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Question The thing about physical science is that it seems likes it doesn't tell you anything that couldn't be simulated by a virtual reality device of some sort. Am I wrong? Can science test that hypothesis in a reasonable way? It seems like the only real and accessible metaphysical qualities are things like color. Color is real whether we are looking at a virtual reality simulation or something else. "Has science allowed us to go deeper than that to an actual world behind manifestations such as color?

Accepted:
May 10, 2012

Comments

I think there are limits to how far the skeptical worry you describe can go. Your reference to virtual-reality devices is telling: "The thing about physical science is that it seems like it doesn't tell you anything that couldn't be simulated by a virtual reality device of some sort." Notice that it's physical science itself (computer science, neuroscience) that encourages you to say that. In broaching the idea that virtual-reality devices could fake what we take to be truths revealed by science, you make two non-skeptical assumptions: (1) Science really does claim such-and-such about reality; (2) science has it right about the power of virtual-reality devices. (Now, someone's skepticism might stem from merely imagining that reality is radically different from how it seems to him/her, but that kind of skepticism doesn't -- and shouldn't -- rely on anything scientific.)

Can empirical science test a radical skeptical hypothesis? No. Of necessity, empirical scientific testing always occurs against a background of indefinitely many non-skeptical assumptions. Scientific testing makes sense only if we assume that radical skepticism is false. Philosophy, rather than empirical science, gives us the only viable ways of responding to radical skepticism.

Incidentally, some would challenge the claim that colors are "real and accessible metaphysical qualities." See especially section 6 of this SEP article.