To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
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Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#2The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn has some interesting commentary on how invalid scientific models of our world are eventually (and painfully) discharged. It's the book that coined the term "paradigm shift". This article tends to focus more on bad science, but I think the book is still at least partially relevant.
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#3Technology development is going through a revolution over the last decade or two. The process of teams creating things that have a high degree of precision and detail has been found to overwhelmingly social in nature. That is, while technical skills are irreplaceable, it's the social aspects of developing new things that are much more critical to success than the technical aspects.
Many technologists do not get this. To them, anything important must by definition involve some kind of new tech. They fail to see that even in breakout technology development, the social way we construct teams and interact with each other (and our market) is critical.
Turns out humans are social animals. And this nature has impacts on all kinds of things, even things that are completely analytic.
Science has yet to make this leap. We're still at the stage where the details of the science are published and gushed over. We focus on the science itself instead of the much more interesting and powerful thing: the social structure of how we are conducting our scientific research.
There is a slight bit of light on the horizon. People from technical backgrounds are taking a hard look at how we organize our information and work. There are calls for more open science, there are calls to rethink our how we make funding decisions. There are calls for scientists to stop trying to be priests of knowledge -- arbiters of all that is true -- and work more as servants. These are all taken from mistakes the tech community has made and suffered from (and still suffers, in many cases). Let's hope this trend continues.
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#4Like democracy, science is the worst way to discover truth… apart from all the others.
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#5The truth machine is broken. How do we fix it?
And why is it that whenever I see a list of the "top 10 most important problems" to solve, this isn't on it? Most educated people take the veracity of published science as given, and we clearly know that's a false assumption.
I know we need more transparency in science - sharing of data and code, and negative results. But institutionally, I don't know how we get there with the tools we have.
Part of the reason the current system stays in place, despite failing at its charter mission, is billions of dollars of annual subsidies. Changing the way research dollars are allocated would change the structure of the academic enterprise, but that is incredibly hard to do. Few systems have as much momentum.
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#6The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn has some interesting commentary on how invalid scientific models of our world are eventually (and painfully) discharged. It's the book that coined the term "paradigm shift". This article tends to focus more on bad science, but I think the book is still at least partially relevant.
I agree with you that Kuhn is still worth reading, but perhaps a better intro to Philosophy of Science can be found in Laudan's "Science and Relativism". He is not dismissive of Kuhnian-style relativism, but he is critical of it and helps you see how it fits into the larger debate.
At least that's what I remember. It's been a while since college :/
http://www.amazon.com/Science-Relativism-Controversies-Philo...
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#7Like democracy, science is the worst way to discover truth… apart from all the others.
Status quo apologetics. Ewww.
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#8Like democracy, science is the worst way to discover truth… apart from all the others.
This would only be interesting if it were (true) that all truths are scientific ones. Of course, this is an absurd proposition. Logical abstraction is not per-se science, but rather art itself. Cue Irony...another counter-example. &tc.
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#9The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn has some interesting commentary on how invalid scientific models of our world are eventually (and painfully) discharged. It's the book that coined the term "paradigm shift". This article tends to focus more on bad science, but I think the book is still at least partially relevant.
I agree with you that Kuhn is still worth reading, but perhaps a better intro to Philosophy of Science can be found in Laudan's "Science and Relativism". He is not dismissive of Kuhnian-style relativism, but he is critical of it and helps you see how it fits into the larger debate. At least that's what I remember. It's been a while since college :/ http://www.amazon.com/Science-Relativism-Controversies-Philo...
As a side dish, also perhaps enlightening
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Untimely_Meditations#On_the_Us...
Re: To an alarming degree, science is not self-correcting
#10The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn has some interesting commentary on how invalid scientific models of our world are eventually (and painfully) discharged. It's the book that coined the term "paradigm shift". This article tends to focus more on bad science, but I think the book is still at least partially relevant.
The "painful" bit is key. There's a difference between constantly self-correcting and massively self-correcting, in a sudden, irregular way (known as "punctured equilibrium") only occasionally.