Science is Simply a Process at Establishing Absolute Truth

How about math? Are there absolute truths in math? Geometry? Trigonometry?

You post the most foolish s here regarding what you think you know of science.

What is your education and profession?

Good For You - go read some more....

Try some version out of this, and good luck in doing it without formal instruction.

 

Theory is the strongest "truth" that science can possibly provide. There is nothing stronger than theory.

Don't get me wrong. Our theories are incrediblly strong and they have proven to be of critical importance in extending knowledge. But, they can not be called "truth".

Theories get tested all the time - every day. That adds to an astounding amount of testing. And, any failure would be a huge deal. But, the repeated success doesn't prove truth.

In science, theories describe a process - how something works. Laws don't do that. They represent observations of relationships, such as the relationship between pressure and temperature or conservation of energy. But, they don't describe any process. Laws come with limitations. Science doesn't necessarily know all the limitations of a law, so calling laws "truth" is also a mistake.

 

Math is VERY different than the natural sciences. For example, in math one fully defines a universe.

The result is that in math one can prove theorems that depend on the definition we create. So, we can create groups that include the requirements for the algebra we teach in high school. One can also create groups that support other algebras. The point here is that these systems are fully known. There are zero unknowns about the definitions of these groups, because WE created them.

But, in science we don't know the full definition of our universe - the "group" within which the natural sciences operate.

This is what happened to Newton. His physics fails, because he didn't know about relativity.

And, that's not unique to Newton.

Today, our physics can not resolve the differences between quantum field theory and Einstein gravity.

In other words, there is MAJOR evidence that we don't understand the full definition of our universe today. And, it's obviously worse than that, as we don't know what all else we don't know.

Science offers NO posibility of EVER knowning the full deinition of our universe.

So, in math one may prove a theorem. But, in science there is no possibility of proving a theory.

 

You and I are communicating here via a medium that intrinsically proves so many absolute truths that few if any individuals have sufficient knowledge of to replicate these results given a blank slate to rebuild this technology.

Classical Newtonian Physics are irrefutable to this day. Relativity only moderately impacts Newton's work with respect to time, and distance from gravitational fields. Science offers the only possibility of providing the full explanation of our universe, albeit there are some particular aspects of existence that defy even the ability of science to resolve. Science has as of yet spectacularly failed to create life from inanimate matter. This is a glaring thing given that there are theories that life was created by sunshine, internal energy and random primordial surface actions on Earth. Hmmm, it just all came together after enough photons, volcanic eruptions, and tide pool wave forms?

Just spouting off crap like we will never know anything while you simultaneously and consistently post about your absolute confidence in the science of global warming is, <sigh>.... Consistency - try and get ya some bro.

 

You have the Newton thing backwards. Newtonian physics is a special case of Einstein's theory,. It is valid only within the limits that Einstein's theory defines. Suggesting Newton's ideas are "truth" is nonsense.

Your comment on biology is not even about science. Building a life form is an engineering task, not a task of science. I know we claim anything that looks less than practical or seems "sciency" is science, but building things doesn't use scientific method It uses engineering principles that may or may not depend on what has been learned by science.

I said we will nver know everything - that we will never have a theory of physics that covers everything within our universe. And, even that wouldn't be sufficient, as it wouldn't include a full understanding of the possibility of factors outside our universe affecting us in some way.

The issue we were discussing is whether there is proof of truth in science. The answer to that is a resounding "NO". Nowhere in any science text will you find anything about scientific method proving something to be true. Science depends on casting out false ideas.

But, that doesn't mean that we don't have theories in which great confidence must be placed based on their track record.

Refusing to accept what we have learned is a seriously stupid approach if what it is based on is whether science has a method of positive proof.

We use Newtonian physics TODAY, even thought we know it isn't "truth'". And, the reason is that we have an understanding of its limits. We know how to decide whther Newtonian Phyics is going to fail us.

We know, for example, that Newtonian Physics is totally inadequate to accomplish GPS. Engineers look at what we have learned in physics and realize that if they are going to build a GPS system, it can't be based on Newton - that Einstein is required.

 

Hahaha.... You are clueless. There would never have been an Einstein without Newton and Leibniz. Not to mention Euler, among many others. Einstein supplied a slight but very profound amount of modelling that corrects for time with respect to velocity and gravity that enables our current precision technology for one of its most widespread applications in GPS.

Did you forget along the way to your rant of a response your claim that science cannot offer any possibility of providing absolute truth?

Dee Dee Dee, Hi, I'm Will Read More, and SCIENCE PROVES THAT WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE FROM CLIMATE CHANGE, but SCIENCE OFFERS NO ABSOLUTE TRUTH.

FFS. Stuff your head in the loo and flush....

Biology is engineering, not science? Again, stuff your head in the loo and flush. This is beyond absurd. You embarrass yourself Sir.

What are your qualifications as either a scientist or an engineer? What is your highest level of completed math? Calc 1? Did you even complete Calc 1 at the college level in the US? How about chemistry? College Chem 1 and 2? Organic? How about Physics? Physics 1 and 2? Either of these?

How about that reference to Thomas and Finney. 7ed was my textbook. Calc 1, 2 and 3. 12 of the most demanding semester hours of my ENGINEERING degree.

I really hate to be so unkind and vent such anger here, but you really are infuriating with your obviously uninformed pop culture popular science, popular mechanics, scientific american amateur wannabe intellectual prognostications that I just want to puke.

Explain to me what engineering is, will you?

Science holds no absolute truth, yet you consistently support the "science" of the The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and rail about its validity.

Meh, I've allowed your lack of knowledge to influence my response in an unfavorable light upon my own character, but I will post this response nevertheless. I think maybe sometimes a little pure passion is worth conveying. And I have a bit of passionate disagreement with your weird opinions about what is and what isn't science.

 

You haven't even HEARD of bioengieering??

Sorry. There was once a time when I thought you were trying to be serious.

 

Seriously, did you even complete algebra II in high school? Even take a chemistry class in high school?

 

Why are you thinkig this is a topic you can win with ad hom?

 

Global warming and climate change is a fraud. Every scare tactic and every prediction these idiots have made has not come true.

The Obamas bought a $7M house in Martha's vineyard at a time Al Gore predicted our east coast would be under water from a tidal wave. They obviously do not believe it.

These so called scientists have been spectacularly wrong for 100 years. In 1970 Paul Erlich predicted 200 million deaths a year from world wide famine. There is less starvation and mal nutrition today than there was then.

https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/18-s...st-earth-day-in-1970-expect-more-this-year-3/

 

Of course the libocrats are in love with China. They only build 300 coal plants around the world as part of their commitment to climate change.

China good. USA evil!

 

Right-wing think-tank propaganda.

 

Liberals use political correctness as de facto censorship to silence any and all debate that does not fit the Liberal narrative regardless of its truthfulness.

Such as African Americans commit murder at a higher rate than White Americans.

You can't say that even though it's true.

 

There are no facts in science only theories-sometimes laws.

There are no facts in science only theories because theories can change.

For example ' the theory of evolution' is a theory and not a fact because it indeed changed with the advent of molecular biology in the 1930's showing a mechanism of evolution, 'single nucleotide polymorphisms,' and the 'theory' of evolution changed again with the discovery of horizontal gene transfer in 2005-which showed how an organism could acquire a gene hundreds to even thousands of nucleotides long in a single generation which explained the mechanism of punctuated equilibrium and the absence of intermediate fossils is the fossil record.

A 'Law,' is a 'Law,' and not a theory because it cannot be changed, but all Laws were once hypothesis's that were tested by experiments just like theories are tested by experiments-The difference, theories can change.

 

Are you certain a 'law' cannot be changed? This particular astrophysicist says this about the subject:


https://archive.briankoberlein.com/2015/09/10/breaking-the-law/index.html

(To any copyright cops, on 'about' he writes: "you are free to copy and share, but not sell or monetize")

CAN WE BREAK THE LAWS OF PHYSICS?

In Physics by Brian Koberlein10 September 20153 Comments

One of the assumptions most scientists have about the universe is that there are absolute physical laws that describe or govern the behavior of the cosmos. They’re often referred to as the laws of physics. Of course the scientific theories we’ve developed over centuries of experiment and observation are also referred to as the laws of physics. The two aren’t necessarily the same, which is why you sometimes hear of some new discovery as “breaking the laws of physics.”

While I’m not particularly fond of the term, it does raise an interesting question. Can the laws of physics be broken? If you take the position that there exist some absolute set of physical laws, then the answer would be no. Any violation of the scientific theories we’ve developed would simply show that our “laws of physics” are not the real laws of physics and must therefore be modified accordingly. If, however, you take the position that our known laws of physics are the only knowledge we have of the universe, then clearly the laws of physics can be broken. Our goal as scientists is then to develop a set of physical laws that aren’t violated.

While it seems reasonable to presume that there is some set of absolute physical laws, we have no way of proving it. The idea is a metaphysical assumption we can never test. We might discover the absolute rules of the universe through scientific study, but we could never be certain that there isn’t some rule-violating process we haven’t yet observed. We may also reach a point where we have no way to distinguish between competing models. For example, the idea of early cosmic inflation would explain things such as why the universe appears to be uniform. As BICEP2 found, the presence of dust in the universe can obscure evidence of early cosmic inflation, assuming it occurred. What if it’s impossible to prove that early cosmic inflation occurred?

Of course it’s possible that there are no absolute physical laws. There may only be approximate rules that we can discover, like a game of twenty questions. One of the strengths of science is that it works even if absolute laws don’t exist. Our theories are only as good as the evidence, and are always open to improvement.

That’s why we love finding some new phenomena that “breaks the laws of physics.” It means we can learn something new about the universe.


This is precisely why when someone tells me 'their might be aliens the universe but they aren't visiting earth because they can't come here because of the great distances', I say, bullshit. Who is to say aliens, millions of years more advanced than us, haven't figured out some new paradigm ( or whatever term works here ) and can get here in a zip. Who's to say they can't?

 

That does not necessarily mean science is the only logical process that can be used to establish truth, or to try to establish truth, or even to establish universal truth.


one example
Heuristics are commonly used by humans to determine things. Humans probably would not be able to function in this world if it were not for heuristics. The level of certainty with heuristics can often be a lot lower than science though, although it depends on the type of situation. I'm sure someone could be able to come up with some situations where heuristics would be likely to give a more accurate result than science would.

Philosophically it could be stated that even science relies on heuristics, on some level.

Logic tells us that nothing can really be determined with absolute complete certainty. Then the question of whether there is any certain foundation on which we can base any premise.

 

I know hypothesis's must be falsifiable. I have never considered whether Scientific Laws must also be falsifiable. However, since Laws were once hypothesis's at one time, at least when they were hypothesis's, they had to of been falsifiable to be scientific.

 

Even if a theory is not, "true," practical applications can still be derived from it (I'm pragmatic. I determine the value of a theory based on how many practical applications can be derived from it, not really how well it describes all the phenomena it's meant to describe).

For example, there was once a theory that electricity flowed like water. Today we know that's not, "true," however many practical applications were derived from that theory nonetheless.

 

I would suggest that laws never were hypotheses.

Hypothesis is a step on the way toward theory - a collection of one or more hypotheses that have reached some level of confidence. They describe a process - stating how something works.

Laws don't do that. The laws of thermodynamics don't say HOW it works. They jstate relationshiops that have been seen to be true in all observations (sometimes within certain limitations).

 

Heuristics is really about how knowledge is applied, not advanced.

Science is based on the premise that we can meaningfully observe the universe.

Science does not claim to determine anything with "absolute complete certainty". Only religion makes absolutist claims like that. Thus no theory (or anything else) of science is considered absolute truth. In fact, the most important of our theories get tested on a continuing basis, daily, as they are the principle tools for extending human knowledge of our universe.

 

yep, science is learning that one, took them long enough (but like you said in another post, billion$ were at risk, so the corps will try to complicate things for as long as possible to prevent this from being understood by the masses)

https://cholesterolcode.com/

so many medications like Statins created based on bad science - sad!

 

Scientists are so conservative you cannot say you accept the Null Hypothesis only that you fail to reject the null hypothesis. However, if the Null is proven to be false you can say you accept the Alternative hypothesis but once you accept the Alternative hypothesis it becomes the Null hypothesis. Therefore, you can say you accept a hypothesis once and only once-lol....

 

Science is based on Consensus. I could find you a study that found smoking does not cause lung cancer. I could even find you a study that found smoking even prevents lung cancer. However, the overwhelming scientific consensus is that smoking causes lung cancer.

 

I don't think that's a good description of science especially when we are comparing science to other alternative systems of reasoning.

Such types of statements may be technically true, but they commonly carry implications most people will just take for granted which are false.

There may be various aspects of that statement which are not unique to only science, even if if is only true for science in all the fulness of that statement.

Oh, and by the way even science does recognize that there is only a tiny part of the overall universe that is observable, so even that statement is not technically correct, in a way.

 

Sad, but that's unfortunately what is happening right now.