How reliable is science? (The limitations of science)

by dhw, Wednesday, April 11, 2012, 13:33 (4607 days ago)

TONY (under Proteins, Apes & Us): I remember debates about the missing link from my childhood. My take on it was not "What is the missing link?", but rather, "Is there a missing link at all?"-This is the problem I have with Evolutionary theory and fundamentalist creationist alike: If you are looking at the data with the intention of proving a theory, you will find the proof you are looking for, regardless of whether or not it proves anything or has any explanatory power.-Evolutionary biology looks at hominid and ape specimens, but recent and ancient, looking to prove evolution. So, that is the evidence that they find. Creationist look at those same specimens looking to prove creation, so that is what they find. My understanding of science was that the process was supposed to occur somewhat in reverse. You look at the data without blinkers and blinders, and build a hypothesis based on what you find. Then you try to DISPROVE that hypothesis, not prove it. Science today seems to work the other way around. They come up with a hypothesis, perhaps based on data, perhaps on someone elses interpretation of data, or perhaps based on a personal agenda, and then try to PROVE that hypothesis instead of disprove it.-Not for the first time, I find myself very much in sympathy with Tony's post, and it raises huge issues. Already people have talked about the pressure on scientists to produce results, which may well result in premature publication, misleading statistics, suppression of anti-Establishment views etc., but I'd like to go a little further. In our much lamented epistemological thread, most of us agreed to distinguish between absolute truth (unattainable), knowledge (general consensus), and belief (individual). The range of human activities is now so vast that we rely totally on so-called experts to provide us with information which we cannot possibly check for ourselves. But we know from almost every domain affecting our lives that there is not even a general consensus ... think of the conflicting views we get from politicians, economists, educationalists, sociologists, lawyers etc. Quite often, these people also create a language of their own, which ensures that the layman remains dependent (at least until the catastrophic results destroy his trust!).-Science is no different. In my view there's no doubt that science is best equipped to explain the material workings of the universe, but scientists inevitably bombard us with information which the layman cannot challenge. However, on how many theories is there a general consensus? Evolution, big bang, dark energy, multiverse, string theory....I do believe that evolution has happened, in the sense that all organisms have descended from other organisms. But I have not understood how the mechanisms work, and I remain sceptical about random mutations and gradualism. This is a branch of science which I can understand reasonably well, and so when an expert like Dawkins talks nonsense I feel able to challenge him (though I'm delighted when I get the support of professionals). But most of the time, I'm forced to take information on trust, and even the most recent history of science shows that this is unwise. -For instance, Tony raised the issue of dating techniques. (I googled this, and got some interesting information which I shan't show my wife!) How can we possibly be certain that Filler's Ugandan vertebrae are 21 million years old? The mind can barely encompass that sort of time scale ... let alone figures like 13.75 billion years (big bang), 5 billion years (Earth), 3.4 billion years (life on Earth). Google different websites and you will get different figures, but they are generally around the same, give or take a meagre (hundred) million years or so. Now correct me if I'm wrong, but is there ANY method of dating that does not rely on certain factors being constant? And how on Earth can we be sure that over all these thousands of millions of years, there have been any such constants? -You may argue that we must take what we can get, which of course most of us do, but Tony's scepticism seems to me to be a very apt warning. We shouldn't take information on trust, especially when it's used to promote agendas which cannot be verified. And that applies to science just as it applies to so-called sacred texts: in both cases, the information is all too often suspect, and so is the interpretation of the information. I'm sure Xenophanes would agree!