Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!bbn!rochester!PT.CS.CMU.EDU!K.GP.CS.CMU.EDU!lindsay
From: lindsay@K.GP.CS.CMU.EDU (Donald Lindsay)
Newsgroups: sci.misc
Subject: Re: Science IS a religion.
Message-ID: <1111@PT.CS.CMU.EDU>
Date: 12 Mar 88 19:03:05 GMT
References: <73600008@uiucdcsp>
Sender: netnews@PT.CS.CMU.EDU
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI
Lines: 84

In article <73600008@uiucdcsp> pax@uiucdcsp.cs.uiuc.edu writes:
>	Since I first made this realization, two things have happened
>	to further shake my confidence in science as a social institution.
>
>	The first has been the discovery of high temperature super-
>	conductivity--a real discovery that exposes other contemporary
>	physics as a species of bookkeeping and the artificiality
>	of theory.  Really, how much confidence can you have in some
>	arrogant astrophysicist's elucidation of the first millisecond
>	of the history of the universe when a phenomenon like 
>	high-temperature superconductivity wasn't even known.  It's
>	not science, it's religion.

Speaking for myself, I found the discovery reaffirmed my trust in the
scientific method. In reverse order:
 - the discoverers were acclaimed by their peers (and the Nobel committee).
 - the discovery was replicated at other labs, from its published data,
	as a check on its correctness.
 - the discovers published an account that was precise enough to
	ALLOW others to follow the trail.
 - the discoverers had the training to know what they had, had the equipment
	to measure what they had, and, even better, were LOOKING FOR
	exactly what they found. (They were trying materials, examining
	them for exactly that property.)
 - the discoverer's employers were a company (IBM) with the foresight to
	let the discoverers follow their own hunches. (Ceramics !?!)
 - the discoverer's employers were willing to fund a long shot (because
	one research in a hundred can break through and pay for the rest).
 - the idea had been suggested years before. In the science fiction novel
	"Ringworld", by Larry Niven, a major plot twist was based on
	the idea of room-temperature superconductors - albeit, organic,
	rather than ceramic. (SPOILER: a mutant bacteria ate the
	superconductor, thus causing a major disaster.)
 - the idea was scientifically reputable at the time the book was published
	in 1970. Scientific American had already run an article, suggesting 
	that we might someday engineer molecules so as to allow room-
	temperature superconductivity. 

All in all ... we found it because the theorists thought it might be there,
so the experimentalists went looking.  It was in an obscure place, or it
would have been found sooner. Science triumphant !! Yeah team ! Roll on !

>	But because the guy that proposed the theory is a Nobel Prize
>	winner in Physics, that is not in the field at all, he
>	thinks his critics should not even be listened to, dismissing
>	them because they are not members of the National Academy 
>	of Sciences.  Frankly if this sentiment is typical of
>	its membership, it must be a detestible institution.

If he did that, it was bad of him. His critics did get heard, though.

>	So what happened to science?  Was it always this bad?

It used to be worse, but then, society used to be more rigid, and have
things like class barriers. (Look up the founding of the Smithsonian ! )
Things are a lot better now, and the triumphs of science had a major hand in
the upheaval.

>	There is not even convincing evidence for
>	the efficacy of modern medicine.  If you doubt this, why
>	don't we live longer than bushmen? Why don't we lead 
>	better lives than bushmen?

Personally, I wouldn't like to live like a bushman. They have a murder rate
higher than the rate in my community. They get by without all the toys
that amuse me (like, netmail). Their numbers (and size) are kept small by
lack of food.

As for modern medicine, it has some clear failings ... but it is remarkably
efficacious at dealing with the major problems of the last century. I am
(just) old enough to remember the discovery of polio vaccine. One of my
classmates was crippled by polio, and my wife remembers classmates dying of
it. A century ago, polio was the least of one's worries. Or maybe you'd like
to live without antibiotics, or aspirin, or iodized salt, or glasses, or
pasteurized milk, or x-rays, or blood transfusion ? The next time the
paramedics scrape a friend of yours into an ambulance, be sure to tell them
that they aren't efficacious, so not to waste any money on transfusions.
And stop with all this cleanliness stuff. Keeping your bodily wastes off
your family's food supply isn't efficacious, so save the water.

Science and medicine have warts, yes. But they beat the hell out of the way
it used to be. 
-- 
	Don		lindsay@k.gp.cs.cmu.edu    CMU Computer Science