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Why the Cloud Cannot Obscure the Scientific Method

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the because-of-science-dude dept.

aproposofwhat noted Ars Technica's rebuttal to yesterday's story about "The End of Theory: The Data Deluge Makes the Scientific Method Obsolete." The response is titled "Why the cloud cannot obscure the Scientific Method," and is a good follow up to the discussion.

8 of 137 comments (clear)

  1. datasource != process by Bandman · · Score: 5, Insightful


    Because a datasource isn't a process?

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  2. missing link by lhorn · · Score: 4, Insightful

    http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080625-why-the-cloud-cannot-obscure-the-scientific-method.html
    I like the fact that the web and search/aggregate engines may combine vast amounts of data in ways we now
    cannot imagine - it expands the field for new scientific research enormously. Replace science? No.

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  3. It's a good rebuttal by Hoplite3 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'd say that the models are the science. They're how you explain your data. They provide evidence that the experiments make sense, and they guide you by making predictions you can test.

    Moreover, SIMPLIFIED MODELS are good science. Understanding which details can be omitted without impacting the predictive ability of your model shows you know which effects are important and which aren't.

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  4. All models are wrong, but .... by gopla · · Score: 4, Insightful

    All models are wrong, but some are useful.

    We still need scientific methods to develop useful models and understand and refine the existing models. When Newton defined his mechanics that was the state of the art in his era, and now we have progressed to quantum mechanics which might be refined tomorrow.

    But mere observation of some phenomena is not sufficient to postulate the behaviour in a changed condition. A scientific model and its rigorous application is required for this. Correlations drawn from the cloud cannot substitute it.

    gopla

    1. Re:All models are wrong, but .... by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF · · Score: 4, Insightful

      All models are wrong, but some are useful.

      All models are wrong, to some degree. A better way to put it is all models are imprecise, but some are precise enough to be useful. 'Wrong' is a very flexible word and can easily lead to a misunderstanding in this context.

  5. Marketing is not a Science by phobos13013 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Truly, the whole reason someone like Mr. Anderson could claim the end of science because of data is that he is a writer, a thinker, and large part businessman. Businessmen do not think about Science and how to use it to come with a method that produces a conclusion. He uses information to come up with ways to illicit a reaction in people. So to him data is more important than science because he uses it for his purposes. That is marketing, and the "science" of marketing has almost always been that way.

    Mr. Anderson was not prescient in any way, he was just speaking his perspective. The only thing is we must be careful to even consider his proposition as a valid reality worth pursuing. Not for true scientists, but from a social perspective, or it will truly be the end of science. There are some in power as it is already attempting to make this happen.

    That said, I almost consider responding to yesterday's article as falling for the argument. But, since it hit the /. this article is as cogent a rebuttal as one can make.

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  6. Duh! by es330td · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When I read the original article my thought was that someone was just trying to write something to get noticed. The Scientific method, IMHO, is all about a person or group of persons using a logical process to determine the vailidity of an idea. Observing massive amounts of data can reveal relationships that may not have been noticed in other ways, but at the end of the day the process of "I think X, I wonder if it is true", the heart of the scientific method, can no sooner become obsolete than we can stop being human. The questions of What, Why and How are so fundamental to humans as humans that nothing short of total omniscience will ever replace the logical process represented by the scientific method.

  7. Re:I agree, but... by aurispector · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Thank you. Sure, there's a ton of data out there, but how was it collected? What statistical methods were used to analyze the data? How did you select the data set you're analyzing? Nothing I understand about science really applies to data mining a so-called "cloud". Prediction without explanation is just observation. Observation in and of itself is not science. You might have data, but is it the right data?

    I see all this petabyte stuff as interesting and even as a valuable adjunct to real science, but a basic requirement of science is reproducibility and you can't reproduce the data collection.

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