Learn from the mistakes of others

While on the one hand I agree with this guy - this is where the whole notion of science as negotiable came from. The religious right is using these ideas to push their anti-evolution agenda as we speak.

But on the other I can see the point of the whole hegemony argument in some circumstances. It is very relevant to the "soft sciences" (like psychology, for example), where some disciplines dress themselves up as hard science, thus obscuring the weakness of their methods and adding undeserved authority to their theories. Whenever these criticisms came up in some of my subjects I would point out that many of the complaints about methods made by those who criticise science would be made by propper scientists too (when looking at the same dodgy research). These philosophers are probably in some cases drawing their criticisms of science via the social sciences rather than directly from, say, physics.

On top of that, it's a relevant criticism when you are studying something that often doesn't fit well into an empiricist model - such as human behaviour. In an attempt to create a truly rigorous scientific experiment you can exclude so many "confounding" factors as to render your results meaningless - some areas of psychology are very poorly suited to the most rigorous of laboratory studies.

This leads some people who are overly enamoured with traditional scientific methods to decide that the only options are to ignore that area of study all together, or conduct research that's excluded a bunch of confounding variables while making the circumstances of the experiment so bizzare that the people involved in them act in ways they never would in normal circumstances (the catch 22 of studying human behaviour).

Of course, what researchers in this area are really trying to do is not abandon the scientific method (they still want to gain facts about a situation, rather than just make stuff up) but rather to develope new scientific methods that are most appropriate to their particular discipline - that get the most accurate possible results (in a way that is actually practical to implement). Virtually no study of human behaviour is anywhere near perfect. It's alsways a trade off between one thing and another.

Let us also not forget that science has been used as a tool for justifying opression in the past. Australian Aboriginals were designated a lower order of intelligent life. Masturbation was "known", by leading doctors of the early 20th century, to be bad for your health. Homosexuality was considered a mental disorder until 1975. You can "prove" that African Americans are less intelligent that White Americans with IQ tests today. Those scientists concerned with nice abstract research don't encounter these power games, or see them for what they are. It's where science interacts with any study of humanity that the power games begin. The protestations of impartiality made by hard scientists in some respect add to the weight of spurious claims dressed as science.

Of course, this whole debate suffers from the problem of ignorance on all levels. Real scientists know that today's well supported theory may well be superceded by something else tomorrow. They accept that scientific study is a process that refines and revisitis ideas constantly. Unfortunately the lay person can't seem to find a grey area between definitely absolutely true and total utter falsehood. It's no good trying to explain to them that "Pretty definitely true, with lots of supporting evidence" is as close to "totally true" as we get. Or that if "Pretty definitely true with lots of supporting evidence is OK", it doesn't follow that "I just made this up" is somehow just as good. It's either black and white, or there is no objective fact at all and all ideas carry equal weight as "truths". Which is utter bollocks. Of course, many philosophers of science are essentially lay people. They end up with that "all is relative" mindset, flavoured with a bit of sociology, and a bit of Marx and a bit of Foucault, without reference to any kind of practical reality.

OK, that rant is long enough now. Your posts always make me want to write essays. :-)

We know we're fallible. actually, we tend ot count on it. it's one reason we like ot publish and have our peers examine our work.

it's the bean-counters and the sociopaths who fuck things up.

there is a storng tradition of public science in the english-speaking world. unfortunately most people's sceintific education stops in middle school, and either lack of curiosity or lack of 'opportunity' prevents them from engaging with science.

technology is easier. you go to the shop and buy some. you just have to figure out how to use it.

science requires you to think, to learn how things work and why they fit together the way they do.

in our current culture of economic imperative, the *why* of things is replaced with *what for*.

it's hard enogh doing science these days, without having to educate the mundanes as well. there are plenty of sources for kepeing up with science, you just have to do some regular reading. which is too hard for most people in this tv oriented culture.

scientists are *portrayed* as being elitist, by the very people trying to replace them with theocracies and ideologies. very few scientists are unapproachable - but most are trying to get things done while having to justify it to bean-counters and non-scientific administrators.

science for it's own sake is no longer possible. there *has* to be some identifiable "benefit" or "product" at the end of it.

most of the really big leaps in technology, including medicine, have been pure flights of fancy - or worse, complete accidents - that turned out to be damn useful.

those making money and wielding power are doing so with ideologies - deliberately confounding matters with propaganda tricks. scientists are not necessarily well equipped ot play stupid political games with fucktards like that - but they're giving it a good go nonetheless.

they're not getting as much press as the evangelicals because cold hard reality is not as exciting as fantasy.