Is Science Rational? Essay

Many of science’s debates and theories are correlated with the objectivity of science. For instance, claims, methods, and experiments/results can act as a type of objective. Helen Longino believes that science is objective due to the ways of the scientific method being put to use and how we approach ideas with our opinions. Her article elaborates upon social dimensions of scientific knowledge that acknowledges objectivity is more of a social culture done within the community which allows criticism to be present. This allows unbiased theories and concepts to be eliminated or reasoned with. She points out the association between social and cognitive values and she offers a reusable approach to why science is objective rather than the two pre-existing

The word "science" probably brings many different pictures into your mind, some being: a fat textbook, white lab coats, microscopes, an astronomer looking through a telescope, a naturalist in the rainforest, Einstein's equations scribbled on a board, the launch of the space shuttle, bubbling beakers.... All of those images reflect some aspect of science, but none of them provides a full picture of what science completely is. Science is defined to be the knowledge attained through study or practice, or knowledge covering general truths of the operation of general laws, especially as obtained and tested through scientific method and concerned with the physical world.

What is Science? When it comes to the word ‘science’ most of the people have some kind of knowledge about science or when they think of it there is some kind of image related to it, a theory, scientific words or scientific research (Beyond Conservation, n.d.). Many different sorts of ideas float into an individual’s mind. Every individual has a different perception about science and how he/she perceives it. It illustrates that each person can identify science in some form. It indicates that the ‘science’ plays a vital role in our everyday lives (Lederman & Tobin, 2002). It seems that everyone can identify science but cannot differentiate it correctly from pseudo-science and non-science (Park, 1986). This essay will address the difference between science, non-science and pseudo-science. Then it will discuss possible responses to the question that what should we do when there is a clash between scientific explanation and non-scientific explanation. Then it will present a brief examination about the correct non-scientific explanation.

In the TED talk, “The Pursuit of Ignorance,” Stuart Firestein makes the argument that there is this great misconception in the way that we study science. He describes the way we view the process of science today as, "a very well-ordered mechanism for understanding the world, for gaining facts, for gaining data." (Firestein 0:11 and 18:23) Although Firestein provides a convincing argument that modern science processes rely too much on facts instead of ignorance and new discovery, he fails to provide strong evidence that it should instead focus solely on the pursuit of ignorance.

The general definition of science is the systematic study of the physical and natural world through observation and experiments. On the contrary, it is much more than that. Much like art, it holds a sense of subjectivity. It is an abstract paradigm that requires the input of one’s personal beliefs and values to help it progress. It is much more than just facts and theories of how the world works, but also a prime representation of the ethics and beliefs of the scientists that help mold it today. Science is a database for factual knowledge on the natural world, furthermore, it also incorporates the environment it has created. The environment consists of the particular people, behaviors, and struggles of the scientific community. Even though science incorporates many thoughts and ideas, it does not contain other ideas. Science does not hold a moral category. It does not define what is considered right and what is considered wrong. It merely provides information on certain ideas for further understanding. Any theories and applications of it can lead to other subjects. This idea also applies to what the acquired scientific knowledge is used for. Even though the ideas of complexity and subjectivity are present in both science and art, the concept of aesthetic should only be important for art. Despite requiring organization and general cleanliness, science does not need to pass the eye test. Science should be represented through proper data and its analysis and the non factual features need to have a rational reasoning. To judge or base an idea on its appeal does not equal to

In the TED talk, “The Pursuit of Ignorance,” Stuart Firestein makes the argument that there is this great misconception in the way that we study science. He describes the way we view the process of science today as, "a very well-ordered mechanism for understanding the world, for gaining facts, for gaining data." (Firestein 0:11 and 18:23) Although Firestein provides a convincing argument that modern science processes rely too much on facts instead of ignorance and new discovery, he fails to provide strong evidence that it should instead focus solely on the pursuit of ignorance.

What is science? A question everybody knows but only few choose to answer. A question that never goes out of style, a question that can trigger someone to jump off of the window for being the most “cliché” question that a teacher can ask. Name all those thoughts, but if we look on the other side of it, science had contributed a lot of things in the world and in our lives.

Scientists understand that everything they know now can later be proven false or altered to

First, I will begin with some quotes from the biology textbook Biology: Exploring Life by Campbell, Williamson, and Heyden. I used this book in my 9th grade biology course; note that the authors are evolutionists. Here is how the authors define “science:”

One doesn’t need to believe in gravity to fall, a cup of coffee doesn’t believe in thermodynamics to cool down, and one doesn’t need to believe in Boyle’s law to blow up a balloon. A wise man by the name of Neil Degrasse Tyson from Real Time with Bill Maher once claimed, “The good thing about science is that it’s true whether or not you believe in it.” Various can agree with Tyson’s views, for facts that have been reviewed and tested numerous times over an extended period of time can be tough to contradict. Aside from one’s theory, it all comes down to the paperwork and long-term observation progression to rationalize what make science science.

The following essay aims to discuss the inconsistencies between the inductivist and Popper’s points of view of science rationality of science in light of claims that the scientific method is inductive yet an inductive method is no. I think is rational to say that inductivist view of science has significant contradiction that Popper’s view solves. To support Popper’s view my argument will introduce the inductivist and falsificationsist views and I will focus in showing the issues of considered science as objective, scientific knowledge as proven and nature as uniform as well as the differences between inductivism and falsificationism to the creation of hypothesis.

I think in the world today we have lost sight of what science is really about which is finding the facts in order to build a better

Today’s scientific community is facing a crisis on how to determine what fits the definition of science. Summed up in an article by Natalie Wolchover called, “A Fight for the Soul of Science,” Wolchover discusses how modern physics relies on deductive reasoning rather than empirical reasoning, straying from the traditional scientific method. The central question in the article asks: “Can we ever really trust a theory on empirical grounds?” And the disagreement on the answer is splitting the scientific community in half. Though this question is contemporary, David Hume, an 18th century philosopher, asked similar questions hundreds of years ago, and his answers are still relevant today. Hume would believe wholeheartedly that we can never trust a theory on empirical grounds and deem the current theories in physics unfounded. While this one-sided view has merit, it ignores a valid method of thinking and closes the door on future innovation in physics, making it an unsatisfactory answer for the scientific community.

Karl Popper is commonly regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of science in the 20th Century. He is well known for his rejection of the inductivist viewpoint of the scientific method, in which one uses observation to propose a law to generalize an observed pattern, and later confirm that law through more observation. Popper states that “induction cannot be logically justified” (Popper 14). Inductivism relies on the process of inductive reasoning which is a logical process in which multiple premises, all thought to be true and found to be true most of the time, are combined to obtain a conclusion and in many cases formulate a law or theory. Popper rejected the inductivist viewpoint in favor of a theory called empirical falsification which holds that a theory can never be proven, but it can be falsified, and therefore it can and needs to be scrutinized through experimentation.

I also tend to agree that underneath all claims to consilience among the disciplines, there lurks a tyrannical attempt to reduce all human knowledge to terms that we already understand. To think that science is the only way to get ‘real’ truth is analogous to thinking that English is the only ‘real’ language (and that all others are merely poor imitations).