On Aug 5, 7:19 am, Jerry Kraus
yahoo.com> wrote:> On Aug 4, 11:22 pm, Immortalist
yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>>> On Aug 4, 2:53 pm, "Chom Noamsky" wrote:
>
>>> "Immortalist"
yahoo.com> wrote in message>
>
>>>> "Immortalist"
yahoo.com> wrote in message:>>>>> Look here is some old "science" fiction; please read this excerpt and
>>>>> tell me if you think that the science is good enough.
>
>>>> All I see is a writer who understands the concept of a four-dimensional
>>>> universe, something which most primary schoolers can also comprehend.
>>>> Beyond that I didn't see any testable scientific theories.
>
>>> It looks like what we have here is "The Problem of the Criterion" and
>>> any criteria presented will be deemed inadequate by you on a slippery
>>> slope that will make all fictional science untrue or to vague. But you
>>> have not presented your criterion see, before you can say how much is
>>> enough or not you need to draw a line in the sand. Please give an
>>> example of how much science is just enough.
>
>>> A general argument against the invocation of any standard for
>>> knowledge has come to be known as "the problem of the criterion." As
>>> we have just seen, there have been disputes about standards of
>>> knowledge. Some are about particular kinds of arguments that provide
>>> evidence for knowledge claims. As we will see shortly, others are
>>> about the degree of evidential support or reliability required for
>>> knowledge. The Pyrrhonian skeptics argued that such disputes cannot be
>>> settled.
>
>>> If the dispute is to be settled rationally, there must be some means
>>> for settling it. It would do no good of each side simply to assert its
>>> position without argument. So how would a standard of knowledge (or
>>> "criterion of truth," in the language of the Stoics) be defended? It
>>> could only be defended by reference to some standard or other. If the
>>> standard under dispute is invoked, then the question has been begged.
>>> If another standard is appealed to, the question arises again, to be
>>> answered either by circular reasoning or by appeal to yet another
>>> standard. So either the process of invoking standards does not
>>> terminate, or it ends in circular reasoning, and thus the dispute over
>>> the standard cannot be settled rationally.
>
>>> -------------------------------
>
>>> I stated my criterion when I said 'testable scientific theories', the key
>>> term here being testable. Eienstien came up with some really whacky
>>> abstract stuff involving mass and energy, and some two decades later we had
>>> nuclear fission. Science put his theories to the test and the proof was
>>> Trinity.
>
>>> Let me ask you a question: in your HG Wells extract, identify the theories
>>> that can be tested by scientific methodology as we know it today. The
>>> obvious big theory here is that arbitrary travel is possible in the 4'th
>>> dimension. Now demonstrate it to me; make it a repeatable and undeniable
>>> truth.
>
>> Time travel wasn't my point. It was the science before that idea was
>> presented, the testable idea of "dimensions" and the theory of four
>> dimensional spacetime. There is a category, or sub-genre of science
>> fiction called hard science fiction which has alot more falsifiable
>> science as a context, even for further wacky sounding ideas about what
>> might be possible.
>
>>> That is the difference between science and science fiction, one is testable
>>> and the other is yet to be testable. Now, clever Jerry might claim that
>>> global warming theories cannot be tested, but they can in simulation with
>>> accurate models and data. We simulate all kinds of complex models and the
>>> predictions are often surprisingly accurate when compared to reality. The
>>> question is to what degree of certainty and how reliable are the
>>> simulations.
>
>> The theory of fictional prose is a testable science itself. I think I
>> see your point, maybe not, are you saying that science fiction should
>> never be a complete replacement for science education? If so I agree.
>> Even a mystery novel has alot of good falsifiable science.
>
>>> Maybe Jerry can read some more science fiction and tell us how much faith we
>>> should put in simulation?- Hide quoted text -
>
>> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> You are, of course, correct Immortalist. There is no clear
> distinction between science and science fiction. And, these days,
> this distinction is more blurred than ever, with the advent of complex
> computer models. I've been arguing for some time, as you are aware,
> for the need for a new concept of metatheoretical analysis which would
> allow objective, systematic, critical evaluations of scientific
> theories, in terms of their utility, testability and accuracy.
> Currently, no distinction is made between excellent models like
> Newton's Laws of Motion, useful but questionable models like Darwin's
> theory of Evolution, and totally confused models like those in Global
> Warming theory. Some meaningful criteria for distinguishing between
> them must be made. Otherwise, much time and money are wasted.
I think when social and physical sciences are compared it is easy to
see how the conflict arises. It has a traditional/historical analog as
well where with the emergence of social science as a discipline there
was conflict with physical scientists;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_Wars
If the social sciences are sometimes criticized as being less
scientific than the natural sciences, in that they are seen as being
less rigorous or empirical in their methods, but economics is a social
science that seeks to analyze and describe the production,
distribution, and consumption of wealth, and many peoples lives are at
stake, I wonder if the less rigorous nature of some sub-genres of
science can be compensated for by other means.
The social sciences are sometimes criticized as being less scientific
than the natural sciences, in that they are seen as being less
rigorous or empirical in their methods. This claim has been made in
the so-called Science Wars and is most commonly made when comparing
social sciences to fields such as physics, chemistry or biology in
which corroboration of the hypothesis is far more incisive with regard
to data observed from specifically designed experiments. Social
sciences can thus be deemed to be largely observational, in that
explanations for cause-effect relationships are largely subjective. A
limited degree of freedom is available in designing the factor setting
for a particular observational study. Social scientists however, argue
against such claims by pointing to the use of a rich variety of
scientific processes, mathematical proofs, and other methods in their
professional literature. Flyvbjerg (2001) has argued that the
discussion of whether natural science is more scientific than social
science is futile; social science is best practiced as phronesis,
whereas natural science is best practiced as episteme, in the
classical Greek meaning of the terms, and both have important if
different roles to play in the production of knowledge in society.
It has been argued that the social world is much too complex to be
studied as one would study static molecules. The actions or reactions
of a molecule or chemical substance are always the same when placed in
certain situations. Humans, on the other hand, are much too complex
for these traditional scientific methodologies. Humans and society do
not have certain rules that always have the same outcome and they
cannot guarantee to react the same way to certain situations.
A third criticism is that social sciences tend to be compromised more
frequently by politics, since results from social science may threaten
certain centers of power in a society, particularly ones which fund
the research institutions. Further, complexity exacerbates the
problems, since observed social data may be the result of factors
which are hard to evaluate in isolation.
Not all institutions recognize some fields listed above as social
sciences or as being only social scientific. Some disciplines have
characteristics of both the humanities, social and natural sciences:
for example some subfields of anthropology, such as biological
anthropology, are closely related to the natural sciences whereas
archaeology and linguistics are social sciences, while cultural
anthropology is very much linked with the humanities. Note that social
science methodologies are being incorporated into so-called hard
science fields like medicine, where a three-legged stool to the
understanding of physical well-being is now emphasized in the medical
curriculum: biological, socio-psychological, and environmental.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_sciences
