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What Causes or Motivates the Anti-scientists?

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
Discovering facts is not science. Constructing and testing hypotheses and theories is science.
I never said that 'discovering facts' was science!
I said that 'FACTS' was science.

EDIT: You see? We discover science, discover facts....... facts exist out there waiting for us to 'discover' them.

The theory that Viagra has specific effects was tested in clinical trials.
The 'FACT' that Viagara has specific effects was discovered by ACCIDENT whilst researching the product in trials for other benefits. Don't try to tell me about this because an acquaintance of mine took part in the tests and experienced the extraordinarily unexpected results.

If you don't think that science is about facts, and theories about facts, then you're going to have a hard time giving me any examples which exclude the above. :)
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
You spent so much time around fakers, you got
to thinking everybody is like that? Too bad.

Maybe you learned to be skeptical of everyone but
yourself, forgetting you are the easiest one to fool.

You call a research pharmacist who was offered a chair at Balliol College, Oxford, a faker?

Now come on, let's see your definition of science if you think you're so able to tell us all.
 

Thermos aquaticus

Well-Known Member
I never said that 'discovering facts' was science!
I said that 'FACTS' was science.

Science is not facts. Science is the activity of applying the scientific method to observations and experiments.

The 'FACT' that Viagara has specific effects was discovered by ACCIDENT whilst researching the product in trials for other benefits.

That's a theory. The fact was that there were statistically significant numbers of people in the Viagra treatment group that reported certain effects as compared to the placebo group.

Don't try to tell me about this because an acquaintance of mine took part in the tests and experienced the extraordinarily unexpected results.

His reported effects are the facts. The hypothesis is that the Viagra caused it.
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
Science is not facts.
Disagree.... :shrug:

His reported effects are the facts. The hypothesis is that the Viagra caused it.
His reported effects are 'The FACT'.
A hypothesis is just that, an idea......... it has not become a Fact, or Science, and may never do so.

I'd hate to read your Witness Statement if you observed a road traffic accident....... :facepalm:
:p


EDIT: I must to bed...... will respond to any posts tomorrow.... :0
 

Milton Platt

Well-Known Member
Let me say at once I do not mean here people who reject just one particular scientific theory or set of facts. The motives of the man or woman who objects only to evolutionary theory or to vaccines can often enough be easily guessed at.

But I'm curious about what I take as both a relatively recent phenomena and a somewhat more difficult one to figure out the causes of. That's what I call in this thread "Anti-science", the rejection not just of one or two scientific theories and sets of facts, but more broadly "anything science".

About the phenomena being recent. I readily grant there have always been people who rejected the sciences, but I think that up until relatively recent times their number and influence was less significant than it is today. For instance, a half century ago, the notion they might influence government policies or how well the sciences were funded and taught in the public schools was easily dismissed. Beyond that, the sciences were on an order of magnitude more respected than they are today. I think that is a fact.

So what causes or motivates the anti-scientists?

I would point first and foremost to the long history in America of deeply rooted anti-intellectualism. But surely, there's more to it than that. That anti-intellectualism is so much stronger today. Why?

Many people point to the cultural changes of the 1960s and 70s that seem so closely associated with the rise of the Baby Boomers. Among other things, they dramatically boosted the popularity of the notion that "truth is relative", sometimes expressed as, "truth is personal" As I understand it, that notion was once more or less confined to fringe intellectuals, but the Baby Boomers mainstreamed it, made it -- if not actually respectable -- then fashionable.

A third often mentioned cause is religious based antagonism to the sciences. But that strikes me as superficial. When you look more closely, you first discover it's not all Christian denominations at fault. The old mainstream denominations have mostly remained pro-science. The antagonism is coming overwhelmingly from only factions of Christianity, such as the Southern Baptists, and the non-denominational churches. Groups that usually identify themselves as Evangelicals.

But I would not stop there. No matter how deeply ingrained is the reflex to "blame the Christians", I think the truth is deeper than "the Christians". Again, looking closely, it becomes undeniable that those Christian groups most opposed to the sciences originate in the culture of the South, which has been the longest and most virulently anti-intellectual section of the country.

And if you really wanted to understand it, you could trace Southern anti-intellectualism back to the South's earliest English settlers, who predominantly came from the Cavalier class of England, a class that favored only educating elites, and then only minimally. So, the notion "it's a Christian thing" strikes me as superficial and poorly informed. It would be more accurate to say Southern Christianity only gave Southern anti-intellectualism its main focus: Evolution.

One last point about the South: Even if what I said is true, the question remains, "Why did Southern anti-intellectualism pick only recently to become so virulent? Any answer to that should mention air conditioning. After WWII, air conditioning made the South more attractive to migrants from other parts of the country such that today four in ten Americans live there. Such a large chunk of people will inevitably have an influence.

However! Least you think it's all nicely decided now, consider this: Is Southern Culture broadly anti-scientific, or only narrowly anti-evolution? I myself think the former, but I believe the latter is still arguable.

Is that enough to explain it? American anti-intellectualism (especially Southern anti-intellectualism) combined with the mainstreaming of thoughtless trash like "truth is relative" by the Baby Boomers?

What do you think?

And beyond that, is there any good chance anti-science will wane in the future? Last puzzle of the day: What caused the Baby Boomers to embrace such a hollow, gutless notion as, "Truth is relative"?

An interesting topic. I'm sure this will be a long thread.
For the most part, the anti-science attitudes are restricted to things that run counter to deeply held religious beliefs, or center around conspiracy theories (I use the term loosely)

It is amusing to note that people who are virulently anti-science are typing their rants into a computer and broadcasting it to a network of other computers over a complex network.
 

exchemist

Veteran Member
Oh yes........ we are a good % of what our pasts built us into....... I wish I could have been a veterinary surgeon or something similar. Here in the UK folks even make bequests to them in their wills. :D
I'm in London myself, though I've never come across that practice. I gather you can see the London Array off Margate where you are. Are you actually in Tracy Emin's home town, then?
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
How do you do science without a hypothesis?
OMG......... it begins to appear that you might possibly be beyond saving....... :D

A Hypothesis is simply any kind of idea....... People ask questions every minute of every day, but ideas and questions do not have to be present for the existence of science.

We have already seen how massive breakthroughs in knowledge have occurred by accident, where no questions or ideas had previously existed, nor any goal been intended as the main objective of a particular area of research..

Why would you think that a witness is doing science?
What on earth do you think a researcher is, as s/he observes an experiment taking place? ....... a Witness.....

I used the car-crash scenario because of my experiences while training people to be event witnesses. Over the years it was discovered that delegates and students on various courses who had introduced themselves as intellectual, clearly holding that characteristic in high regard and importance, were much less capable when it came to watching a simple event take place (they watched a film) and then writing a statement about what they had seen. And in mock courtroom scenarios during question-answer examinations , they 'drowned' in their own complexity. True. That memory popped up ........ :)
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
I'm in London myself, though I've never come across that practice. I gather you can see the London Array off Margate where you are. Are you actually in Tracy Emin's home town, then?
Oh .... Wow........ you're a Brit? I expected that you might be thousands of miles away ........

Tracey Emin? Whenever I think of Artists and Margate I think of Turner and his sunsets.......... I believe that he also had a lover in Margate

I live in Herne Bay, and driving my wife to work along the clifftops at Hampton in bright sunshine and after rainfall, I often catch sight of distant lines of tiny propellers turning, way out in the Estuary, many hundreds of them. The Estuary is huge, and its sands extend far out into the North Sea. There are wind farms established on many of them. There is one directly off Herne Bay on the Kentish flats, so we do realise how massive these turbines really are. I used to sail all over the estuary, even landing on far out sands and turning my boat over to sleep under for an hour or two. If somebody had told me what would be built on those sands one day I don't think that I could have believed them. :)
 

Audie

Veteran Member
You call a research pharmacist who was offered a chair at Balliol College, Oxford, a faker?

Now come on, let's see your definition of science if you think you're so able to tell us all.

Perhaps you dont know how transparent your word games are.

You claim to have had a lot of experience around fakers, I said it might affect your outlook. Suggested you might
try being skeptical of yourself.

Your notion of a clever response?

You cite someone who was offered a job and challenge
me to define science.

Maybe it is not a word game, maybe your thinking really is
just that disorganized.
 

ecco

Veteran Member
For the most part, the anti-science attitudes are restricted to things that run counter to deeply held religious beliefs, or center around conspiracy theories (I use the term loosely)

thumbs-up-sign_1f44d.png
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
Most of what is being called science is not science at all now says.

Everyone believes a bunch of claptrap that isn't true and has no basis in metaphysics, theory, or experiment.

Modern science has deviated from reality because too many are using "logic" and appearances rather than experiment and proper observation.
 

oldbadger

Skanky Old Mongrel!
Perhaps you dont know how transparent your word games are.

You claim to have had a lot of experience around fakers, I said it might affect your outlook. Suggested you might
try being skeptical of yourself.

Your notion of a clever response?

You cite someone who was offered a job and challenge
me to define science.

Maybe it is not a word game, maybe your thinking really is
just that disorganized.

Come on Audie, you claiom to know so much about science, and you claim that science=fact is incorrect.

You were thus invited to give any examples of your science, and all you give is waffle.

I didn't think that you could do it...........
 

Audie

Veteran Member
Come on Audie, you claiom to know so much about science, and you claim that science=fact is incorrect.

You were thus invited to give any examples of your science, and all you give is waffle.

I didn't think that you could do it...........

Evade what is asked of you, and come
up with something new to demand of others.
Your games clearly do amuse you.

"Off thro' the treetops", in this case.
Very undignified.
 
Last edited:

cladking

Well-Known Member

Virtually everything that is called "science" today is in actuality technology, statistics, or advanced mathematics. This cuts across every field from cosmology to meteorology. This isn't to say it is all wrong, merely that it is not scientific and much of it is wrong in part or in whole.

Science has become the new religion whose practitioners are far holier than thou than has ever before been achieved. Anything put forth as an hypothesis becomes gospel until even after it has been shown to be wrong. We live among millions of modern days Gods who write a new reality every day and it's never noticed they are all nude.
 

Audie

Veteran Member
Virtually everything that is called "science" today is in actuality technology, statistics, or advanced mathematics. This cuts across every field from cosmology to meteorology. This isn't to say it is all wrong, merely that it is not scientific and much of it is wrong in part or in whole.

Science has become the new religion whose practitioners are far holier than thou than has ever before been achieved. Anything put forth as an hypothesis becomes gospel until even after it has been shown to be wrong. We live among millions of modern days Gods who write a new reality every day and it's never noticed they are all nude.

Please notice you have given no example, just posted
your feelings.

Anything put forth as an hypothesis becomes gospel until even after it has been shown to be wrong. *

This is such obviously hyperbolic nonsense that there
is no point in asking for an example.


*speaking of gospel, what do you do when something
in "gospel" like say, the flood, is shown to be wrong?
 

exchemist

Veteran Member
How do you do science without a hypothesis?



Why would you think that a witness is doing science?
Actually I think you can do science without a hypothesis. Observing and classifying natural things is part of science, e.g. what used to be called natural history. But obviously the aim is to detect patterns that can yield hypotheses.
 

exchemist

Veteran Member
Virtually everything that is called "science" today is in actuality technology, statistics, or advanced mathematics. This cuts across every field from cosmology to meteorology. This isn't to say it is all wrong, merely that it is not scientific and much of it is wrong in part or in whole.

Science has become the new religion whose practitioners are far holier than thou than has ever before been achieved. Anything put forth as an hypothesis becomes gospel until even after it has been shown to be wrong. We live among millions of modern days Gods who write a new reality every day and it's never noticed they are all nude.
You speak like someone who takes the breathless reports in the newspapers a bit too literally. Dietary fads and so on.
 

Audie

Veteran Member
Actually I think you can do science without a hypothesis. Observing and classifying natural things is part of science, e.g. what used to be called natural history. But obviously the aim is to detect patterns that can yield hypotheses.

As a sometimes-observer of science, not a participant, I get the
idea that most of what goes on is adding data, and the chance to
play hypothesis on any level higher than a "lets try it again at 1
higher temp. and see how it goes" sort of thing is pretty rare.
 
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