# The World is a High Tech Oracle Imagine that we have been given an ultra, high technology oracle that can predict the outcome of any possible experiment, but provides no explanations. According to [Instrumentalism](Instrumentalism.md), once in possession of this oracle, we would have no need for scientific [Explanations](Explanations.md), except as a form of entertainment. But is that really true? How would the oracle be used in a practical sense? In some sense it would contain the [Knowledge](Knowledge.md) necessary to build, say, an interstellar spaceship. But how would it help us build one? Remember, the oracle only predicts the *outcomes* of experiments. Hence, in order to use it at all we must first know *what experiments to ask about*. Sure, if we gave it the design of a spaceship and the details of a proposed test flight, it could tell us how the spaceship would perform. But it could not *design the spaceship* in the first place. And even if it predicted that the spaceship would explode on takeoff, it could not tell us how to prevent such an explosion. This would still fall on *us* to work out. Before we could begin to improve upon the design in *any way*, we should have to *understand* how the spaceship was supposed to work. Prediction is simply no substitute for explanation. The same would hold true in scientific research. The oracle would not provide us with any new theory. We would still need to come up with a theory, think of an experiment to test it, and then finally ask the oracle what the outcome of that test would be. Thus, the oracle would not be replacing theories at all: *it would be replacing experiments*. The oracle would be useful in many situations, but its usefulness would always depend on people's ability to solve scientific problems as they always have, by devising *explanatory theories*. The oracle would not even be able to replace all experimentation - its ability to predict the outcome would in practice depend on how easy it was to *describe*[^1] the experiment. At this point it starts to become clear that there already is an oracle out there serving this purpose: **the physical world**. It tells us the result of any experiment if we ask it correctly (do the experiment). But it provides no explanations. --- Date: 20240818 Links to: [The Fabric of Reality](The%20Fabric%20of%20Reality.pdf) Tags: References: * Fabric of Reality, pg 4 [^1]: This touches on [Information](Information.md)t is Fundamental](Measurement%20is%20Fundamental.md). It also alludes to what I have seen time and time again that [Measuring the Right Thing](Measuring%20the%20Right%20Thing.md) is one of the biggest challenges when probing reality. It is a fundamentally *creative* act.