described in Chapter 6. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.
- But quantum physics agrees with observation. It has never failed a test, and it has been tested more than any other theory in science. Chap 4
-That is, quantum physics recognizes that to make an observation, you must interact with the object you are observing. Chap 4

The universe would start as a point at the South Pole, but the South Pole is much like any other point. To ask what happened before the beginning of the universe would become a meaningless question, because there is nothing south of the South Pole. In this picture space-time has no boundary—the same laws of nature hold at the South Pole as in other places. C6
The histories that contribute to the Feynman sum don’t have an independent existence, but depend on what is being measured. We create history by our observation, rather than history creating us. C6
The idea that the universe does not have a unique observer-independent history might seem to conflict with certain facts we know. C6

-Bodies such as stars or black holes cannot just appear out of nothing. But a whole universe can. c8
-Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going. c8



- M-theory is the most general super-symmetric theory of gravity.
For these reasons M-theory is the only candidate for a complete theory of the universe.
-Free Will: Do people have free will? If we have free will, where in the evolutionary tree did it develop? For example, a study of patients undergoing awake brain surgery found that by electrically stimulating the appropriate regions of the brain, one could create in the patient the desire to move the hand, arm, or foot, or to move the lips and talk. It is hard to imagine how free will can operate if our behavior is determined by physical law, so it seems that we are no more than biological machines and that free will is just an illusion.
-In the case of people, since we cannot solve the equations that determine our behavior, we use the effective theory that people have free will.
-Some people claim that self-awareness is something unique to humans.
It gives them free will, the ability to choose between different courses of action.
How can one tell if a being has free will? We would therefore have to say that any complex being has free will—not as a fundamental feature, but as an effective theory, an admission of our inability to do the calculations that would enable us to predict its actions.

[Flannel Jesus]

I've read that, and I don't believe it disagrees with what I'm saying

[Flannel Jesus]

Imagine this: our mutual friend Peter Holmes gets a chance to speak to the immortalised mind of Stephen Hawking, somehow. Through the course of conservation, eventually Peter Holmes says the following:

The chemical structure of water was discovered to be H2O in 1811, but of course it was H2O even in 1810, we just didn't know it yet.

What would Stephen Hawking likely say in reply? Would he say something like:

No you can't say that, you have to say based on the framework of knowledge of chemistry we can speculate that water might have been h2o, but we really have no idea what it was prior to 1811.

Or would he instead say,

Yes, of course Peter Holmes, the molecules in a glass of water were largely H2O in 1810 the same as they would be in 1812.

? What do you think? (Obviously the space of things he might say are much wider than those two responses, including him questioning why they're even talking about that at all)

[Veritas Aequitas]

I've asked you before, va, if your whole philosophy here hinges on the difference between reductive raw truth and emergent truths - as in, do you only think the TRUE truths are the fully reduced ones, and emergent features of our reality aren't that kind of truth? You said no to that, which I found disappointing, because if you had said yes your philosophy would have suddenly made a lot more sense to me.
Hawkings philosophy is more similar to that kind of approach, he thinks (correctly) that we don't and can't know the fully reduced truths, and that we can know only the emergent truths that we do our best to reverse engineer.
But he's fully comfortable calling those emergent truths "true".
He doesn't need the boiler plate "fsk yada yada" to say, for example, "abiogenesis chemically happened approximately xbillion years ago, and probably it happened something like this..."

The problem is it is impossible to ever establish the reality of the 'fully reduced truth' because of the infinite regress.
Philosophy had been searching for this "holy grail" since the beginning and has never found it.
This is why Kant initiated his Copernican Revolution to approach reality from the emergent perspective, which entail the human based FSKs.

The quest for the reduced truth 'TRUTH' is where theists make the hasty jump to the uncaused cause, the unmoved mover, and the likes and reified that as God.
This I had stated a actually a psychological problem rather than an epistemological or for philosophy-proper, because it is irrational, meaningless, thing-in-itself, illusory and nonsensical.

It is the same with the philosophical-realist's position which you are adopting the 'fully reduced truth' as the TRUE Truth.
As with the theists, the philosophical realist chasing and reifying an illusion is also a fundamentally a psychological problem.

When Hawking is comfortable calling emergent truths 'true' the FSKs he participated in are implied, i.e. the science-physics-QM FSK.
There is no way he can make any assertion with confidence without reference the conditions of the existing scientific framework and system, where he mentioned 'framework' within QM.

I did a search in Hawking's Grand Design, he did not mention 'abiogenesis' at all.
If he were to speculate on 'abiogenesis' he definitely [professionally as a scientist] has to refer [implied by default] to the science-chemistry, science-biology with his science-physic FSK.
Surely he is not going to claim, "... because I said so".

Re your idea of so called 'reduced truth', Kant did not abandon this idea of the reduced truth which he labelled as the noumenon which is only an intelligible object, which is illusory.

Note in Geometry, we have the idea of a perfect triangle [mathematical construct] but such a perfect triangle can never be really real or an ultimate truth.
What is a perfect triangle is merely an ideal and is a useful guide for empirical reality acting as a standard to get as close as possible to the ideal.

As such, as for the reduced truth, it can be an ideal but should never be reified as something that is really real.

What is really real is the emergent truth and this can be verified and justified with empirical evidence with correction for falsehoods within a credible and reliable FSK.
Thus my point,
whatever are truths, facts and knowledge must be conditioned upon a specific human based FSK.

To insist on the reduced truth as the TRUTH and reified it as really real is delusional and that is fundamentally a psychological problem.
I have asked, what is the worst if we simply give up the idea of the reduced truth?
There is no significant risk to humanity other than the psychological pains and potential cold turkey.

On the other hand, one cannot simply give up the FSKs conditioned emergent truths we have at the present.
If we give up emergent truths, technologies that has facilitated the progress of humanity will go down the drain.

[Agent Smith]

"That's an amazing statement!" Harry spoke with a tone that everybody recognized, reassured. Tom, sitting next to Harry, was the least impressed of the three. Harry, just the average Joe, looked at Tom and went, "That's an amazing statement ... right?", his confidence in his assessment of what Dick said beginning to dip. Tom's eyes looked like that person Harry had seen at the clinic - some myasthenia whatever - and Tom gave out a loud yawn. "Tom, Tom, answer my question, amazing statement, no?" Harry was getting agitated. Tom turned ... slowly ... looked at Harry with eyes he could barely keep open and yawned ... even more loudly ... "Harpfshi... pft gju alfsh." Harry was mere seconds away from a major panic attack. "What?!?!" Harry was on his chair, pulling at his Polo shirt, with a look on his face that meant only one thing - he was an extraordinary person!

[Flannel Jesus]

I don't think you're accomplishing anything by making Peter Holmes preface everything he says about chemistry with "according to the chemistry fsk".

And yes, we don't have access to the raw unreduced truths and we never will most likely. But you're taking a strong position about that - that there is no such thing - rather than the weaker position that we don't know what it is. You're acting like "there is no such thing" is this glorious philosophically profound lack-of-stance, but it's not, it's as much of a stance as saying "there is such a thing and it works exactly like this" - in other words, your stance is even more of a strong stance than the stance of someone like Peter Holmes, or general philosophical realists like Sean Carroll. At least Sean Carroll admits ignorance about what the fully reduced truth might be, you claim no such ignorance.

Your claims about reality imply you think you have a stronger understanding of the deep down truths than any of Hawking, Carroll, Einstein, me or Peter Holmes claim. All we claim is that there is a reality, but we don't know the deep down true nature of it. Our ignorance is our strength here, compared to your certainty that you know the nature of it: that the nature of it is that it doesn't exist at all.

And please note that Stephen Hawkings quotes mostly go in the direction of "we can't know what the deep down reality is" which is very very different from "there isn't one."