How much do we really know about the Earth?

[kstevens67]

I have a friend who is big into Science and is adamant that we have a good grasp on how the World works. I can agree that Science has discovered many things about the Earth. I cannot agree that we have such a good grasp on the Earth yet to be able to state this with such conviction.

 

95% of our Oceans remain unexplored according to the National Ocean Service. According to live Science, we have discovered only 10% of living things on the Earth. In my opinion, Science has only barely scratched the surface on the Earth and what’s out there.

 

If I knew only 10% of my multiplication tables, would it be reasonable for me to state I have a good grasp on multiplication tables and how they work. If I knew 10% of Spanish, would it be reasonable to me to state I have a good grasp on Spanish and how to speak it? I wouldn’t think so.

 

As more discoveries are made, there may be times we discover an error that was made years ago. It happens. If additional discoveries are made that prove a certain scientific discovery was incorrect, Science just moves forward with this new knowledge. Many things improve because of it.

 

Is it fine to act like we know how the world works when Science only has just scratched the surface? Wouldn’t it be better to understand and accept how much we do not know instead of assuming we have a good grasp of the World and how it works at this time? How much do we really know about the Earth? My personal view is very little.

 

[Phi for All]

As you say, because science works with theory we can realize when a better explanation needs to supersede an old one, and move forward with this new knowledge. Of course there's a lot to learn. One of the beautiful features of the scientific method is being able to model reality and make predictions based on what we already know, and that helps us learn even more. It sometimes helps us predict where something new might be.

 

I love NOAA, they're just up the street from me, but they need funding like any other agency. When they say "95% of our oceans remain unexplored", don't forget that the oceans are a lot like space; most of it is uninteresting and empty. Perhaps the reason that much remains unexplored is because there isn't much there in most of it. And of course, there is expected to be plenty of life in places that are too costly for us to get to right now.

 

Similarly, much of the Earth's species are in places we have no other reason to visit. Many things live in the ground we haven't seen because as big as the Earth's surface is, what's beneath it is much, MUCH bigger. Are we really supposed to dig them all up just so we can say we've discovered more of them? Perhaps we should wait until our technology matches our curiosity before going deeper. We've known about dynamite for a long time, and we used to use it in archaeology, but we stopped.

 

When we hear that 90% of what is living remains undiscovered, we also tend to think in terms of critters we can see. Much of what hasn't been discovered is microscopic.

 

I'm sure there's parts of Spanish and multiplication that have the vast gulfs of nothingness that the sea and earth have. The right 10% of Spanish will make you understood in most social settings. The easiest 10% of the multiplication tables should be more than enough to get the average person through their whole life.

 

Science does have a very good grasp on the world and how it works. Science also understands and accepts the fact that there is much we don't know. Advances in science need to be cautious and thoughtful. Keep in mind that discoveries often require their own counterpart that may not be temporally compatible. The steam engine was discovered well before there was compatible engineering and materials to take advantage of it's abilities. Similarly, we may be able to drill deeply into the Earth, but using current techniques to discover new species may be counterproductive.

[Ophiolite]

If I know multiplication tables up to 6 x 6, I know the rules to construct them up until any arbitrary limit.

 

I have a vocabulary of between 25,000 and 60,000 words, depending upon how tightly you define a word. Yet someone can get by very well speaking 2,000 words or less. That's not even 10% of the language.

 

You are correct that there is still a great deal to learn about the planet, but we have defined - to a great deal of accuracy - many of the broad principles of how it functions and how it evolved through time.

 

So I agree with you and your friend. We do have a good grasp of how the world works, and there is still much to discover.

[studiot]

 

95% of our Oceans remain unexplored according to the National Ocean Service

 

Do you really believe this figure or is it just empty words?

 

What does it mean?

 

Can I say that because we have only breathed one trillionth of the atmosphere there is any reason to believe the rest is not breathable?

Or that if I have only swum in .0001% of the sea I have any reason to believe I would not be able to swim in most of the rest of it?

Or that because I have only sampled 5% the rest is not made primarily of water?

 

 

We know some from direct observation

We infer more

We test our infererences and refine our knowledge from the test results

 

But we should not give credence to non scientific headline pseudofacts.

 

ophiolite sums it up well

 

 

So I agree with you and your friend. We do have a good grasp of how the world works, and there is still much to discover.

 

Edited August 11, 2013 by studiot

[Enviro0801]

I'm not sure your analogy fits. First of all science is the persuit of what we don't know, which is theoretically limitless. Language and math are created by us and have specific intentions and limits. Science is the investigation of the natural world. Once that investigation produces significant results, then we can use language and math to interpet those results (i.e. science is discovery, math and language are tools). The true purpose of science is not to answer questions, rather it's to propose new ones. That's why it's limitless.

So hypothetically, let's say we conduct observational science and discover the entire area of the oceans. Is our work done? No! We just made a bunch of observations that we now need to interpret. So you make a hypothesis, think of a way to test it, and conduct experimental science. If that fails, go back to step 1 and repeat. Let's say our experiment produces signficant results, and we experimentally reproduce those results hundreds of times, now we got a theory! Yay! So we're done right? Noooope lol, those results pose new questions like: "Now that I discovered this theory, how does it relate to that over there", or "What sort of new experiments could I conduct to try and falsify my new theory", etc..

So you see, each new discovery should produce multiple questions to investigate. When it comes to science, no matter how well you know something, there is always a way to know it better. Now we might come to a road block and not know how to procede (which has happened many times). Maybe there was some other discovery we needed to further that topic, and we figure it out 100 years later and pick it all up again. Maybe there was a fundamental flaw in the experiment, or a bad assumption, perhaps. Some other experiment years down the line figures that flaw out, and off you go again. That is the beauty of science. It's eternal. it's INternal in a metaphorical sense because we are hard wired to ask questions via our consciousness.

Finally, getting to what your friend claimed, and you disagreed with, I would make the argument that you're both incorrect. The perception that we have a good understanding of our "world" "universe" (whatever) suggests there is some ultimate understanding or goal that we are getting close to. I hope I provided a good argument that the is no end in science, only the means. So our understanding could never be good or complete, just better than the before. It cannot be any worse, however, which is another cool thing about science I think. You could get something wrong, but that just furthers your understanding, sometimes even more so than getting it right! The perception that we have a bad understanding is even more flawed. Compared to what? This also assumes there is some ultimate end to what we can discover. Now a single person might have a bad understanding of our scientific knowledge up to this point, but that's not required. They can still learn, or just benefit from the knowledge regardless. I might say we understand everything and nothing at the same time; Yet it's irrelevant because science is about the journey, not the destination... Yes, science is life... lol

[Deidre]

''We'' know a lot about the earth, in terms of how we arrived here, how the earth fits into the bigger picture. That said, the cool thing about science is that we are always discovering new things. Like the poster above me states, 'science is about the journey.'

 

Maybe we never really ''arrive.''

[arc]

So our understanding could never be good or complete, just better than the before. It cannot be any worse, however, which is another cool thing about science I think. You could get something wrong, but that just furthers your understanding, sometimes even more so than getting it right!

That is unless you completely miss with that all or nothing, do or die planet killer asteroid impact avoidance mission.

[Enviro0801]

That is unless you completely miss with that all or nothing, do or die planet killer asteroid impact avoidance mission.

I ask you this. Does our understanding not get better moments before impact??

[arc]

That depends on how fast the bureaucrats can put together a fact finding committee. Because we all know that is how we get to the bottom of these type of things.