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Google Begat the End of the Scientific Method?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the well-i-begat-a-roast-beef-sandwich dept.

TheSauce writes "In a fairly concise one-pager from Chris Anderson, at Wired, the editor posits that all of our current (or now previous) models for collecting data are dead. The content is compelling. It notes that we've entered the Age of the Petabyte — where one can collect immense amounts of data that are paradigm agnostic. It goes on to add a comment from the head of Google's R&D, that we need an update to George Box's maxim: 'All models are wrong, and increasingly you can succeed without them.' Have we reached a time where all of our tool-sets are now made moot by vast clouds of information and strictly applied maths?"

5 of 387 comments (clear)

  1. Google =/= scientific method by Rubikon · · Score: 5, Informative

    That an incredible amount of data exists on any given topic does nothing to describe relationships, causality, precision, accuracy, distribution, correlation, or anything else. Data is information, and information must be processed in order to make it meaningful. Additionally, everything that's written, printed, published, etc, is not necessarily true, accurate, precise, etc.

    If anything, the Google phenomenon demands more rigorous examination by accepted methods.

    The preceding message has been brought to you by Captain Obvious and the letters O,R,L,Y.

  2. Re:Ahem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Each claim the others data is unsound by the paradigm's umbrella it falls under.

    No, each claim the other's theory is wrong.

    Nobody (sane) refutes the existence of ring species, or refutes microevolution, or other observable forms of data. The only thing in dispute in the controversy is "species are species because they were made that way" versus "species are species because after some really big N evolutionary steps they become that way".

  3. No. Science Scales. by mbone · · Score: 3, Informative

    Have we reached a time where all of our tool-sets are now made moot by vast clouds of information and strictly applied maths?

    No. And also no to the basic premise of the article.

    Meteorologists have been doing this for decades (principal component analysis has been a crucial tool there since the 1960's, and correlation analysis has been used in some form since the 1920's if not earlier) and so have the astronomers. Oh, and the particle physicists have been sifting data in their own way on a big scale ever since World War II.

    As one of many examples, if you ever have heard of an "El Nino event," that was discovered through correlation analysis and is best understood through principal component analysis. BTW, the original work predates electronic computers and was all done by hand. The vast quantities of meteorological data require statistical analysis to make any progress at all, but that certainly does not mean that you cannot use the scientific method.

    So, no, this does not invalidate the scientific method. In the Internet jargon, science scales.

  4. Quite... by denzacar · · Score: 3, Informative

    I'm sure there are some kernels of insight buried in there someplace, but I'm just not clear what they are My thoughts exactly.
    And since most slashdot readers don't RTFA most comments here have proven useless in trying to figure what those kernels you mention are.
    But this guy, who has read TFA (and commented on it on the Wired's site) seems to have found them.

    Posted by: technophile
    20 hours ago1 Point

    I think what you have hit on here is the difference between analytical and empirical solutions. Analytical relationships are usually first determined from empirical ones. Once you have the empirical relationships you can determine the missing factors or constants.

    (See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empirical_method )

    They are both necessary and a part of the scientific process. You collect data, generate empirical equations, then try and derive or otherwise model the empirical relationship with an analytical one. Empirical relationships are limited because they are somewhat system dependent. For instance an empirical relationship for the ideal gas law could be generated using methane. This might be accurate for methane, but limited in its use for a gas that deviates from the ideal behavior (i.e. hydrogen fluoride gas). You could generate an empirical relationship for every single molecule in the universe but that would be impractical, which is why analytical relationships can often be more useful. Hopefully the "Petabyte Age" will allow the scientific method to flourish, not replace it.

    edit: Rethinking my reply, what the article seems to say is that the Petabyte Age will make determining empirical relationships for everything practical. The scientist who generates loads of empirical relationships and never questions the underlying theory is not a scientist at all, just an observer of scientific processes. I suppose it depends on your goal as to whether this will suit you or not.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  5. Re:Ahem by JeanPaulBob · · Score: 5, Informative

    In the minds of some Creationists, science is itself defective because it only deals with natural phenomena.
    Psst. It doesn't. It deals with phenomena about which (or based on which) we can make measurable, testable predictions.

    If your methodology for evaluating a theory requires classifying it by abstract metaphysical concepts like "natural" and "supernatural", then you're a step away from the scientific method of "experiment".