Discussion»Questions»Science and Technology» Are you a "person of science" who depends on proven facts or do you pooh pooh scientists/science because you think it's bullsh**? Why?
Many great scientific discoveries were made by accident. This makes me think that the term 'mad scientist' may actually be a good thing------- let a wacky person do wild experiments, it could result in genius.
Science does not work by "proven facts" alone. If it did, it could not progress.
It works on uncertainty, narrowing the uncertainty down either to certainty or rejection.
Instead, it takes an idea or suggestion, essentially an intelligent guess based on what can be observed of how something might work. That is a Hypothesis, and it is picked up, examined, debated, tested by other scientists in its field until either shown false or of sufficient merit to become a Theory - essentially a workable model that is not absolute but close enough, and capable of refinement.
The Theory becomes only a scientific Law - the "proven facts" - when it can be show to be 100% correct and repeatable every time it is tested in the correct manner. The basic science taught in schools, or that which lies behind your ability to discuss it here, falls into this category.
Some Examples:
The Inception Hypothesis (of the initial development of caves) that gained British geologist David Lowe his doctorate, is so because it is still quite new and a very hard model to study: you can't actually view the mechanism in progress!
The Theory of Evolution is that because it fits all that we know so far but is constantly being refined as new knowledge emerges: nothing so far at least has arisen to destroy the basic idea, but there are gaps still to be filled.
Snell's Law of refraction, and Ohm's Law in electricity, are Laws because they always work. They are of school-level simplicity in both explanation and demonstration, and very easy to replicate with very simple lab equipment. Even their numerical expressions are straightforward. Snell's Law uses the ratio of two angles' sines. Ohm's Law's actual arithmetic is of Infants' School level; just multiply or divide two numbers.
Now, it is perfectly possible for a Hypothesis or even a Theory to be overturned, radically revise, even throw out as new evidence emerges. E.g., early doctors thought the blood-stream was an ebb-and-flow action like the tides.
The history of Geology is full of such examples thanks to the physical scale of the subject, and techniques available. Key parts that relied on the only evidence available at the time of publication were later shown wrong when new observing methods arrived, giving powerful insights hitherto hidden, for example, by the contemporary limits of seismology or by the sheer depths and volumes of the oceans. The first genuine attempt to calculate the Earth's age used simple cooling-laws. Later geologists realised this was less and less tenable because their calculations of process rates demanded far more time than that theory allowed; but this puzzle had to wait until the discovery of radioactivity led them to realise what keeps the planet's innards hot (natural radioactive decay).
So the "Person of Science" does not depend on Proven Facts alone, but on observation, test and revision using the existing facts as a starting-point. Had society stuck merely to "proven facts" rather than using such facts as a springboard into the unknown, we would not be able to chat about it here. Computers? We would not even have electricity.
As for the other extreme, "pooh-poohing" science is the refuge of the wilfully ignorant who if they did that here, would show only their inability to see the irony of their case!
This post was edited by Durdle at February 16, 2017 1:52 AM MST
B.H.Wilson 