"How do scientists KNOW these things?" Topic

"Scientists KNOW things until they don't know it. Then they just move to theory 2.0

Global warming, beginning of life, nutrition, 9 planets, you name it. It's best to ignore any calls for action and let them changing their mind."

Science be damned for getting it wrong, and science be twice damned for changing its mind …

Lord Kelvin worked out that the age of the earth was at most 400 millions of years based on the time it would take for the outer crust of a molten ball of rock to cool down. He didn't know about radioactivity being part of the process that keeps the earth's core molten.

Yeah, Kelvin was such an idiot, like all scientists who change their minds …

He didn't know about radioactivity being part of the process that keeps the earth's core molten.

That would be part of the things "you don't know that you don't know."

Scientsts can keep making their guesses; just don't tell me how I should live based on those…if I wait long enough the answer will change. Am I supposed to eat Low Fat or High Protein now…I can't keep up.

Why humanity probably deserves its fate in one simple post. I love people, they're ing great…. :-( You do all sorts of things based on how science says you ought to live (unless you've never taken medical advice, still poo near your drinking water supply, etc….)

So it's not that science can't and doesn't tell you useful life-saving stuff, but that you don't want to listen if it's an inconvenience. Hooray for you.

'The key word for me (my spleen isn't really big enough to explode with all the splenetic juices of fury that drive me when I consider this), but the real key word that triggers my rage is the word 'energy', when people start talking about it in terms of negative or positive types. For instance, "there's very negative energy in here." What are you talking about? What do you mean? I mean, let's think about it. What does energy mean? Well, we know what it means: energy from petrol when it's burned, it moves the car. "This room has positive energy" — well, where the 's it going then? It's not moving. It's covering up such woolly thinking, such pathetic nonsense. And astrology: most people will say of astrology, "Well, it's harmless fun." And I should say that for 80% of the cases it probably is harmless fun, but there's a strong way in which it isn't harmless. One, because it is so anti-science. You will hear things like, "Science doesn't know everything." Well, of course science doesn't know everything. But, because science doesn't know everything, it doesn't mean that science knows nothing. Science knows enough for us to be watched by a few million people now on television, for these lights to be working, for quite extraordinary miracles to have taken place in terms of the harnessing of the physical world and our dim approaches towards understanding it.'

Stephen Fry

Scientsts can keep making their guesses; just don't tell me how I should live based on those…if I wait long enough the answer will change. Am I supposed to eat Low Fat or High Protein now…I can't keep up.

To be fair, most of the nutritional info we are bombarded with, does not come from any scientific sources. Rather, we get most of the " low fat or high protein" info from advertisements. Secondly, you ignore your own Doctor's nutritional advice at your own peril. Low fat is always a good idea considering the rising obesity levels, and too high a protein diet can also be bad. But I'm not your MD.

most of the geologists I am acquainted with don't have tans or spend a lot of time outdoors – they work/worked in underground mines.

You seem to think this disdain for other professions that are having more fun than the observer is based on rational thought. It is not.

Jealousy plays a part of it. Geologists can be hip deep in their profession, literally, for the price of a tank of gas for the 4x4 and a few hours drive. Multi-million dollar budgets, esoteric theories that may never be testable, and a strong tendency to exclude the dilettantes are not common characteristics of Geology.

Oh, and the majority of Geologists actually work in the field. There are professions for a Geologist that are not theoretical or limited to the top 1% of the class, and a B.S. is enough to get a job that isn't simply "Chief Lab Assistant". When a college Physics advisor suggests you stick around and get the Masters, he is looking at making you into a Physicist. No such step is required to make a Geologist.

A more rational line of thought is that most Geology departments offer a B.A. as well as a B.S. Geology has a specific path for teachers, and it is a good scientific path for teachers because it is so broad (and kids dig dinosaurs and volcanoes). A lot of Geologists have B.A.s.

Hey goragrad,

Unfortunately, I have read in several places that there is a need in humans to 'believe.'

You are right and a lot of folks, scientists included, get that wrong in my opinion. And I hope folks realized my last post, was, of course, my opinion.

In my view, "Belief" is religion and belief has nothing to do with science. Of course, I believe strongly in the scientific method, and when observations are presented in a fashion consistent with proper science, then there's no reason not to believe they are true.

Believing something is true is not the same as belief in a a spiritual or religious sense. That may sound funny, but I hope it gets my point across.

Respectfully, to the many devoted evangelical/fundamentalist Christians out there (I don't know if both adjectives are the same, but I am neither), I have to say that I think some of the sort of behaviour from the folks who are "scientifics" (as per your good definition) has to do with shock at how some aspects of science are treated. It seems they are selectively cherry picked or reworked to meet a view of the world in such a way that completely disregards the scientific method.

Things like dinosaur theme parks with people and made up crap about human footprints with dinosaur tracks.

Maybe some of that sort of insularity is a result of science types who feel insecure about themselves and start applying scientific method to belief (a ridiculous concept – the two are separate entities). Regardless, it's incredibly sad to see. That behaviour and the hideous fundamentalism of other religions should serve to truly remind us preventing a recurrence of another of the various dark ages in human history that destroyed knowledge is only being prevented by a very thin layer of defence. The Canticle of Leibowitz is an old and wonderful sci fi novel dealing with this sort of thing.
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Tim

Scientsts can keep making their guesses;

Mr Elmo, you seem very dismissive of science, yet somehow I can't believe you are not availing of myriad technologies that have been discovered and/or improved upon using the scientific method.

Am I supposed to eat Low Fat or High Protein now…I can't keep up

Neither can I. However, a lot of the ever changing news items on some these sorts of things the past 30 years are a result of some arse-pick doctoral student who should be in public relations instead of science. I'm an engineer and I'm not an academic, but the academic world is a really cut-throat place to be from all I hear, so any noise and notice one can bring upon oneself, adds to one's resume.

I think if you think of it, that's not all that different from the business world or any other, even the facilities maintenance world which I am a part of most of the time. You always have boot lickers, cutthroats, the power mad and all the sort of personalities and behaviours that manifest themselves in any human endeavour.
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Tim

@GypsyComet – I sem to have sparked off something of a row about geologists. That wasn't my intention – I was a geologist for 15 years, and I loved working in the field, lab, and modelling on the computer. So I'm completely with you.

The view that the "historical sciences" are not quite real science is not a new one – Stephen Jay Gould mentioned it in his books, and I got more than a few snide comments (mostly at the rubbish parties held by non-geologists). My answer was always that geologists are the Sherlock Holmes of the scientific community.

I loved geology precisely because it was such a great mix of other disciplines, and we can use those techniques to make sense of an environment that is far less constrained, and a record far more fragmentary, than any lab would ever be. I think geologists are far more aware than many that, because of that, their hypotheses can be overturned in an instant. We can predict the temperature of a Jurassic sea through Oxygen isotope ratios, but never visit it to confirm the result.

Or, as Terry Pratchett said, it only takes the discovery of one tyrannosaurus holding a "Ban Nuclear testing" placard…

"Peer reviewed" is another piece of crap as well.

Tim, could you elaborate on this statement?

Hey there Bowman.

I meant with respect to all the "google-scientists" (again, I will say there are many of them here on TMP) I mentioned who like to use the term "peer reviewed" to make themselves sound like they are very wise. As if without it, any work is not science. They don't seem to realize that peer review has some pretty vacuous definitions. Yes, the concept of peer review is an import part of the self-regulatory process (though it's vulnerable to the vagaries of human intransigence like any other endeavour), but science occurs with or without it.

Are your experiments and observations conducted and documented in accordance with accepted standards and can they be conducted by others? That's science.

In the case of the people you mention, with whom I'm not familiar, it's a case of the above. Was their work peer reviewed or just the conclusions so outlandish, I don't know.
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Tim

I should like to add one more point.

It is important like the OFM to ask that kind of questions and not to accept any claims on faith/reputation alone.

All kinds of people make claims and add words like "scientific" or "unscientific" to trick people into believing them. Lots of people distrust science and scientists and that's were words like "biased, keep an open-mind, agenda, prove me wrong, and conspiracy" are often used to win the argument.

But in every case I'd rather accept something from a scientist than from somebody who claims to be the reincarnation of Cleopatra.

I meant with respect to all the "google-scientists" (again, I will say there are many of them here on TMP) I mentioned who like to use the term "peer reviewed" to make themselves sound like they are very wise.

Well, as a Google-scientist myself, it's a little better commenting on some scientific topic with a refereed journal as a reference than just a blog.

As if without it, any work is not science.

I'll disagree here, Tim. Presenting scientific work is as important as doing it. Ideally peer review makes sure the I's are dotted and the T's are crossed. We all have confirmation biases and these get weeded out by other dispassionate eyes. It keeps the science "open", even though more enclosed, secret work is being done all the time. Yes it is not perfect, but ultimately self correcting. It is a backbone of modern science.

In the case of the people you mention, with whom I'm not familiar, it's a case of the above.

It also corrects the "argument from authority" fallacy. The examples I gave are from brilliant Nobel Laureates, who ventured into realms outside of their expertise. They became infamous for making some pretty strong, unsupported and provocative allegations. Again, their comments were not judged by their peers, but were quickly picked up by the press.

"zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz"

First, sorry about the formating error, that got loud.

Ditto, you left one thing out – good science is transparent. Part of that is providing raw date and explaining any manipulations thereof. 'Peer reviewers' should be looking at that as well.

As to geologists, one thing that has amused me in the AGW/ACC debate is the disparagement by supporters of the theory of those contrarians who come from the field of geology or one of its sub-disciplines. As noted geology has the longest view and the capability to actually base its finding on historical evidence.

Nice to read a reasonably respectful discussion like this. And thanks to Dom for The Guardian links. I wound up clicking along a bit on those, as I have a layman's interest in physics and cosmology, so that was fun to explore. (I've often thought that the use of the word "dark" might be a mistake with regards to whatever it is that "dark matter" and "dark energy" are, as people expect to be able to see "dark," if only as general blackness, and that in English, at least, "dark" often has emotionally negative connotations— "the Dark Side," "the Dark Powers," etc.. But what to use as an alternate, easy term that would be technically correct and not slip into erroneous connotations escapes me. Perhaps if I understood it all a bit better… *sigh*)

As one who holds that religion and science are neither opposites nor incompatible (and only willful ignorance makes them so), I've enjoyed what I've read so far. Pray, continue on, gentlemen!

what to use as an alternate easy term [for dark matter, etc.]

Brain flash— how about "nosium" and "nositon" (pronounced "no see 'em" and "no see 'ton."

Or maybe that wasn't much of a brain flash…

As to geologists, one thing that has amused me in the AGW/ACC debate is the disparagement by supporters of the theory of those contrarians who come from the field of geology or one of its sub-disciplines. As noted geology has the longest view and the capability to actually base its finding on historical evidence.

While there may be "contrarians" to AGW within the field of Geology, the Geological Society Of America has a different viewpoint, as can be ascertained from their position statement:

PDF link

I would hazard to guess that the GSA's position statement echoes those of other international geological scientific associations. I'll leave that to you to look it up yourself.

Just as with the Theory of Evolution, the "debate" does not exist within the scientific community. It exists in the political arena and in the press. As to your question above, I'd also assume that geologists would also disparage the opinions of those "contrarians" who champion the "flat-Earth" theory. I'd doubt that is a "debate" in the geological field either.

A bit off topic.

There is a debate about AGW/ACC? In the scientific community? Well, DUH! Science is about debate and exploration, I give you my question and findings any you get to pick it apart, if it survives we move on to the next related question, what is so hard about that? Numous studies of nateual climate change have been compared and contrasted with Human caused climate change and the evidence con only lead one to conclude that yes indeed we are causing shifts in the climate.

In the course of this discussion I often scratched my head in wonder in the lack of understanding of the divisions/scope academic science research. In that what the different "specializations" study, I never denigrate another field of study because I never know when I might need to ask them questions in relation to my own course of study.

Back to the original question, Why don't they provide more background? In general the assumption is that if you are interested in news of this sort you have kept up on the popular reading and news to support it. But with the death of comprehensive newspapers this can be difficult in this day and age. Tough there are several Journals and magazines that can help one along in their place. Keeping up on a broad number of sciences in the news can be a royal pain even for someone like me who need to do it as part of my discipline (and I have most of the necessary educational science basics).

As a side point on scientific disciplines, you can tell how difficult it is to become a professional in a stated discipline by how large the department is. The larger the department the easier it is to become a professional in it. Though I might be biased in this observation in that My discipline had 15 students (both undergraduate and Graduate) in it and was the smallest department in the entire school and traditionally is in pretty much any school I have encountered. The joys of being a Geographer….

Science isn't a religeon. Anyone who thinks it is doesn't understand science. You don't like something that science is telling you, disprove it. Go ahead. If they are wrong it will be easy. There is no 'higher universal power told me so' in a scientific proof. Each link in the chain is testable. That's what science is. Testable. Every link can be tested. There is proof that 1+1 = 2. It is a big book, and it shows that the basis of everything so far worked out is true.

So you don't like 'x'.

Go ahead. Make yourself famous.