
Scientific Regress - eastbayjake
https://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/05/scientific-regress
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georgewsinger
A winning poker player only needs a tiny edge to be long-term profitable. Yet
there will be swings in his bank account, no matter how good his play; there
is even a real chance of bankruptcy in his lifetime.

The question I would then ask to the author: is science (in its current form)
a winning, long-term player?

That is, let's grant that most of science is wrong (i.e., not replicable).
Let's grant that entire paradigms -- which are objectively better than their
successors -- can be wiped out by garbage fads and the fraudsters that
perpetuate them. Let's even grant that it's possible for scientific
understanding to net regress over the course a lifetime.

The interesting question to me is whether the human practice of science
(inclusive of its politics and fraudsters) is still on a long-term, upward
trajectory towards truth (not strictly monotonic, but upwards as n goes to
infinity). Even after reading horrifying accounts of how bad science is in
2016, I would still be shocked if the answer to this question was no.

