Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
With humility the issue the op is presenting is not whether Big Foot exists or not. The OP was using the analogy of Big Foot to poke holes in the scientific method. That's why I posted I agree with his sentiment but not with the analogy. The point I was making within the analogy of Big Foot is that the scientific method applies to scientific questions in a defined way and that's why his analogy wasn't the best. The part I agree with the OP is the further away you deviate from the scientific method the less scientific your endeavor. That was the point of bringing in the social sciences which largely don't follow the scientific method. I brought that in only because the OP was also making an argument of perception which is a valid criticism whenever you deviate from the scientific method.
I'm a little bit frustrated with the internet right now because I cannot find a valid history of the scientific method. I can't even find the actual scientific method oulined online. I'm looking for it because you may not be familiar with it. I'm a little bit frustrated because this isn't some obscure method. Without the scientific method there is no science. The scientific method is science. From what I remember, there was a point and I believe it was in the enlightenment where a group of scientists got together and outlined the method of scientific investigation to outline what constitutes science and scientific discovery and scientific conclusion. The method is elegant, by that I mean it's not overly complicated but it's not simple either. It's a method with certain steps and sub steps but it's not an instruction manual.
I think you're getting into the philosophy of science here rather than a steadfast agreed upon method in practice. I think Popper's ideas/interpretations have been one of the more current influences and he speaks to what you were referring to earlier about proving hypotheses wrong as I'm reading here, which I think you will find interesting.
I think you're getting into the philosophy of science here rather than a steadfast agreed upon method in practice. I think Popper's ideas/interpretations have been one of the more current influences and he speaks to what you were referring to earlier about proving hypotheses wrong as I'm reading here, which I think you will find interesting.
Ahhhh, thanks for the link. The article was written in 2003, the year I graduated from college. Whelp, it blows me away; my whole scientific experience from grade school to college was primarily influenced by Karl Popper, which isn't a bad thing. I am being completely honest when I write ever since I remember in science classes the scientific method was ingrained up to the point of repeatedly having to write a correct hypothesis. Again, my major in college was Economics with a minor in Stats. As part of my general requirements I took Honors Physics for two semesters. The only comfort I take from the article is that Popper's method is the most widely accepted but there is no specific scientific method.
OK, so, I do enjoy philosophy but I've never taken a formal class on the philosophy of science--if such a class exists. However, However, I have run across the name of Karl Popper in relation to Thomas Kuhn. I have read Kuhn's the Structure of Scientific Revolution. Again, I have never read the works of Popper but, but I did read a wonderful, lesser-known philosophical work called Liberation and the Aims of Science by Brian Eslea--A Theoretical Physicist and Philosopher . Just looking him up, I'm saddened to find out he died just last year. Here is a link to a Gaurdian Article about him. Definitely check out the article:
There are two thinkers who I can honestly write have influenced me: Hegel and Brian Eslea. You're a scientist so definitely check out his work if you have the time. Now, in Liberation and the Aims of Science he contrasts the thinking of Popper on Science with that of Thomas Kuhn. He doesn't write this but in the most simplified fashion I can muster to oversimplify he sees Popper as a proponent of Objectivism while Kuhn as a proponent of Relativism. However, there is so much more going on in the book, I just bring that up as to how I know of Popper.
OK, the next important concept, What is Science for and what is the fundamental basis of scientific understanding? The basic truth, the one thing that all other scientific endeavors are built on?
I'd argue Science exists as a means to answer Man's deepest questions about the world around us... the "Big Questions" that Religion failed to give us answers to. What am I? Why am I here? Where am I going?
I disagree about this being the purpose of science. I think the purpose of science is to help us achieve our goals. Sometimes our goal is to learn more about the universe. Sometimes our goal is to cure diseases. Sometimes our goal is to make money. Sometimes it's to invent a sharp hunting tool to throw at wild animals so you don't have to be within stomping range of them. Science is just a traditionally useful tool to achieve a goal.
I do agree that for people using science to answer the big questions of What am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? science has at least so far failed though. I'd like to see some elite team of psychologists and neurologists centuries from now try to explain why laughing feels good and sadness feels bad. They'll probably have all sorts of explanations about chemical reactions and they may even be knowledgeable enough about the way the body works to accurately predict human thoughts given certain feedback...but that will not explain why laughing feels good and sadness feels bad...I bet.
How can something tell us why we are here, if it cannot tell us why things feel good?
So we are left with the only purpose of the universe that seems most evident: Do/get good stuff. Avoid/don't do bad stuff.
Science might help get more good stuff and avoid more bad stuff, and some types of science might help us define what is good stuff and bad stuff (I think what knowledge about the developmental stages of a growing fetus is useful for determining at what stage abortions are most undesireable, for example) but it can only go so far.
I think some day, if we begin uploading our consciousness into other bodies to achieve a form of immortality, and have baseball teams filled with ourselves, and one of them passes away due to a head-hit with a baseball, and the other eight start wondering just who the clones are and who is the continuation of the life of the person who was cloned, we'll realize, at root purpose stems from our emotions and experiences and maybe instinct...and that's as close as science has come so far to understanding the purpose of life, and infants and lizards know that, presumably.
Ahhhh, thanks for the link. The article was written in 2003, the year I graduated from college. Whelp, it blows me away; my whole scientific experience from grade school to college was primarily influenced by Karl Popper, which isn't a bad thing. I am being completely honest when I write ever since I remember in science classes the scientific method was ingrained up to the point of repeatedly having to write a correct hypothesis. Again, my major in college was Economics with a minor in Stats. As part of my general requirements I took Honors Physics for two semesters. The only comfort I take from the article is that Popper's method is the most widely accepted but there is no specific scientific method.
I appreciate it particularly for the caveat about discovery, which makes sense in hindsight, but it's nice to have it articulated.
Quote:
OK, so, I do enjoy philosophy but I've never taken a formal class on the philosophy of science--if such a class exists. However, However, I have run across the name of Karl Popper in relation to Thomas Kuhn. I have read Kuhn's the Structure of Scientific Revolution. Again, I have never read the works of Popper but, but I did read a wonderful, lesser-known philosophical work called Liberation and the Aims of Science by Brian Eslea--A Theoretical Physicist and Philosopher . Just looking him up, I'm saddened to find out he died just last year. Here is a link to a Gaurdian Article about him. Definitely check out the article:
There are two thinkers who I can honestly write have influenced me: Hegel and Brian Eslea. You're a scientist so definitely check out his work if you have the time. Now, in Liberation and the Aims of Science he contrasts the thinking of Popper on Science with that of Thomas Kuhn. He doesn't write this but in the most simplified fashion I can muster to oversimplify he sees Popper as a proponent of Objectivism while Kuhn as a proponent of Relativism. However, there is so much more going on in the book, I just bring that up as to how I know of Popper.
I will read that. I have a vacation coming up next week. I've read a little of Popper, and am unfamiliar with Easlea, but I'm pretty disconnected to be honest. I need to educate myself. Feynman, OTOH, is a bit more relatable.
I love his interview youtube series. I hope you enjoy.
I searched this thread to see if anyone had mentioned Popper and I am glad to see he was recommended. His work on science is irreplaceable in moving past positivism.
I love Feynman but I find Popper just as relatable. I think you will really enjoy his stuff, OP.
true science isn't something that can fail. It's just constant questioning and investigation, following the trail of bread crumbs to see where it takes you.
The materialist/reductionist science movement has failed, quantum physics took care of that pretty handily. We still don't know where we are being lead, but consciousness has entered the picture in a big way and it's throwing scientists for a loop.
true science isn't something that can fail. It's just constant questioning and investigation, following the trail of bread crumbs to see where it takes you.
The materialist/reductionist science movement has failed, quantum physics took care of that pretty handily. We still don't know where we are being lead, but consciousness has entered the picture in a big way and it's throwing scientists for a loop.
Perhaps some scientists, but it doesn't really come into play in many areas of inquiry. Although, maybe I don't understand what you're saying.
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
8,297 posts, read 14,157,672 times
Reputation: 8105
Quote:
Originally Posted by Artifice32
...........I'm a little bit frustrated with the internet right now because I cannot find a valid history of the scientific method. I can't even find the actual scientific method oulined online. I'm looking for it because you may not be familiar with it. I'm a little bit frustrated because this isn't some obscure method. Without the scientific method there is no science. The scientific method is science. From what I remember, there was a point and I believe it was in the enlightenment where a group of scientists got together and outlined the method of scientific investigation to outline what constitutes science and scientific discovery and scientific conclusion. The method is elegant, by that I mean it's not overly complicated but it's not simple either. It's a method with certain steps and sub steps but it's not an instruction manual.
Just as a general aside to the particular question of Big Foot and Science, what can science in general or any scientist in particular do about Big Foot that the non-scientist can already do? I mean, someone wants to prove Big Foot exists he doesn't need a scientist to do that. Suppose for example, one day a hunter brings in the carcass of Big Foot to the media. Well, now we know Big Foot exists. Great. I'm sure it will be all over the news: Big Foot Exists. Neither I, nor anyone else, needs the greatest scientific minds much less the much more common mediocre minds of scientists to sign off, give their approval, their benediction that Big Foot exists after his dead carcass is found. At that point, it's Captain Obvious that requires no scientific knowledge to say it. Not to say some sort of Scientists won't study the dead animal. That's fine if they do but that is after the fact.
Well, actually that has happened, but of course it was a hoax - he wouldn't let geneticists take a sample. That or careful dissection by a primatologist would be about the only ways to really verify that it's an unknown ape from the Northwest. Yes, scientific verification would be required by most intelligent people to believe it.
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
8,297 posts, read 14,157,672 times
Reputation: 8105
Quote:
Originally Posted by tofur
........The materialist/reductionist science movement has failed, quantum physics took care of that pretty handily. We still don't know where we are being lead, but consciousness has entered the picture in a big way and it's throwing scientists for a loop.
That's a mystical interpretation popular among New Agers etc, but it's not seen that way by most physicists. I have dangerous mystical tendencies myself. However I found quantum dynamics to be a difficult subject to learn about, especially the observer aspects, but have to defer to the majority of experts for now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by harhar
......The double-slit experiment video was very interesting; and initially I doubted that observation had anything to do with the experiment as the observer was non-sentient.
---
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cruithne
This interpretation of the double-slit experiment is not accurate. It is not the act of conscious observation that changes the outcome of the double slit experiment, but the method of observation or interaction with the photon (the apparatus), that determines the result.
You could run the experiments with no human being present and the outcome would be as described by Jim Al-Khalili. Human consciousness plays no part the running of the experiment. It only comes into play when you read the result.
Well, actually that has happened, but of course it was a hoax - he wouldn't let geneticists take a sample. That or careful dissection by a primatologist would be about the only ways to really verify that it's an unknown ape from the Northwest. Yes, scientific verification would be required by most intelligent people to believe it.
I'm not trying to be tough on you. However, I personally don't trust Wikipedia as a source for anything important. Now, I will use Wikipedia if there is a popular figure who I am not too interested about just to get a gist of what people say he or she is about but that is the extent of my use of Wikipedia. So, this is a Philosophy forum so I will also indicate that while I trust the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy more than Wikipedia...I don't even trust the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. In the rare instances I have used the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy it has only been to get a quick roundabout autobiography of a Philosopher.
I always tell young people, if you want to understand something in literature, art, philosophy, science go directly to the source. So, in the case of Popper or any other philosopher the only way you are going to understand them is by reading their material and not reading about their material. The reason I tell them that is because I genuinely want people to get away from relying on others to interpret anything for them instead of learning on how to rely on themselves and form their own judgments. Another reason I do this is because I know the moment your read about someone or something you are relying on their interpretation with the obvious problem of what makes their interpretation even remotely valid. In the case of Philosophy, philosophers wrote with the intention of being read and not with the intention of having a select few read them, interpret them, and then pass on their interpretation to the masses.
Now, as for Big Foot, "yes, scientific verification would be required by most intelligent people to believe it." Well, that statement is the epitome of irony. I'm not being tough on you, but to me that's a reflection of your misunderstanding of what a scientist can do--again, it is very common among the masses, that is why I find it ironic. I don't believe in the term the masses; it is condescending but the irony is that in distinguishing yourself from the masses you are committing the common fallacy the masses are accused of.
Here is what I mean. A scientist will never be able to conclude Big Foot exists even if we had his dead carcass for all the world to see. Why? We have nothing to compare Big Foot to. So, supposing we find Big Foot. Well, all a scientist can do is make certain determinations about origin, ancestry, common species and the like. But because there has never been a Big Foot found ever even in pre-historic times, they have nothing to compare it to, to ever make the claim this is in fact Big Foot.
In fact, if these scientist take themselves very seriously they may even give give this new species a fancy latin-esque name giganticus pedicus for example. That doesn't mean that we haven't found the dead carcass of Big Foot. The only way I or anyone else would agree it's Big Foot is if the dead carcass looks like the images in picture, videos and matches up to alleged accounts of what this animal looks like. There is nothing a scientist can do about Big Foot.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
