Before you link that next study

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So what? Now PROVE THAT THIS IS THE MAJORITY OF SCIENCE. Go ahead, PROVE IT!

If there's more demand for bad science than there is for good science, more bad science will be done. Hardly the fault of science, but, hey, rejecting science is rejecting reason, so no need to pretend to be reasonable—just blame whomever or whatever you feel like, for the hell of it

BREAKING NEWS: new studies suggest science isn't perfect. leading experts assure it's only a statistical anomaly

what else is new, right? whether it's getting better or worse (it is getting worse), science is always subject to conflicting interests and influences like any other integral part of society. no system is possibly complete or self-contained, but it's in the interest of those in power to convince others to the contrary. that is the basic nature of organized religions, and science is effectively one of them

Erm, first up there are no "those in power". Secondly, the closest thing to "those in power" in science are the editors of major journals, who are the ones publicising this.

A fish is a limbless cold-blooded vertebrate animal with gills and fins. Science does not fit that definition. Science is not a fish. Agreed?

Similarly, a religion is a system of faith and worship based around a superhuman controlling power. Science does not fit that definition - there is no worship, no superhuman controlling power, and evidence is used ahead of faith (although there is trust, I will grant you). Science is not a religion.

oh i don't mean "those in power" within academia. you're right, there's no such thing as "the ruling scientists" or anything to that effect. the main point of confusion at large is the question of what is science after all, and it's a giant loophole. the basic idea of science is, in theory, a method (and, by extension, the dynamic system that supports it). it's not an institution, and it's not a body of knowledge either, it's a way of building knowledge through balanced skepticism. but not many people are aware of that, and chances are that not many people ever will. that's how it gets to be effectively a religion

researchers are mere "monks" in that religion, while "the higher clergy" is made up of capitalists instead (capitalists and politicians. they're either symbiotic or indistinguishable). they are "the ones in power" that i mean, the people who most benefit from a certain status quo. maybe in previous times in history it was different (or maybe not, i don't know), but nowadays, more often than not, science under development is used as a rationalization rather than as a foundation. because "if scientists say so, then it must be true. they're smarter than me"

over time, as skepticism starts to grow about the way how the media spreads "things scientists said" that no scientist ever did say, and as institutions evolve to be more rigorous and demand more formal rationale to support public policies, the role of what scientists actually say starts to be socially more relevant. that's a good thing, but then there's a catch. it means it's often a smarter move for capitalists to go straight for the source. instead of making sure people will hear distorted versions of the results, make sure the results are what you want them to be in the first place. then the media doesn't even need to distort it (which could even help it regain credibility)

so the method remains the same. that's real science. but the nature of the knowledge and the institutions built upon that knowledge are (possibly irreparably) corrupted, because they're not actually based on the method anymore. those corrupted things are what the public understands as "science". and, without some kind of unexpected change, each generation of new scientists will be less aware themselves of what science is supposed to be. meanwhile, masses who have become disappointed with the anachronism of their original faith are looking for a new, opposing one

an organized religion is born

Bumping to add this video I came across today:



And lo, the gospel according to Progessives was found to be of questionable value.

nice video

"the .05 threshold was arbitrarily selected by ronald fisher in a book published in 1925", when there were way fewer people doing research than there are now, and way less money poured into it, and especially, no computers were available to fish for convenient statistics. and the threshold is only supposed to apply to the one particular hypothesis in question anyway, not the entire study surrounding it. it's like physics questions in middle school where you're told to ignore gravity and friction. there's a snowballing of uncertainty that isn't accounted for

if there's one thing i learned from all my statistics classes, it's that the way how statistics and probability work is very, very, very unintuitive. lies, damned lies, statistics. it's the perfect tool for making anything look legitimate, because "numbers don't lie". but oh, they do

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i think this illustrates the other side of how "logic and science" get to become mystical powers, and how epidemic irrationality-in-denial ensues as a result:


combine that with facebook and twitter and the scarcity of time left for careful thought and cooling down at the average receiving end of information, and, boom!

and i think this illustrates how the boundaries get blurred between different domains of human thought and knowledge:


in this case, the very debate on whether it's science or pseudoscience is deceptive and intentionally promoted by some who have a financial interest in it. it's not supposed to be either. it's a loaded question. and when you have a false dichotomy, you only need to disprove one falsehood in order to prove the other. it's established that a definitive theory of everything is impossible (poor zac newton. he tried). but now there's the search for a definitive scientific theory of the human mind instead. aspiring for godlikeness all the same, except with much more insidious consequences, and not much in terms of constructive results

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in short. this is how research is done:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZpUjcLJEqw

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@mikah: i think you're right when you emphasize the counterbalancing role of religion. because if you think about it, true science in large scales was always a utopian idea. we're lucky for the few random hobbyists here and there who existed in times and places where they could pursue their passion. and they will always exist, but their impact might never be as substantial again as it's been in the past, because there's too much noise, and it's there on purpose. i'm starting to think that the cult of science is an inevitable social consequence of the rise of technology combined with the fall of religion (which itself is largely a result of the rise of technology)

another self-quote:
(because i'm so humble )


technology solves problems created by economy, economy solves problems created by technology, technology solves problems created by technology. and accumulated knowledge eventually leads to ignorance. hubris is blindness

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this is all very personal to me. it's one of the main reasons why i dropped out of college just a few credits short of graduating (after working for different professors as a research assistant myself), and part of the reason why i ended up having a so-called "mental breakdown" afterwards. which was basically the end of my life as i had always imagined it, and the beginning of my life as it is now. it's just too difficult for me to participate in something i believe is wrong

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my conclusion so far: we need new forms of proper mysticism

Someone smart once said that the first effect of not believing in God is to believe in anything. I'm not sure how much of a role technology played in the downfall, there are other parts of the world where technology seems to have the opposite effect eg. Purist strains of Islam. The more I look into the fall of Christianity, the more it looks like a crisis of confidence in Europe the spans back to the beginning of the 20th century and the meat grinder wars there. A real doubt that our way of life was Good and Worthy. You can see that crisis in the formation of the European Union too, we no longer trust ourselves. The US, formed from the same traditions, didn't suffer in the two world wars the way Europe did and remained relatively more religious than the Old World, though now it seems to be going through a similar crisis.

I really don't think Atheism/scientism/technologism is beating back Christianity, it's just another example of "believing in anything", waltzing onto an empty battlefield and declaring glorious victory. The cult of science is hugely overinflated in its importance, remove Christianity and people do not automatically become bastions of reason and scientific knowledge, they fall into all kinds of nonsense. Kabbala, talking to the dead, cupping. Ever heard someone say "I'm a spiritual person"?



Maybe, I think it would be much easier and more prudent to just rediscover and re-privilege Christianity once more. It is our inheritance after all, it made us what we are and it has served us well in the past. With West and East meeting violently once more, we'll need a bit of that Crusader mentality to survive it.

fundamentalism also seems to be getting stronger in the u.s., even if it's not spreading. that's what it looks like from the outside, at least. because it has a presence on the internet now, i think. every average joe and their dog have a smartphone. i don't see it as a direct consequence of the rise of technology though, but as a secondary consequence instead. their inclusion and visibility is a direct consequence, but the radicalization (instead of normalization) is a reactionary effect instead


today it's technology for communication evolving and spreading faster than the available ways to connect. back then it was technology to kill evolving and spreading faster than the available ways to survive. each new stage of the industrial revolution promotes a higher sense of power and control, and a higher sense of faithlessness at the same time because of the consequences. "faith won't save us anymore. it's being on the winning side of technology that will". there's no sense of safety in stillness. there's a constant and paradoxical race for safety instead


it's hard for me to compare religious histories with the u.s., because i don't really understand protestant traditions. but i think the stronger religious nature/component of american culture has more to do with the selective origins of their early settlers, and the social structures that they created. they were moving to a different continent and establishing new settlements specifically because of how much they cared about their particular religious tradition

i think the problem with the european union is that it was established to prevent history from repeating itself, but it never had clear practical goals. it was a reaction to what was wrong, with no agreement on what's right. which was never addressed, because it's all about economic interests in practice. it's a long-term project with no long-term vision, only rhetoric instead


that one is new to me. never heard of it before


"too soon", i'd say. there are older faiths that could be revived and renewed with more relevance today than christianity, with a sense of heritage but without the weight of recent history. i think religion should be a window into a time and place out of our reach. honor and nature are things we've lost touch with, but which we evolved to be tuned into as a species. there should be some sense of both infused through symbolism into the mechanical soullessness of modern life


i wouldn't use that word though. it's good to have something to defend, but the crusades were an ugly chapter of history when defensive rhetoric was used for offensive purposes

That's a point of view, one that I think ignores the nature of Islam, both back then and now. Don't forget the best defence is sometimes a good offence. This probably deserves its own thread though.

i'm not forgetting though, just disagreeing


yes, i think so

Technology is the Cash Value of Science. So far the physical sciences have paid off quite well. Look at the technology which has flowed from the science....

has the technology itself paid off, though? we can live longer now, but are we happier?

https://youtu.be/iywaBOMvYLI

You appear to be a disciple of William James.

maybe it's time for me to rewatch battlestar galactica

http://www.sciencealert.com/study-warns-that-science-as-we-know-it-is-evolving-into-something-shoddy-and-unreliable

More along the same lines.

In the model, devised by researchers at the University of California, Merced, all the simulated lab groups they put in these scenarios were honest – they didn't intentionally cheat or fudge results.

But they received greater rewards if they published 'novel' findings – as happens in the real world. They also had to expend greater effort to be rigorous in their methods – which would improve the quality of their research, but lower their academic output.

"The result: Over time, effort decreased to its minimum value, and the rate of false discoveries skyrocketed,"