What is Science?
What is science? I do not mean just the dictionary definition, though perhaps we need to start with something commonly accepted like that in order to understand more fully what science is.
(This came up in the discussion of "Ego Depletion." My comments here were too long and involved for that. So, I offer this as a new topic.)
A few years ago, before going under the knife at a university research and teaching hospital, I signed an agreement that I understood that medicine is an art, not a science, and that outcomes are not predictable. Maybe that is why the German word for medical doctor is "der Arzt." But medical practice certainly depends on science, does it not? And they do have medical research, which we hope is practiced as a science, rather than an art like ballet or ceramics.
(Granted that art has a lot of science in it: chemistry of pigments, physics of firing, anatomy, botany... it is all there if you care to know. Does "the science of painting" make sense?)
In this discussion, blarman, WilliamShipley, and lucky differentiated engineering from science. We commonly accept the generalization that scientists discover basic laws; and engineers apply those to the creation of new products; and technicians maintain those creations. That is how things are today. History provides a different model.
The steam engine came before thermodynamics. The telegraph and telephone antedated Maxwell's Equations. Luther Burbank died 20 years before DNA was announced. Similarly, William Smith, who predicted and found the presence of coal by the fossil record of England, died 20 years before The Origin of Species (-- http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/20....
Inventions are largely the improvements of technicians, not the direct applications of theories to new practices.
Computer science may not yet be a science, but the summary work we are doing now will be generalized into new theoretical models.
In William Gibson's "Bridge Trilogy" set in the immediate future, some of the viewpoint characters are artists in a beach house, majoring in Media Science at UC Berkeley. It is not a science yet...
But, what, then is a science?
I look at the practice. If a pursuit consciously chooses the scientific method, then it is a science.
We all know the basic Scientific Method:
1. Observe some aspect of the universe.
2. Invent a tentative description, called a hypothesis, that is consistent with what you have observed.
3. Use the hypothesis to make predictions.
4. Test those predictions by experiments or further observations and modify the hypothesis in the light of your results.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until there are no discrepancies between theory and experiment and/or observation.
http://physics.ucr.edu/~wudka/Physics...
Norman Edmund (1916-2012), founder of Edmund Scientific - and who has not been a customer? - taught a 14-step process.
http://www.scientificmethod.com/index...
Steps or Stages of the Scientific Method
1. Curious Observation
2. Is There a Problem?
3. Goals & Planning
4. Search, Explore, & Gather the Evidence
5. Generate Creative & Logical Alternative Solutions
6. Evaluate the Evidence
7. Make the Educated Guess (Hypothesis)
8. Challenge the Hypothesis
9. Reach a Conclusion
10. Suspend Judgment
11.Take Action
Supporting Ingredients
12. Creative, Non-Logical, Logical & Technical Methods
13. Procedural Principals & Theories
14. Attributes & Thinking Skills
http://www.scientificmethod.com/index...
The way I learned it - five steps, seven, or more - publishing your findings is always the last step. That can mean just recording this in your notebook, if the results are intermediary. But in any case, you must finalize the process by making it possible for others to replicate the work.
That was perhaps the essential truth that separated chemistry from alchemy in Robert Boyle's Sceptical Chymist (1661). Boyle argued for open disclosure of means and methods. That openness - your own open mind open to the minds of others - may be the sine qua non of science. It also speaks to the tension of science in the context of national security. That is nothing new. Projective geometry was held as a French military secret. Can anything secret be a science?
(This came up in the discussion of "Ego Depletion." My comments here were too long and involved for that. So, I offer this as a new topic.)
A few years ago, before going under the knife at a university research and teaching hospital, I signed an agreement that I understood that medicine is an art, not a science, and that outcomes are not predictable. Maybe that is why the German word for medical doctor is "der Arzt." But medical practice certainly depends on science, does it not? And they do have medical research, which we hope is practiced as a science, rather than an art like ballet or ceramics.
(Granted that art has a lot of science in it: chemistry of pigments, physics of firing, anatomy, botany... it is all there if you care to know. Does "the science of painting" make sense?)
In this discussion, blarman, WilliamShipley, and lucky differentiated engineering from science. We commonly accept the generalization that scientists discover basic laws; and engineers apply those to the creation of new products; and technicians maintain those creations. That is how things are today. History provides a different model.
The steam engine came before thermodynamics. The telegraph and telephone antedated Maxwell's Equations. Luther Burbank died 20 years before DNA was announced. Similarly, William Smith, who predicted and found the presence of coal by the fossil record of England, died 20 years before The Origin of Species (-- http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/20....
Inventions are largely the improvements of technicians, not the direct applications of theories to new practices.
Computer science may not yet be a science, but the summary work we are doing now will be generalized into new theoretical models.
In William Gibson's "Bridge Trilogy" set in the immediate future, some of the viewpoint characters are artists in a beach house, majoring in Media Science at UC Berkeley. It is not a science yet...
But, what, then is a science?
I look at the practice. If a pursuit consciously chooses the scientific method, then it is a science.
We all know the basic Scientific Method:
1. Observe some aspect of the universe.
2. Invent a tentative description, called a hypothesis, that is consistent with what you have observed.
3. Use the hypothesis to make predictions.
4. Test those predictions by experiments or further observations and modify the hypothesis in the light of your results.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until there are no discrepancies between theory and experiment and/or observation.
http://physics.ucr.edu/~wudka/Physics...
Norman Edmund (1916-2012), founder of Edmund Scientific - and who has not been a customer? - taught a 14-step process.
http://www.scientificmethod.com/index...
Steps or Stages of the Scientific Method
1. Curious Observation
2. Is There a Problem?
3. Goals & Planning
4. Search, Explore, & Gather the Evidence
5. Generate Creative & Logical Alternative Solutions
6. Evaluate the Evidence
7. Make the Educated Guess (Hypothesis)
8. Challenge the Hypothesis
9. Reach a Conclusion
10. Suspend Judgment
11.Take Action
Supporting Ingredients
12. Creative, Non-Logical, Logical & Technical Methods
13. Procedural Principals & Theories
14. Attributes & Thinking Skills
http://www.scientificmethod.com/index...
The way I learned it - five steps, seven, or more - publishing your findings is always the last step. That can mean just recording this in your notebook, if the results are intermediary. But in any case, you must finalize the process by making it possible for others to replicate the work.
That was perhaps the essential truth that separated chemistry from alchemy in Robert Boyle's Sceptical Chymist (1661). Boyle argued for open disclosure of means and methods. That openness - your own open mind open to the minds of others - may be the sine qua non of science. It also speaks to the tension of science in the context of national security. That is nothing new. Projective geometry was held as a French military secret. Can anything secret be a science?
Previous comments... You are currently on page 4.
Without a basic epistemology and metaphysics recognizing the basic nature of reality, observation and conceptual thinking would not be possible at all, let alone advanced science. It is up to us to discover and conceptualize what we need from what we are aware of, recognizing that things do change in accordance with their nature, in order to logically formulate and validate scientific, contextual principles in accordance with non-contradiction. It isn't a game with tentative metaphysical "assumptions".
The nature and methods of any science depend on the subject matter. The methods and procedure of the sciences of mathematics, epistemology, ethics, grammar, geology, evolution, astronomy, psychology, etc. are not the same as those of physics, and no one science should be copied for the others.
How do you know which attempt is "really" science?
All it showed was the initial assumption of Darwin - which no one ever denied - that living things adapt to their environments (or not) and those that do reproduce more of their kind. So, Eskimos are short and round and Watusi are tall and thin and Finns are very lightly pigmented. As far as we know, people from pole to pole interbreed all very well.
Darwin's consequent assumption - which has never been shown - is that successive generations of adaptation by members of one species creates new species.
The easy inference - denied as "ignorance" - is that once there was only some generic mammal (CLASS), and by selective adaptation ORDERS were created. And the Orders adapted to their changing environments and their descendants were the FAMILIES. Success generations of families adapted to their many different environments and became GENUSSES (genii). And now, we have species.
But that is not how it works at all. Dinosaurs had genii and species. Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes. Other great apes have 24 pairs. How did that come about? What were our common ancestors and how did we get 23 pairs of chromosomes? It is truly a chicken-and-egg problem.
And the genus homo gave rise to homo erectus and homo habilis and homo neanderthalis and homo sapiens. However, we know that homo neanderthal was really just a breed or strain of homo sapiens because their DNA is found among modern humans, showing that fertile offspring were possible.
I enjoyed and agree with the article. Real and honest science, even within the limits of the knowledge available at the time, has done more to improve the conditions of life for man than any other human activity.
Some effort is productive, some is not, yet honest effort directed at actual vs imagined effects, productive or not, will provide information and knowledge. Many 'discoveries' are unforeseen or previously unseen effects, observed while examining another.
.
We see and measure the effects we call Gravity, We don't yet understand the cause nor have we "found it".--Darwin's observations and theories, within the knowledge available to him at the time, has led us to most of our current,understanding of natural evolution vs creationism.
Jan
It seems to me that, reading the responses on this thread, people are going far into the topic 'how you do good science' and not 'what is science'. A good example of this is 'publication': Publication has nothing to do with whether or not you have rigorously examined the nature of reality and discovered a new facet of it - it just determines if you communicate this. (Of course, no one else can test your discovery or build on it if you do not communicate it, but that is part of the process of science not the discovery itself.) I agree with most of what is said about how to do good science, btw, but do not want to drop the concept of discovery per se.
My mind also boggles at an attempt to figure out how a Tarot Deck could be used to discover reality (except perhaps as a generator of statistics) but, again, I am trying to distinguish between the process of doing good science (how) and the essence of science (what). If someone brighter than I can figure out how to use a Tarot Deck to do science, I will be willing to include that as a valid tool...but it makes my brain leak out of my ears to think of how to accomplish that.
Jan
We also need to be more explicit in Step 1. Even observational sciences such as geology and astronomy are based carefully defined and validated explanations of what to observe and why. We do not just look around at random. I love going out with my telescope, but wondrous as it is, I am (I hope) more than a slack-jawed savage staring at the Great Unknown.
That speaks to what a "test" is.
"Since the Renaissance, the term experiment has been used in diverse ways to describe a variety of procedures such as a trial, a diagnosis, or a dissection …"
(On my blog here: http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/20....
Your thumbnail definition begs a myriad of questions. You said that science is "the effort we put put forth to find and understand the causes of the actual effects we encounter in life as human men." But not human women? I am sure that you did not mean that. What is a human non-man or a non-human man? What are you trying to say?
It has to be more than effort. It must be productive effort. How do we know what will be productive? We are not working at random. Something must be informing our efforts. That "something" is science itself. it is important that the scientific method is self-validating. Modern philosophers claim that tautologies are uninformative. (That is the "analytical" side of the analytic-synthetic dichotomy.) Unmarried men are bachelors says nothing, they claim. In fact, it says a great deal and, being a statement of identity it is fundamental to understanding the very complicated social structure of marriage.
What do you mean by "actual" effects? You mean real, rather than supposed or wrongfully perceived? Well, yes, of course, so is "actual" a redundant term? Did you mean something else?
Is finding the causes without understanding them not also science? Even 300 years after Newton we do not "understand" gravity, but we certainly "found" it. The same is true of biological evolution. Darwin's theories cannot stand up to skeptical inquiry. And he was not the first to propose them. He also was preceded by others such as William Smith (1769-1839) who put the theory of evolution to practical use.
Nobel laureate Kary Mullis noted that many of his peers were born in months close to his own. He wondered if there was a correlation. You could do a statistical study to show that Geminis are two-faced and Tauruses are plodders, etc. Prove it all you want; it proves nothing. Falsification sorts the truths from the fictions.
1) Yes science does apply to A being a living organism, however it results in an extra layer of complication. Is a tadpole a frog for instance. I did not want to have to explain these cases because I think it would have side tracked the conversation.
2) Real sciences do not have new theories that completely overthrow (contradict) earlier theories, because real science is based on empirical evidence. A new theory cannot change the underlying empirical evidence.
A real science would not say that inflation is good for the economy and bad for the economy that is a straight forward contradiction and cannot occur in a science. This would require the underlying empirical data to change.
Elsewhere I have written on Hume and Carl Popper who are of historical significance to the philosophy of science, but the article was meant to layout the most important concepts not cover every aspect.
Yes people should not make complex subjects more simple than they are (Libertarians non-aggression principle), however they also should not make things more complex than they are. (The common refrain of the left is that things are complex and therefore we have no knowledge)
I judge science fairs. In the other discussion on "Ego Depletion" it came up that we reward "originality" very heavily and we do not reward replication. And no one mentions falsifiability. In other words, as in the case of Ego Depletion, instead of repeating the original experiment in new ways, one of those 30 or 50 subsequent researchers should have sought to disprove it.
We do that in social science. In sociology, ideologues from different schools attack each other's research with studies of their own casting doubt (if not disdain) on those other theories. Just as post modernists denigrate physical science as "not proving anything" because new truths are discovered, physical scientists disparage social science for this process. In fact, though, social science is more true to the standard of truth.
An 'Objectivist theory' of research, a good topic for another thread.
I grant that we have many good examples of that. I just ask about the other examples, again, say, of 3M, a corporation which famously funds open research.
On the other hand, one of the ironies of government research is that their greatest (popular) claims to success about computers and the Internet are just the opposite. Ray Tomlinson recently passed away. He invented email. But he warned his colleagues not to mention it because it was not what they were supposed to be working on. In Steven Levy's Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution are similar stories of people doing what interested them, not what they were being paid to do.
(1) " Einstein’s relativity did disprove Newton, it just refined and expanded on them at speeds near the speed of light and in regions of very large gravity. "
You mean "did not disprove Newton…"
and
(2) GDP - gross domestic product for GPD.
At the very top: "Note for the present discussion we will assume that A is an inanimate object." (Why? Why are living things not subject to what you propose are physical laws? What you say about living entities, is true of all objects. My computer is aging. Last year, my wife put new, bigger, memory chips in it. It is still the "same" computer, as I am still the "same" person. Your claims are easily challenged by baking a cake. I understand objective metaphysics. Your treatment - like David Harriman's Logical Leap - conflates the vernacular with the technical. It is not fatal. I just point out that as an "apologia" it will not convince someone who does not already agree with you.
Your passing comment on pseudo-science and Keynesian counterfeiting is not quite clear. " In a pseudo science a new theory can come along and predict totally different results." Well, of course, that, too is science. New theories, if they are consistent with reality, will predict effects not yet anticipated by the old theories. Moreover, a Keynesian would point out the government money has the full faith of the government behind it, whereas counterfeit money, once detected loses its value. On the other hand, preach all you want about gold, people still take FRNs in preference to it. (Try it at any big box store.) I think that you have a fallacy of a stolen concept in there, "counterfeit." (I know the parable you refer to, from Milton Friedman: some counterfeiters come into town…" But, again, in particular, Friedman, as a monetist accepted that the value in government money is the full faith and credit of the issuing authority. Lacking that, even with gold and silver, we would be weighing every coin in every transaction.) I know what you meant to say. You just need a better example.
And more…
That is why I raised the issue here and offered the discussion. There's a lot to be said.
And it needs to be said because I distrust what I perceive as an "Orwellian sin" of trying to reduce complex realities into shoutable slogans.
(1) you still have to record what you are doing and have done.
and
(2) even if the work is rejected, the submission itself is according to the necessary process.
And that is good. However, is it not true that truth can be verified with different equipment and skills? Being able to replicate an experiment is necessary, but not sufficient. It is not just following a recipe to get a cake. Observations with a spectroscope cannot contradict observations with a telescope or the naked eye. We explain the Doppler Effect of the Red Shift by analogies to fire engine sirens as they approach and leave. It has to be that way.
As for different skills, take pocket billiards, for example. Someone who is not "skilled" as a physicist certainly validates Newtonian mechanics by playing the game. It could not be true that this only works in my lab with my equipment. It has to work for shooting pool, playing baseball, hat tricks in hockey, horses in dressage, and breaking up pavement with a jackhammer. The skills are all different, but they all work to validate the same claims.
And the essence of Newton's theories is that the laws of the heavens are the same as the laws on Earth. That was the paradigm shift of Newtonian mechanics. Even though medieval astronomers could put the Sun at the center of the system, the assumption was still that life on Earth was different from the celestial spheres. And that speaks to the "mono realism" and the
Newton's Laws of Motion fail within our own solar system: the three body problem cannot be solved with Newtonian Mechanics. The Earth-Moon-Sun, the many moons of Jupiter, the Rings of Saturn (Jupiter, Uranus), cannot be understood with Newton's Laws alone. (Moreover, there is no one "Three Body Problem" but several restricted cases, like the Sun-Earth-Moon where two bodies are much larger than the third. And in addition, there is no "Four Body Problem." We have no way to apply Newtonian mechanics to the Rings of Saturn. It needs a different theory.
But the problem is not Newton. Take Darwinian evolution. I question whether it meets the definition of science. No experiments were proposed or are carried out. Scientists have bombarded all manner of species with radiation and not produced a new one. Yet, the "species" of bears of North America -- brown bear, Kodiak, and Polar Bear- and inter-breedable.
I am not asking about this "science" or that, but asking you what you mean by "an attempt to discover an aspect of reality." Not just any "attempt" can be a science, can it?
(Have you read David Harriman's The Logical Leap? It is a basic book for Objectivists who are interested in the philosophy of science.)
Now I would consider a degree in economics to be a science because of it's use of math.
Einstein and theoretical physics and biology always amazed me because much was imagined in mathematics first and later, much was found to be true in reality...like the atom, it's electrons, protons, neutrons of a cell.
Chemistry is another fascinating field. Astrophysics seems to use all of the aspects of science; observation, mathematics, physics, quantum physics and chemistry.
Quantum physics is my favorite...it also demonstrates my main pet peeve with many of the failures in the sciences...The problem with being able to look at whats there and not what one might expect to find there. That's why I was so taken with Mark Hamilton's concept of "Wide Scope Accountability" Below is this excerpt from my book:
Wide- Infinity in all directions
Scope- To extend our mental range and sight to include all vantage points
Accountability- To honestly consider all possibilities and accept responsibility for
all outcomes.
Ok… Now let us define it
To See and Think without Limits, Utilizing all Knowledge; Past, Present and most Probable Future, with Profound Honesty, to consider and Analyze all Possible; Explanations, Outcomes or Solutions, without any preconceived expectations.
A shorter version might be easier to remember, now that you have been exposed to the full meaning: Diligently considering all Possibilities, with Profound Honesty and Objectivity in Dealing with Reality, to solve any Problem or to create any Value.
Without any preconceived expectation is a very important point we will explore further:
""Another factor comes into play often and we do not even realize it. Preconceived expectations. What many scientist, researchers or value creators, have trouble with, when creating something new, solving a problem or compiling statistics, even trying to see through the illusions of what is really going on, is having a preconceived notion of what it is you are looking for. Many times, if you expect to find a thing, you will find that thing. It is just the way the universe works. This is why it is important to remain objective and approach reality with profound honesty. In other words. Remain open to whatever you find.""
Let us examine two concepts presented in the definition.
Accountability: We are all accountable no matter what actions we may choose to take
or not. It is Inherent. LIKE IT OR NOT.
Responsibility: Acceptance of the possibility that you might have to respond
Differently given an Unfavorable or otherwise not as expected
Outcome. You must respond differently given new knowledge
In order to stay in alignment with your intentions.
To effectively use this tool we need:
Dedication to Honesty and Reality: You MUST be honest with yourself therefore you
WILL be Honest with others and deal with Reality,
. Not some Illusion, falsehood or deception .
(To fully understand, being profoundly honest with yourself: read; “As a Man Thinketh” by James Allen and “Suppose We Let Civilization Begin” by Richard W. Wetherill)
Integrated thought: Using both the right mind and the left mind at the same time.
You know… When the light bulb over your head comes on.
The right Photographic creative mind is that voice in your head,
It speaks for the Subconscious that records everything.
The left logical mind brings order and logic to our thoughts,
Through Speech, our actions and Pen to paper.
Now, maybe some of you here can now understand my penchant for honesty and responsibility in science and technology.
science and its applications is the language used to
freeze the knowledge for future use. . if our attempts
to use language like math are to be successful, we
must present scientific statements in enough ways
to allow triangulation to a specific piece of understanding:::
this is the reason that Galt's speech is so long. . he made
enough statements about reality to allow the listener --
well, the reader -- to "home in" on his real meaning.
the "science" of knowing a person, for example, requires
that you have multiple interactions. . I didn't know
stress analysis in engineering before I had done a
whole bunch of triangulating calculations. . prediction
is difficult, but exciting and definitely possible! -- j
.
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