And I'll start by saying that I'd like to be clear. I don't spend much of any time crabbing about NdeGT. In this instance he's just a symbol of a larger problem. He's an illustration. I wish I'd bookmarked a rant I saw a couple weeks ago about people who think it's so cool to claim to love science but in reality would never want to DO science... and hey, it's okay if you don't. We don't all like the same things. But it's so very Hip just now to claim to be all into that sciency crap. And the best way to prove your bonafides is to publicly proclaim yourself a NdeGT fanboy or fangirl. It's like... all the coolness of being into science with none of the Math. That's not really his fault, I think, so I try not to blame him for it.
But all that is just context.
What I actually wanted to complain about was something that happened in class the other day.
It began completely unobjectionably. We were discussing the interpretation of alluvial sediments and the implications for subsurface formations related to a paper that we'd read for class. The author of the paper had gotten his doctorate on the basis of work he'd done showing a particular relationship that his newer paper entirely disproved. Geology is full of such reversals of accepted truth. The prof laughed and asked what things we might all believe to be true now would students be laughing over 20 years from now? As an answer to that rhetorical question she started mocking the idea of CO2 not causing global warming or the world being only 7 thousand years old.
Anyone with any measure of OCD is twitching right now.
There is a point when it stops being science and it possible to locate that point by the moment when a rational person who has been presenting information logically begins to present it emotionally. Widely derided ideas do not represent the scientific consensuses *today*. The scientific consensus is the opposite. But we'd entered a non-scientific state where politics and belief reside. It doesn't matter how right she was about either CO2 or the age of the Earth, it matters that she slipped from logic to illogic... and at that point it's not science anymore. At that point it's an excuse to mock to affirm moral superiority or political righteousness. A little strawman pinata is tossed up there to bat at and destroy. At that point it's illogic and disorder.
Connecting with that point, where the scientist passes over into emotion is the point where the fanboys and fangirls find they LOVE science.
Because math is hard.
(Here's a nice picture to make up for listening to me whine.)
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| What 1.1 Billion years looks like. |
20 comments:
Somebody must be working on a robot scientist, who'll look great in a lab coat, who we can all admire.
Until then, we'll have to make do with human beings, with all their annoying little imperfections.
Thanks, Synova. That pretty much killed what little desire I had to check out Tyson.
This was a middle of the night stealth post, synova.
Not fair.
I shall have to consider its merits and get back to you soon.
When it stops being science...you better not oppose it anyway, because then you'll be a HATER.
The grafting of a class system onto the tree of liberty takes time.
Nobody remembers the shame of those who turned out to be wrong, and who insisted upon theories that survived by consensus alone until science proved them wrong. We remember those who got it right, but forget the advocates of the non-science of their time - often highly respected "scientists".
Consider these wrong scientific consensuses of the past - all highly supported in their time by most of the experts in the field.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superseded_scientific_theories
Nice link, bagoh20. I've written separately about most all of the topics in the "chemistry" subheading.
The notion of emotion in science is Baconian (if not older):
The human understanding is no dry light, but receives an infusion from the will and affections; whence proceed sciences which may be called "sciences as one would." For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Therefore he rejects difficult things from impatience of research; sober things, because they narrow hope; the deeper things of nature, from superstition; the light of experience, from arrogance and pride, lest his mind should seem to be occupied with things mean and transitory; things not commonly believed, out of deference to the opinion of the vulgar. Numberless in short are the ways, and sometimes imperceptible, in which the affections colour and infect the understanding.
~Francis Bacon, Novum Organum, Aphorism XLIX (1620)
Frustrating because those kinds of emotional outbursts are frequent. I can hear it now.
"For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes."
I've always loved that phrase. Who speaks and writes like that anymore? It shows a mastery of the present tense, subjunctive mood.
Nice post, Syn. Sorta makes me glad I'm too old for school anymore, as I'd have a hard time holding my tongue in circumstances such as you describe.
Hey, chick. Have you seen this site...
http://www.compoundchem.com/
"EVERYDAY EXPLORATION OF CHEMICAL COMPOUNDS"
Pretty cool I think.
Last week we visited a +- 140 million year old (Jurassic) mud flat on the Navajo Res, filled with dinosaur tracks. Our guide ($10/person donation is customary), who was instructed to find a big enough dinosaur foot print to photograph our 2 dogs sitting in it, also showed us several human foot prints preserved in the mud, the shapes and direction of which pointed obviously to these folks being chased by a velociraptor. As you all remember, this event was duplicated by Steven Spielberg in Jurassic Park.
The only problem I have with this interpretation is that our guide was a Navajo, a very late comer to the southwest. Had he been a Hopi I would have given the story more credence as Mesozoic humans would have been his ancestors.
Indians have never been very bright or inclined to anything other than superstition.
I think they are the original democrats.
Come to think of it, they do drink like the Kennedys...
Eric, I don't expect scientists not to be human (and I loved the Francis Bacon quote) but rather than admire their science and forgive their humanity it's more a case of pretending that it's science and objectivity that confirms what we want to believe when it's not... because we're operating in that emotional space.
Part of what bugged me about the exchange wasn't her expressed opinion because it certainly wasn't a surprise. (Granted, I did find the 7K Earth bit profoundly annoying because it's such a non-issue and seemed gratuitous religion bashing.) What bugged me is that she took an extremely interesting idea because, by definition, what is non-controversial and widely accepted and considered to be well supported by research, by *definition* is impossible to know which of those things might be overturned by our own research or that of others in the next 20 years.
The importance of thinking about the question is the fact that we *can't* predict what will hold and what will give until it does... and that ought to lead to a small bit of modesty.
Instead it lead to mocking.
Yeah, that prof was trashing the notion of scientific objectivity with her little mocking dance. But I'd rather keep it simple and say she's just one more dishonest twerp. Like that Tyson guy. Of course, with regard to Tyson, that puts me in the racist camp. Because Bill Mahr says so.
Tyson has always gotten on my nerves.
One of the many fun aspects of Neal Stephenson's The Baroque Cycle is the entertaining look at the science of Newton' s time and some of the logical conclusions we now know to be wrong. And I know I'd have come to the same wrong conclusions.
@synova: I just posted a riff on your post here.
John said...
Had he been a Hopi I would have given the story more credence as Mesozoic humans would have been his ancestors.
Although there is considerable argument over whether there were any true Mesozoic humans, I tend to agree with you anyway. There is something ethereal about Hopi art work and graphics...almost hieroglyphics. They came from somewhere, either here or out there. WTF...the Mud-heads alone should give one pause.
I spent a fair part of my youth intimately looking at the Navajo, Zuni, Apache, Comanche, and Hopi cultures as represented in their artwork and lifestyles....and their dwellings. I've crawled around and through some very ancient places in New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, and Utah. My non-scientific conclusion is that "man" was here long before we think he was...for what ever that means. I found remote carvings that had to be Mesozoic or very close in time....just by the geology of the stone work I found them. I drove my parents nuts even as a kid when I'd demand they stop somewhere in BFE so I could go dig up stuff and preserve it. I continued when I was able to drive myself, or better yet, ride a horse in to the remotest places....and camp out there, where I learned that snakes can be really poor companions. Cold nights and guess where the local sidewinder wants to cuddle in to, eh? I never got bitten...I guess because I understood their needs parallel with mine...to be warm.
My favorite era/imagery turns out to be the Hopi, and it is their artwork that I commission when I want a fine piece of jewelry made. I've walked over most of their ancient lands and I want a piece of that with me forever.
I think I've taught Bangkok, Thai-landers, more about Hopi than anything else...since for the pieces I've wanted I could not find any Native American Artists who would do the work in 18 to 22 K gold ...but my contacts in Bangkok would and duplicate the Hopi imagery perfectly to boot...for reasonable price. I've sent some very rare Turquoise stones to Bangkok for rendering in to jewelry with ancient motifs. One, a ring, they asserted it had to be "Persian", but I said sorry folks, it really is a fine piece of Kingman Mine birds-eye stone, with the mottling so faint you need magnification to see it. I spent about $1100 to have it made, and I've been offered $3500+ for it, by Arabs, periodically. I've said I'd take no less that $10K...'cause I'd never sell it. Who gets it eventually (Judi or daughter Kim) depends upon who is there when I croak :-))
My interest dates back to being 8 years old or so and digging in to an ancient burial mound in northern Michigan. It was there so I dug. In those days, at the young age I was, I was comfortable wandering the northern forests alone and taking care of myself....to the great consternation of my parents. I feel a bit guilty about that today, but what I found in Ojibwa artifacts was worth it and I never sold or gave away any of it. I reburied most of it.
If I ever find a genuine piece of original "Landers Blue" (only 90 odd pounds ever found) I will sent it to Bangkok for a piece, ring, pin, or whatever, to give my better half. The odds are about 90:1 on finding a rare "Landers Blue" stone today...what there is has already been used in fine gold jewelry by Native artists. I already have stones in rings that came from places like Landers County, Nevada, but it is not exactly like Landers Blue. Dang. Landers Blue is what I yearn for and will find one day.
I could have tried former Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell's jewelry firm, now run by his son, but they already had their niche, a modernistic design, and it wasn't ancient Hopi...plus their work cost an arm and a leg. I probably could afford one of Ben Nighthorse's quarter horses (he bred fantastic old southwest types) easier than a custom work in his jewelry shop.
So, yes, thank you John for jogging so many memories.
For those who wonder what Landers Blue Turquoise it, here is a Fine Sample. If you ever find one, let me know.
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