Natural science is so successful because…

Great Debates
21

[QUOTE=coberst]

Normal science utilizes the ‘scientific method’ to solve problems. It is not apparent to the laity but science moves in incremental steps. Science seldom seeks and almost never produces major novelties. Science solves puzzles.

[/quote]

I suppose one can say that science solves puzzles in the sense of it looking for the answers to certain questions, such as what killed the dinosaurs. However a lot of science is collecting data, which can’t be said to be puzzle solving.

Science is a bit like punk eek. It goes along for a long time, in a particular field, with most papers being incremental. Then something is discovered, or someone has an insight, and the number of papers in this particular area explodes, with rapid progress made as one scientist builds on the work of another. In a given number of years, everything settles down again. This could come from a paradigm shift, but also happens in less drastic situations. I have many examples of this in my field. I’m editing a special issue of a journal now about a subject that took off in 2001. In the decade before this papers about it appeared in obscure workshops, after there were sessions about it in the major conferences. No paradigm shift, but the discovery of a new method.

I just want to point out that the validity of any bit of evidence might be questioned, as well as the interpretation of it. It usually takes far more than one bit to invalidate a theory in the real world. Kuhn sometimes over-simplifies things.

22

[QUOTE=Voyager]
What if there was observational error in the experiment? Would that provide truth? What if there were variables unaccounted for?

Science certainly converges on absolute truth (sometimes non-linearly) but even if it has reached absolute truth in a certain result, we have no way of confirming that it has.
[/QUOTE]
Yes, it would provide truth, but it would provide the truth that is that experiment with that error taken into account. For example, if the experiment is in telling the colour of an apple, but by mistake a coloured filter is used to view it through, we won’t get the truth of “what colour is this apple” but we will get the truth of “what colour is this apple with a coloured filter in the way”. Not the wanted truth, of course, but a truth nonetheless.

I agree we have no way of confirming what truth there is. We’re pretty much always flawed observers in some way. But just because we can’t see it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. If we somehow knew about and could take into account all the observer effects, confounding variables and the like, then we’d be able to get a nice truth. That we can’t doesn’t mean the truth isn’t there - it just means we can’t necessarily see it.

23

[QUOTE=coberst]
Do you think that science provides absolute truth?
[/QUOTE]
Of course it doesn’t. No human metaphysical system is capable of providing absolute truth.

Theology sometimes CLAIMS that it can, but then fails to deliver. I prefer to stick with an epistomological framework that is up front about its limitations.

Well, this forum is “Great Debates”, is it not? If you don’t like being argued with, perhaps you should post your thoughts in a different venue.

And, for what it’s worth, I’m 43.

24

[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold]
I’m myself under 25 (21, to be exact). I see forums more as a way to refine arguments; not a competition between two with some score kept, but a way of presenting your ideas of the world and getting as many people as possible to poke any holes they see in it, and vice versa.

Also I’d suggest that this shows a good level of ageist bias on your part, but then I wouldn’t expect an old fart like you to understand that*. :wink: What about when others attempt to engage your curiosity? You seem very keen to have an affect, but not to be affected in return. You yourself do not appear willing to address and learn by yourself; you give off the air of one who has read books and is satisfied with what they know, an abhorrent idea to me.

*A joke, in case it’s not obvious.
[/QUOTE]

I am always open for learning something new and interesting, even from youngsters.

25

[QUOTE=Voyager]
I suppose one can say that science solves puzzles in the sense of it looking for the answers to certain questions, such as what killed the dinosaurs. However a lot of science is collecting data, which can’t be said to be puzzle solving.

Science is a bit like punk eek. It goes along for a long time, in a particular field, with most papers being incremental. Then something is discovered, or someone has an insight, and the number of papers in this particular area explodes, with rapid progress made as one scientist builds on the work of another. In a given number of years, everything settles down again. This could come from a paradigm shift, but also happens in less drastic situations. I have many examples of this in my field. I’m editing a special issue of a journal now about a subject that took off in 2001. In the decade before this papers about it appeared in obscure workshops, after there were sessions about it in the major conferences. No paradigm shift, but the discovery of a new method.

I just want to point out that the validity of any bit of evidence might be questioned, as well as the interpretation of it. It usually takes far more than one bit to invalidate a theory in the real world. Kuhn sometimes over-simplifies things.
[/QUOTE]

Practitioners of normal science have:

  1. A paradigm that defines the theory, rules and standards of practice.
  2. Expertise as puzzle-solvers. Puzzles are assumed to have solutions.
  3. A criterion for choosing problems for solution.
  4. Concrete problems for solution i.e. problems with solutions and only lack of ingenuity causes failure.

I suspect that it is a common mistake to think that natural sciences are so successful because of the creative faculties of the scientist rather than their ingenuity at puzzle solving. Kuhn and I think the success rests on the puzzle solving skills of the practitioners.

Ingenious—marked by especial aptitude at discovering, inventing, or contriving; marked by originality, resourcefulness, and cleverness in conception or execution

Creative—bring into existence, to invest with a new form, office, or rank; to produce through imaginative skill; to make or bring into existence something new.

26

[QUOTE=Pochacco]
Of course it doesn’t. No human metaphysical system is capable of providing absolute truth.

Theology sometimes CLAIMS that it can, but then fails to deliver. I prefer to stick with an epistomological framework that is up front about its limitations.

Well, this forum is “Great Debates”, is it not? If you don’t like being argued with, perhaps you should post your thoughts in a different venue.

And, for what it’s worth, I’m 43.
[/QUOTE]

43, that is old for Internet forums. I will not tell you how old I am but I will say that I have 5 children and 7 grandchildren.

27

…it has been to every Tony Robbins and Donald Trump seminar ever offered!

28

[QUOTE=coberst]
43, that is old for Internet forums. I will not tell you how old I am but I will say that I have 5 children and 7 grandchildren.
[/QUOTE]

The SDMB is not a normal internet forum. Get used to that.

29

Since we’re talking about Kuhn - does he posit that the progress through normal science - anomalies - crisis - revolutionary science - paradigm shift is cyclical? What happens when a field just plateaus and there are no anomalies, no paradigm shifts?

Chemists, for example, know how to make molecules on the basis of atomic theory and the nature of the chemical bond. Pauling’s seminal work of the same name was published in the 1930s and is still held to be substantially correct. There have been no anomalies appearing that force a complete re-think on how molecules are put together at the level of the covalent bond, certainly at the grand level of a paradigm shift. It is almost beyond the realms of possibility that a chemist could discover a fundamentally new chemical reaction, given what is currently known about the boundaries of the way a covalent bond behaves. This is all well and good, and chemists are now turning to the challenges of understanding and manipulating the non-covalent bond on a grand scale, which is a much younger field. A field that demands revolutionary science maybe, but one that has hardly precipitated a crisis of transition.

It seems that the SoSRs takes a vast, macroscopic view of the history of science - it definitely seems like the arguments of hindsight. It is hard to identify the concepts year on year in contemporary science.

30

[QUOTE=coberst]
Practitioners of normal science have:

  1. A paradigm that defines the theory, rules and standards of practice.
  2. Expertise as puzzle-solvers. Puzzles are assumed to have solutions.
  3. A criterion for choosing problems for solution.
  4. Concrete problems for solution i.e. problems with solutions and only lack of ingenuity causes failure.

I suspect that it is a common mistake to think that natural sciences are so successful because of the creative faculties of the scientist rather than their ingenuity at puzzle solving. Kuhn and I think the success rests on the puzzle solving skills of the practitioners.
[/QUOTE]

I think I see what you’re saying; the great “paradigm shifts” in scientific history are usually considered the reason, but it is actually the way paradigms are fleshed out (i.e. by solving the puzzles produced in the analysis of their details) that accounts for science’s success in describing the material world.

I wonder, however, if this isn’t just another way of saying science is successful because results are tested objectively. Certainly a lot of puzzle-solving skills went into, say, the theological musings of Thomas Aquinas, and he was also starting from a particular, well-accepted paradigm. Yet theology certainly doesn’t have the successful reputation of science, possibly because Aquinas’ conclusions couldn’t be tested (not arguing pro or con religion here, just using it as an example).

31

[QUOTE=coberst]
Practitioners of normal science have:

  1. A paradigm that defines the theory, rules and standards of practice.
  2. Expertise as puzzle-solvers. Puzzles are assumed to have solutions.
  3. A criterion for choosing problems for solution.
  4. Concrete problems for solution i.e. problems with solutions and only lack of ingenuity causes failure.

I suspect that it is a common mistake to think that natural sciences are so successful because of the creative faculties of the scientist rather than their ingenuity at puzzle solving. Kuhn and I think the success rests on the puzzle solving skills of the practitioners.

Ingenious—marked by especial aptitude at discovering, inventing, or contriving; marked by originality, resourcefulness, and cleverness in conception or execution

Creative—bring into existence, to invest with a new form, office, or rank; to produce through imaginative skill; to make or bring into existence something new.
[/QUOTE]
I’m not impressed with that dichotomy, coberst, its not meaningful. Some scientific problems demand the utmost creativity in their solutions, whilst the genesis of new ideas and areas of research will also demand the sort of analytical ingenuity you’re ascribing to ‘puzzle solving’. Good scientists do both.

[QUOTE=coberst]
I am always open for learning something new and interesting, even from youngsters.
[/QUOTE]
THat would have been funnier if you were replying to pochacco

32

[QUOTE=The Cocky Watchman]
Since we’re talking about Kuhn - does he posit that the progress through normal science - anomalies - crisis - revolutionary science - paradigm shift is cyclical? What happens when a field just plateaus and there are no anomalies, no paradigm shifts?

Chemists, for example, know how to make molecules on the basis of atomic theory and the nature of the chemical bond. Pauling’s seminal work of the same name was published in the 1930s and is still held to be substantially correct. There have been no anomalies appearing that force a complete re-think on how molecules are put together at the level of the covalent bond, certainly at the grand level of a paradigm shift. It is almost beyond the realms of possibility that a chemist could discover a fundamentally new chemical reaction, given what is currently known about the boundaries of the way a covalent bond behaves. This is all well and good, and chemists are now turning to the challenges of understanding and manipulating the non-covalent bond on a grand scale, which is a much younger field. A field that demands revolutionary science maybe, but one that has hardly precipitated a crisis of transition.

It seems that the SoSRs takes a vast, macroscopic view of the history of science - it definitely seems like the arguments of hindsight. It is hard to identify the concepts year on year in contemporary science.
[/QUOTE]

I think that physics went through 250 years with the Newtonion paradigm without change until Einstein came along with his special theory of relatyivity.

33

[QUOTE=CJJ*]
I think I see what you’re saying; the great “paradigm shifts” in scientific history are usually considered the reason, but it is actually the way paradigms are fleshed out (i.e. by solving the puzzles produced in the analysis of their details) that accounts for science’s success in describing the material world.

I wonder, however, if this isn’t just another way of saying science is successful because results are tested objectively. Certainly a lot of puzzle-solving skills went into, say, the theological musings of Thomas Aquinas, and he was also starting from a particular, well-accepted paradigm. Yet theology certainly doesn’t have the successful reputation of science, possibly because Aquinas’ conclusions couldn’t be tested (not arguing pro or con religion here, just using it as an example).
[/QUOTE]

I think that the puzzle solving characteristic of normal science is the real reason that normal science has been so successful With the paradigm placing boundries on the work done and so many people working at incremental steps forms the real foundation of their great success. The paradigm prevents them from trying to solve problems they are prepared to solve.

34

[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold]
Yes, it would provide truth, but it would provide the truth that is that experiment with that error taken into account. For example, if the experiment is in telling the colour of an apple, but by mistake a coloured filter is used to view it through, we won’t get the truth of “what colour is this apple” but we will get the truth of “what colour is this apple with a coloured filter in the way”. Not the wanted truth, of course, but a truth nonetheless.

[/QUOTE]

I think you might be stretching the meaning of truth there just a bit. The problem with observational error is that we might not be aware of the cause. Thus, the existence of the filter might not be known to the person making the statement.

I observed an orange apple is true.
An apple looks orange if seen through a filter is true.
An apple is orange (existence of filter being unknown) is not true.

There there could be a problem with recording data, an issue in ESP experiments. “The data shows 12 hits” might be true, but “he made 12 hits” might be false, since the recorder mistakenly reported several misses as hits.

35

[QUOTE=coberst]
I think that the puzzle solving characteristic of normal science is the real reason that normal science has been so successful With the paradigm placing boundries on the work done and so many people working at incremental steps forms the real foundation of their great success. The paradigm prevents them from trying to solve problems they are prepared to solve.
[/QUOTE]
What problems are those? Can you give us some concrete examples of how science is being retarded by a preoccupation with “puzzle solving”?

I have to say though that I think you’re grossly mischaracterizing how scientists actually work. Yes, there’s a great deal of methodical data-gathering. But there are also creative insights, both large and small, that occur on a daily basis.

You speak as though the practice of science were an algorithmic process – collect the data, feed it into the mill, turn the crank, and … voila … progress! But in reality science only proceeds through intuitive leaps – intuitive leaps that are then validated by observation and experiment.

36

I don’t think science can guarantee any kind of absolute handle on the truth; what it certainly can do (I believe) is to promise that we will very likely become progressively less and less wrong about things.

37

[QUOTE=coberst]

I suspect that it is a common mistake to think that natural sciences are so successful because of the creative faculties of the scientist rather than their ingenuity at puzzle solving. Kuhn and I think the success rests on the puzzle solving skills of the practitioners.

Creative—bring into existence, to invest with a new form, office, or rank; to produce through imaginative skill; to make or bring into existence something new.
[/QUOTE]

I’m at a disadvantage here, being a puzzle solver, but I’d say that creativity is very important. Puzzles, as you say, have answers and are set by people, and often can be solved algorithmically - in a loose sense. Finding incremental solutions might well be considered puzzle solving. But some scientists break out into new areas, and that I think is creativity. How could one say that relativity is just the solution to a puzzle?

I’ll neglect the role of creativity in puzzle solving, which plays a bigger role in science than it does for crosswords, say. And puzzle solving is done 99% of the time. But I’ve actually come up with stuff that I think went beyond puzzle solving - only a few times, but those are the things I remember.

38

[QUOTE=Pochacco]
What problems are those? Can you give us some concrete examples of how science is being retarded by a preoccupation with “puzzle solving”?

I have to say though that I think you’re grossly mischaracterizing how scientists actually work. Yes, there’s a great deal of methodical data-gathering. But there are also creative insights, both large and small, that occur on a daily basis.

You speak as though the practice of science were an algorithmic process – collect the data, feed it into the mill, turn the crank, and … voila … progress! But in reality science only proceeds through intuitive leaps – intuitive leaps that are then validated by observation and experiment.
[/QUOTE]

Normal science is a puzzle-solving enterprise. Normal science is a slow accumulation of knowledge by a methodical step-by-step process undertaken by a group of scientists.

The following quotations I have taken from chapter IV “Normal Science as Puzzle Solving”
of Kuhn’s book “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions”.:

“Perhaps the most striking feature of the normal research problems we have just encountered is how little they aim to produce major novelties, conceptual or phenomenal.”

“the man who succeeds proves himself an expert puzzle-solver,”

“puzzles are,..that special category of problems that can test ingenuity or skill in solution”

“though intrinsic value is no criterion for puzzle, the assured existence of a solution is.”

“a paradigm can, or for that matter, even insulate the community from those socially important problems that are not reducible to the puzzle form,…”

“one of the reasons why normal science seems to progress so rapidly is that its practitioners concentrate on problems that only their own lack of ingenuity should keep them from solving.”

“to classify as a puzzle,..there must also be rules that limit both the nature of acceptable solutions and the steps by which they are to be obtained.”

39

[QUOTE=Voyager]
I’m at a disadvantage here, being a puzzle solver, but I’d say that creativity is very important. Puzzles, as you say, have answers and are set by people, and often can be solved algorithmically - in a loose sense. Finding incremental solutions might well be considered puzzle solving. But some scientists break out into new areas, and that I think is creativity. How could one say that relativity is just the solution to a puzzle?

I’ll neglect the role of creativity in puzzle solving, which plays a bigger role in science than it does for crosswords, say. And puzzle solving is done 99% of the time. But I’ve actually come up with stuff that I think went beyond puzzle solving - only a few times, but those are the things I remember.
[/QUOTE]

Creativity is an imporatnt part of normal science or any kind of science but it is puzzle solving that makes normal science so successful.

40

Puzzle solving is a consequence of the application of the scientific method, but I don’t think I’d describe it as what science does - science systematically discards that which is false - that happens to be a good way to whittle down to that which is not demonstrably false, and this might represent the solution of a puzzle, but science itself is not puzzle-solving, it just happens to do that.