>> What I say happens to be the TRUTH yet >> we do not have any CERTAIN way of telling and >> Scientists can make EDUCATED GUESSES, but that in no way makes these GUESSES correct
That's bollocks. There are lots of separate pieces of evidence that corroborate each other. Sure, it doesn't make it a certainty - any more than a person standing over a bloody corpse, and holding a smoking gun, is likely to have killed them. But we can't be certain! Let's not jump to any conclusions!
Do you, perhaps, have an agenda here? Is there another "truth" that you would really _like_ to believe and this science perhaps contradicts that? If so, why don't you just say it, and get it out in the open? Or alternatively, maybe you can just go on seeing the world through your rose-coloured glasses...
>> equal amount of evidence for other possibilities regarding the origin of life The theory of evolution is not a theory regarding the origin of life.
>> The Monkeyists might like to know I presume you're trying to imply that people are thought to be descended from monkeys. This is not what evolution states.
>> there hase to be NO CHANGE in the ratio of carbon 14 to carbon 12 This is true. In fact, the ratio has not been constant. A quick look at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dating shows that scientists are aware of this. (who would have thunk it?) So, is the ratio constant historically? No. Does that make carbon dating useless? No.
>> I do expect at least 5 posts arguing against what I say That'd be because what you say is factually incorrect and misleading.
I read and liked your essay. In particular, I liked this line:
"I predict matter replicators are certain to be invented, because they're just too cool not to be"..that's awesome!:-)
There are problems, though, with everyone being able to arrange atoms however they wish. It would allow awful terrorism - potentially easily obliterating the Earth (grey-goo scenario), and for this reason I think most people will (rightly or wrongly) support strict controls on their use. Such controls are almost certain to include provisions for copyright protection (maybe a scenario like in The Diamond Age, where the device is networked, and one can only produce certain preset objects), etc.
The thought has occured to me before, though, and it's an interesting one...
The 300 nm refers to the typical desired thickness of a slice of tissue. TFA states that typical glass knives need to be relatively thick to be strong enough, causing the sample to bend as it is being sliced.
Conversely, the nano knife consists of a single carbon nanotube, stretched between two brackets. This is not a 'blade' in the traditional sense of the word, but is more akin to a cheese knife that is a wire under tension.
Wikipedia states that the diameter of a carbon nanotube is in the order of a few nanometers.
But is it a "belief system like every other religion"? Hell no!;-)
But more detailed.. I think it depends on emphasis.. trying to say that science is equivalent to religion is disingenuous at best, as is saying that scientific theories are just meaningless theories. Sorry if I've been unclear - I've not been trying to argue that science rests as much on belief as does religion.
Maybe a better way of thinking about it is that religion is a belief system, whereas science is an evidence-based belief system.
Thanks for your post - it's a good way to think about it.
I like the Lao-Tsu parable!:) I'm soon going to read the Tao Te Ching.. haven't got there yet..
"therefore any change to our understanding of the world as such will,... be a scientific development"
I think we're now debating semantics. I won't argue with what you say;-) Cheers!
Yes, but the scientific methodology can only disprove hypotheses - it can never show a theorem to be truth (which is fine, and has worked well for us so far). There are probably other ways of finding truths about the world that don't fit into your definition of "science". Hopefully in the future we'll find some of them.
Anyway, back to the original point: just because science works for us now doesn't mean it's written into the fabric of the universe as _the_ method of finding truth. Humans haven't always used it. Probably we won't use it forever, but rather will find a better tool.
I think of it as being analogous to Galileo -> Newton -> Einstein
"Not all scientists use reductionist techniques." Good point - but I was just using that as an example. I don't believe reductionism is the only valid scientific method. However, let's run with this for a moment. A definition for science could be "evidence-based analysis of the world. theory, then experiment" etc. But maybe in the future, we'll uncover different ways of doing science (eg reductionism vs holism, experimentation vs modelling, triple-blind statistical analysis, analysis of negative results, etc), and discover that the word "science" is really insufficient to cover these different ways of conducting science. It's quite possible that there are truths out there that can only be found by one approach, and until we codify that approach we cannot learn them. This is totally hypothetical, of course! If that happens in the future (as it has happened in the past), then people will have different ideas about what "science" means. I contend that this can be viewed as a different belief system.
Other posters have said that science is not based on belief. I think that's wrong. I think science is better at describing the world than religion, but I still think it's "just" a belief system - it's just one that's better.:-)
"I suggest that probably your assertions are incorrect. If that is true, then surely you see your argument has no basis?"
Not quite sure exactly what you mean by this. You don't really provide any argument to convince me that what I'm saying is wrong.
"Why is it necessary to have a "creator" to want to understand the world around us?"
I don't think it's _necessary_, I just don't think it occurred to people to try to systematically analyse the world until they believed in god. Maybe because they believe in a loving, rational god it seemed more likely that the world was rational. Maybe it was that they were interested in god's creation. I don't know, but I reckon it's interesting that the first attempts in science occured at around the same time as the flowering in theology...
"Sentient beings would naturally try to work out the mechanics of the world." Really? So why did science (as we currently understand it. I'm not really including astronomy here) really only occur in religious societies? My understanding is that science never took off in tribal African society - maybe this was because of the mystical, shaman-based society there...
"Because I've done it and it worked... You can too." That's true. Science does work. That shows it's more powerful at understanding the world than the previous belief system of mysticism and spirituality. In the future, we'll likely find another belief system that is even more powerful than science as we currently understand it.
For example, in the future we might refer to current science as "reductionism" but decide that because our understanding can be augmented with computer intelligence (whatever), that holistic approaches to understanding are more powerful. That would represent a shift in our belief system
To clarify - I'm not arguing that since is wrong. I'm saying that our understanding of the universe that we glean from science is highly coloured by the age in which we live. Why do you think it is that we so constantly use mechanistic or computer-based analogies for understanding the world?
I guess I'm saying that science is not a wholly objective enterprise, and if we try and pretend that it is, we're deluding ourselves. (I'm doing a PhD in engineering/science - these opinions are based on my observations of academia)
Well, what makes you think that the world can be systematically analysed? Why is it fundamentally comprehensible by us? Why is the world rational? Isn't it amazing that the human brain can understand the _concepts_ and _rules_ that govern the world? And can then apply them to new, previously un-encountered situations? How can an abstract language like mathematics describe real things?
These statements seen natural to us now, but all these ideas are less then about 500 years old, arising around the time of the enlightenment. Previous to this, people thought that gods, magic and spirits controlled the world. They believed in sin and retribution. Pestilence was the wrath of God.
Uhuh.. and who says who gets to be in the "Christian Club"? You? Me? The Pope?
It's like people saying that extremist Muslims aren't really Muslims. Extremist Muslims might say the same thing about moderates!
I think we have to say that anyone who claims to be Christian is Christian, otherwise we'll drown in a sea of bullshit. The problem is that we all want to be able to say "the people in my club are more enlightened than the people in your club." And then it becomes a brand. Think about these statements: "Catholics are lower class than Protestants" "Christians are better educated than Muslims" "Democrats are more enlightened than Republicans" "Republicans are more moral than Democrats" etc...
All these ideas have been bandied about at some time, usually by people that want to manipulate others by appealing to their class-consciousness. People are always more tolerant of those they identify with, and it's how leaders manipulate people to go to war, send in the national guard to break strikes, propogate sweat-shop labour, etc..
>> >> Science is a belief system like any other religion. >> Actually it isn't.
I'm a firm believer in the power of science, but I disagree with you. Science is a belief system, and is based on the idea that we can take the universe apart and understand it, typically in a reductionist manner.
Every teacher passes on values to their students. Usually this is a combination of their values, and society's values. If you were cynical, you could call this a form of indoctrination, but really, that's what education is to a fair degree. It can help keep society stable, as it prevents a total re-evaluation of society's foundations with every new generation.
The problem here seems to be that this teacher's values are more in line with a minority (of religious wackos) rather than those of greater U.S. society (more pluralistic), and he appears unwilling to teach according to society's values rather than his own.
Not only that, but it is quite reasonable to think of science as having come *from* religion. This is because, it wasn't until people believed in a rational creator, that they systematically tried to understand the mechanics of His creation. Science was originally an attempt to understand that which God had made.
Previous to monotheistic religions, people thought that there were a multitude of gods that affected many things on a day-to-day basis.
"I am saying the vast majority of Islamics are degenerates..."
And I'm saying you're wrong. Do some reading and learn something - don't just believe what you're told.
"It's no different than tribes in Africa murdering each other by the millions."
And of course this is limited to Africa...
Argentina Niceragura Congo Vietnam Iran South Africa Iraq
These are all countries in who's politics the West (usually the USA, but other western countries too - notable the Congo, where the Belgian administrators at one point had a trade in human hands) have meddled, with a destabilising effect. If you read the history of these countries, you'll find that in many of them thousands or millions have died from either political or ethnic persecution, largely as a result of Western interference. There are many many more countries that could be added to this list...
This is true however the largest connectivity cost is the "last mile" of cable. Once the internet moves from it's present state towards localised mesh-networks, that are interconnected by fiber/whatever, then most of the cost of that last mile disappears.
"false dichotomy" technically true. However, the reality is that spending is prioritised by mind-share. Other renewable techs *are* underfunded, and probably have a better (and earlier) ROI than does fusion power.
"a working, efficient fusion reactor IS a silver energy bullet." No it's not. My understanding is that fusion power is (at least in the near future) going to involve large plants and large output. While a working fusion reactor would be _fantastic_, it wouldn't suit smaller cities, the remote energy needs of industry (i.e mining), or transport.*
Another thing, one of the great virtues of many forms of renewable energy, is that production of energy is distributed. There are many social benefits of not having the government/corporations holding all the strings, in my opinion.
*I know that many renewable energies wouldn't do this either. But I bundle investment in public transport, fuel-cells, energy efficiencies, etc, in with renewable energies when I talk about them having probably a better ROI than fusion reactors.
While I agree with most of your post, I really take exception to this:
"the middle east would be... another degenerate culture like most of Africa"
It's a very ignorant and arrogant comment. Most of the problems faced in the middle-east and africa are *because* of the resources they have. Resources that the West exploited during the colonial era (19th and early 20th century), and that corporations now exploit.
Part of this exploitation is always to destabilise the country - because a country in anarchy can be more easily controlled and manipulated. Don't try and translate the economic superiority of the West into cultural superiority. It's like saying that Paris Hilton is culturally superior to the Dalai Lama because she's wealthier!
*sigh* did you even read the arguements of these 'hippies', or did you just assume they were a rabble of tree-huggers?
In a world of limited resources (time/money), does it not make sense to prioritise effort to yield the best results per unit of investment? Just because some one disagrees with you about the best way to do this doesn't make them a dogma-driven hippy scumbag (TM). How about you open your own eyes before you sling ad hominums around?
For what it's worth, I think it probably _is_ reasonable to invest in fusion power. But having said that, other forms of renewable energy are _massively_ underfunded, and much progress could be made against climate change by investing a (relative pittance) into these techs. I just wish that narrow-minded people like you* would see that there is not a mysterious energy silver bullet.
I think you're wrong (and you use a double negative;-)
Most people are disinterested in history, hence there is no guarantee of a verbal knowledge continuum in the event of widespread hardware failure. We know that the hardware always eventually fails. We know that hardware always becomes obsolete. We know that civilisations always fall. We also know that these things have happened in the past, resulting in the loss of knowledge (in some cases it was because the language became extinct, and has never been deciphered. In others it was because proper documentation was never made, or was lost, or was destroyed, etc. If you think about archaeology, it only exists because of a _lack_ of documentation. It's trying to piece together data from scattered, incomplete fragments).
The fact that you so easily dismiss this shows a lack of knowledge of history (point 1), and perfectly illustrates that old adage "if there's one thing we can learn form history, it's that we don't learn from history."
I think you're right. Once you replace driver initiative with traffic-lights, you reduce the competancy of drivers, and make them feel like there's no danger.
I'm watching my city (Australia - we drive on the left) as it slowly replaces 'turn left at any time with care,' and 'right turn when safe' lanes with traffic lights at every opportunity. I think it breeds complacence in drivers, and will reduce their ability to deal with unexpected situations if there's not a light or sign to tell them what to do.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't know why I'm bothering, but...
>> What I say happens to be the TRUTH
yet
>> we do not have any CERTAIN way of telling
and
>> Scientists can make EDUCATED GUESSES, but that in no way makes these GUESSES correct
That's bollocks. There are lots of separate pieces of evidence that corroborate each other. Sure, it doesn't make it a certainty - any more than a person standing over a bloody corpse, and holding a smoking gun, is likely to have killed them. But we can't be certain! Let's not jump to any conclusions!
Do you, perhaps, have an agenda here? Is there another "truth" that you would really _like_ to believe and this science perhaps contradicts that? If so, why don't you just say it, and get it out in the open? Or alternatively, maybe you can just go on seeing the world through your rose-coloured glasses...
>> equal amount of evidence for other possibilities regarding the origin of life
The theory of evolution is not a theory regarding the origin of life.
>> The Monkeyists might like to know
I presume you're trying to imply that people are thought to be descended from monkeys. This is not what evolution states.
>> there hase to be NO CHANGE in the ratio of carbon 14 to carbon 12
This is true. In fact, the ratio has not been constant. A quick look at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dating shows that scientists are aware of this. (who would have thunk it?)
So, is the ratio constant historically? No. Does that make carbon dating useless? No.
>> I do expect at least 5 posts arguing against what I say
That'd be because what you say is factually incorrect and misleading.
I've been thinking along those lines for a while, and take my hat off to you.
I read and liked your essay. In particular, I liked this line:
"I predict matter replicators are certain to be invented, because they're just too cool not to be"
There are problems, though, with everyone being able to arrange atoms however they wish. It would allow awful terrorism - potentially easily obliterating the Earth (grey-goo scenario), and for this reason I think most people will (rightly or wrongly) support strict controls on their use. Such controls are almost certain to include provisions for copyright protection (maybe a scenario like in The Diamond Age, where the device is networked, and one can only produce certain preset objects), etc.
The thought has occured to me before, though, and it's an interesting one...
The 300 nm refers to the typical desired thickness of a slice of tissue. TFA states that typical glass knives need to be relatively thick to be strong enough, causing the sample to bend as it is being sliced.
Conversely, the nano knife consists of a single carbon nanotube, stretched between two brackets. This is not a 'blade' in the traditional sense of the word, but is more akin to a cheese knife that is a wire under tension.
Wikipedia states that the diameter of a carbon nanotube is in the order of a few nanometers.
But is it a "belief system like every other religion"? ;-)
Hell no!
But more detailed.. I think it depends on emphasis..
trying to say that science is equivalent to religion is disingenuous at best, as is saying that scientific theories are just meaningless theories. Sorry if I've been unclear - I've not been trying to argue that science rests as much on belief as does religion.
Maybe a better way of thinking about it is that religion is a belief system, whereas science is an evidence-based belief system.
Thanks for your post - it's a good way to think about it.
I like the Lao-Tsu parable! :) I'm soon going to read the Tao Te Ching.. haven't got there yet..
"therefore any change to our understanding of the world as such will, ... be a scientific development"
I think we're now debating semantics. I won't argue with what you say ;-) Cheers!
arrogance _and_ moral high-ground. Well done!
care to elaborate further? with what that I've said do you disagree?
Nice. That's a great way to think about it. Cheers! :-)
Yes, but the scientific methodology can only disprove hypotheses - it can never show a theorem to be truth (which is fine, and has worked well for us so far).
There are probably other ways of finding truths about the world that don't fit into your definition of "science". Hopefully in the future we'll find some of them.
Anyway, back to the original point: just because science works for us now doesn't mean it's written into the fabric of the universe as _the_ method of finding truth. Humans haven't always used it. Probably we won't use it forever, but rather will find a better tool.
I think of it as being analogous to
Galileo -> Newton -> Einstein
"Not all scientists use reductionist techniques."
:-)
Good point - but I was just using that as an example. I don't believe reductionism is the only valid scientific method. However, let's run with this for a moment.
A definition for science could be "evidence-based analysis of the world. theory, then experiment" etc.
But maybe in the future, we'll uncover different ways of doing science (eg reductionism vs holism, experimentation vs modelling, triple-blind statistical analysis, analysis of negative results, etc), and discover that the word "science" is really insufficient to cover these different ways of conducting science. It's quite possible that there are truths out there that can only be found by one approach, and until we codify that approach we cannot learn them. This is totally hypothetical, of course!
If that happens in the future (as it has happened in the past), then people will have different ideas about what "science" means. I contend that this can be viewed as a different belief system.
Other posters have said that science is not based on belief. I think that's wrong. I think science is better at describing the world than religion, but I still think it's "just" a belief system - it's just one that's better.
"I suggest that probably your assertions are incorrect.
If that is true, then surely you see your argument has no basis?"
Not quite sure exactly what you mean by this. You don't really provide any argument to convince me that what I'm saying is wrong.
"Why is it necessary to have a "creator" to want to understand the world around us?"
I don't think it's _necessary_, I just don't think it occurred to people to try to systematically analyse the world until they believed in god. Maybe because they believe in a loving, rational god it seemed more likely that the world was rational. Maybe it was that they were interested in god's creation. I don't know, but I reckon it's interesting that the first attempts in science occured at around the same time as the flowering in theology...
"Sentient beings would naturally try to work out the mechanics of the world."
Really? So why did science (as we currently understand it. I'm not really including astronomy here) really only occur in religious societies? My understanding is that science never took off in tribal African society - maybe this was because of the mystical, shaman-based society there...
"Because I've done it and it worked... You can too."
That's true. Science does work. That shows it's more powerful at understanding the world than the previous belief system of mysticism and spirituality. In the future, we'll likely find another belief system that is even more powerful than science as we currently understand it.
For example, in the future we might refer to current science as "reductionism" but decide that because our understanding can be augmented with computer intelligence (whatever), that holistic approaches to understanding are more powerful. That would represent a shift in our belief system
To clarify - I'm not arguing that since is wrong. I'm saying that our understanding of the universe that we glean from science is highly coloured by the age in which we live. Why do you think it is that we so constantly use mechanistic or computer-based analogies for understanding the world?
I guess I'm saying that science is not a wholly objective enterprise, and if we try and pretend that it is, we're deluding ourselves. (I'm doing a PhD in engineering/science - these opinions are based on my observations of academia)
Well, what makes you think that the world can be systematically analysed?
Why is it fundamentally comprehensible by us? Why is the world rational?
Isn't it amazing that the human brain can understand the _concepts_ and _rules_ that govern the world? And can then apply them to new, previously un-encountered situations?
How can an abstract language like mathematics describe real things?
These statements seen natural to us now, but all these ideas are less then about 500 years old, arising around the time of the enlightenment. Previous to this, people thought that gods, magic and spirits controlled the world. They believed in sin and retribution. Pestilence was the wrath of God.
Now we believe in science.
Uhuh.. and who says who gets to be in the "Christian Club"? You? Me? The Pope?
It's like people saying that extremist Muslims aren't really Muslims. Extremist Muslims might say the same thing about moderates!
I think we have to say that anyone who claims to be Christian is Christian, otherwise we'll drown in a sea of bullshit. The problem is that we all want to be able to say "the people in my club are more enlightened than the people in your club." And then it becomes a brand. Think about these statements:
"Catholics are lower class than Protestants"
"Christians are better educated than Muslims"
"Democrats are more enlightened than Republicans"
"Republicans are more moral than Democrats"
etc...
All these ideas have been bandied about at some time, usually by people that want to manipulate others by appealing to their class-consciousness. People are always more tolerant of those they identify with, and it's how leaders manipulate people to go to war, send in the national guard to break strikes, propogate sweat-shop labour, etc..
Don't be a sucker for the branding of people.
>> >> Science is a belief system like any other religion.
>> Actually it isn't.
I'm a firm believer in the power of science, but I disagree with you. Science is a belief system, and is based on the idea that we can take the universe apart and understand it, typically in a reductionist manner.
Every teacher passes on values to their students. Usually this is a combination of their values, and society's values. If you were cynical, you could call this a form of indoctrination, but really, that's what education is to a fair degree. It can help keep society stable, as it prevents a total re-evaluation of society's foundations with every new generation.
The problem here seems to be that this teacher's values are more in line with a minority (of religious wackos) rather than those of greater U.S. society (more pluralistic), and he appears unwilling to teach according to society's values rather than his own.
Not only that, but it is quite reasonable to think of science as having come *from* religion. This is because, it wasn't until people believed in a rational creator, that they systematically tried to understand the mechanics of His creation. Science was originally an attempt to understand that which God had made.
Previous to monotheistic religions, people thought that there were a multitude of gods that affected many things on a day-to-day basis.
"I am saying the vast majority of Islamics are degenerates..."
And I'm saying you're wrong. Do some reading and learn something - don't just believe what you're told.
"It's no different than tribes in Africa murdering each other by the millions."
And of course this is limited to Africa...
Argentina
Niceragura
Congo
Vietnam
Iran
South Africa
Iraq
These are all countries in who's politics the West (usually the USA, but other western countries too - notable the Congo, where the Belgian administrators at one point had a trade in human hands) have meddled, with a destabilising effect. If you read the history of these countries, you'll find that in many of them thousands or millions have died from either political or ethnic persecution, largely as a result of Western interference.
There are many many more countries that could be added to this list...
This is true however the largest connectivity cost is the "last mile" of cable. Once the internet moves from it's present state towards localised mesh-networks, that are interconnected by fiber/whatever, then most of the cost of that last mile disappears.
"false dichotomy" technically true. However, the reality is that spending is prioritised by mind-share. Other renewable techs *are* underfunded, and probably have a better (and earlier) ROI than does fusion power.
"a working, efficient fusion reactor IS a silver energy bullet." No it's not. My understanding is that fusion power is (at least in the near future) going to involve large plants and large output. While a working fusion reactor would be _fantastic_, it wouldn't suit smaller cities, the remote energy needs of industry (i.e mining), or transport.*
Another thing, one of the great virtues of many forms of renewable energy, is that production of energy is distributed. There are many social benefits of not having the government/corporations holding all the strings, in my opinion.
*I know that many renewable energies wouldn't do this either. But I bundle investment in public transport, fuel-cells, energy efficiencies, etc, in with renewable energies when I talk about them having probably a better ROI than fusion reactors.
While I agree with most of your post, I really take exception to this:
... another degenerate culture like most of Africa"
"the middle east would be
It's a very ignorant and arrogant comment. Most of the problems faced in the middle-east and africa are *because* of the resources they have. Resources that the West exploited during the colonial era (19th and early 20th century), and that corporations now exploit.
Part of this exploitation is always to destabilise the country - because a country in anarchy can be more easily controlled and manipulated. Don't try and translate the economic superiority of the West into cultural superiority. It's like saying that Paris Hilton is culturally superior to the Dalai Lama because she's wealthier!
*sigh* did you even read the arguements of these 'hippies', or did you just assume they were a rabble of tree-huggers?
In a world of limited resources (time/money), does it not make sense to prioritise effort to yield the best results per unit of investment? Just because some one disagrees with you about the best way to do this doesn't make them a dogma-driven hippy scumbag (TM). How about you open your own eyes before you sling ad hominums around?
For what it's worth, I think it probably _is_ reasonable to invest in fusion power. But having said that, other forms of renewable energy are _massively_ underfunded, and much progress could be made against climate change by investing a (relative pittance) into these techs. I just wish that narrow-minded people like you* would see that there is not a mysterious energy silver bullet.
*aren't I a hypocrite - here's my own ad hominum
I think you're wrong (and you use a double negative ;-)
Most people are disinterested in history, hence there is no guarantee of a verbal knowledge continuum in the event of widespread hardware failure.
We know that the hardware always eventually fails.
We know that hardware always becomes obsolete.
We know that civilisations always fall.
We also know that these things have happened in the past, resulting in the loss of knowledge (in some cases it was because the language became extinct, and has never been deciphered. In others it was because proper documentation was never made, or was lost, or was destroyed, etc. If you think about archaeology, it only exists because of a _lack_ of documentation. It's trying to piece together data from scattered, incomplete fragments).
The fact that you so easily dismiss this shows a lack of knowledge of history (point 1), and perfectly illustrates that old adage "if there's one thing we can learn form history, it's that we don't learn from history."
I think you're right. Once you replace driver initiative with traffic-lights, you reduce the competancy of drivers, and make them feel like there's no danger.
I'm watching my city (Australia - we drive on the left) as it slowly replaces 'turn left at any time with care,' and 'right turn when safe' lanes with traffic lights at every opportunity. I think it breeds complacence in drivers, and will reduce their ability to deal with unexpected situations if there's not a light or sign to tell them what to do.