
Stop Calling the Babylonians Scientists (2016) - inlineint
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/02/babylonians-scientists/462150/?single_page=true
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inlineint
In some sense, the current trend of chasing quick predictions at cost of
giving up on understanding of the inner working of things resembles the
described in the article approach that was taken by Babylonians.

A lot of resources is being put into machine learning, as it provides
relatively quick solutions that delivers results that are superior in
comparison to other approaches for many of problems. And I find it to be
fascinating. However, I'm concerned a little about a possible paradigm shift
that can happen if we continue to grow this "prediction-first" attitude and
let it become a part of our scientific philosophy.

Such a shift might make people who actually try to figure out the underlying
mechanics of the problems they work on to be perceived as "inefficient", as
they are going to be (and often already are) inherently less competitive to
machine learning algorithms in terms of ability to quickly provide predictions
that are good enough to be practically used. If it happen, it probably would
make the areas of science that involve building and invalidation of theories
less attractive to youth in comparison to those that are centered around
building better predictive models and application of them to complex phenomena
with a focus on making practically useful predictions.

I see the culture in this type of future as something similar to Babylonian
culture as it was presented in the article and compared to the Ancient Greek
culture. No to say that this future looks completely bad, but I think it is
not as exciting as the one where true understanding of the things is valued
first if not the most.

