The misuse of science and reason

After recent browsing of the interweb I've noticed a growing, and particularly worrying trend. To substantiate entirely un-scientific claims, people often mangle the word 'Science' in various stupid ways in an attempt to provide validity to whatever particular belief it is they hold.

In an earlier post I discussed the mechanic by which science works - being that of constructing a self consistent system.

This is where the proof comes into play. If you want to make grand claims about reality, there is an onus on you to provide evidence, and by evidence I mean rigorous, unbiased testing that can repeatedly show the claimed result in the real world.

So bias, the next issue. Whenever someone performs an experiment, it is to determine the result of putting a certain set of mechanics into play. It is highly unlikely that any person goes into an experiment without a thought as to what they think the result should be - this is unavoidable. The most important part is to examine the result closely, if a single piece of evidence does not hold true to the predictions made by your theory, whatever that theory may be - you must accept that your model is either incomplete, or incorrect - the extent of which is obviously determined by the scope of the error. This is good science, and it allows us to deal with something called 'reality'.

Bad science is where this is not done. When you pick only results that support your theory, then ignore or do not give import to the bits that don't, you have already managed to forfeit any credibility the study in question may have had. The universe does not conform to whim, deal with it.

Apart from the aforementioned badly performed science we also have those who are content to simply lie about the facts. Stringing together lines of meaningless waffle that at first glance may sound plausible, but work entirely on making statements that we know are wrong, and can easily prove to be so. A prime example of this is Answers in Genesis (Try not to growl while browsing that site, I find it particularly difficult).

Then we have people with pseudoscientific belief systems, Astrology for instance. You'll regularly see people talking about the 'science' of astrology, this is a particularly irritating example of what I've been talking about. Astrology is not a science, studies have time and again shown that under proper testing conditions it has about as much to say about the real world as a roll of the dice. Homeopathy? Its not even worth a full sentence.

In conclusion I'll add that covering your eyes and ears and shouting "lalala!" when confronted with contradicting evidence, or a sound reasoned argument does nothing for your credibility. Many out there seem to have a talent for ignoring or dismissing out of hand anything that does not have good things to say about their beliefs - if you want a defense that people will actually listen to, come up with an explanation that stands up under proper analysis.

By which we discover... Science!

Science is awesome.

Oh fine then, I suppose I'll have to elaborate...

Science is the best tool we have with which to describe the world we live in. It is a system by which we attempt to create a self-consistent model of reality that can be used to make accurate predictions about the universe and advance understanding of natural phenomena. It is the means by which we have advanced beyond the imperatives provided us by genetics and become the single species in the cosmos (so far as is currently known) to have ventured, in whatever small way, into the vastness of space.

It is of fundamental import that we all understand these basic principles. Any proposed system must be consistent with reality wherever it makes predictions that can be tested, and until that point we have only a theory which cannot be considered factual truth, however much we may wish it to be so.

This of course brings up points that can lead us down rather abstract and metaphysical paths of conjecture and fantasy - What is reality? To nick a quote by Phillip K Dick

'Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.'

Which I in turn nicked from a post over at Principles of Parsimony where BenD further asserts that

'The world isn't going to go away, it's going to come and bite you in the ass if you believe stupid things about it.'

This is what science endeavors to prevent, to do away with any proverbial ass biting and allow us to get on with growing as a species. We can come closer to understanding the true nature of the reality we live in, and from what we have learned so far, it's more incredible than ever imagined.

And dammit, thats why science rawks.