What Causes or Motivates the Anti-scientists?

[Thermos aquaticus]

I wrote:-
What, sitting in caves in a clean World, with clean air, and not living up to our necks in pollution and filth caused by..... science?

Pollution is caused by humans. There is nothing in science that tells us what we should or shouldn't do. We can decide to use science to build nuclear reactors to provide clean energy, or we can use science to build nuclear bombs and drop them on people. That decision is ours as humans. Science doesn't make those decisions for us. Science can only tell us what the consequences of our actions will be, not what actions to take.

 

[exchemist]

Anybody with internet access and an ounce of investigative science in their being would have discovered all about that in about five minutes.
You let yourself down in a simple test.


A perfect example of dismissive denial.
'Scientists' told us how much cleaner diesels were, and then we found out the devious deceptions, and now, frankly, you don't care.

And I expect that if a modern building in California falls in an earthquake you'll do exactly the same thing..... after promoting the wonders of modern building science you'll 'frankly not care'.

Shallow.......


Wrong........ a total deception, that.
I just don't cling to everything that is claimed to be science, like you probably do.


Don't tell me what my mindset is........
I'm all for trying and learning, I just don't present all research as 'scientific', a much misused term to bamboozle bafoons.
You're not one of those, are you?


What, sitting in caves in a clean World, with clean air, and not living up to our necks in pollution and filth caused by..... science?
Me? No! Never! But come to think of it, since this Earth could become uninhabitable at some point, all through such wonderful 'scientific' developments in the last couple of centuries, many future humans might quite like that idea!

I bet you drove a diesel !! Yeah.... you never denied it!

If nothing else, you have given us eloquent testimony in answer to the question originally posed in this thread.

What we should now be doing is not arguing with you but analysing your replies, I think. There is food for thought there.

For a start there is anger against the adverse side effects of technology. And there is a feeling of having been misled, by theories that are later shown to be false. And maybe too a feeling that modern industrial society has become pointlessly complicated...or is that reading too much into what you say, I wonder?

 

[oldbadger]

I like the modern world of today than the cave world of the neolithic. I have no hope of surviving there, being not physically strong and also genetically shortsighted. That civilization advances, of which science and technology is a part, has improved the lot of humans can be seen by the population of humans today compared to the neolithic. Our focus is now slowly shifting from us and only us to other non-human living things that live with us as a whole. If technological and scientific advances are not stopped due to some unforeseen catastrophe, I am certain that solutions towards ensuring flourishing natural ecosystems will also be found and implemented. The development of solar, wind turbine based electricity, electric cars, greater recycling capabilities are swiftly making a difference on this front. So is biotechnology that is making it possible to increase food production while decreasing resource consumption. But, at the end of the day, science, like everything is a tool. If you misuse a tool, then negative consequences will necessarily accrue. Bit like fire. You can use it to cook or heat or provide light at night, or you can use it to burn cities down (like Nero). Scientific knowledge is no different.

Agreed.
Where I live, hundreds and hundreds of wind-turbines can be seen all across the Thames Estuary, and off Margate (England) is a huge wind-farm called the London Array.

Of course, my point on this thread has not been about science (= truth or knowledge) but about non-science which mankind previously has embraced or is embracing for the worst.

When folks tell me that a proposal is 'science', I don't necessarily believe them. Also I have found that the intellectually arrogant often have gone astray over the differences. I don't mean you.

 

[oldbadger]

Pollution is caused by humans. There is nothing in science that tells us what we should or shouldn't do. We can decide to use science to build nuclear reactors to provide clean energy, or we can use science to build nuclear bombs and drop them on people. That decision is ours as humans. Science doesn't make those decisions for us. Science can only tell us what the consequences of our actions will be, not what actions to take.

Fair enough........... but we've made some cripplingly sorry decisions, of course.

The biggest problem as I see it can occur when we think that we've found some scientific breakthrough, such as medication to control Epilepsy (wonderful) but we didn't find enough science about that breakthrough, and many thousands of children are born with clubbed feet, spina-bifida, hydrocephalus, and worse because such medications were prescribed for pregnant mothers (horrific). That's the problem...... we need massive humility about our science rather than arrogance or pride, don't you think?

 

[oldbadger]

If nothing else, you have given us eloquent testimony in answer to the question originally posed in this thread.

What we should now be doing is not arguing with you but analysing your replies, I think. There is food for thought there.

For a start there is anger against the adverse side effects of technology. And there is a feeling of having been misled, by theories that are later shown to be false. And maybe too a feeling that modern industrial society has become pointlessly complicated...or is that reading too much into what you say, I wonder?

Very good assessment.....,.

Yes..... I think you've got it...... I think you've nailed it, or rather my feelings about those who claim to be scientists, or intellectuals. Today these titles are almost necessary fashionable accessories, but are quite as strange to me as, say, expensive torn jeans!

 

[exchemist]

Very good assessment.....,.

Yes..... I think you've got it...... I think you've nailed it, or rather my feelings about those who claim to be scientists, or intellectuals. Today these titles are almost necessary fashionable accessories, but are quite as strange to me as, say, expensive torn jeans!

Oh dear. I'm afraid I claim to be scientist by temperament and by training, if not a practising one. I have to say I've never thought being a scientist was remotely fashionable. When I was at university, people joked about us having spots and bad haircuts and putting pens in our breast pockets. And I've always found it a bit of conversation-killer socially. But I'm too old to give a Dutch how'syerfather these days.

 

[oldbadger]

Oh dear. I'm afraid I claim to be scientist by temperament and by training, if not a practising one. I have to say I've never thought being a scientist was remotely fashionable. When I was at university, people joked about us having spots and bad haircuts and putting pens in our breast pockets. And I've always found it a bit of conversation-killer socially. But I'm too old to give a Dutch how'syerfather these days.

OK.......... I know a medical guy who, like you, is a scientist. He refused a chair at Baliol College in order to work on a program for GPs to more accurately diagnose and prescribe for diabetics.

But because many sciences are so inexact, I do take a lot of such claims (by such folks) with a pinch of salt.

In fact religion, or should I say spirituality, if coupled with science, this might make a more beneficial balance of all, because religion on its own produces such self-righteous judgement, and science on its own can produce its own kind of monstrosities.

I like neither extremes, but welcome both moderations.

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

The biggest problem as I see it can occur when we think that we've found some scientific breakthrough, such as medication to control Epilepsy (wonderful) but we didn't find enough science about that breakthrough, and many thousands of children are born with clubbed feet, spina-bifida, hydrocephalus, and worse because such medications were prescribed for pregnant mothers (horrific). That's the problem...... we need massive humility about our science rather than arrogance or pride, don't you think?

Let's look at this from a different angle. How did we discover that specific medications caused birth defects? That would be a scientific discovery, would it not?

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

OK.......... I know a medical guy who, like you, is a scientist. He refused a chair at Baliol College in order to work on a program for GPs to more accurately diagnose and prescribe for diabetics.

But because many sciences are so inexact, I do take a lot of such claims (by such folks) with a pinch of salt.

In fact religion, or should I say spirituality, if coupled with science, this might make a more beneficial balance of all, because religion on its own produces such self-righteous judgement, and science on its own can produce its own kind of monstrosities.

I like neither extremes, but welcome both moderations.

Humans cause monstrosities, not science. It's a bit like blaming WW II on the guns. Science is just a tool, nothing more and nothing less.

 

[Polymath257]

Oh dear. I'm afraid I claim to be scientist by temperament and by training, if not a practising one. I have to say I've never thought being a scientist was remotely fashionable. When I was at university, people joked about us having spots and bad haircuts and putting pens in our breast pockets. And I've always found it a bit of conversation-killer socially. But I'm too old to give a Dutch how'syerfather these days.

Try being a mathematician. Now *that's* a conversation-killer! The typical response" "Oh, I was never any good at math.". Almost spoken with pride.

 

[Earthling]

In some fashion we would have to define science. Panspermia and Evolution were speculated upon by the likes of Anaximander, Anaxagoras, Empedocles and Aristotle. Was this science or philosophy? Was Aquinas and even Newton scientist? The alchemists that begat the chemists? The theory of evolution I was taught as fact in school 30 years ago is n o longer fact just as that taught in schools today as fact wont be facts any more 20 years from now.

Then you have the mad scientist on the hill, from Frankenstien to South Park's Dr. Alphonse Mephesto. Then the Nazi scientists that were so fond of Eugenics that come over here to work on the atom bomb and space program. I think they have their own Youtube channel don't they?

For some strange reason people on the religious side fear science can compete with their God? Nonsense. Xenophobia and superstition. At the same time science minded atheists, who have never in their lives successfully reproduced the results of a study, tout science as some Utopian answer to man's problems when in fact science is subject to the same problems and corruptions. As if it were incapable of being subject to those imperfections. See Adam Ruins Science

Mostly though, it's the arrogance. Real science is the modern day version of the Inquisition.

 

[oldbadger]

Let's look at this from a different angle. How did we discover that specific medications caused birth defects? That would be a scientific discovery, would it not?

Like a car crash, you mean?

 

[Subduction Zone]

In some fashion we would have to define science. Panspermia and Evolution were speculated upon by the likes of Anaximander, Anaxagoras, Empedocles and Aristotle. Was this science or philosophy? Was Aquinas and even Newton scientist? The alchemists that begat the chemists? The theory of evolution I was taught as fact in school 30 years ago is n o longer fact just as that taught in schools today as fact wont be facts any more 20 years from now.

Then you have the mad scientist on the hill, from Frankenstien to South Park's Dr. Alphonse Mephesto. Then the Nazi scientists that were so fond of Eugenics that come over here to work on the atom bomb and space program. I think they have their own Youtube channel don't they?

For some strange reason people on the religious side fear science can compete with their God? Nonsense. Xenophobia and superstition. At the same time science minded atheists, who have never in their lives successfully reproduced the results of a study, tout science as some Utopian answer to man's problems when in fact science is subject to the same problems and corruptions. As if it were incapable of being subject to those imperfections. See Adam Ruins Science

Mostly though, it's the arrogance. Real science is the modern day version of the Inquisition.

I see that you have no clue when it comes to the sciences and are still willing to rely on liars like Berlinski.

Why are you so afraid to ask proper questions? It appears that your faith is weak and that you know that you are wrong. A person that knows that he is correct does not have to rely on such improper methods.

 

[oldbadger]

Humans cause monstrosities, not science. It's a bit like blaming WW II on the guns.

I was never actually moaning about science, I am moaning about pretentious imposters, and some corrupted humans who hide behind, or (worse) use science for bad ends.

Science is just a tool, nothing more and nothing less.

You can think of science like that, but I just think of science as facts.
It's when people who think that they are scientists jump to conclusions without all the science (facts) that things can go so badly wrong. And the World is filling up with them. And the easiest way to sell themselves and their productions is to call it all 'science', which sadly, folks just swallow up, hook line and sinker..

We need to change that old proverb to:-
Beware of imposters who bring gifts of 'science'.

 

[Earthling]

I see that you have no clue when it comes to the sciences and are still willing to rely on liars like Berlinski.

Why are you so afraid to ask proper questions? It appears that your faith is weak and that you know that you are wrong. A person that knows that he is correct does not have to rely on such improper methods.

Evolution can't abide by criticism.

 

[Skwim]

Evolution can't abide by criticism.

Go ahead. Give it your best shot. Level a criticism. All that's required is that it be based on a true aspect of evolution, and not on some contrived fallacy.

.

 

[exchemist]

OK.......... I know a medical guy who, like you, is a scientist. He refused a chair at Baliol College in order to work on a program for GPs to more accurately diagnose and prescribe for diabetics.

But because many sciences are so inexact, I do take a lot of such claims (by such folks) with a pinch of salt.

In fact religion, or should I say spirituality, if coupled with science, this might make a more beneficial balance of all, because religion on its own produces such self-righteous judgement, and science on its own can produce its own kind of monstrosities.

I like neither extremes, but welcome both moderations.

Balliol, eh? He wasn't a communist by any chance, was he?

 

[exchemist]

Try being a mathematician. Now *that's* a conversation-killer! The typical response" "Oh, I was never any good at math.". Almost spoken with pride.

But at least you get some reshpect! People think you're terrifically brainy, that your head sticks out at the back and that you practically live on fish (Bertie Wooster, re Jeeves).

If you're a chemist, you run the risk (in the UK at least) of people thinking you are a pharmacist and boring you about their medications, or else of being regaled with crank diets (my bête noire being that utter tosh about "alkaline" diet).

 

[oldbadger]

Balliol, eh? He wasn't a communist by any chance, was he?

Ha ha !!!
Clearly more of a commercial guy than an academic, and an amazing artist, having looked at some of his pictures.

I've been thinking about your posts on this thread, and of ways to explain myself more clearly, and I might have an angle to present to you.

I was a commercial detective for a long time, and sadly bumped into lots of people who didn't always tell me, juries or judges the truth.

People would often claim 'these are the facts!' and then tell rubbish, lies or inaccuracies, and most mature folks are aware of this which makes them cautious. But when we hear of surveys, productions, research etc we might swallow the accounts more easily if they are presented as 'science' or by 'scientists'. Anybody with an agenda who carries out a (loaded) survey for some effect or other will be much more successful if they report the results as 'carried out by scientists'.

 

[exchemist]

Ha ha !!!
Clearly more of a commercial guy than an academic, and an amazing artist, having looked at some of his pictures.

I've been thinking about your posts on this thread, and of ways to explain myself more clearly, and I might have an angle to present to you.

I was a commercial detective for a long time, and sadly bumped into lots of people who didn't always tell me, juries or judges the truth.

People would often claim 'these are the facts!' and then tell rubbish, lies or inaccuracies, and most mature folks are aware of this which makes them cautious. But when we hear of surveys, productions, research etc we might swallow the accounts more easily if they are presented as 'science' or by 'scientists'. Anybody with an agenda who carries out a (loaded) survey for some effect or other will be much more successful if they report the results as 'carried out by scientists'.

Yes you would have had to be a professional sceptic, which I imagine carries some danger of shading off into cynicism, given that you would be dealing with that portion of humanity that is trying to conceal something, for whatever reason!

Scepticism is a valuable trait in science...... The Sceptical Chymist - Wikipedia