Critique on...The Myths of Science

2PhiloVoid · Apr 27, 2017

Hello Everyone,

Over the years, I've noticed some people have a sense of confidence in the scientific method that may or may not be reflective of the reality that is claimed for it, especially if we take into account the actual nature of science and its method(s).

So, what I propose for this OP is simple. Read the accompanying article, or some substantive portion of it which you find to be questionable, and then offer WHATEVER critique you have of it, telling us where and why it falls short in its estimation and evaluation about the structure of 'science.' It's all open game. (Hint: In this article there are 15 Myths about science--maybe you'll just want to focus on one of them.) My thanks is extended ahead of time to all those who make the effort.

Here's the article (and just ignore its strange pagination numbers):

THE PRINCIPAL ELEMENTS OF THE NATURE OF SCIENCE: DISPELLING
THE MYTHS- William F. McComas

Peace,
2PhiloVoid

Ophiolite · Apr 27, 2017

It is a long article and therefore I shall take it very much bit by bit. The first myth:
HYPOTHESES BECOME THEORIES THAT IN TURN BECOME LAWS

This myth, which includes the egregious "it's only a theory" remark is reasonably well dealt with. I should like to have seen a proper description of what constitutes a theory. I also found it odd that the author implies that this myth is perpetrated in text books. I have read many text books in all the major sciences and have never seen that myth presented in any of them.

The second myth:
SCIENTIFIC LAWS AND OTHER SUCH IDEAS ARE ABSOLUTE

Again, the author's treatment of this is sound, but I question whether this is ever presented in textbooks. And if science teachers are promoting this myth they deserve to be given posts as assistant PE teachers.

sfs · Apr 27, 2017

MYTH 9: SCIENTISTS ARE PARTICULARLY OBJECTIVE
The author proceeds to write quite a bit about objectivity and science, but nothing he writes address the myth in question. I have no idea whether scientists tend to be more objective than nonscientists. I didn't know before reading the article, and I still don't know, since no data on the subject was presented. (Yes, I know that scientists aren't perfectly objective, but that doesn't answer the question.)

2PhiloVoid · Apr 27, 2017

Ophiolite said:
It is a long article and therefore I shall take it very much bit by bit. The first myth:
HYPOTHESES BECOME THEORIES THAT IN TURN BECOME LAWS

Yes, it is a long article, so I appreciate you're willingness to engage it. I look forward to reading what you think about McComas' evaluations, as far as you wish to critique (or even agree) with them.

This myth, which includes the egregious "it's only a theory" remark is reasonably well dealt with. I should like to have seen a proper description of what constitutes a theory. I also found it odd that the author implies that this myth is perpetrated in text books. I have read many text books in all the major sciences and have never seen that myth presented in any of them.

Yes, McComas treats some of the Myths in brief fashion, which leaves it open for those like yourself who'd like to comment further. As far as his reference to mistakes in text books is concerned, his content in this article was first published in 1998 and probably applies to some text books from an earlier time. IT would have been nice if he had cited at least one or two examples; but for now, I'll just take his word for it that he came across these mistakes at some point in his research.

The second myth:
SCIENTIFIC LAWS AND OTHER SUCH IDEAS ARE ABSOLUTE

Again, the author's treatment of this is sound, but I question whether this is ever presented in textbooks. And if science teachers are promoting this myth they deserve to be given posts as assistant PE teachers.

In this myth, he seems to allude to the idea that this myth is something found in 'creationist' text books on science. But, who knows? Maybe there are some old secular text books out there somewhere in which this myth is propounded. It could also be a present issue regarding the semantic meaning of 'absolute' as might be used by various people who don't have a fully adequate understanding of the nature of science...like students, perhaps.

Thanks for your comments.

2PhiloVoid

sfs · Apr 27, 2017

Ophiolite said:
This myth, which includes the egregious "it's only a theory" remark is reasonably well dealt with. I should like to have seen a proper description of what constitutes a theory.

I would like to see that too, since I've never been able to detect any consistent well-defined usage by scientists for the word "theory". I see statements about theories being well-supported explanatory frameworks or the like, but I've never seen any supporting evidence that this reflects anything real about how scientists think about ideas, hypotheses and explanations. (None of the references in this section seem likely to be offering anything very substantial, either.)

sfs · Apr 27, 2017

MYTH 13: SCIENCE MODELS REPRESENT REALITY
I wouldn't call that a myth. People debate whether it's true, but debatable is not the same as mythical.

2PhiloVoid · Apr 27, 2017

sfs said:
MYTH 9: SCIENTISTS ARE PARTICULARLY OBJECTIVE
The author proceeds to write quite a bit about objectivity and science, but nothing he writes address the myth in question. I have no idea whether scientists tend to be more objective than nonscientists. I didn't know before reading the article, and I still don't know, since no data on the subject was presented. (Yes, I know that scientists aren't perfectly objective, but that doesn't answer the question.)

Good comment, sfs. We might want to notice that in the opening paragraph for MYTH 9, McComas does state that "contributions from both the philosophy of science and psychology reveal that complete objectivity is impossible for at least three major reasons," and then he proceeds to give those three reasons. And those reasons imply that data is subject to perceptions and conception in the mind, apart from the idea that the data we engage may be perceived/conceived of as "data."

I think what he is trying to imply is that some people, even some scientists (and Christians), think that because they followed rigid procedures, that there is little to no room to show that their ideas can be improved; that somehow they've got 'the truth' and that is the end of the story, since they are supposedly 'fully' objective.

sfs · Apr 27, 2017

2PhiloVoid said:
I think what he is trying to imply is that some people, even some scientists (and Christians), think that because they followed rigid procedures, that there is little to no room to show that their ideas can be improved; that somehow they've got 'the truth' and that is the end of the story, since they are supposedly 'fully' objective.

Sure, and there's good reason to point out that scientists aren't completely objective either. Maybe I was being a little nitpicky, but it actually is an interesting question: are scientists more objective than most people? I'm not sure how one would measure objectivity, but it should be possible.

2PhiloVoid · Apr 27, 2017

sfs said:
Sure, and there's good reason to point out that scientists aren't completely objective either. Maybe I was being a little nitpicky, but it actually is an interesting question: are scientists more objective than most people? I'm not sure how one would measure objectivity, but it should be possible.

I think that within the field in which scientists operate, i.e. whatever field of science they are in, they can be 'more' procedural (and 'objective) than the common joe, but just because they are professionals doesn't mean they have the last word on 'reality.' The interesting thing for me, here, is that this article by McComas is a secular article, not a Christian one. So, we aren't simply eschewing science because some 'Christian' says it has limits; rather, we are looking at another secular source offering his evaluation upon other secular minds and institutions...

2PhiloVoid · Apr 27, 2017

sfs said:
MYTH 13: SCIENCE MODELS REPRESENT REALITY
I wouldn't call that a myth. People debate whether it's true, but debatable is not the same as mythical.

I don't know if I'd call it a myth or not, but there are those (like students who are still learning their science) who think that models show an actual construction of such and such scientific entity or theory. So, I think McComas is trying to point out that what we see, like the atomic model, isn't what is necessarily really happening in reality, or at least not in full. Scientific models can always be improved, therefore (unless we have further difficulty in extracting additional data from reality.)

Michael · Apr 27, 2017

sfs said:
MYTH 9: SCIENTISTS ARE PARTICULARLY OBJECTIVE
The author proceeds to write quite a bit about objectivity and science, but nothing he writes address the myth in question. I have no idea whether scientists tend to be more objective than nonscientists. I didn't know before reading the article, and I still don't know, since no data on the subject was presented. (Yes, I know that scientists aren't perfectly objective, but that doesn't answer the question.)

Scientists are human just like everyone else, and admitting to being wrong is as difficult for them as for anyone else.

If that BICEP2 fiasco and the LIGO paper taught me anything, it's that even hundreds of scientists can show obvious signs of confirmation bias when the stakes are high enough.

bhsmte · Apr 27, 2017

sfs said:
Sure, and there's good reason to point out that scientists aren't completely objective either. Maybe I was being a little nitpicky, but it actually is an interesting question: are scientists more objective than most people? I'm not sure how one would measure objectivity, but it should be possible.

I agree. In general, i believe scientists tend to be more "analytical" thinkers (fact finders) and facts tend to lean more towards the ability, to at least rely more on objectivity vs more intuitive thinkers.

lesliedellow · Apr 27, 2017

Michael said:
Scientists are human just like everyone else, and admitting to being wrong is as difficult for them as for anyone else.

If that BICEP2 fiasco and the LIGO paper taught me anything, it's that even hundreds of scientists can show obvious signs of confirmation bias when the stakes are high enough.

Ho hum. Another mini rant from Michael.

Michael · Apr 27, 2017

lesliedellow said:
Ho hum. Another mini rant from Michael.

Not at all. I just see no evidence whatsoever that the label 'scientist' automatically makes someone more objective, or less prone to personal biases.

KCfromNC · Apr 28, 2017

I'm not particularly happy with #1. There are many different usages of both words in science. Thus you get both Newton's laws, which are relatively straightfoward mathematics, and the laws of biology, one of which includes the entirety of evolutionary theory. And which explanation does the theory of special relativity provide aside from the math that the laws of universal gravitation don't? The theory of quantum mechanics isn't theoretical - one of the supposed hallmarks of a theory - it is well established experimental science used in many practical applications.

Not to mention I have a large problem with trying to make a distinction between how and why here. Science doesn't really do why all that well - all it gives are tentatively working models. Does anyone really understand why quantum mechanics works like it does? Yet it is still commonly labeled a theory.

I get what he's going for - "just a theory" shows that people don't understand science. But the problem here is that people have been naming discoveries for hundreds of years and that necessarily leads to messiness in labeling. Pretending that those grey areas don't exist gets in the way of the point he's trying to make. It feels a lot like a science teacher trying to create artificial categories for students to sort various ideas into on a test while ignoring that a lot of them are judgement calls.

KCfromNC · Apr 28, 2017

sfs said:
I would like to see that too, since I've never been able to detect any consistent well-defined usage by scientists for the word "theory". I see statements about theories being well-supported explanatory frameworks or the like, but I've never seen any supporting evidence that this reflects anything real about how scientists think about ideas, hypotheses and explanations. (None of the references in this section seem likely to be offering anything very substantial, either.)

The most interesting idea I've heard is that there was a shift from law to theory following the discovery of early 20th century "modern" physics. The universe seemed pretty simple until then so law seemed like the right word to use. After digging in a bit deeper and seeing that the universe was stranger than they thought people stopped using law quite so much.

But yeah, I've never heard the distinction between "cookbook" and "theoretical" science in any of the classes I took. I certainly never thought that tensor algebra was cookbook - oh wait, GR is a theory so even if a computer is just churning out the results of cookbook math I was doing theoretical science at that point...

2PhiloVoid · Apr 28, 2017

KCfromNC said:
I'm not particularly happy with #1. There are many different usages of both words in science. Thus you get both Newton's laws, which are relatively straightfoward mathematics, and the laws of biology, one of which includes the entirety of evolutionary theory. And which explanation does the theory of special relativity provide aside from the math that the laws of universal gravitation don't? The theory of quantum mechanics isn't theoretical - one of the supposed hallmarks of a theory - it is well established experimental science used in many practical applications.

Not to mention I have a large problem with trying to make a distinction between how and why here. Science doesn't really do why all that well - all it gives are tentatively working models. Does anyone really understand why quantum mechanics works like it does? Yet it is still commonly labeled a theory.

I get what he's going for - "just a theory" shows that people don't understand science. But the problem here is that people have been naming discoveries for hundreds of years and that necessarily leads to messiness in labeling. Pretending that those grey areas don't exist gets in the way of the point he's trying to make. It feels a lot like a science teacher trying to create artificial categories for students to sort various ideas into on a test while ignoring that a lot of them are judgement calls.

And this is why Science Educators in Science schools at universities are supposed to be teaching aspects of the Nature of Science ... so that the school doesn't churn out students who think that all this stuff is purely malleable in meaning. There is a difference between a Scientific Law and and Scientific Theory; the difference is in what each does or CAN DO for us.

For instance, we can say that evolution is a fact. And it is, as far as we can tell from our observations. But as you stated, science can't always tell us 'why' something in the world is the 'way it is.' But, Evolutionary Theory, for instance, attempts to pull together all the various disparate facts of evolution we have from various scientific disciplines to 'explain' why we see the evidence we do and bring some coherence to the overall picture.

So, Evolutionary Theory is scientific theory, not Scientific Law, even though we can be tempted to posit that the facts of evolution seem to tell us that it seems to be a law that organisms change through extensive periods of time. And it is this distinction that Science Educators are SUPPOSED to be instilling in students as they are sent 'out' into the world. But, often the schools fail to mention all of the 'philosophy of science' stuff.............probably for some of the same reasons that contribute to the ongoing holding by students of the other myths about science that McComas mentions in his article.

Peace,
2PhiloVoid

sfs · Apr 28, 2017

KCfromNC said:
I'm not particularly happy with #1. There are many different usages of both words in science. Thus you get both Newton's laws, which are relatively straightfoward mathematics, and the laws of biology, one of which includes the entirety of evolutionary theory. And which explanation does the theory of special relativity provide aside from the math that the laws of universal gravitation don't? The theory of quantum mechanics isn't theoretical - one of the supposed hallmarks of a theory - it is well established experimental science used in many practical applications.

There is one distinction that's pretty consistently maintained and that is easily missed: the distinction between "theory" and "a theory". The former is a mass noun and describes a usually mathematical framework or set of tools. This usage comes straight from math (set theory, group theory) and covers a lot of physicists' use of "theory", but extends beyond physics. String theory, quantum field theory and diffusion theory are all examples; they are approaches, rather than specific models, and can be applied to multiple models. I think something similar but less mathematical is meant by "evolutionary theory".

"A theory" is a specific model, and in actual usage can range from the extremely broad and well-supported (e.g. the theory of evolution) to the more specific (the Special Theory of Relativity), to "a guess I just came up with to explain my funny results". Quantum mechanics is theory, not a theory, I think; QM has been incorporated into a variety of theories, e.g. quantum electrodynamics, quantum chromodynamics.

There is some fuzziness to this distinction. Electroweak theory despite its name is a theory, I think, rather than being theory. Heavy quark effective theory, which is a set of approximations useful for doing quantum chromodynamic calculations, straddles the boundary(*). It is a mathematical framework, but one designed to operate within a specific model.

(*) Assuming it's still a thing. I don't keep up with particle physics these days.

essentialsaltes · Apr 28, 2017

MYTH 10: EXPERIMENTS ARE THE PRINCIPAL ROUTE TO SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE

If we think carefully about this, I don't think this is a myth that many people hold. Experiments test hypotheses, but hypotheses do not emerge fully born out of thin air.

"For his most revolutionary discoveries, Darwin recorded his extensive observations in notebooks annotated by speculations and thoughts about those observations. Although Darwin supported the inductive method proposed by Bacon, he was aware that observation without speculation or prior understanding was both ineffective and impossible. In fact he stated this view clearly by saying, “I could not help making hypotheses about everything I saw.” "

And contra the author who declares that students in school link science to experimentation, our biology texts tell these stories of Darwin's observations. Or Mendel's observations of peas. Or other science books tell of Galileo's observation of the satellites of Jupiter and the craters on the moon. Or Becquerel's exposed plate. Or Fleming's moldy plate.

So I don't think this myth is held by either working scientists or the lay public.

FireDragon76 · Apr 28, 2017

Ophiolite said:
It is a long article and therefore I shall take it very much bit by bit. The first myth:
HYPOTHESES BECOME THEORIES THAT IN TURN BECOME LAWS

This myth, which includes the egregious "it's only a theory" remark is reasonably well dealt with. I should like to have seen a proper description of what constitutes a theory. I also found it odd that the author implies that this myth is perpetrated in text books. I have read many text books in all the major sciences and have never seen that myth presented in any of them.

The second myth:
SCIENTIFIC LAWS AND OTHER SUCH IDEAS ARE ABSOLUTE

Again, the author's treatment of this is sound, but I question whether this is ever presented in textbooks. And if science teachers are promoting this myth they deserve to be given posts as assistant PE teachers.

Those ideas are all common in science textbooks at the primary level.

Critique on...The Myths of Science

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