See ALL the stars!
Da Rules excuse all the inaccuracy in the world. Listen to them, not me.
No, there really are no answers from science. There's only decisions to make from the data.
Science tells you how things are, not how to do things. Making decisions depends on what you're trying to achieve, and that isn't same for everyone.
edited 26th Oct '11 3:55:13 PM by abstractematics
Now using Trivialis handle.
Crime was probably a terrible example since we might not know the "perfect" way of doing things but we know how to perfect the way of dealing with crime. THAT is science. Constantly raging on about punishing criminals and locking up bad people because you "think" that'll work, that's how most countries deal with crime... good ole "tough on crime" stance. More sensible countries deal with crime by going "gee why don't we try this", and then look at data and see if it worked.
Take for example the "Safe Injection Site" in Canada. A place where addicts can shoot drugs cleanly, prevent O Ds because there are doctors there to reduce disease and crime. That's the hypothesis. Then we carried out the project. It worked. Crime dropped by a lot, O Ds dropped a lot, addiction rates dropped, rehab rates rose and so on. We compared it against everyone else who was not using it. They all didn't fare as well (but everyone was improving though). So what do the Tories decide to do? Shut it down. Because they believe it doesn't work. Based on what? Belief. That's it.
That's when people think, well if we did things scientifically, that made no sense.
scratching at .8, just hopin'
Breadloaf's hit it on the head. That's the thing. We shouldn't put scientists in charge, we should make everyone in charge more scientific. True, scientists are fallible and stubborn and imperfect. But the scientific method's beauty is in how it continues to progress and find the most correct answers in spite of the flaws of its practitioners. That's what peer review and objective testing does. That's why each generation of stubborn ideologues and career ladder-climbers in scientific disciplines are left behind by the graduate students who are paying attention to whoever has it right at the time.
There's a saying popular among strident atheists that goes like so: "Evil people do evil. Good people do good. But to get good people to do evil requires religion." I'm not supporting that saying and I'm not arguing that it's accurate. But I will argue for this:
- Stupid people do stupid things. Smart people do smart things. But to get stupid people to do smart things requires science.
Radical Taoist, I would appreciate it if you answered my prior question.
breadloaf's example is considerable because we have a consensus on what we want, and we have discovered an effective method to achieve it. But we don't always have that. Sometimes we have conflicting interests, either because they're different or because they interfere with one another.
Now using Trivialis handle.
scratching at .8, just hopin'
Oh sorry, missed that.
Is math a science, according to my (admittedly strict) definition? No, math is not a science to my knowledge. At least, I have never heard of any experimentation or hypothesizing in math; from what I can tell, all advancements in mathematical knowledge have been from reasoning, without needing to test further if the reasoning is sound. Accordingly, math is no more a science than logic, though science depends heavily on logic and math.
Now: I may be incorrect, and if someone who knows more about math than I can set me straight on this I would appreciate it.
Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.
Christmas Sheep
I don't know much about math myself, but I've discussed this subject with my grad-student-in-math brother, he said it's not a science, it's a language that science uses.
Math provides the data, science provides the results.
Still Sheepin'
Depending you defition of "science", math either is or is not science. Using original term, Field Of Knowledge, it is. However, using the most commnon standard, natural science, it is not. Math is "a scientific language". We have gone trough this already. Science uses math since it is the easiest way to represent scientific concepts. How else could you explain how Force is generated or something else?
Scientist propably wouldn't be best in chargem, however, applying scientific method would propalby be for the best. Get hypothesis, do a small scale test that, if proven wrong, can be reversed. Expand to see if it works on larger area. If it prrofs to be much better than previous method, apply it.
Sticking to inefficient methods and opposing better methods just because they were proposed by opposing party is really bad. Seriosuly, how much democrats and republicans vote against proposal jsut because otherone proposed it, not because they consider it bad?
Also... why the heck am I getting add for The Inernational Muslim Matrimonials Site... Anyone else ever get that?
This is sort of a pretty silly subject. Science is a tool. It cannot "Rule the world" or whatever, because it is not conscious and it does not have motivation or judgement of its own. Its like saying "let plumbing rule the world". It means nothing and I think the only type of people who say that kind of thing are those who know little about what science actually is.
