The Science Delusion: has science become dogmatic?

[SIY]

There’s a funny podcast where Chomsky is pressed by a cognitive neuroscientist on precisely how language can exist outside of the physical brain, as he believes is the case. He just produces a series of tautological statements and then say, ‘well I’m Noam Chomsky, so fucking accept it’.

I'd love to get a link or searchable name for that...

 

[Phorize]

I'd love to get a link or searchable name for that...

I was paraphrasing obviously I’ll see if I can find it.

 

[tomtrp]

It appears tomtrp has made the very common error of equating the limits of their own knowledge with the limits of human knowledge on the subject.

So much of this silliness could be avoided if folks would just ask, “Can this phenomenon or factor be measured, and if so how?” Instead of asserting, “This phenomenon or factor can’t be measured.”

No.
What I really want to say is that though the research in physcoacoustics is valuable, you should not put the same confidence as physical science in them when you apply their results and conclusions.

 

[Ron Texas]

So his science was right and you were wrong.

Your math is off. Infections are peaking right now. At best his science was incomplete. Sorry, but to discuss this any further requires venturing in to politics which is discouraged around here.

I don't know what your game is, but quoting an 8 month old post to tell someone they were wrong when they were right is disrespectful.

 

[BDWoody]

So his science was right and you were wrong.

Ummm...seriously?

No need to answer... Just not really appropriate.

 

[Wagstaff]

Rupert Sheldrake making the case brings to mind this Onion headline:

https://www.theonion.com/pseudoscience-is-it-catching-up-to-real-science-1819588057

 

[Phorize]

So his science was right and you were wrong.

If you go and look at the detail of what it takes to model a pandemic at a centre of excellence like John’s Hopkins, you’ll notice that it’s a very expensive, complex multi-disciplinary research programme that’s needed. To be honest this is far too serious a subject for idle speculation by novices in the field of multidisciplinary epidemiology.

 

[Phorize]

If you go and look at the detail of what it takes to model a pandemic at a centre of excellence like John’s Hopkins, you’ll notice that it’s a very expensive, complex multi-disciplinary research programme that’s needed. To be honest this is far too serious a subject for idle speculation by novices in the field of multidisciplinary epidemiology.

And as someone who is very close to the pandemic response at regional level in the U.K, the variables are so multitudinous and the spectrum of plausible scenarios so wide that you know that you can only adopt one strategy; build as much system resilience as possible and vaccinate as fast as possible.

 

[Phorize]

And as someone who is very close to the pandemic response at regional level in the U.K, the variables are so multitudinous and the spectrum of plausible scenarios so wide that you know that you can only adopt one strategy; build as much system resilience as possible and vaccinate as fast as possible.

I’d also add that it’s one thing to know roughly how many cases you’ll have, quite another to know how it will impact in a complex system-there’s no cockpit from which to pilot a society.

 

[Phorize]

And that’s my last comment on this subject. Apologies for getting excited; I don’t normally let it get the better of me but when I look at the heroics of the people on the front line of this (which I’m not I might add) I find this sort of arm chair punditry childish

 

[Ron Texas]

The only thing I have to say about the pandemic is it's a full scale tragedy. Millions have died and many more suffered through serious illness. Trillions of dollars (or whatever currency you have) of commerce have been lost. Millions are unemployed. Businesses have closed. Almost everyone is suffering from frayed nerves. The only bright spot was proving mRNA technology works.

I have ordered more take out food since March than in my entire entire lifetime prior to this.

 

[j_j]

First, sample size is small and each strata is even smaller. They are enough to drawn statistical conclusions, but their power to make claims about the public/individual is weak.

Go study the math behind population sampling. Go study the math behind subject selection, as well.

Second, there is no repeated experiment.

The Headphone papers are just the latest in a long series of papers. There is literally now a century of experiments, or more, starting with Helmholtz and then Fletcher. There are many, many experiments that lead to these results. Your complaint about replication is invalid, and demonstrates the ignorance of your position.

Third, the ''high" correlation is not physical science standard. Usually even less than 95% confidence while physical science is up to 5 sigma confidence (1-3x10^-7).

And this isn't particle physics. You do understand that preferences vary substantially among listeners. Finding something this close is quite remarkable.

Forth, results of physical theories are usually predictions of a sound conjecture and tested

No, that's not required. Science is about developing testable theories, and then testing them. An overarching theory is not required. Were it required, no advancement would ever, under any circumstances, be possible, because in a new field, there IS no "sound conjecture" to start with.

Science is TESTABLE, VERIFIABLE, and REPEATABLE. You can never, EVER say "proof" only "best available understanding". When you say "scientific proof" you're talking about something that does not exist.

then confirmed by numerous repeatable experiments with required accuracy and confidence level. While results of Olive's reseaech are drawn from this single 268 sample.

Your statement ignores a century of work. Your statement ignores a great deal of work on how to select subjects. Your statement ignores a great deal of work on population sampling. Just give it up.

How would you compare the credibility of this kind of research to any of the modern physical science?

Within their stated limits, they're fine. Both of them.

They have done a great job in researching human preference, but their conclusion is limited and should be applied with care.

What's the mass and half-life of a neutrino?

And I don't believe the consipracy that it is Harman wants to be a rule maker and utilise/amplify these limited results to market their products. But you can't completely ignore it since both Toole and Olive were employed by Harman and look at the way Harman promote their research results and their products.

Their work, and mine, is part of a thread of work that goes back to Helmholtz in the late 1800's. Give that one up.

 

[tmtomh]

No.
What I really want to say is that though the research in physcoacoustics is valuable, you should not put the same confidence as physical science in them when you apply their results and conclusions.

I understand what you really want to say, and I agree that that is in fact what you want to say. But what you want to say - your main claim - is flawed, as demontrated amply by @j_j 's comment just above, along with several other prior comments.

My comment, by contrast, was about why or in what way your claim is flawed, and I stand by that.

 

[Inner Space]

No. What I really want to say is that though the research in physcoacoustics is valuable, you should not put the same confidence as physical science in them when you apply their results and conclusions.

No. What you really want to say is you love the magic and the mystery, and the tempting gleam of the next upgrade, almost within reach, the next step on the exciting journey ... but for some obscure internal reason you feel the need to justify it, if only to yourself ... so you adopt a reasonable and sagacious tone and hint gnomically at things yet to be explained.

 

[TimF]

Science is an goal for humans, a difficult stretch for them. Will they accommodate it or will it wither? To develop standards for arriving at what constitutes fact, the degrees of factuality, the relative precision of a fact, and such. It establishes rigor to observation, encourages testing and verification, and even allows for revolution-evolution of concepts. What else is there to take it's place? Find me a substitute?

 

[j_j]

Science is an goal for humans, a difficult stretch for them. Will they accommodate it or will it wither? To develop standards for arriving at what constitutes fact, the degrees of factuality, the relative precision of a fact, and such. It establishes rigor to observation, encourages testing and verification, and even allows for revolution-evolution of concepts. What else is there to take it's place? Find me a substitute?

Indeed, look how long it took to get to the concept of an external, testable definition of knowledge.

 

[Phorize]

The only thing I have to say about the pandemic is it's a full scale tragedy. Millions have died and many more suffered through serious illness. Trillions of dollars (or whatever currency you have) of commerce have been lost. Millions are unemployed. Businesses have closed. Almost everyone is suffering from frayed nerves. The only bright spot

Science is an goal for humans, a difficult stretch for them. Will they accommodate it or will it wither? To develop standards for arriving at what constitutes fact, the degrees of factuality, the relative precision of a fact, and such. It establishes rigor to observation, encourages testing and verification, and even allows for revolution-evolution of concepts. What else is there to take it's place? Find me a substitute?

Well, there is ‘a wizard did it’.

 

[preload]

I'm more concerned about science becoming a means to accomplish non scientific goals. A local virologist has been regularly interviewed by the Houston Chronicle. Most recently he pulls out a model showing COVID-19 infections in Houston spiking by mid July. He does admit the model's assumptions are not robust. The model at healthdata.org, which is used by Dr. Birx, shows infections peaked recently and will gradually decline to insignificant numbers by August. This physician scientist is playing games. He may be trying to convince people to be careful, or he may have some other agenda. It's clear to me the model he selected was an outlier. Note that I think the reporter is a very good journalist, and I told her about this.

So his science was right and you were wrong.

I had a similar reaction reading the Ron Texas's post from May 2020. Looking at City of Houston data, it looks like, in fact, cases did peak prior to mid-July.

Source: https://covid-harriscounty.hub.arcgis.com/pages/cumulative-data

 

[tomtrp]

Go study the math behind population sampling. Go study the math behind subject selection, as well.


The Headphone papers are just the latest in a long series of papers. There is literally now a century of experiments, or more, starting with Helmholtz and then Fletcher. There are many, many experiments that lead to these results. Your complaint about replication is invalid, and demonstrates the ignorance of your position.

And this isn't particle physics. You do understand that preferences vary substantially among listeners. Finding something this close is quite remarkable.

No, that's not required. Science is about developing testable theories, and then testing them. An overarching theory is not required. Were it required, no advancement would ever, under any circumstances, be possible, because in a new field, there IS no "sound conjecture" to start with.

Science is TESTABLE, VERIFIABLE, and REPEATABLE. You can never, EVER say "proof" only "best available understanding". When you say "scientific proof" you're talking about something that does not exist.

Your statement ignores a century of work. Your statement ignores a great deal of work on how to select subjects. Your statement ignores a great deal of work on population sampling. Just give it up.

Within their stated limits, they're fine. Both of them.

What's the mass and half-life of a neutrino?


Their work, and mine, is part of a thread of work that goes back to Helmholtz in the late 1800's. Give that one up.

You keep down playing the preciseness, predictability, numerously-tested physical science and praise the history, effort etc of your area.
Unfortunately, this is not the fact. The fact is that all the published, accepted physical science results went through a much stricter validating process than AES papers.

For statistical reasoning, maybe you should go to study population sampling.
Any stat/math graduate will raise the same question: when you have only less than 50 subjects in a strata like nationaliltiy, how could you say the inference about the population is rigourous with a single non repeated group experiment? Any science will have the problem of generalisability and Olive’s research’s generalisability is much weaker compared to physical science.
And you avoided all the other doubts. Like repeatability? Especially when your confidnece level is only around or less than 1 sigma, there should be a repeated experiment on at least another 200-300 people group to get similar 80-90% correlation with the same method applied.
Any physical science or even social science research result will require way more carefulness than that to be accepted, applied and promoted.
You are pointing my flaws here and I accept. But you subjectively underrate their limitations because I doubt your friend’s research.
But please take a step back and have a critical thinking on the limitations of Olive’s research and the fact that Harman over-promote their valuable research results to a much wider situation for marketing purpose. Everything in this area is of course done in a scientific approach, but you can’t only talk about results and findings without the limitations and unfortunately you can’t put the same confidence in the results of AES paper results as with well-accepted, tested, physical science results.

 

[tomtrp]

No. What you really want to say is you love the magic and the mystery, and the tempting gleam of the next upgrade, almost within reach, the next step on the exciting journey ... but for some obscure internal reason you feel the need to justify it, if only to yourself ... so you adopt a reasonable and sagacious tone and hint gnomically at things yet to be explained.

No, at least I read the papers, like their research and have my doubts before accepting them and I learned a lot when discuss with j_j.
You are just attacking me and put a ‘magic lover’ hat on me like a fanboy.