
A scientist must go where the evidence leads - bookofjoe
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/a-scientist-must-go-where-the-evidence-leads/
======
tabtab
Even in research, when everyone else is zigging, it may be time to start
zagging and pursue alternatives. Neural nets have a lot of attention, but
maybe competitors will show sufficient promise once enough research is done.
For example, Factor Tables:

[https://github.com/RowColz/AI](https://github.com/RowColz/AI)

Most of the research on early semiconductors focused on germanium.
Manufacturers got pretty good at preparing it, but some started looking to
silicon as a promising alternative. Germanian had a _head start_ due to
experience, but silicon research started paying off after a while. Lesson: the
early leader may not be the best finisher.

~~~
bookofjoe
e.g. Blu-Ray v VHS

~~~
tabtab
I'm surprised disks are still as prevalent as they are for music and movies.
Thumb-drives should have replaced them years ago. Perhaps there are copyright-
related reasons holding it back?

~~~
CharlesColeman
> Thumb-drives should have replaced them years ago. Perhaps there are
> copyright-related reasons holding it back?

IIRC, thumb drives are far more unreliable and unstable than discs.

~~~
tabtab
Perhaps because manufactures are sloppy. Redundancy perhaps could be added,
but consumers don't seem to reward it yet.

------
JunkDNA
The discipline of science (and its sibling mathematics) has been one of the
great achievements of human civilization. It has been so astonishingly
successful, we can’t even fathom there being any phenomena beyond its reach,
given enough time and enough foundational understanding. Because I like to
stretch my mind in uncomfortable directions, I often wonder: is there
something else? Something that can lead us to Truth other than mathematics and
science? Has human civilization gotten stuck in a local maximum where it
appears as though we now have a means for understanding the entire universe,
but there is another whole level we are as yet too primitive to reach? I worry
that as a species we haven’t spent enough time trying to answer this question.

~~~
yesenadam
It sounds like you may mean philosophy. You are getting philosophical, being
meta..(although I'm suspicious of capitalizing things like 'Truth') Philosophy
asks "What is X?" e.g. what is science, how does it work? Tries to understand
things. When the answers philosophy gets in an area become complete enough,
that area is called science/maths/logic etc.. That happened with science
itself, which used to be 'natural philosophy'. Also, if there was some new way
discovered for increasing scientific-type knowledge, it would itself become a
part of science.

------
chiefalchemist
I think a better way to state this is:

If you're not going where the evidence leads then you are not a scientist.

Too often we're using the wrong words, and that further complicates an always
complex process (i.e., human communication). Other words that are also often
misused are: leader and journalist.

~~~
CM30
Yeah, pretty much. There seems to be a misconception in some circles that
pseudoscientific ideas, religious faith, etc are outright despised by
'scientists' because they somehow go against some naturalistic order or
something rather than because the evidence for them isn't there/happens to be
weak. It's basically the basis for the old 'flat Earth atheist' trope, the
idea that fictional scientists will turn up their noses at claims of magic or
ghosts or gods because they're 'not real', even if said universe has them
clearly existing.

But this isn't how science works. A 'scientist' who ignores evidence because
they don't want something to be true isn't a good scientist, and doesn't act
at all like a real life one would. If clear evidence for Bigfoot or Nessie or
whatever else was found, it'd become a normal part of science. If we suddenly
saw religious style miracles occur in plain sight with no other possible
explanation, the idea of a miracle would become a scientific concept that we'd
try and study. And in the worlds of say, the Lord of the Rings or Star Wars or
Ghostbusters or the Legend of Zelda or whatever other franchise with things
that don't exist in real life, those elements would be scientific in their
universes too, with their scientists and academics studying them and their
literature treating them like everyday things.

But yeah, despite certain fiction tropes and complaints from certain corners,
science is about what the evidence says, not about some hard nosed disdain for
anything not seen as 'logical'.

~~~
CharlesColeman
> If we suddenly saw religious style miracles occur in plain sight with no
> other possible explanation, the idea of a miracle would become a scientific
> concept that we'd try and study.

I disagree. Even if miracles happened and were observed, I think they'd likely
still be outside the realm of scientific study and would therefore remain
unscientific concepts. Science is built around the assumptions that
mechanistic and predictable processes are being studied, but an actual
religious miracle would be preformed by an transcendent agent who is likely
aware of all attempts to predict its actions and can react to and influence
those predictions, breaking the assumptions. The only secular discipline that
could really study them would probably be history.

However, if you replace miracles with Harry Potter-style magic, I think your
point stands.

~~~
CM30
Hmm, good point. I guess miracles if they happened would be an interesting
kind of beast, since they obviously wouldn't follow any sort of standard
logic. That might definitely make them difficult to study, especially compared
to other, more logical (but non existent) possibilities like the undead or
Harry Potter style magic.

But I guess scientists would still accept they're a thing that exists if they
did provably happen, even if there was no logical framework for explaining or
studying it.

~~~
CharlesColeman
> But I guess scientists would still accept they're a thing that exists if
> they did provably happen, even if there was no logical framework for
> explaining or studying it.

I think they could, but not as scientists wearing their science-hats. They'd
only be able to accept the miracles as individuals with personal experience or
as people who trust the historical record.

------
jonmc12
> Rather than softening our interpretation of a conflict between our models
> and new evidence, we should always seek the simplest explanation and be
> willing to abandon failed models.

Sure, but what is exactly is "evidence"? The word is used as if observational
data has no ambiguity or subjectivity is the way it is defined.

The book, Range (Epstein), had a great example of this in discussing the
Challenger explosion in the last chapter.

The premise: several engineering teams in Nasa had a working theory/model
about O-ring susceptibility to cold whether. However, their model was not
backed up by the evidence available. Nasa made the call to launch based on
data alone.

Why? the evidence collected for decision-making was incomplete and poorly
presented. Range presents a thesis that over-reliance on a quantitative
thinking can lead to optimization of the wrong thing and actually inhibits
learning.

Related, "The Challenger: An Information Disaster"
[https://www.asktog.com/books/challengerExerpt.html](https://www.asktog.com/books/challengerExerpt.html)
\- Tufte’s re-examination of the Challenger disaster.

------
tptacek
What's the subtext of this column?

~~~
ta0987
The current state of Physics research, as far as I can tell:

 _[if such and such then] ... physicists should move on to consider
alternatives and admit that our original concepts of “naturalness” might have
been wrong._

"naturalness" as in: [http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2017/11/naturalness-is-
dead...](http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2017/11/naturalness-is-dead-long-
live.html)

------
RickJWagner
I like it, especially the constant referal to checking models against results.

For me (and I suspect many others), this is the key to making a convincing
argument about the state of climate change. It seems we have lots of headlines
(and guesses) about exactly how bad things are, but nobody seems able to
correctly forecast even a year or two out.

I think a short pattern of correct predictions would really, really deserve
attention.

------
jihadjihad
In my mind any perversion of this truth undermines the very credibility of the
scientific discipline. For if our scientific leaders are swayed by forces
other than facts, how can we be surprised when public opinion turns on
science? One of my favorite quotes that resonates with this piece is by John
Maynard Keynes:

"When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"

EDIT: to address the possibility that the Keynes quote is apocryphal, here is
another (also possibly apocryphal!) quote I enjoy:

"In God we trust, all others bring data" \- W. Edwards Deming

~~~
opo
Apologies, since I don't want to derail your point, but there is little
evidence that Keynes ever said that:

[https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/07/22/keynes-change-
mind/](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/07/22/keynes-change-mind/)

------
miles7
Too many religious people that I know think that scientists have it out for
them and/or are conspiring against them. Enough articles like this and it will
prove their point for them (the statement equating being irreligious with
acting like an adult), even though I don't think it's true of scientists as a
whole.

------
wellpast
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving
> professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general
> notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ...
> This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are
> religious.

This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception.

It also reflects a common sentiment and so reflects a common deficit in many
people's thinking and perception, especially in the contemporary Western
world.

At some point in history, Science and Religion _both_ got tricked into a
debate -- both got tricked into thinking that their propositions somehow exist
in the same domain when they do not. Their domains are mutually exclusive and
yet the conversation continues stupidly (on _both_ sides) as if they were.

So a Scientist will say the Resurrection never happened and proceed with their
proof leveraging physics and biology. The Scientist makes the first mistake by
trying to engage on these grounds, as if any of that fundamentally mattered to
the Religious person. The Religious person, not recognizing the flub, takes
the bait, and tries to answer the Scientist using the scientific vocabulary
(the internet is not short on religious apologists doing just this.)

The Religious makes this mistake because they are tricked into thinking that
Truth is a pure function of propositions in scientific terms. They are tricked
into this rhetoric, at least. They are not fully tricked, though, because
after debating on these grounds (and likely losing -- b/c after all Science
owns those terms, and brought them to the table), the Religious person will
still go home and pray, will still go home and live according to the mimetic
behaviors of the characters within their faith.

What a Religious person derives from their beliefs has nothing -- _zero_ ,
_nothing_ \-- to do with the measurable/observable particle interactions of
the material world. Even if they say it does, self-reports are not to be
trusted here.

What a Scientist derives from their observations has nothing -- _zero_ ,
_nothing_ \-- to do with how they approach the world and others in the way of
morality, pursuit of contented life, etc. Again self-reports are not to be
trusted here.

Corollary to this is that _everybody_ is Religious and _everybody_ is
Scientific, and plays the card when its needed.

~~~
andrepd
>Their domains are mutually exclusive and yet the conversation continues
stupidly (on both sides) as if they were.

This may be true in principle, but your whole argument falls apart because
religion _does_ make assertions about the real physical world. They (taking
here the example of Christianity) they postulate miracles, divine
intervention, life after death, an unlikely and unsubstantiated cosmology, not
to mention of course stories about the creation of the universe or biblical
floods which have conveniently become "metaphorical" after it became plain
enough that they were nothing but fabrication. So your premise is not true,
and that is where the whole friction comes from.

EDIT: Engagement rather than downvotes would be appreciated :)

~~~
DoofusOfDeath
I agree with your central thesis, but I doubt one of your other points:

> not to mention of course stories about the creation of the universe or
> biblical floods which have conveniently become "metaphorical" after it
> became plain enough that they were nothing but fabrication.

People hold (and have held) various beliefs about Christian theology and
proper interpretation of scripture. E.g., you rightly point out problems with
a literal 6-day interpretation of creation, but St. Augustine and others [0]
were skeptical of that interpretation well before modern archaeological
methods and/or carbon dating.

So I think it's helpful to look closely at just a handful of testable claims,
that cut across many different theologies, denominations, and interpretations.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegorical_interpretations_of...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegorical_interpretations_of_Genesis)

------
wffurr
Was there a point to this essay?

You can figure out the ingredients to a soup two ways: taste it and guess
based on experience or use fractional distillation too separate and identify
the compounds. What a poor analogy.

~~~
tzar
It's an analogy for the second law of thermodynamics:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_law_of_thermodynamics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_law_of_thermodynamics).
The point is that it's “challenging” and that complex events “evade a
straightforward explanation”. That “challenge” is our intuitive experience of
the directional arrow of entropy. A similar analogy would be to consider the
difficulty of un-cracking an egg. Also, imagine comparing one bowl of soup to
another bowl which was made just from tasting (or distilling) the first.
Intuitively these are not likely to taste the same, otherwise a notable
episode of Seinfeld would be invalidated.

------
notadoc
What if the evidence is deemed offensive by a mob because they don’t like the
scientific findings?

Or what if the scientist has personal beliefs or opinions that are
disagreeable to some?

And what if the evidence is politically toxic?

~~~
chousuke
Assuming "evidence" in this context is something that has been sufficiently
scrutinized and no alternative hypotheses pass muster, why would any of those
three things matter? And if you're leaving open the possibility that the
evidence in your hypothetical situation is wrong, then what is the point of
your question?

The universe is what it is regardless of what we think of it. When we attain
better understanding of the truth of things, we need to adapt to the truth. It
is literally insane to do otherwise.

Fortunately, we are also part of the universe, so better understanding also
grants us tools to change things more to our liking.

~~~
oh_sigh
> why would any of those three things matter?

Because the public is not scientific, and scientists generally rely on
explicit or at least tacit approval of the public to do their work.

~~~
stochastic_monk
Most basic science is funded by the government, at least in the US, whose
money in turn comes from taxes.

