History of science: A documentation of the struggle to "accept" reality.

[swansont]

- "The energy produced by the atom is a very poor kind of thing. Anyone who expects a source of power from the transformation of these atoms is talking moonshine." Ernst Rutherford, 1933 (1)

 

 

It also helps to get the quotes right and understand their context. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Rutherford

 

"We might in these processes obtain very much more energy than the proton supplied, but on the average we could not expect to obtain energy in this way. It was a very poor and inefficient way of producing energy, and anyone who looked for a source of power in the transformation of the atoms was talking moonshine. But the subject was scientifically interesting because it gave insight into the atoms"

 

He was discussing using an accelerator, specifically, and knocking an alpha out of lithium (the atoms, not any atoms) He was right about that — it would be nonsense to try and derive net energy that way. But he wasn't talking about the approach in a general sense.

 

So the short list gets shorter by one.

[jeremyjr]

Dogmatism and closed-mindeness are not the absolute property of "science types" or religious people. The implicit "topic" in this thread that I can't mention but others already had done for me is also "rejected" by UFO believers and there the similarity between groups with "strong beliefs" gets clearly in the open.

 

That is why I had said before that debunkers/science types and UFO believers are two faces of the same coin: On one side UFO belivers have a very concrete "expectation" of what they think is out there and on the other side debunkers/science types have a very simplistic, cartoon-view of the world, both groups have strong preconceptions that make them unable to accept facts that are in contradiction with their very own preconceptions and expectations.

[Strange]

Dogmatism and closed-mindeness are not the absolute property of "science types"

 

You have provided no evidence that this is the case.

 

But you are adding to the mountain of evidence that these descriptions can apply to people with their own pet theories.

[swansont]

To avoid discussion of a closed topic, let's take another example. Bigfoot. The Loch Ness monster. Yeti. Whatever.

 

Visual evidence, especially of the limited quality that's been offered, is insufficient. Compare that with the standard of evidence for naming a new species. The gap between what we have and what is required is huge. Enforcing those standards is not dogma.

[Phi for All]

Perhaps a lot of people look at this type of informal peer review as some kind of judgement, rather than an attempt to help the person with the idea hold to a certain amount of rigor. They hear, "You're wrong about the whole thing" when we say "How did you arrive at this conclusion?", or "What did you do to rule out that it's a man in a suit?"

[jeremyjr]

Building "accurated" models of reality can be considered as a sophisticated expression of the "survival instinct" present in any living being, humans as sentient beings had tried that explicitly by the development of the scientific method and its wide application in almost all branches of human knowledge.

Many times these models of reality are extremely simplifications of the reality that we try to understand, then understanding the model many times gets confused with understanding reality.

Reductionism we know now that have intrinsic limitations( the incompleteness theorems), the "tendency" of trying to "explain" new properties using simple ones is bound to fail, emergent properties or new facts will be impossible to "deduct" from simple principles for the simple fact that these new facts are fundamentally independent from previous known principles or axioms.

Theories will get more complex, new notions will be completely foreign to no initiated.

Being closed to fundamentally new facts or ideas is in contradiction with the very notions that science had brought to us and ultimately makes our models of reality inaccurate and place our very survival as species in very unsecured grounds.

[pzkpfw]

... Being closed to fundamentally new facts or ideas is in contradiction with the very notions that science had brought to us and ultimately makes our models of reality inaccurate and place our very survival as species in very unsecured grounds.

Nobody here is closed to new facts or ideas. But facts only become facts when shown to be correct and new ideas are not necessarily useful just because they are new, or because they were presented. You can't assume your "fact" is "reality", then simply expect everybody to accept it.

 

(I'm skipping, here, over whether science is about "truth" or "proof", and what a "fact" is.)

 

This sub section of the forum is full of people with threads about their idea of how Gravity works. Are any of them "reality"? Are all of them "reality"? Should we believe each one as it appears, then discard it as the next appears?

 

That this forum and this sub section exists at all is evidence that people are open to new facts and ideas.

 

If your own "reality" has been rejected, that's just tough.

Edited June 16, 2015 by pzkpfw

[StringJunky]

Building "accurated" models of reality can be considered as a sophisticated expression of the "survival instinct" present in any living being, humans as sentient beings had tried that explicitly by the development of the scientific method and its wide application in almost all branches of human knowledge.

Many times these models of reality are extremely simplifications of the reality that we try to understand, then understanding the model many times gets confused with understanding reality.

Reductionism we know now that have intrinsic limitations( the incompleteness theorems), the "tendency" of trying to "explain" new properties using simple ones is bound to fail, emergent properties or new facts will be impossible to "deduct" from simple principles for the simple fact that these new facts are fundamentally independent from previous known principles or axioms.

Theories will get more complex, new notions will be completely foreign to no initiated.

Being closed to fundamentally new facts or ideas is in contradiction with the very notions that science had brought to us and ultimately makes our models of reality inaccurate and place our very survival as species in very unsecured grounds.

Theories build on what is already known.... the wheel has been invented.

[Phi for All]

Being closed to fundamentally new facts or ideas is in contradiction with the very notions that science had brought to us and ultimately makes our models of reality inaccurate and place our very survival as species in very unsecured grounds.

 

Being closed to proven methodology is in contradiction with the fact that science is successful. That's really why the models attract reasoned thinkers, because they work. And because we had to sift through so many bad ideas to get to them.

[cladking]

To avoid discussion of a closed topic, let's take another example. Bigfoot. The Loch Ness monster. Yeti. Whatever.

 

Visual evidence, especially of the limited quality that's been offered, is insufficient. Compare that with the standard of evidence for naming a new species. The gap between what we have and what is required is huge. Enforcing those standards is not dogma.

 

You're seeing this in terms of "science". You're seeing the methodology required to build

on existing science/ theory. And you're understanding it all in terms of models and existing

paradigms. Many times new ideas simply spring from new facts or new perspectives rather

than scientific methodology. Saying they aren't "science" isn't necessarily accurate. Yes, often

they aren't subjected to the rigors of experiment, mathematical proof, or normal methodology

but this hardly means such ideas aren't "scientific" in nature or that they are wrong.

 

If I hypothesize that "bigfoots" are descended from alpine Neanderthals then the problem is

lack of a specimen to study moreso than that there might exist a more reasonable explanation

of how bigfoot arose. That the evidence they exist at all is poor at best is irrelevant to their na-

ture or their ability to survive. Sometimes reason puts the onus of proof on the contention and

sometimes on existing models or dogma.

 

Progress always arises as ideas of individuals and often the same idea pops up in many locals.

If a yeti appeared then many people might recognize its ancestry. Such is the nature of progress.

Until something is proven to be consistent with theory derived from experiment it is simply a mod-

el for understanding. Much of what we believe has little to do with experiment and everything to

do with beliefs. Even experiment can be misinterpreted. We "know" far less than people think we

do.

 

Being closed to proven methodology is in contradiction with the fact that science is successful. That's really why the models attract reasoned thinkers, because they work. And because we had to sift through so many bad ideas to get to them.

 

Science isn't successful because it generates knowledge. If we depended on knowledge

 

 

We couldn't have built the pyramids or put a man on the moon because we don't know what

gravity is. Science is successful because reality asserts itself through (in) experiments and

we model this reality to gain ever more knowledge which results in ever more experiments.

It is the ability to perform the "magic trick" of manifesting experiment outside the lab as tech-

nology that is the basis of science's success. We don't need to know why something works

to build it into a machine.

[ajb]

So what have we learnt from this discussion?

 

i) Scientist are people and there is 'peer-review-pressure'. You need to work on things that you can get published and will not ruin your future. You need to be able to attract grant money. This is less so as a scientist matures, but early on it is important.

ii) There is some dogma in science, but this dogma is not beyond reproach. No idea how well established is beyond questioning, but to shake something there needs to be evidence.

iii) Evidence is required and this needs to be up to the standards expected by scientists (or mathematicians) working in that particular field.

iv) Proper evidence can and will change scientists opinions on things: assuming the individual scientists have thought about the 'things' at all.

[swansont]

You're seeing this in terms of "science".

 

Yes. I make no apologies for that, since that's what we're discussing.

[jeremyjr]

Suppression to new ideas and facts is the norm not the exception, we are fundamentally conservative and intrinsically reject "new" things.

We are essentially not different that we were two thousands years ago or five hundreds years ago, we are in essence not different than the people that burned Giordano Bruno. We do not burn people alive today but we burn people socially. It is in our very nature.

[ajb]

Suppression to new ideas and facts is the norm not the exception, we are fundamentally conservative and intrinsically reject "new" things.

Being careful not to accept new ideas without some evidence for them is a good thing. Otherwise our knowledge of the Universe would be rather more confused than it is today. For example, are you not pleased that your GP does not simply accept 'new age magic' as a valid method of treatment?

 

Also, can you provide some example of this suppression in the context of science?

[jeremyjr]

Suppression of new ideas or facts is a common occurrence in many human groups.

For example in Ufology, Ufology is not a science fundamentally for one reason: Ufologists as a rule never had done systematic observations of their subjects of interest.

Can you imagine a biologist trying to build any theory of living beings without any direct and systematic observations of living beings? Or relaying on "sightings reports" of animals from unprepared and casual observers? Very likely any theory coming in that way will be detached from reality as been the case with almost anything coming from ufologists.

But one Ufologist did systematic atmospheric observations: Trevor J Constable and he made amazing discoveries, but his discoveries had been ignored/dismissed by the same Ufologists that never did any systematic observations of the sky.

Edited June 17, 2015 by jeremyjr

[Strange]

For example in Ufology, Ufology is not a science fundamentally for one reason: Ufologists as a rule never had done systematic observations of their subjects of interest.

 

That is true. And I am often puzzled as to why they won't do that. However, when people have done a proper, scientific analysis of UFO reports then nearly all of them have mundane explanations and a small number have to be classified as "not enough evidence to determine the cause". There is zero evidence of extra-terrestrials (or plasma amoeba).

 

 

But one Ufologist did systematic atmospheric observations: Trevor J Constable and he made amazing discoveries

 

Have his "systematic observations" been subject to peer review, published and replicated by others? No? Then it isn't science.

 

(We will skip over the fact he is also apparently a con man. Because, of course, that wouldn't affect scientific observations, just his personal unsupported claims.)

[swansont]

Suppression of new ideas or facts is a common occurrence in many human groups.

For example in Ufology, Ufology is not a science fundamentally for one reason: Ufologists as a rule never had done systematic observations of their subjects of interest.

 

There are more reasons than that.

 

Being ignored is not the same as being suppressed.

[ajb]

For example in Ufology, Ufology is not a science fundamentally for one reason: Ufologists as a rule never had done systematic observations of their subjects of interest.

The few scientific investigations that have been done show no real evidence for alien visitors. Most cases are either misidentification, atmospheric phenomena or hoaxes. A few citing of course never get fully explained, but it is a big jump to assume that it is not of this world.

 

But one Ufologist did systematic atmospheric observations: Trevor J Constable and he made amazing discoveries, but his discoveries had been ignored/dismissed by the same Ufologists that never did any systematic observations of the sky.

Forget what ufologists said about his work, what did any scientist say? Have any of his findings been published?

 

Back on topic, can you give us good examples where scientific ideas have been suppressed?

[Strange]

Back on topic, can you give us good examples where scientific ideas have been suppressed?

 

The only example I can think of is Eddington's opposition to Chandrasekhar's work on the formation of black holes (which barely qualifies, if you really stretch the meaning of the word "suppressed").

[ajb]

The only example I can think of is Eddington's opposition to Chandrasekhar's work on the formation of black holes (which barely qualifies, if you really stretch the meaning of the word "suppressed").

I would say that is a bit of a stretch. The works were published in mainstream journals which then allowed them to be properly examined. Publication is only the first step. People after that may agree or disagree on the significance of the results.

 

At the risk of getting off topic and with no details, the formation of black holes was discovered in a series of steps. The first steps needed lots of symmetry and so even Einstein did not really believe they would form in nature. Then better and better results were formulated with the most general being the singularity theorems of Hawking and Penrose, which require only a few physically reasonable assumptions. The results of Hawking and Penrose came after Einstein had left us. I think today few people really doubt the formation of black holes, but of course the true nature of the singularity is very much open.

 

So back to topic; when new evidence comes to light, and in this particular case it is mathematical evidence, the community can change it ideas. Albeit, many of the original 'doubters' may well have died by the time this happens.

[jeremyjr]

The "suppression" of new ideas, facts, evidence supporting these new ideas or facts is a common trait of any "organized" human groups: scientific circles, religious groups or ufo believers. All share common worldviews and all will offer strong resistance to any new ideas or facts that will place questions marks to their cherished ideas.

Many UFO believers frequently talk about some "cover-up", etc. But later they will suppress any references to the implicit topic in this thread.

That is why it had been said that the only cover-up is in people's minds, nothing more nothing less, and this forum is a perfect example of the resistance to even consider new facts, that reaction is pervasive everywhere and is independent of any professional training that any person may have.

Edited June 17, 2015 by jeremyjr

[Klaynos]

Back on topic, can you give us good examples where scientific ideas have been suppressed?

You need to do this.

[jeremyjr]

The world is literally full of cardinals, as in the Cardinals in Galileo's time, the rarity, the "anomaly" are the Galileos, Trevor J Constable is a Galileo of this time.

[Klaynos]

The world is literally full of cardinals, as in the Cardinals in Galileo's time, the rarity, the "anomaly" are the Galileos, Trevor J Constable is a Galileo of this time.

He's written 10 non fiction books how is that suppression?

 

His rain producing device just didn't work when tested. It turned out to be a con according to the Malaysian government.

[Mordred]

The "suppression" of new ideas, facts, evidence supporting these new ideas or facts is a common trait of any "organized" human groups: scientific circles, religious groups or ufo believers. All share common worldviews and all will offer strong resistance to any new ideas or facts that will place questions marks to their cherished ideas.

Many UFO believers frequently talk about some "cover-up", etc. But later they will suppress any references to the implicit topic in this thread.

That is why it had been said that the only cover-up is in people's minds, nothing more nothing less, and this forum is a perfect example of the resistance to even consider new facts, that reaction is pervasive everywhere and is independent of any professional training that any person may have.

This isn't true by any means. Anyone can publish ideas. Whether or not those ideas get accepted depends on its evidence and testable predictions.

 

Just because an idea doesn't gain weight in mainstay thinking has absolutely nothing to do with suppression.

 

It's due to lack of evidence and/or predictive ability. As pointed out there is zero conclusive evidence for UFOs. The majority has been found to be hoaxes. The term you should learn is irrefutable proof.

 

Culture once believed in witchcraft, no irrefutable evidence of witchcraft exists therefore it isn't accepted by the scientific community.

 

UFOs falls into a similar category. If you can't accept that then science isn't your field.