[TelmoMenezes]

It's conceptual nitpicking, perhaps.

I defend that using the word "proof" in the context of scientific theories is misleading. It invites people to suspend doubt, which is precisely the opposite of the scientific stance. Religions deal in absolute truth. Science is something much better than that, precisely because it is rationally humble.

[eli_gottlieb]

>I defend that using the word "proof" in the context of scientific theories is misleading. It invites people to suspend doubt, which is precisely the opposite of the scientific stance. Religions deal in absolute truth. Science is something much better than that, precisely because it is rationally humble.

Science is fundamentally subject to abductive, statistical reasoning. As such, the whole "doubt" and "humility" shtick wears out once you get to well-tested ideas.

We do not have "some evidence" that "supports", for instance, our conclusion that the Earth orbits the sun. We can simply say that all available evidence supports such a statement. We can imagine some chance, some probability, that the statement is wrong, but that probability involves revoking so very much of our established corpus of scientific observations that it makes no odds. In well-established matters like these, underconfidence in colloquial speech is every bit as misleading as overconfidence in bleeding-edge research.

Note that when you start trying to talk about things anti-scientific people wish to dispute, such as evolution and global warming, all of a sudden it's the enemies of science yacking on about the humility of mere empiricism, as though empiricism is mere.

[shkkmo]

It's not just conceptual nit picking. 'proof' and 'prove' do indeed mean something different in mathematics than they do in science. This semantic difference confuses people (you see a lot evidence of that in this thread). I think it's better to use 'evidence' rather that 'proof' and 'substantially support' rather than 'prove' when talking about science. That doesn't mean that the terms are invalid when used to talk about science, just that they are confusing to people.