>Hmmm..but surely you miss the point that science is self-correcting. The
>theory proposed in 1987 is longer supported as science has moved on. This
>list appears to cater to those who would attack science for various
>reasons. Are we supposed to believe that it is some kind of miracle that
>the theory of general relativity has been vindicated by empirical studies
>of binary pulsars to within one part in ten to the power twelve?
>            Stanley Jeffers



How do we KNOW "science is self-correcting"?  Theories change, sure.  The
changes usually result in our explanations encompassing more of our
experiences each time.  BUT, how do we know these are more "correct"?

At any given time, how do we know that there is not another explanation
which does not just as well explain all experience so far plus more that
our current explanation does not?

The only data we have, all the data we have so far tells us there is always
such a new explanation, the character of which or direction of which was
not imagined.  If the history of science appears to tell us nothing else,
it appears to tell us this, doesn't it?

I would add too that with each major new explanation the assumed nature of
the phenomenon has changed in an unpredictable, non-asymptotic way.  Light
was something that came from the eyes, then it was rays from sources, then
it was tiny particles, then it was waves of aether, then it was waves of EM
field, then it was chunks of energy...  This is not an asymptotic approach
to anything, yet all the while we are able to explain more and more of our
possible experience with the phenomenon we call light.

I'm not attacking science, but I am taking issues with representations of
science that do not seem to make sense.

Dewey


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Dewey I. Dykstra, Jr.                 Phone: (208)426-3105
Professor of Physics                  Dept:  (208)426-3775
Department of Physics/MCF421/418      Fax: (208)426-4330
Boise State University            [log in to unmask]
1910 University Drive                 Boise Highlanders
Boise, ID 83725-1570                  novice piper: GHB, Uilleann

"As a result of modern research in physics, the ambition and hope,
still cherished by most authorities of the last century, that physical
science could offer a photographic picture and true image of reality
had to be abandoned."  --M. Jammer in Concepts of Force, 1957.

"If what we regard as real depends on our theory, how can we make
reality the basis of our philosophy? ...But we cannot distinguish
what is real about the universe without a theory...it makes no sense
to ask if it corresponds to reality, because we do not know what
reality is independent of a theory."--S. Hawking in Black Holes
and Baby Universes, 1993.
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