The Science Delusion, a talk banned by TED

[Mr.Samsa]

Mr Samsa wrote:

Science is impossible without uniformitarianism. If we find that the rate of gravity is X, then in order to make predictions about the future we need to assume that (with all conditions being stable) the rate of gravity will be X. If you're building a bridge and you need to calculate some constant but it could have changed since yesterday when it was measured, then what good is it?

Firstly, there is no such thing as "the rate of gravity". If you wish to be taken seriously in a discussion of physics, use your terms correctly. Depending on requirements, "gravitational field strength" would probably be the term you are looking for...

We're not having a physics discussion, so if you want to be taken seriously in a discussion on the philosophy of science I recommend not referring to it as a "physics discussion". I used a throwaway made-up concept because it's irrelevant to the point being made and it's easier than looking up actual figures for real concepts.

Secondly, you are really using an example about engineering requirements, not science.

No, I'm talking about science and highlighting it with an example from engineering because real-world examples are easier to understand because they have actual consequences. The same principles in my example apply to science but the catastrophic failure would simply be having to remeasure the constant and never applying it to a model for fear that it might change after measurement.

Thirdly, gravitational field strength may well be one of the parameters that has altered over time, if several of the competing hypotheses about the nature of dark energy and its relationship to Einstein's cosmological constant are correct, implying the end to at least one aspect of uniformitarianism. Sure, the time scale would be huge, but within our ability to model

Which, of course, is irrelevant to uniformitarianism (as discussed above).

...A disproof of uniformitarianism would require, for example, some way of demonstrating that on a Wednesday 6 billion years ago the strength of universal gravitation increase 20-fold and then dropped back down to its usual level after that. ...

That example is more in the line of a capricious universe, rather than non-uniformitarianism. All that science requires is the ability to gather data, build models, and make testable hypotheses. If examples of sudden changes in physical quantities occurs, it is merely one more set of data to be investigated.

Except that uniformitarianism can't be tested by science. There's no way to test whether the laws changed on that Wednesday or that they'll still be true tomorrow.

Cosmology, one of the more speculative branches of physics, does not have to assume uniformitarianism to be valid. Some of its theoretical models of the universe may include uniformitarianism, others may not. It does not have the profound metaphysical significance that you are granting it. One clear-cut example is the existence of singularities. They are regions within which the laws of physics no longer apply; the universe is thus not uniform in physical laws. The nature of singularities is of huge interest to physicists trying to uncover the discontinuities between general relativity and quantum physics; in one sense, such anomalies are vital in terms of stretching, challenging and refining our conceptual base. People who think that physicists have a narrow and inflexible metaphysical position should look at the fascinating and often exotic concepts that are part of the edge of cosmological physics...

You're still conflating uniformitarianism with the idea that we can't adjust our understanding of the laws. Are you seriously trying to tell me that when scientists measure a constant or a law, they automatically assume that it only holds true for the moment they measured it?

[JimC]

Mr Samsa wrote:

...Are you seriously trying to tell me that when scientists measure a constant or a law, they automatically assume that it only holds true for the moment they measured it?

On pragmatic grounds, mostly not, if they wish it to apply to regions of space-time that do not differ wildly from our own experience. And such a working assumption is perfectly reasonable; it does not require a dogmatic assertion of uniformitarianism applying on all scales, at all times...

However, they would not necessarily assume that it holds true in all places or all times... There would be many a law that breaks down when field strengths (either gravitational or electromagnetic) exceed a certain value, perhaps near the event horizon of a black hole, or during the first picosecond of the existence of the universe. Go back several billion years, and it may well be that the physical parameters have altered; it is not impossible that the nature of that change could be modelled and tested...

[Xamonas Chegwé]

I think you're missing the point - there is no empirical or scientific evidence or scientific testing that could ever support or disprove uniformitarianism. The important part is that this goes both ways. Someone doesn't need to present an alternative model to point out that some scientists are blindly accepting an unsupported assumption. It's up to the people making the assumption to support it.

If something is untestable and unprovable within our current universe then, by definition, it has no effect on our current universe. The converse is equally true. Speculation about such things belongs firmly in the realm of mind-wankery!

That's just nonsense of the highest Dawkinian order though. There are many, many things which are untestable and unprovable by science but are nonetheless real things that have an effect on the world, the assumptions and axioms of science itself being a major example.

Not nonsense at all! If anything affects the world, in any way, its very effects are a test! A test does not have to be quantifiable. The assumptions and axioms of science can be shown to exist simply because they are written down in books about science and agreed to by most scientists that you question. Not to mention their effects on the methodology of science and upon what is agreed to be "good" and "bad" science by other scientists. Feel free to find a better example.

Science is a well-proven, useful process that increases our understanding of the universe as it is (or appears to be to us) and, through application, enhances our ability to manipulate that universe. Speculation about untestable, possible past or future states of that universe are outside of its remit unless a methodology of investigating them can be devised.

But speculation about past and future states is one of the fundamental assumptions of science. That's the point.

You seem to have overlooked the last part of my statement here: "unless a methodology of investigating them can be devised." If a test can be devised to examine the speed of light a billion years ago, or the smell of gamma rays, or the tastes in soft furnishings of quarks, then they can be examined scientifically, if not, then they cannot. This flows directly from those axioms of science that you mention (and is, incidentally, another proof of their existence.)

I can claim that the speed of light was originally 4 miles per hour, or that protons are all green, or that the Higgs boson is the saddest, loneliest particle in the universe. I have every right to make these claims but NOT in the realm of science. Not unless I can back them up with evidence.

Yes, that's Sheldrake's point. They aren't scientific claims. They still need to be evidence-based and supported in some way though, even when science itself is making these non-scientific claims.

When Sheldrake edges into this realm of speculative conjecture, he leaves science behind and enters self-fellatiory philosophy. He mind-wanks. I am not saying that this is pointless, wrong, or even of lesser import to science. All I am saying is that it is outside of the scope of science. Just like carpentry is outside of the scope of 4 part harmony.

Again, sort of agreed in that they aren't scientific questions. Nobody is claiming they are though. They are the philosophical assumptions that science needs to accept in order to work, and sometimes they are just popular philosophical assumptions that scientists adopt that Sheldrake is questioning, but the point is that they still need to be justified in some way.

Why do they need to be justified? Or rather, why do they need to be justified in order to function? Surely, the proven usefulness of the scientific methodology is its justification.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

...

When Sheldrake edges into this realm of speculative conjecture, he leaves science behind...

I agree.

...and enters self-fellatiory philosophy...

I disagree. You disparage philosophy with this statement. Philosophy =/= speculative conjecture.

I did not intend to imply that philosophy in general is self-fellatiory (assuming that is a word - but that's another discussion!), only that a subset of it is - that subset which is speculative conjecture about the unknowable and unprovable.
Besides, what's so bad about self-fellatio and mind-wanking anyway?

[FBM]

I did not intend to imply that philosophy in general is self-fellatiory (assuming that is a word - but that's another discussion!), only that a subset of it is - that subset which is speculative conjecture about the unknowable and unprovable.

Besides, what's so bad about self-fellatio and mind-wanking anyway?

In the sense that Sheldrake is doing it, quite a bit.

[Mr.Samsa]

Mr Samsa wrote:

...Are you seriously trying to tell me that when scientists measure a constant or a law, they automatically assume that it only holds true for the moment they measured it?

On pragmatic grounds, mostly not, if they wish it to apply to regions of space-time that do not differ wildly from our own experience.

Exactly, that's all that is required.

And such a working assumption is perfectly reasonable;

Sure, and nobody is arguing that it isn't reasonable.

That's just nonsense of the highest Dawkinian order though. There are many, many things which are untestable and unprovable by science but are nonetheless real things that have an effect on the world, the assumptions and axioms of science itself being a major example.

Not nonsense at all! If anything affects the world, in any way, its very effects are a test! A test does not have to be quantifiable. The assumptions and axioms of science can be shown to exist simply because they are written down in books about science and agreed to by most scientists that you question. Not to mention their effects on the methodology of science and upon what is agreed to be "good" and "bad" science by other scientists. Feel free to find a better example.

A popular example is that of a possible interventionist god. Imagine a god that exists who manipulates the world through naturalistic means, so (for example) at some point in our history he steps in with a naturalistic event so that humans appear. This intervention would be entirely untestable and unprovable (because god is a supernatural entity and science ignores the supernatural), and yet it would have a massive effect on the world.

But speculation about past and future states is one of the fundamental assumptions of science. That's the point.

You seem to have overlooked the last part of my statement here: "unless a methodology of investigating them can be devised." If a test can be devised to examine the speed of light a billion years ago, or the smell of gamma rays, or the tastes in soft furnishings of quarks, then they can be examined scientifically, if not, then they cannot. This flows directly from those axioms of science that you mention (and is, incidentally, another proof of their existence.)

But we accept uniformitarianism without such measurements.

Yes, that's Sheldrake's point. They aren't scientific claims. They still need to be evidence-based and supported in some way though, even when science itself is making these non-scientific claims.

...

Again, sort of agreed in that they aren't scientific questions. Nobody is claiming they are though. They are the philosophical assumptions that science needs to accept in order to work, and sometimes they are just popular philosophical assumptions that scientists adopt that Sheldrake is questioning, but the point is that they still need to be justified in some way.

Why do they need to be justified? Or rather, why do they need to be justified in order to function? Surely, the proven usefulness of the scientific methodology is its justification.

They don't need to be justified as there's nothing inherently problematic with accepting irrational positions based on faith but generally people aren't happy about doing that. The usefulness of the scientific method can't be used to justify the scientific method, that's circular reasoning.

[FBM]

It needs to be justified because otherwise you're subject to the pragmatic fallacy.

[JimC]

Mr Samsa wrote:

A popular example is that of a possible interventionist god. Imagine a god that exists who manipulates the world through naturalistic means, so (for example) at some point in our history he steps in with a naturalistic event so that humans appear. This intervention would be entirely untestable and unprovable (because god is a supernatural entity and science ignores the supernatural), and yet it would have a massive effect on the world.

If the "stepping in" is so "naturalistic" as to be undetectable in comparison to a non-theistic event, then it is utterly pointless to even assume the possibility. There would be an infinite series of such undetectable manipulations, and Occam's razor neatly slices the bullshit away...

If it quacks like a naturalist duck, it is a fucking naturalist duck...

[Mr.Samsa]

Mr Samsa wrote:

A popular example is that of a possible interventionist god. Imagine a god that exists who manipulates the world through naturalistic means, so (for example) at some point in our history he steps in with a naturalistic event so that humans appear. This intervention would be entirely untestable and unprovable (because god is a supernatural entity and science ignores the supernatural), and yet it would have a massive effect on the world.

If the "stepping in" is so "naturalistic" as to be undetectable in comparison to a non-theistic event, then it is utterly pointless to even assume the possibility. There would be an infinite series of such undetectable manipulations, and Occam's razor neatly slices the bullshit away...

If it quacks like a naturalist duck, it is a fucking naturalist duck...

Whether it's "pointless to assume it" is irrelevant. It was claimed that if something is untestable and unprovable then it cannot have an effect on the universe, I gave an example of something that is untestable and unprovable which would have a fundamental effect on the universe (to the point where the universe essentially wouldn't exist at all without it) and so the claim must be wrong.

On your point though, Occam's razor is a shitty tool for determining truth. If I want a tool that simplifies things to make them more convenient and easier for me to use, then the razor is my tool. If I want to determine what's true or not, then the razor is useless.

[FBM]

If anyone's interested:



And his website: http://www.sheldrake.org/

[Hermit]

The usefulness of the scientific method can't be used to justify the scientific method, that's circular reasoning.

Excuse me? Science works. That is its justification. Where is the circularity in that?

[Hermit]

97 more minutes of Sheldrake? No thanks. I've sampled enough of his stuff already.

[FBM]

The usefulness of the scientific method can't be used to justify the scientific method, that's circular reasoning.

Excuse me? Science works. That is its justification. Where is the circularity in that?

The pragmatic fallacy. Just because something is useful doesn't make it true. Also, "it works" isn't what Mr. Samsa said. "It works" is ambiguous. Do you mean it is internally consistent and matches observation, or that it is useful?

97 more minutes of Sheldrake? No thanks. I've sampled enough of his stuff already.

I wanted to see what sort of evidence he offers. Looks very flimsy to me, but he does talk a lot about experiments that have been independently replicated which verify some of his results and claims. It would take a lot of work to investigate his claims, and I'm just not that interested.

[Mr.Samsa]

The usefulness of the scientific method can't be used to justify the scientific method, that's circular reasoning.

Excuse me? Science works. That is its justification. Where is the circularity in that?

Depends what you mean by "works". If you simply want to say that the scientific method leads us to creating things that benefit us, then that's reasonable and not circular because you're appealing to things external to the scientific method (i.e things like bridges and planes). Saying that science "works" in the sense that it describes true things or accurate models of the world, on the other hand, is far more difficult to demonstrate and is circular when that justification comes from science itself.

The best thing you can do is propose a logical argument like the unreasonable effectiveness of science which uses scientific results as part of its justification but it is not based on those results.

I wanted to see what sort of evidence he offers. Looks very flimsy to me, but he does talk a lot about experiments that have been independently replicated which verify some of his results and claims. It would take a lot of work to investigate his claims, and I'm just not that interested.

Any chance you could summarise what his position on the extended mind is? I can't watch a video at the moment but the extended mind is a fairly dominant position in psychology so I'm wondering whether he's describing that position or whether he's coopting a valid term to mean something a bit more kooky.

[JimC]

The usefulness of the scientific method can't be used to justify the scientific method, that's circular reasoning.

Excuse me? Science works. That is its justification. Where is the circularity in that?

It depends on how Samsa is using the word "justify". I suspect he is using it in a rather absolutist sense, as asserting an unassailable metaphysical position.

He thinks that scientists generally regard science in that light, and are therefore guilty of hubris at least, but he is largely attacking a straw man, a seldom-seen archetype of arrogant scientism...

The majority of scientists have a much more pragmatic view, akin to your "It works" statement. If the process of science can continually generate models which have an increasing ability to predict events in the universe as they are refined, then it is a process worth doing. The only touch of possible hubris comes from a side-observation; no other human process has ever achieved the same predictive ability...