What does science do?

[Molybdenum]

After spending a few years surrounded by scientists, it seems to me there are two ways of thinking about scientific pursuits.

The majority view is that science is discovering absolute truths about the universe, or if not, is capable of discovering absolute truths about the universe, perhaps upon the solution of string theory or something similar.

The minority view, which I happen to hold, is that science is building predictive models of a universe that cannot be fully grasped by logical methods. Take physics, for example. Newtonian mechanics works well with low speeds, large objects. Relativity works well with high speeds. Quantum mechanics works well with small objects. It would seem that in each domain different models apply to predict results. Thus science is phenomenally useful in guiding humanity's interactions in the physical world, but may not be capable of encompassing reality the way the majority view would like to think.

Some questions for debate along these lines:
Will we ever see a smallest particle, an absolute limit? What would it look like?

String theory postulates that everything is comprised of strings vibrating in an 11-d or 26-d space. What do these strings consist of? What kind of scientific theory would explain why we have strings in the first place, or why they vibrate in this metric space, or why there exists a space within which they vibrate?

If we go down small enough, mass and energy start looking very similar. If mass is just compressed energy, what is energy? We can come up with a predictive description of how it will behave (either wave or particle depending on the situation), but what does that tell us about what it is?

 

[lifeisforliving]

What does science do?

It has developed the most thorough and "trustworthy" method of examining the world around us. It tells us the how, we need to figure out the why. Hell, science may figure out the why too, we just don't know yet.

It will be utterly shocking if/when science figures out the "Theory of Everything". The reconciliation of newtonian physics and quantum mechanics (or something beneath). It may still not tell us why, but it will give the ultimate foundation for building the "why".

Science merely gives us solid platforms for further research but in doing so it frees us from the often circular logic of religion.

Will we ever see a smallest particle, an absolute limit? What would it look like?

String theory postulates that everything is comprised of strings vibrating in an 11-d or 26-d space. What do these strings consist of? What kind of scientific theory would explain why we have strings in the first place, or why they vibrate in this metric space, or why there exists a space within which they vibrate?

If we go down small enough, mass and energy start looking very similar. If mass is just compressed energy, what is energy? We can come up with a predictive description of how it will behave (either wave or particle depending on the situation), but what does that tell us about what it is?

Well string theory talks about 'branes and 'strings'. I find it fascinating. I think quantum mechanics is giving us a window to view "that world". The seeming impossibility of Schrodinger's cat is but a simple example. Obviously it defies conventional logic. There must be SOME information passing between the two "cats" yes? And if so, how?

I also found that the idea (from string theory also correct?) that gravity is weaker in our 3D space because it is the only force that travels/connects all/most dimensions?

 

[Slaughterhousefive42]

Science forces our society to advance with technology and reason. It is the reason we live longer, the reason we know about evolution, the reason we question reality...It is part of any intelligent beings daily life- asking why and how about the world around him.

 

[Slaughterhousefive42]

Urgent Announcement: Rijo Kilor, a physicist at the CERN collider in Switzerland, stumbled onto the theory of everything. The key: all of our information is encoded in subjective nonsense that only humans can understand. It doesn't matter what happens when you shoot little quantum balls at each other. Like smashing clocks to figure out how they work. It is a collosal waste of money, and utter baloney. Humankind has bigger threats than the names of theoretical strings, irrelevant inventions of our consciousness. The theory of everything is that we already know enough to save the frigging world, but we don't.

 

[heliospan]

Science is doing the exact same thing poetry is doing.

 

[Slaughterhousefive42]

^^I would disagree. Poetry has been around for ages, only lately has science stopped the spread of preventable diseases with vaccines. It has lengthend our life span. It has connected humans on a global scale.

So maybe poetry and science both contribute positively to human society, but I would not say "they are doing the same exact thing."

 

[Acidfiend]

Urgent Announcement: Rijo Kilor, a physicist at the CERN collider in Switzerland, stumbled onto the theory of everything. The key: all of our information is encoded in subjective nonsense that only humans can understand. It doesn't matter what happens when you shoot little quantum balls at each other. Like smashing clocks to figure out how they work. It is a collosal waste of money, and utter baloney. Humankind has bigger threats than the names of theoretical strings, irrelevant inventions of our consciousness. The theory of everything is that we already know enough to save the frigging world, but we don't.

Thats quite a powerful assessment of the situation.

 

[Molybdenum]

It doesn't matter what happens when you shoot little quantum balls at each other. Like smashing clocks to figure out how they work. It is a collosal waste of money, and utter baloney.

The uses of pure science often take decades to become apparent. There was a specific type of math (damn, I can't remember what now) that laid around for 70 years until someone somehow figured out it was the most efficient way to control troop movements in world war II. Maybe those experiments will someday provide us with a new energy source, or anti-gravity capacity, or faster than light travel. Who knows? The budget for pure science is such a small portion of what we spend our money on, and the potential benefits of a breakthrough are so large, that I think there's no way we can avoid it. Of course I have a vested interest since I'm a scientist myself.

It has developed the most thorough and "trustworthy" method of examining the world around us. It tells us the how, we need to figure out the why. Hell, science may figure out the why too, we just don't know yet.

Hmmm... this is kind of a good alternate version of what I think I was trying to ask: do you think science can figure out the why? Why or why not?

 

[thursday]

The majority view is that science is discovering absolute truths about the universe, or if not, is capable of discovering absolute truths about the universe, perhaps upon the solution of string theory or something similar.

i think that most scientists will concede that there isn't absolute certainty in science and scientific facts are thus never absolute. there is always a slight chance that a new discovery will come along and revisions will have to be made on previously accepted scientific models. so i would describe science simply as the fulfillment of man's insatiable desire for knowledge.

The minority view, which I happen to hold, is that science is building predictive models of a universe that cannot be fully grasped by logical methods. Take physics, for example. Newtonian mechanics works well with low speeds, large objects. Relativity works well with high speeds. Quantum mechanics works well with small objects. It would seem that in each domain different models apply to predict results. Thus science is phenomenally useful in guiding humanity's interactions in the physical world, but may not be capable of encompassing reality the way the majority view would like to think.

science is built on logical deductions and empirical observations, and has been able to reveal much about the way the our universe works, so how can you say that our universe cannot be fully grasped by logical methods? what are the alternatives? religion?

also, relativity works equally well with objects moving at low speeds as it does with objects moving at high speeds. it expands on newtonian physics by stating that reference frames are relative thus can be used interchangeably to arrive at the same answers. it doesn't really apply to a different domain than newtonian physics. and quantum mechanics is exactly what the name implies. subatomic particles are influenced by forces of different magnitudes than larger objects. there is no logical inconsistency between quantum physics and non-quantum physics.

i'm not quite sure what you mean by "encompassing" reality but scientific observations and models have done a pretty reliable job at explaining how our universe works. there really is no other way of ascertaining knowledge or truth other than by "logical methods." some forms of knowledge such as that concerning the metaphysical world require a priori knowledge rather than phenomenal observations. but sound logic and reasoning is still always required to synthesize new knowledge.

 

[PGTips]

It doesn't matter what happens when you shoot little quantum balls at each other.

If someone hadn't been doing that for about 100 years we'd have no electronics, no nuclear power, almost understanding of the subatomic at all, and much of our technology is based on the very small.

When you look at something, you "see it" because "little quantum balls" smash into the object, get altered slightly and then thrown back out, into your eyes and your brain inteprets the data as "Its a keyboard", "Its a clock", "Its my own hand". Our sense of sight is based on "shooting little quantum balls at one another".

 

[Slaughterhousefive42]

Science is an invention, just like poetry.

Alphanumeric, you are quite right. Much of our technology is based on the very small. But when people start talking about the purely mathematical and presently untestable string theory, it seems well beyond our scale of understanding. I would argue quantum mechanics dictates that once we go to 10^-20 meters or so, it is impossible to know if we have invented the perception of a particle trail/wave/energy we assert to see. We make up names for everything and separate everything, which has its benefits for atoms, molecules, and above, but below the quarks/neutrinos, everything is so interchangable and entangled. It is like the bose condesate, a state of matter in which the atoms are in the same quantum state, and therefore can conduct energy at almost 100% efficiency.

I would also argue now as we have broken below the subatomic realm, into baryons, muons, neutrinos, it is interesting, but not immediately important.
Resources IMO would be better spent on engineering and fashioning nanotechnologies to benefit the global community NOW, providing food, clean water, and shelter for all.
Our sense of sight is based on shooting little quantum balls at each other. Yet our sight can be fooled quite easily- think optical illusions or magicians.
Of course I cannot argue to stop contemporary physics research- I would be taken for a fool and anti-progress. All I am saying is that our knowledge of science is more than sufficient to save the world, yet scientists around the world fight to win status/abstract sex by inventing the "theory of everything," after being brainwashed by the industrial establishment.

There are four fundamental forces we need be concerned with. Electromagnetic, Weak, Strong, and Gravity.
The first three forces have been unified as one, it is only a matter of time before a lucky scientists unifies them all, and then we will have a fun theory on a piece of paper which does NOTHING for most of humanity.
All is one. One rule. One information. One constraint. One force. One love...

 

[PGTips]

Resources IMO would be better spent on engineering and fashioning nanotechnologies to benefit the global community NOW, providing food, clean water, and shelter for all.

I agree that the world would be a better place if certain areas had their resources funnelled elsewhere. However, I think that science and the pursuit of knowledge is a worthwhile area of interest, I'm not saying its more important than feeding and clothing every person, but still important non-the-less. Certainly more important than the billions (possibly trillions) of dollars a year pumped into war budgets around the world. If for just 1 year every country spent their national defence budget on AIDS, Cancer, Nanotechnology, Food/Water reclemation systems etc I imagine the benefit to mankind would be enormous. Unfortunately distrust between everyone is too great.

Even now, the development of nanotechnology, laser/plasma technology and even somewhere as "mathsy" as number theory are being paid for in the vast part by militaries to develop better armour, better weapons and better codes.

Our sense of sight is based on shooting little quantum balls at each other. Yet our sight can be fooled quite easily- think optical illusions or magicians.

Those are not tricks of light, but "slight of hand", where your attention is drawn away from the card/ball/whatever and your concious mind isn't paying attention. Your eyes see, your mind does not.

All I am saying is that our knowledge of science is more than sufficient to save the world, yet scientists around the world fight to win status/abstract sex by inventing the "theory of everything," after being brainwashed by the industrial establishment.

I think thats dangerous ground. If science should be halted (or at least slowed) then what about culture? Art, music, poetry? They too are distractions from "saving the world".

Our current understanding of the universe is pretty good, however who is to know that the next development in, say, solid state physics won't yeild ideas which means we can build cheap room temperature super conductors meaning a revolution in power generation and distrubution? Thats why I think plowing money into such areas is a good thing. String Theory is on shaky ground in that respect, but then I'm sure people first said that about Relativity, now it's used to correct our GPS system. Hell, they said that about the electron. At a meal at Cambridge University shortly after Thompson discovered the electron, he made a toast "To the electron, may it never be useful" (or words to that effect). Now look how much the electron is in our lives? You never know what the next scientific advancement could yeild.

Weapons Research and the billions spent on it, you do know. It'll result in having $50 billion nukes sitting in a launch site (hopefully never to be used). I hope you can see my point that while there are better things out there to put money into than the latest particle accelerator, but then there are countless things better than weapons research

 

[Cex]

I would say that both viewpoints in the original post are wrong.

There are no absolute truths in science - to claim that would be akin to lowering (or raising!) science to a religion, which it emphatically is not. Science is about building ever more accurate models of the world we live in - whether you think we're doing that to further our understanding, to improve our quality of life or just to get rich. But as thursday pointed out, proceeding by logical means is the only way to make scientific progress. If you're not proceeding by logical means then you're making speculations and guesses - you're not doing science any more, but practising religion.

Slaughterhousefive, you're correct when you say that a theory of everything wouldn't immediately benefit everyone - or even necessarily benefit anyone, ever. However, it would increase our understanding and awareness about the universe we inhabit. Do you not consider that a worthy aim, even if there are no tangible benefits?

It's true that there are a lot of things more immediately useful that we could be spending the money on. But in all fairness, if we were all to unite under a common banner of humanity and give up personal greed for a bit, we could solve many of the world's problems and still have more than enough resources to continue scientific research. It's not science which is preventing solutions to society's problems; it's society itself.

Edit: Very good post, Alpha

 

[Slaughterhousefive42]

Visual illusions and hallucinogens show that our perception pick up different patterns of information, different ways our consciousness define the surrounding reality.

Cez, Of course I believe our understand and awareness are of the utmost importance. My argument was simply that scientists toil under the banner of industrial achievement impressed upon them by the military/industrial establishment.
And although I believe ultimate scientific knowledge is important, I would be willing to bet the billions living on a dollar a day would rather have food, medicine, shelter, health care- all of which could be provided fifty years ago.
We should not stop our progression of peaceful, forward-thinking science, but under the banner of "we're not there yet," it should not be a hinderance to positive action.
Alpha, military research above all is wasteful and dangerous, as you said, and its cancerous effects must be stopped if humans shall survive and prosper.
Cez, it is not science that is preventing solutions to society's problems, it is society itself, surely! We need a social, political, and economic revolution! A holistic solution...
However, instead of staying trapped in the current "lack of understanding" of the universe, we should assume all will eventually be revealed in the future, and act to improve the world with the exponentially evolving knowledge we have.
Its like Rumsfeld said (hate to quote him, but...)- you go to war with the army you have, not the army you want to have or think you have.
Science and knowledge and peace need to become the moral equivalent of war. I shudder at the thought of more scientists working for the man to develop better death weapons, thats why I say why don't we employ what we know now instead of waiting for the future when we will know the "theory of everything."

 

[lifeisforliving]

However, instead of staying trapped in the current "lack of understanding" of the universe, we should assume all will eventually be revealed in the future, and act to improve the world with the exponentially evolving knowledge we have.
Its like Rumsfeld said (hate to quote him, but...)- you go to war with the army you have, not the army you want to have or think you have.
Science and knowledge and peace need to become the moral equivalent of war. I shudder at the thought of more scientists working for the man to develop better death weapons, thats why I say why don't we employ what we know now instead of waiting for the future when we will know the "theory of everything."

Well said. I think it should be considered why it is easier to build a particle accelerator than it is to feed the world's poor? Is there even hope of changing the world to a more enlightened (wise) state of being? Look at how slowly democracy has progressed (not that that is the pinnacle of our quest for the best government, but it's a start), look how many billions can't read yet.

I hate to sound like a downer but we don't even know how to start to bring about world peace - a 'Theory of Everything" or just continued scientific discovery should be continued for the simple reason is we don't even know how to START the "feed the world" project.

I think that the fact that science keeps progressing is a testiment to how far a fairly unbiased/testable method of living can take us.

It looks at this point that geo-political democracy is our "method" to improve society so far - and it appears much more prone to corruption and regression than the scientific method does.

Maybe we need the equilalent of the Theory of Everything for how to run society? aka "The Theory of Society".

 

[Cex]

Its like Rumsfeld said (hate to quote him, but...)- you go to war with the army you have, not the army you want to have or think you have.
Science and knowledge and peace need to become the moral equivalent of war. I shudder at the thought of more scientists working for the man to develop better death weapons, thats why I say why don't we employ what we know now instead of waiting for the future when we will know the "theory of everything."

What I'm taking from this (stop me if I'm wrong) is that you see the attitude of science as one of:

"We're working for a better tomorrow - if we're allowed to continue our research now, then in the future we'll be able to use it to improve the quality of living for everyone on earth."

Whereas actually we have the technology available now to improve the quality of life of everyone on earth - we're just not using it. Ever heard of Buckminster-Fuller, of bucky ball fame? His dream was cheap, easily-assembled accommodation for every singe person on the earth, and he laid out an achievable, cost-effective scheme to do this. But it never happened, because the countries with the resources to implement it were too greedy.

If that's what you're saying, I agree with you. But that's not a reason to stop scientific research. I think that the big thing to realise is that new, cutting-edge research into quasi-metaphysical areas are not mutually exclusive to bringing about change for the greater good.

 

[heliospan]

^^I would disagree. Poetry has been around for ages, only lately has science stopped the spread of preventable diseases with vaccines. It has lengthend our life span. It has connected humans on a global scale.

So maybe poetry and science both contribute positively to human society, but I would not say "they are doing the same exact thing."

I didn't mean it like that. I meant to say that science does the same type of thing as poetry because it is poetry. Science is underdetermined. "Science is metaphor."

 

[PGTips]

I don't get what you mean by "metaphor"? Do you mean it attempts to give a possible intepretation of reality that fits with that we see, but might not infact be the underlying truth?

 

[Slaughterhousefive42]

Heliospan, I agree science is a metaphor in that humans have invented it to approximate reality as best we can.
Cex, you seem agree with me. I'm not saying stop any research except for on death-weapons. I just believe we have the knowledge, power, and potential to revolutionalize the world with the "pretty good" understanding of the world and ourselves, its just a matter of taking the power from the upper elite who fuck everyone else over so they can hoard billions of dollars in their personal bank, have 10 cars, 5 houses, 20 slaves, etc.

We can take energy from the sun and wind, water from the clouds and oceans, to provide for the whole globe. We can teach people how to farm if they don't know how.
All people need is water, food, basic medicine, clothing, and shelter. If we provide this for everyone, our global economy will benefit in the long and short term.

 

[pa..]

math....

It's an abstraction. As in.... outside of what is real. You will never find a perfect circle anywhere in nature. You won't find a straight line in the universe, yet science is all based off of math. How much can perfect math teach you about an imperfect universe?

Only so much....