[wegs]

This was not what I expected. I expected the standard line about how the general public should trust scientists, and a fight for a greater role of scientists in decision-making.

It was a good read.

I think the pieces I would add are a clear understanding of the flaws of scientific processes:

* Circle of mutual adoration hiring processes

* Cursory-at-best peer review in many disciplines

* Impact over integrity in hiring

* Selection biases in science reporting (and more generally, the pay-per-click incentive structures places on games-of-telephone)

... and so on.

As well as a clearer understanding of how we go from hypothesis to fact. In many policy discussions, I see individual scientific papers cited which is a nonsense way to use science. One can find a paper which says anything and most results are false. That's still part of the process. Once a result has been poked at from enough directions, it becomes a theory and then an fact. Connecting the hypothetical process to empirical process would be awesome to see in schools.

[nvahalik]

Science is seeing full-well the problem that many religions (at least, those with Scriptures) have been having for centuries. (s/hypothesis/belief/ and s/fact/creed/).

* I see individual scripture references cited (out of context). (Called "proof texting"... "See, here's the proof!")

* One can find a verse which says anything (if you ignore the context).

* Once an idea has been poked at from enough directions, it becomes a belief and then a creed (or a part of one).

Science, like religion also has a method: exegesis vs. the scientific method. A source: scripture vs. creation. Etc. etc.

Sadly, this is not a problem which can be "fixed". You can have your die-hard zealots on either side. The evidence can be placed before them. You can show them that their error (heresy) has been denounced for a thousand years. But yet erroneous beliefs are still rampant.

[kspacewalk2]

I have a somewhat less charitable take on the whole "context incorporation"/exegesis process. It's simply a process of reconciling an ancient, mostly irrelevant religious text to the modern-day economic, social and political realities. What do you need the Bible to do for you, dear leader/dear society? A la carte options available with a little exegesis.

- Need the Bible to justify slavery? With a little judicious exegesis, here you go! Oh, society realized slavery is an abhorrent crime? Time to dust off your trusty exegesis experts.

- Is homosexuality a horrible sin punishable by death, or is that now an anachronistic view which is making us bleed subscribers... scratch, the faithful? Religion Has A Method to correct this!

- etc., etc.

[thereddaikon]

Science has also been used to justify some pretty terrible things.

And that is their point, humans are the corrupting force here. Taking a framework and then using it to justify whatever they want. The scientific method is not uniquely immune to people cherry picking quotes from studies to justify their agendas. And in many ways it is very much the same thing as someone cherry picking scripture to justify the same.

[kspacewalk2]

Sure, humanity is flawed and all that good stuff. But the central point is that of course there's a huge difference between religion (corruptable by humans) and science (corruptable by humans) - the scientific method is not in itself based on evidence-free magical thinking, and is rooted in verifiable/falsifiable reality. So while the two can be compared at this superficial oh-but-what-about-flawed-humanity level, at their root/essence they are fundamentally, categorically different.

[nvahalik]

> the scientific method is not in itself based on evidence-free magical thinking

However, the scientific method is, in many ways, based on faith. In science, you can only measure what you can observe. We cannot "observe" what occurred in the past. We can guess but it is a lie that we know without a doubt what happened before recorded history began: Nobody actually observed it.

Each religion makes its own claim about its epistemological systems. It different for each, but each system ought to be internal consistent for it to make sense. Some systems are far more consistent than others. Based on the internal consistency, one can make an objective assessment as to the validity of said belief system. You can test it based on what it produces and how it judges itself.

At the end of the day, science and religion do not stand on equal footing—but religion has to make sense first because our scientific method was built upon Bacon's own religious beliefs:

"Bacon's entire understanding of what we call "science," and what he called "natural philosophy," was fashioned around the basic tenets of his belief system."

This belief system was Christianity—the idea that a creator created a system that can be known and studied and has order rather than chaos.

[gspr]

I'll bite: examples, please.

[nvahalik]

Sure. There are several that I've personally had to deal with: baptism (by creed? by birth?), the nature of hell/eternal fate of the wicked, nature of Christ, even the support of slavery, etc.

The one that I see that's really in play right now actually has to do with the nature of hell/fate of the wicked.

You've probably heard the fate of the wicked is that whoever does not believe will go to hell: a place of eternal conscious torment (ECT). Proponents of this position will lean heavily on various scriptures:

* "It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, 'where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.'" Mark 9:47-48 * "..lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever." (Rev 20:10).

There are a couple of examples. And they are used. A lot. However, the last couple of hundred years (at least, that we know of, perhaps further back, though it wasn't discussed as much) is the idea of annihilationism: That the fate of the wicked is not ECT but rather is simply to finally die again forever.

The doctrine of final judgement (for our purposes here is clearly defined in Matthew 25:31-46) declares that all of the dead will be raised and will be judged. So, if you were dead, you will be raised and then the final judgement will be made and the two sides (the left and the right) will go to their inheritance: either Christ's kingdom or eternal fire.

But the idea that eternal fire _means_ eternal conscious torment for the wicked makes some specific assumptions that many people assume but are not supported:

* Why is it assumed that all who are raised are now immortal? * Why does the nature of the fire (i.e. that it is eternal) mean that it must burn eternally rather than simply describe its provenance and its effectiveness.

For me (and for many others), we do not find the "evidence" of ECT compelling and can actually point to a number of other areas where ECT makes no sense. The biggest example is everyone's favorite verse: John 3:16 (For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whoever believes in him shall not PERISH but have ETERNAL LIFE). EMPHASIS MINE. In what world does "Perish" mean "be alive but tortured forever"?

Anyway, the point is that many people start with the end in mind. They start with ECT and work their way backwards. Scripture has the advantage over the natural sciences in that (at least for protestants) we believe the canon is closed and therefore no new information can be made available. We have what we have to work with.

[gspr]

That sure is a lot of religious gibberish. Your original claim was about science. Where is the connection?

[nvahalik]

The point is that both science and religion can "start with the end" in mind and back-fill to make their position seem solid.

This has been done with global-warming/climate-change. Being done with COVID measures. Each side has their own set of data that they want to use but the wholistic set of data may or may not ultimately support an individual position.

[gspr]

You're not explaining anything. You're asserting your opinion. Again: examples (of scientists doing that), please?

[neonological]

These are political flaws and flaws with human systems.

You are missing the logical flaw buried within the scientific method itself.

Nothing in science and therefore reality can be proven to be true. We can only falsify things in science.

What this means is every claim ever made by anyone or any scientist from now to eternity can never be proven to be true.

We can only make repeated attempts at falsifying things. After we fail to falsify a thing enough times we can say, hey this theory is maybe true. That is the best science can do and that is what nobody, including most of the people on hacker news do NOT understand.

There is literally no such thing as an actual “fact” in science and therefore in reality as we know it.

This flaw is the origin of most of the distrust in science it is also the reason why blind trust of the scientific method itself is wrong. No claim made by a scientist has actually ever been proven.

[kbelder]

Why do you see it as a flaw? Constantly shedding false beliefs equates to constant improvement.

We all want to get closer to the truth; science is one technique for doing so, and since there's no direct line to God, it's the most efficient one. It has the best corrective feedback loops.

[neonological]

I see it as a flaw because in logic and math, it is very possible to prove your theorems to be true. It is just not possible to do so in reality. Logic is a game with a limited domain. Reality has an unknown domain, hence the inability to prove anything.

Because this feature doesn’t exist in science it is therefore a flaw.

Additionally it doesn’t align with human intuition. Humans assume by default that things can be proven and that facts exist. The truth is that nothing can be proven and facts don’t actually exist. This is counter intuitive and therefore although science is the best tool we have, the counterintuitive qualities science possesses justifies calling these things flaws.

This relatively unknown “flaw” is what drives most of the debate in the political arena. No scientist can ever prove global warming to be true. It is fundamentally impossible. The debate would be over long ago if there was some way for science to prove global warming to be real.

[lotsofpulp]

> I think the pieces I would add are a clear understanding of the flaws of scientific processes:

>* Circle of mutual adoration hiring processes

>* Cursory-at-best peer review in many disciplines

>* Impact over integrity in hiring

>* Selection biases in science reporting (and more generally, the pay-per-click incentive structures places on games-of-telephone)

None of these are part of the scientific process.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method

[thereddaikon]

They didn't at any point say the scientific method. And I'm pretty sure that's intentional because there is nothing inherently wrong with the scientific method. The problem is with the processes we have built around modern academia which leads to a system that does not give an ideal or intended outcome.

[lotsofpulp]

Yes, but I guess I wouldn’t label them as scientific processes, which I would assume be in line with the scientific method.

These listed problems are all people and people’s incentives problems, and have nothing to do with science. They exist just as much in non scientific endeavors, and so attaching the word science to them seems meaningless, and at worst muddies people’s understanding of science.

[thereddaikon]

Scientific processes =/= scientific method

The problem is with the business of science.

Processes are very much a business concept that most adults can understand. We develop new processes every day

Furthermore it was used plural so it can't possibly be the scientific method because not only is that a proper noun but there is only one scientific method while there are many scientific processes.

And yes they can be specific to science. The process of getting published in a peer reviewed journal is unique to academia.

Or what about the process of getting grant funding for research?

I know, you will say but that isn't science.

But nobody is arguing against the validity of the scientific method. At least nobody worth listening to. When people say there are flaws with science that must be addressed they are saying they are flaws with the business of science. And the scientific community is not doing a great job of fixing them.

[wegs]

> Yes, but I guess I wouldn’t label them as scientific processes, which I would assume be in line with the scientific method.

It's that exact assumption which is common, incorrect, and which I'd like to see addressed in K-12 education.

The scientific process in my discipline works as:

1) Graduate students come in to do research

2) Ones which align with hot topics have venues to be published, people to cite them, sources of funding, etc.

3) Some people do diligent work, and write a publication a year. Those don't go anywhere. Some people write 12 publications per year, often based on poor scientific methodology and buggy analysis algorithms.

4) The highest-impact results often come from methodological errors, and never replicate. Most errors are never found, but even if they are, by that point, the people who wrote those papers have found tenure.

5) No one has time for good peer reviews, so reviewers glance at the abstract, sometimes to see if they were cited, and skim the paper.

6) Press picks up the sexiest results, which almost always are nonsense. People also cite the sexiest results.

Increasingly, this has moved from sloppiness to intentional gaming of the system. About half of academics I saw hired in the past decade had some level of intentional sketchiness going on.

This doesn't align well with scientific methods.

In the same way, I think high school civics courses should talk about issues like buying influence, polarization, and corruption as part of civics.

[brightball]

If you ever take the time to read the studies being cited, they also rarely say what people think they say when citing them.