Re:Why Science Needs Metaphysics
by cwyers on Friday October 02, 2015 @10:39AM
(#10318837)
> He assumes that "science is done by people", "people are flawed", ergo "the output of science is flawed".
This has the benefit of being right, at least. Look at the history of science. Look at all the models of planetary movement we've had -- a succession of incorrect models getting closer and closer to the truth. Look at any field of scientific inquiry, and compare the results of what they had 100, 200 years ago with what we understand to be correct today. Look at the speed of light:
In 1675 we thought the speed of light was 220,000 km/s. Jump into 1849 and it was measured at 315,000 km/s. Right now it's at 299792.458 km/s and is likely to stay there because we have now defined the meter in terms of the speed of light.
I mean, people know this. Everyone knows we still teach Newtonian physics in school even though Einstein proved them wrong before many of us on this website were even born. The history of science is a history in incremental improvement. Science IS flawed. There are plenty of things that we believe now because of science that will be disproven in the future -- some of them days or weeks from now, some of them decades away. To admit that science is flawed is not to take away from either the power or the importance of science, it is simply being honest about what we are doing.
This has the benefit of being right, at least. Look at the history of science. Look at all the models of planetary movement we've had -- a succession of incorrect models getting closer and closer to the truth. Look at any field of scientific inquiry, and compare the results of what they had 100, 200 years ago with what we understand to be correct today. Look at the speed of light:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_light
In 1675 we thought the speed of light was 220,000 km/s. Jump into 1849 and it was measured at 315,000 km/s. Right now it's at 299792.458 km/s and is likely to stay there because we have now defined the meter in terms of the speed of light.
I mean, people know this. Everyone knows we still teach Newtonian physics in school even though Einstein proved them wrong before many of us on this website were even born. The history of science is a history in incremental improvement. Science IS flawed. There are plenty of things that we believe now because of science that will be disproven in the future -- some of them days or weeks from now, some of them decades away. To admit that science is flawed is not to take away from either the power or the importance of science, it is simply being honest about what we are doing.