In the Beginning was Information

The persistence of a paradigm which has survived the onslaught ofreality for a long time, is even greater [W4, p 632]:“When it comes to collisions between paradigms and empiricalreality, the latter usually loses, according to Kuhn’s findings. Hebased his conclusions on the history of science and not on sciencetheory. However, the power of the paradigm is not unlimited...There are stages in the development of a science whenempirical reality is not adapted to fit the paradigm; during suchphases different paradigms compete. Kuhn calls these stagesscientific revolutions... According to Kuhn’s conception it is afable that the reason why successful theories replace previousones is because they perform better in explaining phenomena.The performance of a theory can be measured historically inquite different terms, namely the number of its sworn-in adherents.”Much relevant scientific data is lost because of the dictatorshipof a false paradigm, since deviating results are regardedas “errors in measurement” and are therefore ignored.A minimal requirement for testing whether a theory should beretained, or whether a hypothesis should not yet be discarded, orthat a process could really work, is that the relevant laws of natureshould not be violated.2.3 The Nature of Physical LawsA fundamental metaphysical law is that of causality. This meansthat every event must have a cause, and that under the same circumstancesa certain cause always has the same effects. For a betterunderstanding of the laws of nature we will now discuss somebasic aspects which are important for the evaluation and applicationof events and processes:N1: The Laws of nature are based on experience. It is oftenasserted that the laws of nature are proved theorems, but we haveto emphasise that the laws of nature cannot be proved! They areonly identified and formulated through observation. It is oftenpossible to formulate conclusions in exact mathematical terms,ensuring preciseness, brevity, and generality. But even though26