| > It's easy to dismiss a field when you compare a complicated problem to an easy problem, and then object to a lack of answers for the complicated problem, because there are so much more and better answers for the easy problem. Psychology is not dismissed as a science because it's complicated, it's dismissed because it's not science. The fact that it's complicated is irrelevant to its standing among sciences. And offering the explanation that it's comparatively complicated fails any test of common sense -- remember quantum theory? It's more complex than any psychological theory, and yet we acquire perfectly reliable results to ten decimal places. In fact, quantum theory is the single most successful scientific theory in existence, yet no one fully understands it. "Anyone who is not disturbed by quantum physics has not understood it." -- Neils Bohr. > Let's face it: Physics is easy! Only to those who don't understand the subject. > In contrast, the social sciences are really hard. Psychology is not a science because psychological research is so difficult? Okay, but if I were a psychologist, I would ask you not to be on my side. > ... for finding the truth is really hard here. Science is not about finding truth, and scientific theories never become true. Some of them resist falsification for extended periods, but all of them are perpetually falsifiable in principle by new evidence. |