# What's wrong with this definition of science? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 7, 2002, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685 "2002-05-07T09:30:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2002, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/81 "2002-05-10T19:34:37Z")
**DSeid** : to most of your questions and points, yes-yes-yes. Yes, I do think that the label of “science” is often arbitrary on many levels. Often we apply it to areas which we “feel” are scientific, then retroactively or regressively try to explain why this area is science, that is not. Does that mean I think that the scientific method is useless? No. Does that mean I think that it is limited? Yes. The fact that we, with our finite human brains, cannot _imagine_ a way to explain some aspect of the Universe according to a set of particular rules (the scientific method) does not mean that the aspect can be dismissed, or is unreal. It simply means that these rules do not apply to every phenomenon in the Universe. To think otherwise is arrogance. Does this mean I am uncomfortable with a definition of science which draws rigid lines between this and that? Yes. Rather than defining science as a thing itself, I propose the following. Consider this a thought-experiment rather than a manifesto, and please excuse any generalizations or over-simplifications I seem to make, and try to see the overall thrust of this thought-experiment. First, recall that in English the word _science_ is derived from the Latin _scientia_, the most basic meaning of which is “knowledge”. That is, the basic meaning does not carry around all that baggage it has accumulated since the European Renaissance. I’d like to attach that basic idea of “knowledge” to all of those areas which have been, until now, labelling “science”, “non-science”, “proto-science”. So instead of thinking about “science”, let’s instead think about human endeavors which deal in _knowledge_. Now, for several centuries we’ve had this catchy, useful philosophy in circulation called _the scientific method_. This is an unfortunate name because it implies that “this is the way to acquire knowledge” and so seems immediately exclusive. Instead, let’s call it _the Baconian method_. Granted, he wasn’t the first/only person to adopt this approach, or parts of it, but he was the first to express it in writing for posterity. Also granted, that other thinkers helped to fine-tune the approach, but his basic thinking is still what defines this method. The Baconian method was very useful for understanding and explaining the natural world – the world accessible to the five human senses. It was attractive because it did so in a way and to a level of detail which other philosophies, such as mysticism or a particular religious mythology, had not been able to do. This was very satisfying to the human mind during a time (in Europe) when humans had started to believe that Earthly existence was just as important as any afterlife, that human thought and culture and expression were intrinsically meaningful, that the way human beings looked at the world was important. And so the Baconian method caught on, to varying degrees, in many areas of knowledge. It was eminently suited to explaining the natural/physical world – the world experienced with the human senses – because this method was predicated on the idea that the human senses were a good way to gather information. (Unlike the approach of, say, Aristotle, who tried to explain the world without interacting with it.) Of course, the Baconian method included other precepts about how one uses and interprets information so gathered, so that, in other areas of knowledge which could not or did not gather information the same way, the Baconian method was less useful. Not entirely useless, mind you, but it had its limits. For instance, the method could be employed in the study of history to set standards of “evidence” for historical events and phenomena, but history did poorly when it came to predicting future events. But this is true for any philosophy: it is useful in some areas, less useful in others. In time, the significance of human life, culture, expression, Earthly existence became hallmarks of “Western” civilization. Along with them came an emphasis on the importance of the natural, physical world – the “real world”, so to speak. This placed those who practiced the Baconian method, in areas of knowledge concerned with the natural world, in an admirable and enviable position. Eventually these practitioners forgot (or ignored) the fact that their method just happened to be a good one _for one subset of human knowledge_ and came to label their area(s) of knowledge _science_ because they were able to employ the Baconian method most thoroughly and rigorously. Other areas of knowledge, which could not apply the method so rigorously, were not called _science_, or at least not thought of as being quite in the same company. They may have been considered scholarly, but not scientific. In time, too, people began to build devices which, in effect, extended the human senses by measuring things more precisely than the senses alone. An increasing understanding of the physical world allow the construction of machines to accomplish amazing tasks. Along comes the Industrial Revolution. This is another happy development for the _soi-disant_ scientists: these machines offer insight into the physical world beyond that accessible to normal human senses, allowing greater understanding of the world and the construction of increasingly complex machines in a never-ending cycle of _progress_. And civilization is indebted to these so-called scientists because all of this is built, primarily, on their particular areas of knowledge. And so down to the present day, where those rigorous practitioners of the Baconian method (or so they claim) decide, in effect, that “anything which does not follow our method to the letter is not science”. But in the present day, there are so many different fields of knowledge, and so much communication, overlap and cross-fertilization between them, that this assessment doesn’t “feel” right to some scholars. Why does it matter, though? Why don’t these scholars just shrug and say, “So what if my area of knowledge isn’t _science_?” Because in the 20th-century Western world, the self-defined body of knowledge called _science_ became, in a sense, a new religion. At the very least, it is held in awe, the pinnacle of human achievement, something with a desirable cachet. My definition? Well, in case you hadn’t guessed, it goes something like this: _There is no such thing as science_, per se. The original meaning of that word, in English, is far too corrupted, too loaded, for it to be used in a neutral way. So, depending on how rigorously and completely the Baconian method can be (or is) employed in a particular area of knowledge, that area is classified as _more scientific_ or _less scientific_. There is very little white, very little black, mostly shades of grey. So, is chemistry science? No. Is it scientific? Yes, very much so. Does this entitle it to a place of superiority among the fields of human knowledge? No. Is the study of history science? No. Is it scientific (or can it be)? Yes, because the basic premise of what constitutes valid evidence, for or against a particular hypothesis, carries over from the Baconian method very nicely. On the other hand, the idea of generating predictions about the future from theories doesn’t fly too well, and in any case history doesn’t pretend to these kind of predictive powers. Are psychology, and related fields, science? No. Are they scientific? Perhaps more so than history (I don’t know enough about psychology to rank it against history!), but decidedly less so than chemistry, for reasons pointed out by **Demosthenesian** above: "_A human mind is, ironically, in many respects a much tougher system to understand than the ones that allow it to exist."_ Is astrology science? No. Is it scientific? Well… some say to a degree it is, others say absolutely not. The problem here is that astrology is usually measured against psychology to determine whether it is scientific. But psychology does not lend itself to a rigorous application of the Baconian method. So what makes it a good yardstick against which to measure how well other areas employ the Baconian method? Here endeth the lesson. Jerevan ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2002, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/82 "2002-05-10T22:18:51Z")
DSeid, your posts are inspired! I have no significant disagreement with anything you’ve said. I see it very much the same as you — science isn’t the destination; it’s the journey. By the way, your successful avoidance of the f-word is probably the smoothest [ennoia](http://humanities.byu.edu/rhetoric/silva.htm) I’ve ever seen. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Demosthenesian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Demosthenesian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Demosthenesian)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/83 "2002-05-11T04:19:44Z")
Dseid and Jerevan: > [@](#): > > Because in the 20th-century Western world, the self-defined body of knowledge called science became, in a sense, a new religion. At the very least, it is held in awe, the pinnacle of human achievement, something with a desirable cachet. See, **that** is a line I’m not necessarily willing to cross. I’ve heard it mentioned before as a criticism of science (usually by academics in the humanities) but I think it’s important to remember that nothing in science in-and-of-itself is taken on faith; it’s largely a probabalistic exercise where one is attempting to disprove something over and over again and believing it is increasingly likely to happen again with each iteration. There is definitely a philisophical basis to science, but I think some here are overstating it. The assumption that the sun will rise again tomorrow may be a philisophical one, but one with a pretty damned good empirical and theoretical foundation. I took pains (although it seemed to be in vain) to argue that the social sciences aren’t necessarily non-sciences or inferior sciences, merely different, that require a different type of methodology and which inevitably contain competing paradigms. To argue that one can’t ensure either validity or repeatability (and therefore intersubjectivity) seemingly argues that there one can’t ever use the knowledge gained from studying and theorizing about human behaviour in order to understand current behaviour and predict future behaviour. I don’t think I’m quite ready to give up rigour in economics, political science, sociology and psychology just yet. Even if they’re wrong sometimes, they’re pretty damned useful on a broad scope. Mr. Svin keeps on asserting that quantitative tools are necessary, but he glossed over the usefulness of intersubjectivity in-and-of itself as a “side issue”. It isn’t. It’s the way you get around the problem of instrumentation when the researchers are the instrument. Don’t know if a thermometer works? Check it to make sure it works consistent, works against others, and works against other methods. Don’t know if a researcher is right? Check him/her against the same. And again, without falsification, how do you guard against satisficing? It becomes too easy to simply prove whichever hypothesis exists, rather than finding out which one best fits the situation as it actually exists. I read a few good articles from the CIA warning analysts about this problem and suggesting a regimen of falsification of hypotheses in order to guard against it. If it’s good enough for spooks, it’s good enough for scientists. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Spiritus\_Mundi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c68b51/32.png) [@Spiritus\_Mundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiritus_Mundi)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/84 "2002-05-11T06:43:05Z")
**Mr S** > [@](#): > > Did you not claim, “Science is what scientists do,” on the previous page? There was significant iron content in that phrase. > [@](#): > > That passage seemed to me to be somewhat in the nature of a definition, but if I’ve jumped the gun here, please accept my apologies. You might also want to present your definition of science, if you have one, so that I know where you stand. You are correct, and that was careless phrasing on my part. I do not think the characteristics I listed are sufficient to delineate a scientific endeavor, though I do think they are characteristic . I haven’t offered my own definition for the simplest of reasons–I don’t have one which can be concisely communicated. Science is a fuzzy set. Characteristics which can be weighted to determine membership in that set include methodological, philosophical and psychological traits. Your definition focuses nearly exlusively on the methodological, and so it is flawed. Popper’s definition focuses exclusively on the philosophical, and so it is flawed. > [@](#): > > But the examples you post here seem to indicate, again, that I’m not getting my message across. So I’m going to try a little schematic: The schematic wasn’t necessary. I understand your message. I just disagree with it. To me, your declaration that science can only be done with the aid of tools strikes me as almost fetishistic. Still, I think if you are looking at my most recent examples as dealing with the question of instruments then you will be frustrating yourself unnecessarily. They were rebuttals to your statement that science began in 16[sup]th[/sup] century Europe. That is a question quite independent of the necessity for artificial aids in the practice of science, though they are both instances of you’re position being flawed. > [@](#): > > So, to return to my argument: what I see here is a tendency, in science, towards greater and greater instrumentation. I agree, though I disagree that this is a return to your argument. The statement above is irrelevant to your statement that science can only occur with the aid of instruments. And my position is not, as you seem to think, that you are wrong because of the inescapable phenomenological truths of human existence. You are wrong because direct human perceptions have been and remain a valid method for gathering scientific data. > [@](#): > > In taxonomy, the minute such an instrument had been developed, the direct, subject-to-Object model of research was abandoned. Really? You don’t think biologists and taxonomists directly observe their subjects? I am afraid you are making another mistake. > [@](#): > > I think that I want to call theories related to these kinds of measurements scientific, and other theories non-scientific – with the caveat that non-scientific theories can, of course, be valid, intelligently designed, and systematic. And I think you are foolish to do so. > [@](#): > > The change in the color of litmus paper is of course a chemical reaction observed by the human eye. But here that reaction is, as it were, taken for granted. How many times must a scientific experiment be repeated before it ceases to be scientific? Repeatability is a virtue of science but a mark of the unscientific? Those questions are tangential, though, since my point relates even more strongly to the initial discovery of litmus paper as a pH meter. > [@](#): > > Or do you regard alchemy as a natural science? I regard some things done by alchemists as scientific. You really should do a quick google on Jabir ibn-Hayyan. Or Isaac Newton, for that matter. I do not dismiss as unscientific all of a man’s work simply because he also held some unscientific ideas. If I did, I fear that I would be hard pressed to admit anyone into my select fraternity of scientists. > [@](#): > > If I try to identify and organize stars according to how bright they are, that might be a kind of proto-scientific activity. I’m afraid that I really cannot see any reason to twist themeaning of “proto” into “without artifial aid”. > [@](#): > > But these patterns had to be measured against some sort of stable background, did they not? Sure, but measured by what? Human perception. Those humna observations led to new areas of scientific thought. > [@](#): > > Of course I do. But these observations do not bear upon scientific investigation except in the most tangential manner – except, arguably, the bird calls. So what? Your statement was: \*\*"I think this is backwards, see? The problem with sensory impressions alone is that they fail to create a “shared consensual background.” \*\* I disagreed, and I gave several counterexamples. Apparently your technofetish has convinced you that we rely upon instrumnets through some _a priori_ understanding that they are both accurate and precise. This is not the case. In all cases our trust in instruments is ultimately founded upon the shared sensory perceptions of human beings. We use tools because our senses have confirmed for us that they are useful. > [@](#): > > I have not, I repeat, “removed human sensory impressions from the equation.” You have, repeatedly, said that you do not consider direct human observations to be within the realm of science. Thus, I ask again for you to either state that the Kelvin scale was not developed scientifically or explain how it was developed without the reliance upon data gathered directly through human senses. **Jerevan** > [@](#): > > Yes, I do think that the label of “science” is often arbitrary on many levels. Often we apply it to areas which we “feel” are scientific, then retroactively or regressively try to explain why this area is science, that is not. > . > . > . > There is no such thing as science, per se. The original meaning of that word, in English, is far too corrupted, too loaded, for it to be used in a neutral way. So, depending on how rigorously and completely the Baconian method can be (or is) employed in a particular area of knowledge, that area is classified as more scientific or less scientific. I agree with many of your ideas, but I have to criticize your approach to semantics. Three things:[ul] [li]Meaning **always** follows usage. Science in this sense is no different from “horse” or “green”.[/li][li]Meaning **almost always** shifts through time. Comparing a modern word to it’s root in a dead language is a good source of amusement but a poor reason to declare the word “corrupted” (from the latin for “broken”). After all, we don’t abandon the word “threat” because it no longer means “crowd” (or “oppression”, for that matter).[/li]Saying somethin is more or less scientific requires that there be such a thing as “science”, per se. The comparison requires a standard.[/ul] ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Svinlesha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/22d042/32.png) [@Mr.Svinlesha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Svinlesha)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 10:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/85 "2002-05-11T10:02:39Z")
**Jerevan** : > [@](#): > > \*\* I will look forward to an expansion on this point, since I have already submitted that the idea in question is the _potential falsfication_ of theories, not the actual falsification. Maybe it’s a nitpick but I do think there is a difference.\*\* Popper never wrote about “potential falsification,” to my knowledge, but only about quite simple, straightforward falsification (as if falsification was ever “straightforward” or “simple”). The reason for this becomes obvious if one pauses to critically reflect upon it: practically any statement about the universe is “potentially falsifiable.” Consider the following exchange: **Claim** : _the “psychic apparatus” of human beings is “charged with libido.”_ **Response** : Libido is a figment of Freud’s imagination, doesn’t really exist, and the proceeding statement is “unscientific.” **Rejoinder** : _Just because we haven’t figured out a way to measure libido at our current level of technology, doesn’t mean that at some point in the future we won’t discover a “libido meter.” Once this discovery is made, we will be able to test, and possibly falsify, Freud’s claim. Therefore, since it is a **potentially falsifiable** statement, it must be considered scientific._ Introducing the idea of _potential_ falsifiability, I submit, only confuses Popper’s account of science. It represents an attempt to save Popper’s criterion in the face of its myriad, and very significant, inconsistencies. We can discuss this question at more depth, and in a much more hands-on, concrete fashion, by inspecting the Davies “solar neutrino” experiment I presented above. > [@](#): > > \*\* The point is that we design and construct instruments which, to a large degree, confirm and conform to our sensory perceptions because that is the only way through which the vast majority of us can imagine the universe.\*\* This claim doesn’t hold very much water, I fear. A measuring instrument _might_ conform to our sensory perceptions, but there are literally thousands that do not. Radio telescopes, solar neutrino catchers, thermometers – all of these instruments order our universe into quantified units, and thereby produce a “mechanical” picture of the world around us. If I want to know how warm it is outside, I don’t “touch” the thermometer sitting on my window seal: I look at it, and translate the reading it presents to me into an approximate picture of how warm (or cold) it might be outside. Does your mass spectrometer flash a picture of the molecular structure and elemental weight of a substance onto a screen, so that you can _see_ it, or does it produce a technical readout, with numbers, graphs, etc? > [@](#): > > \*\* One does reach a point, in practice, where the accumulation of “consistent” results effectively amounts to confirmation – because the likelihood of the chemist having n flawed hypotheses in series (that is, each presuming the correctness of the last, as I describe) and still achieving “consistent” results in the final step becomes quite low as n increases. AHA!\*\* That’s the point. As **erl** stated earlier, your account of the day-to-day routine of scientific work represents little more than a sort of “lip-service” to Popper: and with good reason. If you had to go around trying to derive falsifiable observation statements from every theory you had in your head, and figuring out ways to “robustly test” them, you’d never get any work done. Anyway, I suspect there’s a significant difference between the kind of science you do, and the kind Popper was talking about. You seem to be engaged in _applied science_; Popper was referring to _pure research_. In the applied sciences, falsification can be utilized as a _technique_; but in some cases induction is just as useful, practically speaking. **Spiritus** : > [@](#): > > \*\* That’s okay, so long as you are not actually deluding yourself that prehistoric human beings were less intelligent, inquisitive, and concerned with the workings of nature than we enlightened children of modern science.\*\* I may suffer under many delusions, but luckily, that particular bugbear is not among them. > [@](#): > > \*\* Then I would submit that these “scholars of science” are guilty of monumental perceptual bias–perhaps even cultural hubris. Most scholars that I know group mathematics, particularly theoretical mathematics, as a science. No scholar that I know believes that before 1600 only “proto-mathematics” existed. \*\* Most of the work I’m familiar with does not classify mathematics as a science. Sciences are generally related to _empiricism_, if I’m not mistaken, and mathematics is not. And no, neither I nor any of the sociologists/historians I base my understanding upon would claim that before the 1600s, there was only “proto-mathematics.” > [@](#): > > \*\* Scientific inquiry did not begin with the European Rennaissance, despite the towering figures of Bacon and Gallileo.\*\* I don’t want to be too categorical here, because it’s rather difficult to draw an exact line. But it was around this time that the ball really starting rolling, they say. I mean, we don’t call it “the Enlightenment” for nothing, you know. There are a number of important “transitional” figures during this period, who seemed to span the gulf between a “magical” and a “scientific” world picture: Giordano Bruno, for example, and John Dee. It should not be forgotten that even Newton was a hermetic philosopher on the side, and wrote a large volume about the celestial spheres. For these men, there was no real difference between “magic” and “science.” Anyway, I can’t make heads or tails of your accusation of “cultural hubris,” unless you somehow assume, intentionally or unintentionally, that science always represents a “superior” method of producing/acquiring knowledge. If that’s the case, it should in no sense be attached to my point of view, anyway – nor to most of these sociologists and historians. They were working against a background (late 1950s through early 1980s) in which, as Everett Mendelsohn once wrote, science was viewed as “an almost holy activity.” Their work threatened to relativize the claims to absolute objectivity and rationality that had (and in many circles, still does) characterized the image of the scientific endeavor, and laid the ground for social constructivism and it’s bastard step-child, post-modernism. If anything, it was the epistemological monopoly of the hard sciences that displayed “cultural hubris” – _not_ the sociologists and historians of science who challenged this monopoly. I would agree, I think that most of the examples you post here (Eratosthenes and in particular, Archimedes work on buoyancy – although I’m less certain about Ptolemy) would represent scientific work, or, at the very least, something very close. Certainly, if they used any sort of measuring device, they would fall into my definition (although I’m beginning to see a new weakness to my claims, off on the horizon). But the point is that while you and I might be able to name a handful of candidates for membership into the Guild of Science who lived before 1650, after that date the number of candidates becomes legion. Scientific institutes spring up; the Illuminati of Europe wag their heads and excitedly converse about the “New Learning,” its potential for social good, its egalitarianism, the need to refine its methods, etc., etc. It becomes yet another avenue to God, a means of studying his grace in the book of Nature, and a necessary compliment to the spiritual illumination mediated by the Church. So that’s when science really starts to take off as a pursuit. Before that time, even though exceptional examples of work that we would now call scientific might be found, still, in general, the vast majority of work done, research conducted, and knowledge produced was something other than “scientific.” I see now that in your last post you’ve addressed the question of your own definition of science, but at any rate, my “Paleolithic caveman” routine did have its point. Taking the three characteristics you listed previously to be a kind of “off-the-cuff” definition of science, then _I_ would be a scientist in my daily therapeutic work with patients: after all, I have “a methodological approach, a spirit of investigation, and a willingness to adjust [my] ideas to match observed results.” Yet I feel that what I do is _not_ science, nor do I believe that any good scientist would argue otherwise. And while we’re at it, I just want to respond to this “Science is what scientists do” discussion as well. I understood, of course, that you were being facetious. But in a way, this is the best definition yet offered in the thread, and the only one that I think a professional sociologist, philosopher, or historian of science would be liable to accept. I wanted in fact to comment that you showed an unusually keen grasp of the subtleties involved in defining science, but figured you would think I was being sarcastic, so I refrained. A person in our society, whom we have agreed to label “a scientist,” goes to work in the morning and does \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_. Whatever, fill in the blank. We call what he does “science.” The term “science” is just a notation for what it is that people we’ve designated as “scientists” do. Our problem is that these scientists do such different things, in so many different ways, that we have a hard time figuring out what it is, exactly, that they have in common, and that justifies using the word “science” without direct reference to specific scientists. I want to say that what characterizes the work of these mysterious people in their white lab coats, and what differentiates their modes of inquiry and knowledge production from others, is that they are primarily focused on measuring Nature with instruments. In my work, I also make inquiries, and produce knowledge; I have a methodology, and I even falsify my hypotheses on occasion. That does not make me a scientist. I argue that this is for the simple reason that _I don’t try to “measure” my patients’ responses with any sort of instrument at all_. While it is true that I might place a quantitative estimate, sometimes, on what I suspect is going on within a given patient (based, of course, upon my meticulous observation of him/her) – I might say, for example, that a patient is “_extremely_ angry” – this does not in any sense make my observation “scientific.” However, the minute I start scanning their brains with a CAT scan, monitoring their galvanic skin responses, or have them fill in some kind of psychometric survey that allows me to chart their “masculinity” on a graph, a profound shift has taken place in my work. I’ve started _measuring_ them. And the results of my work, at least in the court of common opinion, suddenly become “scientific.” **rsa** : > [@](#): > > \*\* But that was my point. The “Higgs Boson” is subject to empirical tests. Do you remember that big hole that was dug south of Dallas? The Super Conducting Super Collider’s primary’s purpose was to find the Higgs. \*\*Super Collider? Oh, you mean that great big ole _measuring instrument_ they were building? When they start using to locate this Higgs and his Boson, then I say they are _doing science_. **Demos** : > [@](#): > > \*\* Ok, just to be clear on your position: if it doesn’t have numbers, it ain’t science. Yup or nope? \*\* Okay, if I’m only allowed a monosyllabic response: Yup. 🙂 For the sake (and remainder) of this discussion, by the way, you may translate the word “science” into the phrase “hard science,” and understand the debate as hinging upon the way in which “hard science” is to be differentiated from “soft science.” > [@](#): > > \*\* Trying to translate human behavior into neat numerical patterns (outside of perhaps economics) introduces more problems of validity than it solves a lot of the time.\*\* Amen to that, brother! Preach it! > [@](#): > > \*\* I rather hope that you don’t actually think that “humans can’t be studied scientifically”; that just gets right back to that Aristotle guy. ;)\*\* ? Damn. Just when I though we were on the same note…let’s try this: Humans can’t be studied by the methods of “hard science.” Yup, or nope? **DSeid** : > [@](#): > > \*\* The key question here seems to be – > > What is the difference between “science” and other forms of rational, skeptical inquiry? \*\* Jackpot. > [@](#): > > \*\* Science is looking for a _resonance_ between the data and the ideas, a feedback loop.\*\* I kinda like this idea, but I think you might be hard pressed to use it as a means of differentiating scientific inquiry from say, meditational insight, or from knowledge produced during a clinical psychoanalytic session. I can see that you are at least entertaining my ideas before dismissing them, and I want you to know that a appreciate that. Thanks! More later. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/86 "2002-05-11T12:39:04Z")
**Mr. S** : I will have to answer your posts later, when I have more time to ponder what you’ve said. **Demosthenesian** and **Spiritus Mundi** : my last post was inspired by what I had begun to perceive as the difficulty we (collectively, not just the three of us) are having in this thread. We are working to find a precise definition of _science_ which we can all accept, but it is pretty clear that many of us have different ideas about which fields of study make up _science_. If we can’t agree on this point, how can we hope to define _science_ by the commonalities in these field? On the other hand, if we say that a _science_ is field of study which is governed by the philosophy of the _scientific method_, we still have problems: some may say that the method must be applied in its entirety for the field to be _science_ – and if so then we must define this _method_ in absolute terms; others may say that certain areas aren’t amenable to adopting this particular method in its entirety but that calling those areas _non-science_ has the appearance of invalidating them undeservedly. (Note for the record: I didn’t mean to suggest that psychology is not _rigorous_ or that it does not employ a valid, structured methodology, and I certainly didn’t mean to imply that it was somehow inferior to chemistry and the like. As **Demos** says, psychology happens to employ a _different_ approach because of what it studies.) In making the “science as religion” remark (and associated ideas in that statement), I was trying to point out IMO that we _should_ avoid drawing rigid lines between the disciplines, if we wish to arrive at some mutually satisfying definition of _science_. We still might not find one anyway – but surely it will be impossible for us to find one if we don’t even agree about what kind of lines/divisions we’re making. [QUOTE] \*Originally posted by Spiritus Mundi \* I agree with many of your ideas, but I have to criticize your approach to semantics. Three things:[ul] [li]Meaning **always** follows usage. Science in this sense is no different from “horse” or “green”.[/li][li]Meaning **almost always** shifts through time. Comparing a modern word to it’s root in a dead language is a good source of amusement but a poor reason to declare the word “corrupted” (from the latin for “broken”). After all, we don’t abandon the word “threat” because it no longer means “crowd” (or “oppression”, for that matter).[/li][li]Saying somethin is more or less scientific requires that there be such a thing as “science”, per se. The comparison requires a standard.[/ul] [/li][/QUOTE] Thank you. All three are understood. As for the first two points: I was not unaware of them as I wrote, but I chose to avoid using the word “science” in particular because that is what we are attempting to define and/or having a hard time agreeing upon. I was concerned that by using the word “science” in my thought-experiment, modern connotations of the word would be applied automatically. Perhaps I over-stated the case by calling our use of the word “science” corrupted/broken; instead I probably should have said, “for the sake of argument, let’s put aside that word _science_ temporarily”. In this I did go a bit too far. But hey, I was on a roll. 😉 Point three: yes, I also realized that one, though I can’t say why I didn’t avoid using _scientific_ as I did the word _science_. For consistency I ought to have substituted the word “Baconian” for “scientific”. I mean, you are right: if I am going to advocate laying aside the word _science_, then the adjectives and adverbs must be laid aside as well. More later. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Svinlesha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/22d042/32.png) [@Mr.Svinlesha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Svinlesha)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/87 "2002-05-11T12:46:14Z")
**Spiritus** :\*\* > [@](#): > > I haven’t offered my own definition for the simplest of reasons–I don’t have one which can be concisely communicated. Science is a fuzzy set. Characteristics which can be weighted to determine membership in that set include methodological, philosophical and psychological traits. Your definition focuses nearly exlusively on the methodological, and so it is flawed. Popper’s definition focuses exclusively on the philosophical, and so it is flawed.\*\* Well, to begin with, I’m not sure that Popper’s criterion is “exclusively philosophical,” and even if that is the case, it is _not_, IMHO, the reason why it is flawed. But maybe that’s a side issue. I agree that science is a “fuzzy set,” (witness my difficulties with taxonomy, previously), and I also agree that this set is comprised of “methodological, philosophical, and psychological traits.” My point is that I do not think that you can differentiate the set “science” from other sets of knowledge production on the basis of its psychology, or its philosophy, primarily because many other modes of knowledge production share those traits with science. Thus, for me, the demarcation point, if one exists, must lie in the sphere of methodology. Hence my definition. Do you think you could consider listing some of the methodological, philosophical, and psychological traits that you feel characterizes scientific activity, and that can be usefully employed to separate it from other sorts of knowledge production? It would be helpful to me if I had at least a sense of where you are coming from, yourself, in this discussion. > [@](#): > > \*\* To me, your declaration that science can only be done with the aid of tools strikes me as almost fetishistic. \*\* Science: _The fetishistic attachment to instruments of measurement._ Nah…I knew a guy once who was sexually involved with a Geiger counter – and he certainly _wasn’t_ scientific about it. While a nice rhetorical trick, I feel this is an unfair characterization of my views. > [@](#): > > \*\* And my position is not, as you seem to think, that you are wrong because of the inescapable phenomenological truths of human existence. You are wrong because direct human perceptions have been and remain a valid method for gathering scientific data.\*\* Very well. I hereby issue a challenge, one that should be childishly easy for you to meet. If you do so, I will relinquish my definition. Leaving aside taxonomy for the moment, name 5 disciplines within the hundreds comprising the field of Natural Science that rely exclusively upon “direct human perceptions” of objects in Nature, unmediated by instruments of measurement, as their primary research methodology. No, I’ll tell you what, better yet. Leave in taxonomy, even though it is still somewhat in dispute, and name 4 more. I would especially be interested if you could direct me to any professional journals that are being produced within these fields, and in which scientists do not discuss quantified data, but rather present and dissect data produced exclusively by their direct perceptions of naturally occurring objects. > [@](#): > > \*\* Really? You don’t think biologists and taxonomists directly observe their subjects? \*\*Of course they do. Do these unmeasured and unquantified observations form the basis for research reports? I don’t think so. > [@](#): > > \*\* Those questions are tangential, though, since my point relates even more strongly to the initial discovery of litmus paper as a pH meter. \*\* I don’t know anything about this discovery, but would be keenly interested to read about it. > [@](#): > > \*\* I regard some things done by alchemists as scientific.\*\* Well, that wasn’t really an answer to my question, but anyway: what “things done by alchemists” do you consider to be scientific, and why?\*\* > [@](#): > > Sure, but measured by what? Human perception.\*\* No, or at least, no except in all but the most phenomenological sense; in the sense that when I look at a readout produced by a computer that’s analyzed data from a mass spectrometer, _I’m measuring it with my perceptions_ – a point we’ve already agreed upon as not particularly relevant to the discussion. The chemical clock, for example, was measured by laboratory clock. _The direct perceptions of the scientist recording the data would have been worthless – or at the very least, unscientific – without a clock to measure the changes his perceptions were recording._ > [@](#): > > \*\* I disagreed, and I gave several counterexamples. Apparently your technofetish has convinced you that we rely upon instrumnets through some _a priori_ understanding that they are both accurate and precise.\*\* Technofetish? Band name! (I’m such an SDMB ho’.) Anyway, not true. My quotation from Kuhn, above, should have made that clear, but just to reiterate: the problem with the thermometer, originally, was that we had no _a priorí_ understanding that it was accurate or precise. In fact, it seemed at first to be quite the opposite. Thus, when it was invented and proposed as a device for measuring heat, a process began in which a number of researchers challenged its usefulness, and spent many laboratory hours trying to figure out how the damn thing worked. That was primarily because there was no real consensus over what, exactly, _heat_ was. Eventually, over time, scientists came to agreement about the way in which the thermometer measured the degree of heat, and after that, they no longer had to stick their hand in the vat to see how warm the water was. This process also lead to the development of a consensus among scientists about what, exactly, they were in fact trying to measure in the first place. This scientific consensus, together with an agreed upon standard by which to measure heat, represented a major step forward in the progress of science. In the case of the thermometer, _we replaced our subjective perceptions of heat with an instrument that measured heat_, and subsequently, laboratory reports after that point became _more scientific_. The consensus, I argue, was created by the instrument (or, more accurately, by a discourse about the instrument), not the other way round. Sorry if the presentation above comes out somewhat convoluted; but I assure you, there is method in my madness. Lookit, **Spiritus** : Og the caveman decides, for some unimaginable reason, that he wants to know how far it is from the front door of his cave to his favorite fishing hole. For many moons, he goes back and forth, counting the number of steps he takes, or sometimes counting the number of steps Madonna, his girlfriend (hey, this is my thought experiment), takes, or trying to look and see how far the sun has moved in the sky between the time he leaves his cave and the time he arrives at the pond, but alas!, to no avail. For some reason, he always gets different answers; and his friend Ugh, who also helps him out, gets even more different answers. Maybe, on some days, the fishing pond is closer to the cave than it is on other days? Or the sun moves faster? One day, Og has a brainstorm: he cuts down a branch from a nearby tree that’s, say, _yea_ long. Standing at the front door of his domicile, Og lays the stick on the ground, marks the far end, picks it up, lays one end of the stick at the mark, marks the far end again, picks it up, lays it down, marks, and so forth, until he reaches the pond. Og discovers that it is precisely 423.6 _yeas_ from his cave to the nearest fish (give or take a _yea_ or two). By my definition, Og has performed the world’s first scientific investigation. In this case, his stick is not related to the length of anything else, nor does it have to be. But by using the stick, and repeating his measurements a few times, Og comes to the realization that he can _organize his perceptual world in terms of yeas_. Madonna, for example, is about a _yea_ long, but Ugh, is friend, is almost a _yea and a half_. What does _a priorí_ accuracy have to do with this example? And in what way do you think it fails as a characterization of the essence of scientific activity?\*\* > [@](#): > > You have, repeatedly, said that you do not consider direct human observations to be within the realm of science.\*\* I myself would not phrase it like that, but okay. Anyway, this a significantly different claim from stating that I’ve “removed human sensory impressions from the equation,” which is what you wrote first. How are we going to debate if you keep changing your claims all the time? I would say that I do not consider direct Subject-to-Object observation to be an activity that characterizes the scientific endeavor…or something along those lines. That what characterizes science is _instrumental measurement_ rather than _direct observation_. > [@](#): > > \*\* Thus, I ask again for you to either state that the Kelvin scale was not developed scientifically or explain how it was developed without the reliance upon data gathered directly through human senses.\*\* I’m not avoiding this question, I just don’t know how to answer it. I know absolutely zero about the historical specifics surrounding the development of the Kelvin scale, and to be honest, it’s kind of unfair for you to beat me over the head with this. Can’t you just present it’s history yourself, as a counter-example to my claims? ---
**Author:** ![Spiritus\_Mundi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c68b51/32.png) [@Spiritus\_Mundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiritus_Mundi)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/88 "2002-05-11T15:38:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Well, to begin with, I’m not sure that Popper’s criterion is “exclusively philosophical,” and even if that is the case, it is not, IMHO, the reason why it is flawed. But maybe that’s a side issue. Popper’s position is purely an epistemological valuation. It may indeed be flawed for other reasons, but the fact that it ignores methodology and psychology makes it necessarily inadequate to fully delineate “science”. If I give you one point, I have not delineated a triangle, no matter how accurate I might be in describing one of its vertices. > [@](#): > > My point is that I do not think that you can differentiate the set “science” from other sets of knowledge production on the basis of its psychology, or its philosophy, primarily because many other modes of knowledge production share those traits with science. Thus, for me, the demarcation point, if one exists, must lie in the sphere of methodology. Hence my definition. And hence your flaw. Unless you posit (or demonstrate) that all human endeavors share the same philosophical and psychological boundary conditions as science, then you cannot segregate science from all other human endeavors simply by looking at methodology. Like Popper, you are pointing to one vertex and saying, “this determines the triangle”. > [@](#): > > Do you think you could consider listing some of the methodological, philosophical, and psychological traits that you feel characterizes scientific activity, and that can be usefully employed to separate it from other sorts of knowledge production? It would be helpful to me if I had at least a sense of where you are coming from, yourself, in this discussion. I dont think it would, really. We can argue back and forth about individual trait-valuations (as we have been doing with the “instrumental” trait of scientific methodology), but that does nothing to address the underlying conflict in our views. We agree that science is a class comprised of methodological, philosophical, and psychological traits. My position is that any definition of science which does not address all three of these areas is necessarily inadequate. > [@](#): > > Nah…I knew a guy once who was sexually involved with a Geiger counter – and he certainly wasn’t scientific about it. > > While a nice rhetorical trick, I feel this is an unfair characterization of my views. Agreed. I should have found a word denoting obsessive attachment without the implication of sexual attachment. I apologize. > [@](#): > > Very well. I hereby issue a challenge, one that should be childishly easy for you to meet. If you do so, I will relinquish my definition. > > Leaving aside taxonomy for the moment, name 5 disciplines within the hundreds comprising the field of Natural Science that rely exclusively upon “direct human perceptions” of objects in Nature, unmediated by instruments of measurement, as their primary research methodology. And speaking of rhetorical tricks, asking me to defend an absurd reduction of my very simple claim certainly qualifies. I refuse. However, if you wish me to repeat some sciences in which direct human observations have been and remain valid methods for obtaining data, then I will offer: taxonomy, biology, chemistry, astronomy, and physics. I’ll even throw in chaos theory as a bonus. > [@](#): > > Do these unmeasured and unquantified observations form the basis for research reports [from biologizsts and taxonomists]? I don’t think so. Really? Ever read any Jane Goodall? Do you think biologists studying the visual language capacity of apes are doing science? Do you think they use their eyes to record data? > [@](#): > > I don’t know anything about this discovery, but would be keenly interested to read about it. I would, too. I can’t find much detail online, but as a thought experiment let us imagine the fiirst person to gain confidence that litmus paper changed color when exposed to acidic (or basic) solutions. I would consider the work involved in testing and confirming that result to be scientific, would you agree? I would also consider it impossible for that work to have been done without relying upon direct human observation of the litmus paper, would you agree? I have to run, part II later. ---
**Author:** ![rsa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/839c29/32.png) [@rsa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rsa)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/89 "2002-05-11T16:34:27Z")
Man, you guys are sure verbose. 🙂 I don’t presume to be able to offer a “perfect” definition of science, but I would like to reject **Mr. S’s** definition by counter-example. Forget for a moment the “fuzzy” sciences. A point which has been raised several times is whether mathematics is a science. I argue that it is. If math is a science that presumably eliminates “instrument” as a necessary requirement in a definition of science. Earlier, some people stated that mathematics was not a science while others claimed that it was. Can we come to a consensus on this point? While the definition of mathematics has changed over time, a modern definition is that mathematics is the _science of patterns._ Agree or disagree? As for the argument that mathematics is not “empirical” or “falsifiable”, I think that is not correct. Some examples: The Four color theorem. A single counter-example would falsify the theorem. Sphere packing problems. Topology. How does the study of these things not qualify as science? ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Svinlesha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/22d042/32.png) [@Mr.Svinlesha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Svinlesha)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/90 "2002-05-11T17:14:15Z")
**Spiritus** : > [@](#): > > \*\* And hence your flaw. Unless you posit (or demonstrate) that all human endeavors share the same philosophical and psychological boundary conditions as science, then you cannot segregate science from all other human endeavors simply by looking at methodology. Like Popper, you are pointing to one vertex and saying, “this determines the triangle”. \*\* Just out of curiosity, how do you define a right triangle as a discrete entity within the class of _all possible triangles_? If I were to modify my definition thusly: Science: _a mode of knowledge production that relies upon the interrogation of Nature by means of instrumental measurement._ Would that sit better? I’m also not clear about your first point, actually. All I have to do, as far as I can tell, is posit that some (not all) human endeavors share the same philosophical and psychological boundary conditions as science, and yet are not science. This is indeed my claim. Psychoanalytically-oriented psychotherapy, for example, shares these conditions, but is not a natural science. > [@](#): > > \*\* Agreed. I should have found a word denoting obsessive attachment without the implication of sexual attachment. I apologize. \*\* I’m not sure if this is an apology, or a veiled insult. > [@](#): > > \*\* And speaking of rhetorical tricks, asking me to defend an absurd reduction of my very simple claim certainly qualifies. I refuse.\*\* There seems to be an awful lot of this “absurd reduction” going around. But this is no rhetorical trick on my part, nor do I feel that your claim is very simple. But let be; since you admit that there are no such disciplines, then I rephrase my request and ask that you provide me with 5 scientific reports that rely exclusively upon “direct human perceptions of Nature,” unmediated by instruments of measurement, as their primary research methodology. > [@](#): > > \*\* However, if you wish me to repeat some sciences in which direct human observations have been and remain valid methods for obtaining data, then I will offer: taxonomy, biology, chemistry, astronomy, and physics. I’ll even throw in chaos theory as a bonus. \*\* This is all very well and good, but claiming that these are fields of study in which “direct human observation” remains a valid method for obtaining data, without providing examples, won’t get us anywhere. Must you search all the way back in history to your poor horse thief, to find but one good example to support your argument? > [@](#): > > \*\* Really? Ever read any Jane Goodall? Do you think biologists studying the visual language capacity of apes are doing science? \*\* Actually, no, I haven’t read any Jane Goodall. I _suspect_ that biologists studying the visual language capacity of apes are doing science, but at the risk of sounding obtuse (or, rather, _more obtuse_) I’m not 100% sure. My biologist friends tell me that ethology is frowned upon by many biologists because its measures aren’t “scientific” enough. A former lady companion of mine, a Scottish biologist who’s dissertation work involved the study of seal behavior, explained to me that this was perceived as a major problem in ethology, which (according to her) isn’t considered quite as “respectable” as many other branches of the biological sciences. In order to compensate for these sorts of accusations during her fieldwork, she and a companion sat in a blind with stopwatches, recording the movement of seals sunning on the beach, and attempting to quantify the level at which they kept their heads – from on the ground (resting), to up in the air (alert), with five increments in between. The information they produced was trivial in the extreme, and was nevertheless roundly criticized because of its lack of precision. Admittedly, one anecdotal story does not prove very much, and to return to your example, if you would flesh it out a little more, I might allow that it runs counter to my thesis. Since I’ve allowed taxonomy, that would mean you only need three more examples to get me to shut up. > [@](#): > > \*\* I would, too. I can’t find much detail online, but as a thought experiment let us imagine the fiirst person to gain confidence that litmus paper changed color when exposed to acidic (or basic) solutions.\*\* I don’t get it. First, you present the historical example of the development of litmus paper three or four times throughout the thread as a support for your argument; then, when I ask you about it, it turns out that you don’t know anything about the history of litmus paper yourself. > [@](#): > > \*\* I would consider the work involved in testing and confirming that result to be scientific, would you agree? \*\*Very probably, yes. > [@](#): > > \*\* I would also consider it impossible for that work to have been done without relying upon direct human observation of the litmus paper, would you agree? \*\* Yes, I think so. But what is it that differentiates that work on litmus paper from, let us say, my direct observations of a patient in a therapy room? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2002, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/91 "2002-05-11T21:21:28Z")
Cross-purposes run amock. First off, I can accept > [@](#): > > Science: a mode of knowledge production that relies upon the interrogation of Nature by means of instrumental measurement As long as you include that the instrument can be our own senses. You do that, and I’ll throw in that the instrumental measure should have inter-user and event to event reliability. I’d be even happier if you threw in something about doubt reduced and reserved! The cross-purposes seem to be over what _subjects_ are “science” vs. what _methods of inquiry_ are scientific. Memorizing the Periodic Table is not study through scientific inquiry, even if it is studying the products of such. Your formulating a hypothesis about your client, using a psychoanalytic model, making a prediction about what his/her response to a question would be, based on that hypothesis, asking that question and altering your level of doubt about the hypothesis in question based on that new datum, and thus being guided in the pursuit of additional data … that is scientific inquiry. Even though psychoanalytic theory as a subject is scarcely science. **rsa** , Some of mathematics uses scientific inquiry, but some does not. It follows out given sets of postulates deductively. Can the results of these deductions be considered new data? Clearly mathematics is the preferred tool of, and language of, science. But is it science? Only occasionally. ---
**Author:** ![Spiritus\_Mundi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c68b51/32.png) [@Spiritus\_Mundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiritus_Mundi)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/92 "2002-05-12T02:52:11Z")
I see that I skipped one of your posts earlier, and that you have since added a new reply. Well, just for fun let’s take them in reverse order: > [@](#): > > I’m not sure if this is an apology, or a veiled insult. I don’t veil my insults. I think my record on that front is pretty clear. > [@](#): > > Just out of curiosity, how do you define a right triangle as a discrete entity within the class of all possible triangles? By defining the single trait which specifies the type. The anlogy you seem to be reaching for is faulty, though, unless you are prepared to argue that all human endeavors share the philosophical and psychological traits of science (as all triangles share at least two acute angles). I believe I mentioned this before, but perhaps I failed to make my metaphor clear. The field of human endeavors does not map to “triangles” it maps to “figures on a plane”, and science is one particular triangle (at least, so we have each agreed). > [@](#): > > I’m also not clear about your first point, actually. All I have to do, as far as I can tell, is posit that some (not all) human endeavors share the same philosophical and psychological boundary conditions as science, and yet are not science. This is indeed my claim. That is not all you have to do, if you wish to define science. Do you imagine that no pursuit can share similar methodological boundary conditions as science yet differ in either psychology or philosophy? If you wish to define a field over three variables then you must account for 3 variable in your definition. It is obvious that you are not clear on this, yet I cannot think of a simpler way to put it. You need three. You have offered one. Insufficient. > [@](#): > > Psychoanalytically-oriented psychotherapy, for example, shares these conditions, but is not a natural science. And music recording and production shares similar (at least) methodological boundary conditions but is also not a natural science. > [@](#): > > There seems to be an awful lot of this “absurd reduction” going around. But this is no rhetorical trick on my part, nor do I feel that your claim is very simple. It is a rhetorical trick. You were using _reductiio ad absurdum_. And you are about to do it again. As to my claim: **human senses have been and remain valid means for gathering scientific data**. That is a simple statement, despite your feelings. > [@](#): > > I rephrase my request and ask that you provide me with 5 scientific reports that rely exclusively upon “direct human perceptions of Nature,” unmediated by instruments of measurement, as their primary research methodology. See, I knew you were about to do it again. You apparently are unable to comprehend the difference between “human senses are an allowable resource” and “human senses are all that need be used”. Here’s an illustration:[ul] [li] **Mr S’** Bodies are made of bones and flesh and hair and fluids.[/li][li] **SM’** Bodies can also contain sinew.[/li][li] **Mr S’** Show me 5 bodies that are made of only sinew![/ul][/li]It is very kind of you to reduce the scope of your request from entire fields of science to single reports, but I still have no interesting in trying to defend a position which I have never taken. > [@](#): > > This is all very well and good, but claiming that these are fields of study in which “direct human observation” remains a valid method for obtaining data, without providing examples, won’t get us anywhere. Without providing examples? This claim demonstrably false and monumentally foolish. I cannot imagine why you decided to make it. And, skipping ahead a bit we see . . . > [@](#): > > to return to your example, if you would flesh it out a little more, I might allow that it runs counter to my thesis. Since I’ve allowed taxonomy, that would mean you only need three more examples to get me to shut up. I don’t know which is more idiotic, making the claim or refuting it within your own post. I do trust, though, that you will not consider these comments “veiled”. While I’m in the mood, though, I think I will also comment upon your rather interesting requirement for 5 examples. Imagine summarizing this process for an outside party: **Mr S** _This, and only this, is science._ What about A? **Mr S** That’s only one counterexample. _This, and only this, is science._ What about B? **Mr S** That’s only two counterexamples. _This, and only this, is science._ What about C? **Mr S** That’s only three counterexamples. _This, and only this, is science._ What about D? **Mr S** That’s only four counterexamples. _This, and only this, is science._ What about E? **Mr S** OKay. The first four didn’t really count, but now I understand that something else can also be science. I am not impressed by the method you use to test the validity of your definitions. > [@](#): > > The information they produced was trivial in the extreme, and was nevertheless roundly criticized because of its lack of precision. Yes, this is exactly the type of nonsense I would expect to result from the position that science can only be done with the aid of artifical measuring devices and precisely quantified data. I would spare your former lady companion from the obtrusions of minds like yours, were such a thing within my power. > [@](#): > > I don’t get it. First, you present the historical example of the development of litmus paper three or four times throughout the thread as a support for your argument; then, when I ask you about it, it turns out that you don’t know anything about the history of litmus paper yourself. You don’t get it because you apparently do not read carefully. I did not offer the historical development of litmus paper 3 or 4 times. I mentioned it once, after you dismissed the present use of litmus paper as “taken for granted”. I asked a couple of questions about when a result ceased to be scientific, and then noted that the first use litmus paper as a reliable test for pH would be an even stronger support for the use of human senses to gather scientific data. Litmus paper was one of several examples I gave in an early post. If you somehow inferred from my mentioning the words that I possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of all things litmus and papery, then you were mistaken. The specific details of it’s origin as a scientific instrument really are not pertinent unless you are taking the position that the reliable property of paper changing color upon exposure to acidic solutions was discovered, tested, and “taken for granted” without the use of human senses to obtain scientific data. Is that your position? > [@](#): > > But what is it that differentiates that work on litmus paper from, let us say, my direct observations of a patient in a therapy room? I would imagine philosophy, psychology, or both–unless we are both mistaken about either the pertinent elements of scientific endeavor or the unscientific reality of your own work. _whew–now to finish with the previous post_ > [@](#): > > in the sense that when I look at a readout produced by a computer that’s analyzed data from a mass spectrometer, I’m measuring it with my perceptions – a point we’ve already agreed upon as not particularly relevant to the discussion. The chemical clock, for example, was measured by laboratory clock. The direct perceptions of the scientist recording the data would have been worthless – or at the very least, unscientific – without a clock to measure the changes his perceptions were recording. The difference between chaos theory and chemistry, though, is that **information is the direct object of chaos theory**. the results of chaos theory are not restricted to the specific phenomenon under observation at the time, they are generalized to all types of information which meet certain criteria. In that sense, the chaos theoretician looking at a graph **is directly observing the object of his study.** Admitedly, this is a less concrete example than looking at a litmus strip or watching a chimpanzee point to “grapes” on a monitor, but the human ability to recognize patterns in information is precisely what gave rise to chaos theory. > [@](#): > > The consensus, I argue, was created by the instrument (or, more accurately, by a discourse about the instrument), not the other way round. Sorry if the presentation above comes out somewhat convoluted; but I assure you, there is method in my madness. Perhaps, but I am still waiting for you to tell me how the consensus that thermometers were measring something acurately came about without being “validated” through human senses. In the case of the Kelvin scale, you might start by telling me how scientists reached consensus that the thermometer registered 100 at the point where water boiled at sea level. Remember, my position is that instruments are calibrated against human sensory impressions. You have disagreed. > [@](#): > > What does a priorí accuracy have to do with this example? Nothing at all. Og has verified the the reliability of his instrument through his sensory impressions that the distance to his fish wasn’t really changing and that Ugh is about 1.5 times as tall as Madonna. Had his stick not produced results in accordance with his sensory impressions (for instance, if he had piced up a vine of unreliable elasticity rather than a stick) then he would have rejected his instrument. This is entirely in accord with what I have been saying about how we come to rely upon instruments. > [@](#): > > **SM** You have, repeatedly, said that you do not consider direct human observations to be within the realm of science. > > **Mr S** I myself would not phrase it like that, but okay. **You said:** _Science: the investigation of Nature by means of instrumental measurement._ **I said:** I object to the word instrument in the OP, unless one includes the human sensory aparatus as elements of the class. **You said:** _I do not include human sensory apparatus as an element of this class._ Perhaps you would be so kind as to point out where my phrasing does not correctly reflect your stated position. > [@](#): > > Anyway, this a significantly different claim from stating that I’ve “removed human sensory impressions from the equation,” which is what you wrote first. I disagree, since we have both made it clear that issues of phenomenological necessity are not within the context of our discussion. If human sensory impressions are not a means of gathering scientific information, then you have “removed them from the equation” when discussing a scientific endeavor. > [@](#): > > How are we going to debate if you keep changing your claims all the time? Your question is insulting and your complaint is fraudulent. My position has been constant, as has been your inability to read my words with comprehension. This might indicate a fault with my writing. Each must judge for himself whether the confusions are in my words or your thoughts. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Svinlesha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/22d042/32.png) [@Mr.Svinlesha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Svinlesha)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 9:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/93 "2002-05-12T09:53:35Z")
**Spiritus** : > [@](#): > > \*\* I don’t veil my insults. I think my record on that front is pretty clear.\*\* You apologized, but at the same time you insinuated that my position was, or bordered on, an obsession. Thus, you seemed to me, from my vantage point and with no other information than your words on the screen, to speak with a forked tongue. Naturally, if that was not your intention, I accept your apology. Not that I feel you needed to apologize for anything, really. > [@](#): > > \*\* That is not all you have to do, if you wish to define science. Do you imagine that no pursuit can share similar methodological boundary conditions as science yet differ in either psychology or philosophy? If you wish to define a field over three variables then you must account for 3 variable in your definition. It is obvious that you are not clear on this, yet I cannot think of a simpler way to put it. \*\* Hmmmm….you may have a point here. I’ll have to think about this for a while and get back to you on it. Actually, since you bring it up, you might explain to me the way in which you feel that the music recording industry represents an “interrogation of Nature by means of instrumental measurement,” thus fulfilling my definition without being a science. That would be a solid, concrete example that would lead me to admit that I am refuted. Astrology was presented in a similar manner, and I managed to defend my claim against it, although the more I think about it (since starting this thread), the less certain I am that my defense holds water. > [@](#): > > \*\* It is a rhetorical trick. You were using _reductiio ad absurdum._ And you are about to do it again. As to my claim: _human senses have been and remain valid means for gathering scientific data._ That is a simple statement, despite your feelings.\*\* My response has not in any sense been intended as rhetoric. I opened this thread with what I felt was a clear definition of a specific human activity, and entitled it, “What’s wrong with this definition of science?” because I was sincerely interested in putting it to the test: “falsifying” it, if you so will. I’ve invited anyone who feels my definition is inadequate to explain to me why they think it is, while defending it in as categorical a manner as possible – to put it to the test, so to speak. I am of course open to counterexamples, and during the course of the discussion have reconsidered and even offered alternative definitions with an eye to encompassing those examples. I’ve pointed out that in all probability my claims wouldn’t stand up in a professional context, although I’m not quite sure why; hence, the OP. It is not my intention to reduce your claims to absurdity. It is my intention to reduce your claims to specific, concrete, empirical examples that refute my definition. That’s all. And, in point of fact, between other arguments, you have been doing exactly that. For what it’s worth, I’ve been pondering your Jane Goodall example: a (presumably) scientifically-trained individual, in the field, directly observing primate behavior (without measuring it), and presenting reports to a community of fellow scientists, all of whom consensually agree that her work is of value and meets their standards of science. The more I consider it, the more I think it represents a good refutation of my definition. In the terms of your “traits,” it would be an example in which someone shared all the philosophical and psychological commitments of a science, but whose research methodology does not fit my definition – yet who appears, for all intents and purposes, to be practicing science. However, since we’ve agreed that science is a “fuzzy set,” I admit that I did ask for more than one refutation. This might have been unfair, but since you seemed to think that your position was totally obvious, I figured you would be able to name five good examples off the top of your head. I also kinda thought that one or two exceptions, out of the mass that is the Scientific Project, might not mean that much, really, since as we all know, definitions are slippery creatures, and examples that span the gap between definitional categories, or classes, are legion. > [@](#): > > \*\* See, I knew you were about to do it again. You apparently are unable to comprehend the difference between “human senses are an allowable resource” and “human senses are all that need be used”. \*\* This is where the rub is; and after ruminating over your “sinew” example, I think I might understand why. You seem to think, for some reason, that my definition “excludes” sinew (i.e., direct observation). I keep trying to tell you that this is not my intention. If I were to present a similar metaphor, I might write something like:[ul][li]Me: Vertebrate bodies are made of bones, flesh, hair, and sinew – but in order to be considered vertebrates, they must have a _backbone_.[/li] [li]You: Not true, you insufferable little twerp. It is, in fact, quite obvious that while most vertebrates _may_ contain a backbone, several prime examples do not – such as, for example, this golden-bellied, three-striped, fluff-eared capybara-marmot, which can only be found in the highland valleys of upper New Guinea. That you have not been aware of this exquisite creature until this moment only serves to once again highlight for me your profound ignorance of all things vertabral. Begone, foolish mortal![/li] [li]Me: Hmmm…yeah, I remember vaguely reading about this creature, but I have to admit I’m not an expert on it. Can you describe this creature in more detail, or give me any other examples?[/li] [li]You: What trick of rhetoric is this? I said begone![/ul][/li] Etc. (Admittedly, perhaps not the best example, but hopefully you get my drift.) > [@](#): > > \*\* It is very kind of you to reduce the scope of your request from entire fields of science to single reports…\*\* You’re welcome! 🙂 > [@](#): > > \*\*… but I still have no interesting in trying to defend a position which I have never taken. \*\* Oh. Bummer. > [@](#): > > \*\* Without providing examples? This claim demonstrably false and monumentally foolish. \*\*Well, you list a group of sciences _as if_ they constitute some sort of proof, in the post I refer to; and the examples you have presented, up until this point, have been in dispute – at least by me. As for the phrase “monumentally foolish:” oh, good grief. Do you suppose they’ll build a monument to my foolishness here on the SDMB, **Spiritus**? > [@](#): > > \*\* I don’t know which is more idiotic, making the claim or refuting it within your own post. I do trust, though, that you will not consider these comments “veiled”. \*\* Not at all. It is clear that you are now openly calling my ideas “idiotic,” and by association, insinuating that I am an idiot. Thus far in this thread you’ve referred to them as “foolish,” “fetishistic,” “obsessive,” (and, of course, let’s not forget, “monumental.”) As far as I can tell, I’ve done nothing other than attempt to engage you in an open, honest, one-to-one debate, as an equal. Considering the general “don’t be a jerk” rule that supposedly underlies the regulation of social relations on this board, I’m beginning to wonder how you’ve managed to survive here so long. > [@](#): > > \*\* Yes, this is exactly the type of nonsense I would expect to result from the position that science can only be done with the aid of artifical measuring devices and precisely quantified data. \*\*I would tend to agree with this statement, especially if we were to replace the phrase “science can only be done” with “knowledge can only be produced;” and I only want to note that it was not _I_ who criticized her work, but rather, the other members of her department – who all were, of course, trained scientists > [@](#): > > **Litmus paper was one of several examples I gave in an early post. If you somehow inferred from my mentioning the words that I possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of all things litmus and papery, then you were mistaken.** Not really, but hell, you brought it up. First you related it as a kind of irrefutable evidence for my idiocy, but when I queried you about it, it turned out to be some kind of “thought experiment.” > [@](#): > > \*\* The specific details of it’s origin as a scientific instrument really are not pertinent unless you are taking the position that the reliable property of paper changing color upon exposure to acidic solutions was discovered, tested, and “taken for granted” without the use of human senses to obtain scientific data. Is that your position?\*\* My position, I say once again, is not, nor ever has been, that science is performed “without the use of human senses to obtain scientific data.” You know, I’ve said this about 5 times now, but I don’t mind. I can say it 5 more times. I’m not proud. Or tired. My contention has been that to obtain scientific data, we need two things: human senses, and _a measuring instrument_. Without the instrument, I have claimed, straightforward, subjectively perceived information is not considered “scientific.” Even though I have not been completely sure of the correctness of this statement, I have nevertheless formulated it robustly and categorically, so that it would be easier for others to criticize it. Even so, there have been significant uncertainties concerning my meaning. I admit that I’ve argued rather tenaciously in support of my position, but it sometimes takes me a little while to consider the evidence that’s put before me. I don’t really see how this makes me “idiotic,” or “monumentally foolish,” despite the occasional inconsistency in my posts that might creep in. _whew – now to respond to the rest of your post_ > [@](#): > > \*\* The difference between chaos theory and chemistry, though, is that _information is the direct object of chaos theory._ the results of chaos theory are not restricted to the specific phenomenon under observation at the time, they are generalized to all types of information which meet certain criteria. In that sense, the chaos theoretician looking at a graph _is directly observing the object of his study._\*\* You see, this is what mystifies me: I ask you for a concrete example of “science done without a measuring instrument,” and you respond that my request is _reducto ad absurdum_ – which is all fine and good. But then you turn around and present a perfectly good example afterwards? However (and, I might add, at grave risk of being called a monumental fetishistic obsessive idiot again), I’m not fully sure I understand your argument. Does chaos theory make claims regarding the behavior of information, the behavior of graphs, or the behavior of Nature? If you mean one of the first two, could you possibly help an old fo’ out with a concrete example of what you mean – like, for example, from the book I mentioned above (_Order from Chaos_)? My copy is in Swedish, but if you can describe approximately where I can find it in the text, I’ll take a look. > [@](#): > > \*\* Perhaps, but I am still waiting for you to tell me how the consensus that thermometers were measring something acurately came about without being “validated” through human senses. In the case of the Kelvin scale, you might start by telling me how scientists reached consensus that the thermometer registered 100 at the point where water boiled at sea level. Remember, my position is that instruments are calibrated against human sensory impressions. You have disagreed. \*\*I’m sorry but I can’t, **Spiritus** , because I know personally very little about the development of the Kelvin scale, and I just don’t have time to research it at the moment (although it would be fun to learn more about it). What I _can_ do, however, is present an example of the way in which consensus was reached concerning another measuring instrument – Davies’ “solar neutrino” catcher. I happen to have some of the relevant literature right here. You may not like my example, however, since, unlike heat, solar neutrinos are weightless, massless particles that can never be perceived by human senses. I would like to propose that the debate around his device, and its results, represents a kind of prototype for the way in which the scientific community incorporates a new measuring instrument; that it might serve, by proxy as it were, to illustrate my views. But this would only be provisional, until I learn more (if I learn more) at some point about these things. So it should be taken with a nip of salt. Shall I post it? > [@](#): > > \*\* Nothing at all. Og has verified the the reliability of his instrument through his sensory impressions that the distance to his fish wasn’t really changing and that Ugh is about 1.5 times as tall as Madonna.\*\* Unfortunately for Og, his sensory impressions had led him to believe that, possibly, the distance between his fishing hole and his cave _did_ change. In fact, using only his direct sensory impressions, Og kept getting all kinds of strange results when he walked back and forth between the two points: sometimes it seemed to take hours, and sometimes only minutes. Even more exasperating, is friend Ugh got totally different results when _he_ tried to measure. > [@](#): > > \*\* Had his stick not produced results in accordance with his sensory impressions (for instance, if he had piced up a vine of unreliable elasticity rather than a stick) then he would have rejected his instrument.\*\* _Au contrairé, monsieur._ How would he know whether or not the vine was unreliable? Maybe the world expands and contracts at night, while we sleep. In fact, in all probability, the vine would be more in line with Og’s direct sensory impressions than the stick. Using his vine, Og would have probably come to the conclusion: “_Aha! I **knew** it! The distance to the pond really does change, just as I suspected!_” > [@](#): > > \*\*This is entirely in accord with what I have been saying about how we come to rely upon instruments. \*\* You claimed that my “technofetish” understanding of science seemed to “rely upon instruments through some _a priori_ understanding that they are both accurate and precise.” My “Og and the _yea_ stick” story was designed, at least in part, to counter that accusation. Do you agree that I have successfully rebutted it? Just as a side note, I would like to point out your statement above appears to show that we are both _in total agreement_ and _total disagreement_, at the same time. All a part of life’s rich tapestry, I guess. > [@](#): > > \*\* Perhaps you would be so kind as to point out where my phrasing does not correctly reflect your stated position. \*\*I’m not really sure. Something about the way it’s phrased would seem to lead on to conclusions that don’t totally jive with my own. Anyway, I accepted it, provisionally. > [@](#): > > \*\* Your question is insulting and your complaint is fraudulent.\*\* That’s rich. You insinuate that I am a monumental, fraudulent, foolish, obsessive, fetishistic idiot, and then conclude your post by complaining that _you_ feel insulted by _me_. Anyway, no insult was intended, other, perhaps, than a gentle nudge. I apologize if you took offense. > [@](#): > > \*\* My position has been constant, as has been your inability to read my words with comprehension. This might indicate a fault with my writing. Each must judge for himself whether the confusions are in my words or your thoughts.\*\* I suspect the problem is a bit of both. Lord knows I can misunderstand folks sometimes. Anyway, with a subject so complicated, and in a forum as limited as a message board, misunderstandings are bound to arise. No hard feelings I hope. **rsa** :\*\* > [@](#): > > Man, you guys are sure verbose. :)\*\* 😃 You say that like you think it’s a _bad_ thing. ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/94 "2002-05-12T13:52:31Z")
Shit. Sorry, all, I had an appointment with an honors English high school sophomore class to take them around to Massachusetts historical sites. Good group of kids, even if they were from Parma, Ohio. First, **Spiritus** , thanks for the clarification re: Popper and the different discussions of _instrumentalism_. But can we agree that without adopting wholesale (or at least much) of Popper’s other views that falsifiability does lend an instrumentalist air to one’s worldview? Also, you noted: _“Very close to Popper, though I would quibble with the assignment of “worth” to the simple correspondence with empirical evidence. Popper, to the best of my knowledge, never framed his arguments in terms of worth and I doubt that eh would have agreed with this valuation.”_ I think he would go on record as describing good science versus bad science. He wasn’t demarcating science definitionally, was he? I think the use of “worth” adds meaning to the statement that probably isn’t appropriate, but I’ve never had the impression that the only thing which seperated science from non-science (in Popper’s view) was a logical or definitional distinction. **Jerevan** : > [@](#): > > The best we can ever say, and the way I and my group do say it, is: the results are consistent with the proposed molecule. This is not just a CYA-type statement. It reminds the chemist that no amount of supporting data will prove her hypothesis absolutely. Recall what I said to eris early on: I only need one piece of good data to prove a theory/hypothesis wrong. But no amount of good data will prove it right 100%. But look at this underlying assumption: _the instrument is right_! “Good data” and “bad data” make sense only in the context of a theory; specifically, the theory behind the instrument itself. The design of an instrument to measure pharmacological properties of developing drug molecules is itself an experiment based on a theory. If the theory behind the instrument changes what is likely to be an interpretation is that _the instrument was still measuring something_, we just weren’t clear on what it was until now (this is what I mean by doubt not going all the way down). _Things_ are behaving _this way_ as described by our _instrument_ which measures _this property_ as described by _this theory_. This is the interpretation I encounter the most (when I encounter it; admittedly, philosophical ponderings aren’t the bulk of my interaction with scientists). But when we change the theory we don’t immediately change the instruments… we change _our interpretation_ of what those instruments are “actually” measuring, or—more likely in higher technology—what we can infer from what our instrument is measuring. I just don’t see science as building houses out of playing cards. There are underlying scientific theories that we _do_ hold with absolute certainty[sup]\*[/sup], whether or not they are wrong or will some day be shown to be wrong, and in fact that we must hold to be certain else our language would not have the construction that it does, even in the most formal writings. We have a theory of lipophilicity based, for one spurious example, on some correlation with hydrogen bonding. But when we test this lipophilicity based on hydrogen bonding, _we are most assuredly assuming that we know how the molecule itself is_. For every measurement we make to test a thoery we assume a whole background of theories. And I don’t doubt that one _could_ say that science is a house of cards, all the way back to extreme skepticism and questioning the existence of external reality; **but** , we do not talk that way, and we do not act that way, so I must return to my impression of paying lip service to ideas we don’t actually believe in. Again, it isn’t that I feel one _cannot_ meaningfully express doubt all the way through scientific theories, but rather that one cannot do so simultaneously, _and_ one cannot do so and expect science to tell us anything. If doubt exists simultaneously all the way down the line, all of science is: “Something we don’t know is doing we don’t know what.” I do not feel this is an accurate representation of scientific work, the behavior of scientists, or the speech that they use. **Svinlesha** , if I may offer a definition of science myself: The creation, testing, use, and amendment of theories about associations of inherent properties of external objects to other properties of other external objects or the object itself, by quantitative measurement along arbitrary but unambiguously defined scales. I would like to expound upon this, if I may. First, the unambiguous scale can very well come as a consequence of a theory itself, and in most cases I would say it _must_ be, but in the realm of mathematics and logic the quantitative measurement can certainly be a matter of inductive or deductive consequence. The association between mathematical modeling of inherent properties (some brand of realism) and mathematical theories themselves lend mathematics _itself_ to be an instrument (which, I suppose, has probably already been asserted or accepted by everyone here). Secondly, the understanding of _qualitative distinction_ (realism) is contained within the idea of _some axis along which quantites vary_. Recognizing qualities is not science; it is merely observation. It is the _quantitative investigation and use_ of inspected qualities. As a consequence of this, _distinction-making is not science_. Taxonomy _itself_, in the general case, is not science, it is distinction-making, but one can perform taxonomy as a scientist if the distinction-making is performed in some manner befitting the definition above (measuring wingspan, and so on). The mere recognition of multiple properties (qualities) is not science to me, nor to this definition. I am not a scientist when I note it is hotter today than it was yesterday. But am I performing a scientific investigation when I look at my thermostat to set the air conditioning (which I don’t have, but whatever)? Hmm. **Mr S** , in general I would like to comment that any definition of science which depends on instrumentation lends itself to naive realism if sufficient steps are not taken epistemologically. This shouldn’t trouble us here, just wanted to toss this out for your consideration. * * * \*[sub]The discussion of absolutes always throws me for a turn in GD. My views on what it means to have absolute certainty vary from time to time, and I often get sloppy and use the term when I really shouldn’t have. In this case, however, I do feel confident that I mean absolute. Any scientist, when pressed to the issue, would [probably] deny the truth of every theory all the way down the ladder; this does not, in me, induce a state of acknowledgement that they really don’t have absolute certainty of these things. I genuinely suspect a great deal of lip service to scientific skepticism and that, even if under certain contexts one may doubt the data, the instrument, or the theory behind the two of them, that the operation of intuition, speech, and behavior of these scientists betrays a confidence in the data and experiments not granted by the theories they apparently ascribe to.[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/95 "2002-05-12T14:34:42Z")
Well, **erl** , my freind, here we will have to differ, as we usually do. 🙂 Even when scientists _say_ that they have _no doubt_ about a particular fact, they do, even if that doubt is almost infinitely small … else they could not be convinced, by sufficient evidence, to alter their view. Sure for some of these beliefs the contradictory evidence would have to be quite substantial, maybe even unimaginably so, but they would eventually concede that such is not impossible. This is direct contradisitinction to a religious belief which is unshaken by evidence to the contrary because the faith in its postulates are absolute. Belief in the face of contradictory evidence is seen as a test of that absolute faith. (Even as the religious Jews burned for their beliefs, they recited the Sh’ma.) ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/96 "2002-05-12T16:00:54Z")
Allow me to illustrate - Last year “The Big Bang” theory would have been one of those ideas that most cosmologists had very little doubt about. Some doubt, but most would have answered that they saw very litle likelihood that would be shown to be false. Now the doubt has been increased. Not because the hypothesis has been falsified but because another hypothesis has been put forth that explains the same data and perhaps does more. As summarized in Science > [@](#): > > the theory–an alternative to the standard, inflationary picture of the formation and demise of the universe–describes a sheetlike “brane” universe that eternally dies and rises from its ashes, hearkening back to the long-discarded steady-state model of a cosmos without beginning or end. … The new idea is an extension of the ekpyrotic or “Big Splat” theory, which Turok and other physicists introduced last year as an alternative to inflation (Science, 13 April 2001, p. 189). Inflationary theory says that for less than 10-30 of a second, the universe expanded at an incredible rate–an idea that can explain features of our universe such as the astonishing similarity of widely separated regions in space and the nature of the cosmic background radiation. Turok, along with Paul Steinhardt of Princeton University and two other colleagues, sought an alternative to inflation based upon the mathematical framework of M theory, a popular successor to superstring theory. The result: the ekpyrotic universe, which describes the birth of our universe in the collision of enormous four-dimensional membranes, or branes. Not only did the ekpyrotic model make similar predictions to inflationary theory, it got rid of the troubling “singularity” of the big bang itself. Now few have thrown out “The Big Bang.” But an elegant alternative explanation alters the level of doubt about the “truth” of the prevailing hypothesis. Which could only happen if some doubt was always reserved. The next step is to figure out what different predictions each hypothesis would predict and search for those data points. That is the process of scientific inquiry. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Svinlesha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/22d042/32.png) [@Mr.Svinlesha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Svinlesha)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/97 "2002-05-12T16:38:05Z")
First off: **erl**! Welcome back! I wondered where you had disappeared to. Regarding this: > [@](#): > > \*\* The creation, testing, use, and amendment of theories about associations of inherent properties of external objects to other properties of other external objects or the object itself, by quantitative measurement along arbitrary but unambiguously defined scales. \*\*Pretty impressive. It may lack the sheer, oh, how shall we put it – _joie de vivre_? – of my original attempt, but it seems a lot more precise. There are some points that I don’t fully understand in your explanation, following, but I’ll have to get to them later. Also, I wonder how you respond to the counterexample of Jane Goodall and primate observation proposed by **Spiritus** , as well as his accusation that a definition based solely on methods, such as the ones you and/or I have proposed, fails to account for the psychological and philosophical aspects of the Scientific Project, and is therefore doomed to failure. **Jerevan** : Regarding your “thought experiment,” posted somewhere in the middle of page 2: personally, aside from small quibbles with the details of the historical narrative you present, I don’t have any serious objections to most of points. I especially like this: > [@](#): > > \*\* And so down to the present day, where those rigorous practitioners of the Baconian method (or so they claim) decide, in effect, that “anything which does not follow our method to the letter is not science”. But in the present day, there are so many different fields of knowledge, and so much communication, overlap and cross-fertilization between them, that this assessment doesn’t “feel” right to some scholars. Why does it matter, though? Why don’t these scholars just shrug and say, “So what if my area of knowledge isn’t _science_?” \*\* I mean, I’m no scholar, but that is essentially my attitude. (By the way, believe it or not, I never knew the original meaning of the word “science.” Thanks.) There is one minor detail, however. Even if we abandon the word “science” and replace it with something less “corrupted,” we are still at a loss as to defining what that thing might be. I’m not sure if it would be quite right, technically, to define “the Baconian method” in the way **erl** or I have attempted to do. On the other hand, clearly, I think that while perhaps not completely all encompassing, the definitions we’ve suggested do capture something very important concerning what the Scientific Project is all about. If I were to use a different idiom, I might say that science (i.e., natural science) involves _uncovering and measuring the architecture of the Universe_. My feeling is that we can still talk about “science” as knowledge; and perhaps the biggest mistake I’ve made thus far is failing to make absolutely clear from the beginning that in defining the word “science,” I was in fact referring specifically to “the Natural Sciences” (I added this as a kind of footnote in the OP, under the impression that most people would just know what I meant by it. In hindsight, a major fuckup). But you really seem to grasp the essence of what I’m getting at when you write: > [@](#): > > \*\* The Baconian method was very useful for understanding and explaining the natural world – the world accessible to the five human senses. It was attractive because it did so in a way and to a level of detail which other philosophies, such as mysticism or a particular religious mythology, had not been able to do.\*\* …because that is the allure, in my opinion, of applying the methodology of NS to _all_ fields of knowledge production – even those that, arguably, it is not particularly appropriate to. Because, I mean, when it comes to doing what it’s _good_ at, NS is completely unsurpassed. **Demos** : > [@](#): > > \*\* I took pains (although it seemed to be in vain) to argue that the social sciences aren’t necessarily non-sciences or inferior sciences, merely different, that require a different type of methodology and which inevitably contain competing paradigms.\*\* Not at all in vain. We are in complete agreement, and simply using different terminology. This is my fault; I should have been more clear in the OP. **rsa** : The problems in terminology continue. Mathematics is a science, but it’s not a natural science – or is it? In most of the readings I’ve done in the history and sociology of science, it seems to have been considered as a side discipline – like, for example, logic. Regarding this:\*\* > [@](#): > > While the definition of mathematics has changed over time, a modern definition is that mathematics is the _science of patterns_. Agree or disagree? As for the argument that mathematics is not “empirical” or “falsifiable”, I think that is not correct.\*\* If there is a branch of mathematics that is empirically based, derived from immediate sensory impressions without any sort of mediation by means instrumental measures, and is considered a science, then I would suspect that **erl** and I are _serious screwed._ What’s the “Four color theorem?” Whew. Almost caught up. ---
**Author:** ![Jerevan\_Somerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c37758/32.png) [@Jerevan\_Somerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerevan_Somerville)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/98 "2002-05-12T19:07:40Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mr. Svinlesha \* > _Jerevan_, Popper never wrote about “potential falsification,” to my knowledge, but only about quite simple, straightforward falsification (as if falsification was ever “straightforward” or “simple”). The reason for this becomes obvious if one pauses to critically reflect upon it: practically any statement about the universe is “potentially falsifiable.” Hmm. Well, I’m not taking the idea of _potential_ falsifiability from Popper, but rather as a recollection from my own education for which, alas, I cannot offer a cite. For this reason I will concede the point. Besides, I am using the word _potential_ simply because it suggests the possibility of being wrong. On reflection I don’t think we’re in serious disagreement on the basic premise: “If you claim a thing is so, you must open yourself to the possibility that your claim could be wrong and put it to the test (whenever possible). Any such test must be designed so that, if your claim is wrong, the results of the test will not support the claim. That is, it is not sufficient simply to assert something without offering a proof or a method to obtain proof, nor simply to construct a test which gives you the expected result.” Perhaps I am over-simplifying and this is not what Popper said. In any case, for the purposes of clarity in this discussion we can adhere to your/Popper’s term and definition for it. > [@](#): > > _Mr. Svinlesha_ > A measuring instrument _might_ conform to our sensory perceptions, but there are literally thousands that do not … If I want to know how warm it is outside, I don’t “touch” the thermometer sitting on my window seal: I look at it, and translate the reading it presents to me into an approximate picture of how warm (or cold) it might be outside. I did not mean that you have to touch the themometer to obtain a reading for the tactile experience of heat/cold, although such an instrument could be constructed. But what you obtain is not a “mechanical” picture, either: you translate the visual reading into a concept of “heat” or “cold” based on the memory of a tactile experience. I see that I need to clarify what I was getting at about with these two statements (among others): > [@](#): > > _Jerevan Somerville_ > The point is that we design and construct instruments which, to a large degree, confirm and conform to our sensory perceptions because that is the only way through which the vast majority of us can imagine the universe. … And I would submit to you that the tools themselves are also shaped by our perceptions. Let’s talk about the themometer, and because the development of the Kelvin scale is somewhat involved, let’s first talk about the Celsius scale of temperature. This scale is based on (calibrated against) the freezing and boiling points of water at sea-level. The scale arbitrarily assigns a value of “zero” to the freezing point, and a value of “100” to the boiling point. The instrument itself is a closed glass tube which contains a liquid which has been observed to change in density (\*i.e.\*the same weight of material takes up more or less space) according to temperature. Mercury is perfect for this because under typical terrestrial conditions, mercury expands and contracts just enough to be readily observable, but not so much that the glass tube needs to be 10 feet high or something. OK, so now you have a closed tube with some mercury in it. Now you have to calibrate it, so that you have some way of gauging what the “temperature” is based on how much room the mercury takes up. So, you put the tube in water which you then to proceed to cool. At the point _which you observe_ the water to freeze, you look at the tube and mark the level of mercury as “zero”. Next you put the tube in water which you proceed to heat. At the point _which you observe_ the water to begin boiling, you look at the tube and mark the new level of mercury as “100”. Then you subdivide the length of the tube between “zero” and “100” – _et voila_! You have a thermometer – an instrument which produces a _visual_ output which you then translate into a recollection of the _tactile_ experience of heat/cold. It will even allow you to know how close water is to freezing and boiling – but not everywhere. If you take your thermometer to the top of a high mountain, you will find that water boils when your instrument reads less than “100”. So which is correct – your eyes telling you the water is boiling, or the thermometer which tells you it isn’t? In any case, the thermometer is a good example of an instrument which is _shaped by our sensory perceptions_. (Note on the Kelvin scale: the subdivisions on this scale are the same size as for the Celsius scale – that is, there are 100 “kelvins” between the freezing and boiling points of water. The Kelvin scale assigns a value of 273.15 to something called the “triple point” of water: the temperature part of the combined temperature and pressure at which water is _observed_ to exist in all three states – solid, liquid, gas – simultaneously.) My point is that simple instruments are, at root, the product of our human senses. If our senses were different, then our instruments would be constructed differently. Thermometers, for instance, would be quite different if we did not have a sense of sight… But what about more complex instruments, those that measure things which are beyond the range of our ordinary sensory experience, such as a mass spectrometer? > [@](#): > > Does your mass spectrometer flash a picture of the molecular structure and elemental weight of a substance onto a screen, so that you can _see_ it, or does it produce a technical readout, with numbers, graphs, etc? Yes, the instrument prints out different types of graphs and lists of numbers on a computer screen or a printed page. It does not print or “flash a picture of the molecular structure” to me. **But** , I take this output and I _do_ compare it to a picture of the suggested (hypothetical) molecular structure. If the data are not consistent, I may even attempt to construct a (partial) picture of my own. Either way, the technical/mechanical result from the computer is eventually processed and conceptualized by me in terms of things I can “see”: pencilled pictures of molecular structures on a page, which are themselves only crude representations of the actual architecture of the molecule, “translations” which allow me to imagine the molecule in a way which one of my five senses can process. This is what I mean when I said that instruments are designed to _conform_ to our senses. Most instrument produce visual output because that is how human beings obtain the vast majority of their information – through sight. The same applies to your example about the swimming pool which served as an instrument for detecting neutrinos. As far as we are aware, we cannot experience neutrinos or observe their behavior directly with our five senses. The swimming pool, etc. translates the unobservable behavior into something which our senses _can_ observe directly, and the whole sequence of events which translates the presence of a neutrino into some kind of “visible” response is _shaped_ by our need to observe/experience the neutrino with our senses, however far-removed. Notice that in your fuller discussion of the thermometer (in a previous post and only partly quoted above), you used the word “picture” several times. Doesn’t that say something about how you – how we all – conceptualize the universe? Can you describe or comprehend the neutrino without invoking one of your senses, either through language or imagination? Many of us, I suspect, could not. Also, as **erislover** (we’ve missed you!) rightly pointed out, the construction of instrumentation itself is based upon certain theories and ideas which must be taken as “confirmed” if one is to decide the results are “good data”. (Later on I will return to the issues of _certainty_, levels of doubt, and so on which **eris** raised – both generally and in connection to instrumentation. Probably in another post as Mother’s Day dinner will need to be cooked shortly!) So, the themometer is based on the theory that mercury will expand/contract consistently depending on the temperature, and the theory that the freezing and boiling behavior of water is consistent – which as I have already pointed out, it is not. The mass spectrometer depends on theory which describes the behavior of ions in electromagnetic fields. The swimming pool depends on theory which describes the behavior of neutrinos interacting with atoms of an isotope of argon, and so on down the line. So even the instrumentation itself cannot be taken as a completely “objective” and “non-human” construction. A lot of our sensory perceptions and our thinking go into building them. > [@](#): > > That’s the point. As **erl** stated earlier, your account of the day-to-day routine of scientific work represents little more than a sort of “lip-service” to Popper: and with good reason. If you had to go around trying to derive falsifiable observation statements from every theory you had in your head, and figuring out ways to “robustly test” them, you’d never get any work done. Well… since joining this thread I have been doing a lot of thinking about these issues, reflecting on how I approach my work vs. the way my colleagues do. I will say much more on this topic later, but for now I admit: I am beginning to realize that my perspective is probably not representative of all chemists. So from here on out I will not purport to speak for “chemists” but only for myself. > [@](#): > > Anyway, I suspect there’s a significant difference between the kind of science you do, and the kind Popper was talking about. ou seem to be engaged in _applied science_; Popper was referring to _pure research_. Very true. Whether or not others will admit it, in the areas of “applied knowledge” – and even in some areas of research which are not “pure” – certain compromises in the rigorous application of the “Baconian method” and/or the principle of falsifiability have to be made in order to “get anything done”, as you and **eris** have rightly pointed out. This does amount to lip-service when one is not actually adhering to the standards one claims to have – or worse yet, holds others to. More on this later. ---
**Author:** ![Spiritus\_Mundi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c68b51/32.png) [@Spiritus\_Mundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiritus_Mundi)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/99 "2002-05-12T19:10:30Z")
> [@](#): > > That’s rich. You insinuate that I am a monumental, fraudulent, foolish, obsessive, fetishistic idiot, and then conclude your post by complaining that you feel insulted by me. > > Anyway, no insult was intended, other, perhaps, than a gentle nudge. I apologize if you took offense. [ul][li]The question of yours which I found frauydulent and offensive was posted before all of the remarks you list save for one. [/li][li]That one has been apologized for, and you have acepted teh apology.[/li][li]Including that claim in your list of grievances is yet another false claim on your part.[/li][li]As a policy, I do not accept conditional apologies. I find them graceless and cowardly.[/ul][/li] > [@](#): > > You apologized, but at the same time you insinuated that my position was, or bordered on, an obsession. Yes. I find your attachment to instrumental measuring as the defining characteristic of science to go beyond reason. > [@](#): > > Actually, since you bring it up, you might explain to me the way in which you feel that the music recording industry represents an “interrogation of Nature by means of instrumental measurement,” Sound is a natural phenomena which is being inerrogated through instrumental means (recorded, quantified, manipulated to acheive effect, investigated to determine new properties, etc.) > [@](#): > > This is where the rub is; and after ruminating over your “sinew” example, I think I might understand why. You seem to think, for some reason, that my definition “excludes” sinew (i.e., direct observation). I keep trying to tell you that this is not my intention. You do? Please quote for me teh relevant lines. I do not recall you changing your position that direct sensory observation was not a valid means of gathering scientific data. In fact, I find this statement by you to be extremely puzzling, since you have been challenging me to provide examples of scientific work which does not rely upon instrumentation. Let me ask you plainly–do you agree that human senses can be valid instruments for recording scientific data? > [@](#): > > As for the phrase “monumentally foolish:” oh, good grief. Do you suppose they’ll build a monument to my foolishness here on the SDMB No. We each build our own monuments, insignificant though they be, with our posted words. Of course, it is only slightly less foolish to pretend that the word “monumental” refers solely to the construction of monuments than it is to chide me for not providing examples well into a thread in which I have provided many. Still, you build what you will, and I shall call it what I will. > [@](#): > > It is clear that you are now openly calling my ideas “idiotic,” and by association, insinuating that I am an idiot. No. I called a specific element of your post idiotic. It was. Referencing an example of mine immediately after pretending that I was not offering any examples is idiotic. It isn’t a particularly tough call. I am not unclear on the difference between characterizing a post and characterizing a person. > [@](#): > > As far as I can tell, I’ve done nothing other than attempt to engage you in an open, honest, one-to-one debate, as an equal. I have done the same. Are you attempting to imply that I have been less than open or honest? Do you feel that I have not treated you as an equal? > [@](#): > > Considering the general “don’t be a jerk” rule that supposedly underlies the regulation of social relations on this board, I’m beginning to wonder how you’ve managed to survive here so long. If you feel I have crossed a boundary then by all means report this thread to a moderator. If not, then please take comments about the behavior of other posters to the PIT where they belong. > [@](#): > > I would tend to agree with this statement, especially if we were to replace the phrase “science can only be done” with “knowledge can only be produced;” That would be a strange substitution to make when the subject of our discussion is the definition of science. Was your former lady companion criticized for not producing knowledge or for not being “scientific” enough? > [@](#): > > First you related [litmus paper] as a kind of irrefutable evidence for my idiocy, but when I queried you about it, it turned out to be some kind of “thought experiment.” Your memory of events does not seem a good match to the words on my screen. Please quote the relevant passages of the post where I first mentioned litmus paper and show how I was introducing the example as, “irrefutable evidence for [your] idiocy.” If not, please consider this a request that you stop misrepresenting my posts. They persist for all to see and interpret without the revisionism of your hurt feelings. > [@](#): > > My position, I say once again, is not, nor ever has been, that science is performed “without the use of human senses to obtain scientific data.” You know, I’ve said this about 5 times now, but I don’t mind. I can say it 5 more times. You have also said[ul] [li]the kicker here is color and pattern, anyway: that birds are most often identified on the basis of their plumage, and that this, in its turn, is direct Nature-to-senses research. Which is a problem, maybe. But then again, maybe not . . . With some luck, it might also relegate bird-watching to a “craft,” rather than a science. [/li][li]There may be cases in which it is difficult to pass judgement on the state of a field of inquiry, such as taxonomy; but the general thrust is towards the development of reliable, quantitative instruments of measurement. In taxonomy, the minute such an instrument had been developed, the direct, subject-to-Object model of research was abandoned. I think that I want to call theories related to these kinds of measurements scientific, and other theories non-scientific – with the caveat that non-scientific theories can, of course, be valid, intelligently designed, and systematic. [/li][li]If I go out at night, sit down in a pasture, and count stars, I do not think that falls under the category of scientific activity. If I try to identify and organize stars according to how bright they are, that might be a kind of proto-scientific activity. When I start measuring them, with, let us say, a sextant, then I have become an astronomer. [/li][li][example sof early “scientific” achievments] represent scientific work, or, at the very least, something very close. Certainly, if they used any sort of measuring device, they would fall into my definition [/li][li]That does not make me a scientist. I argue that this is for the simple reason that I don’t try to “measure” my patients’ responses with any sort of instrument at all. [/li][li]This is all very well and good, but claiming that these are fields of study in which “direct human observation” remains a valid method for obtaining data, without providing examples, won’t get us anywhere. [/li][li](and, from immediately after your the passage in quotes)Without the instrument, I have claimed, straightforward, subjectively perceived information is not considered “scientific.” [/li][/ul] I confess that I was unable to find the five times that you agreed with me whan I made statements like, _“Human sensory impressions have been historically, and remain, a valid element of scientific inquiry.”_ Would you please supply quotes? I would like to see how we both missed such an obvious point of agreement. I did find this, though, **"How are we going to debate if you keep changing your claims all the time? "** > [@](#): > > I’m not fully sure I understand your argument. Does chaos theory make claims regarding the behavior of information, the behavior of graphs, or the behavior of Nature? Chaos theory makes claims about the behavior of systems. Those systems may be natural or artificial. I don’t have any reference works handy, but I will try to hunt one up for you. > [@](#): > > What I can do, however, is present an example of the way in which consensus was reached concerning another measuring instrument – Davies’ “solar neutrino” catcher. Sure, post it. But I hope you don’t imagine that I am claiming that the latest toys of particle physics are calibrated directly against human senses. We would have to follow the chain of instruments and calibrations well back in time to find the instruments whose acceptance hinged upon conformity to human sensory perceptions. > [@](#): > > Unfortunately for Og, his sensory impressions had led him to believe that, possibly, the distance between his fishing hole and his cave did change. Really. And here I thought you had claimed resistance to that particular bugbear. I fear that Og has now become useless an illustrative example between us. The fundamental differences in how we understand Og’s perceptions make reliable communication through Og’s example hopeless. > [@](#): > > How would he know whether or not the vine was unreliable? Maybe the world expands and contracts at night, while we sleep. In fact, in all probability, the vine would be more in line with Og’s direct sensory impressions than the stick. Using his vine, Og would have probably come to the conclusion: “Aha! I knew it! The distance to the pond really does change, just as I suspected!” Hypothesis confirmed. I bid farewell to Og. ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2002, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685/100 "2002-05-12T21:08:58Z")
The four color theorem, **Svinlesha** , was a mathematical hypothesis that one could color any map with only four colors such that no two adoining “states” would have the same color (vertices don’t count: they must share a side). A proof has eluded mathematicians since the inception of the problem, though it was always suspected to be true (like many other problems). A team of persons got a computer program together to draw every map (if this sounds impossible to you, it is, but they showed that some sets of maps are somehow reducable to other maps, and so enumerated the whole set in this way (as I understand it)), colored it, and showed that none of them had adjoining colors. Really, though, I think any “brute force” calculational proof can be considered about as empirical as mathematics can get, and I would put mathematical induction in this camp, myself, since it operates by enumerating all possibilities and accounting for them. As far as Jane the gorilla-watcher goes, she seems to have entered the fray as some kind of behavioral study like psychology or sociology. Any account of these sciences should account for observing the behavior of other animals. But I’ve always been skeptical about these fields amending themselves to what we usually consider science simply because of the messy problem of consciousness being involved in one but not in the other. In principle one should be able to observe any arbitrary creatures, label behavior as emotions, hunger, and so on, and observe variability along different emotional axes. The instrument in this case would be the abstract stucture delineating behavior and values along which specific behaviors may vary. **DSeid** , hi howdy! I’m not entirely sure we disagree this time. At least, not yet. > [@](#): > > Even when scientists say that they have no doubt about a particular fact, they do, even if that doubt is almost infinitely small … else they could not be convinced, by sufficient evidence, to alter their view. Do you feel this is really a function of doubt? Couldn’t the contrary evidence itself create the doubt? As far as the Big Bang theory goes, that some scientists could have doubted the big bang theory doesn’t mean that they all did. In fact, adherence to the very principle of falsifiability would dictate that any meta-science (a scientific investigation of science) would dictate that we cannot say that everyone does have a little doubt. Of course, we aren’t necessarily treating science as an object of scientific inquiry here, just thought I’d throw that out. Still, though, that a small protion of scientists doubt a theory doesn’t seem to show that they all do. Is the theory of evolution a fact? I would say _undoubtedly_ so. I have absolutely no doubt that the behavior described by the theory of evolution is more or less absolutely correct. There is something very “evolution-like” going on, even if we don’t have the exact details worked out yet. Of course, I’m not a scientist. 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-this-definition-of-science/107685.md?page=6)