How Should Scientists Address Misconceptions About Science: Stick or Carrot?

Applying a little ISO [standardization] to research would help. As others pointed out the cure might be worse than the disease.

My experience with ISO is mixed. When you make the SOP's [standard operating procedures] too detailed, you get stuck with them for better or worse. The procedure for revisions can be arduous. All of it is just window dressing, unless everyone from top to bottom buys in.

The assurance of Credibility is probably more important to most of us than the more general public, who want to be entertained.

I understand the original question to be: how to deal with the purveyors of disinformation or outright lies? Rodger's conclusion: ignore em!

What's your opinion?

Actually the scientific method is not the whole story for sometimes great minds make leaps as did Einstein's. The story of this is found in Einstein History and Other Passions, by Kenneth Knowleton of Harvard.

Half the time life is complicated, and the other have the time it is simple.

As far as my opinion, or judgement of Rogers' conclusion that ignoring purveyors of disinformation is a correct strategy, I'd have to say no.

At a very basic level, mistakes get people killed, and who of us would want to know people died because we didn't speak up?

One time my boss asked me to rig a barrel for the crane. I told him I'd had a bad dream about doing that the night before. He said, "I'll get you some help." I was lucky he heard me.

In another case another boss didn't hear me, and I went on to do as told, and ended up with a broken hip, hand and pelvis.

Sometimes you do feel it in your gut, and that is part of the scientific method and why there are buildings on Colleges, called Arts and Sciences buildings.

In this post I have not fully fleshed out how the scientific, and backrunning antenna brain step skipping leads the flesh on driver of the process. However I have referenced a book that struggles to explain great achievements in science dependent on both the scientific method, and the miracle visionary leap incompatible with what realizes the total in dominance.

And who's there to say that "Intuition" or "Gut-Feeling" isn't some unconscious form of mental calculation? Some thorough, very fast calculation, without our being aware of it's intricate detail ?

Someone passes you a ball. You catch it on the spot, without being aware of the complex trigonometric calculation you brain performs in order to predict where it might be in a few milliseconds in front of you, and sends the correct vectoring and orientation orders to both your hands, at an instant.

Now try to teach a robot to do that. Not that easy. Why ? You're not completely sure of the specific order and type of calculations that zapped through you brain at that instant.

But calculations did occur there. Maybe not in the explicit form of trigonometry you are familiar with, but calculation it was, and it was trigonometry of some sort because it had to deal with angular projection of distances, and it also involved relative velocities on mutual axis of time and space.

My point with the trivial example above is that it might just be that what we call "Intuition" is simply a deep, thorough, fast calculation, which because we are not being able to witness or recall in any explicit and formal way (probably due to the speed it takes) - we simply call it "a Hunch", "a Gut-Feeling" - whatever

The same might be applied to theoretical or conceptual thinking. You are familiar with some given theories. You digest those over time. Suddenly you have a breakthrough hunch, a revelation of which you are not sure of the specifics to imply it to yourself in any explicit way. You dare to indulge with it's possible consequence - and it produces a match !

Einstein, you said it

all true!

and here I was taking you for a young whippersnapper. Ha!

Chris

GA, Transcendian.

My take on all this? Sue the bastards. Class action suits for fraud. Or sue them in small claims court. Anywhere they take your money and don't deliver on their promises they should pay. Make them prove their product or service works in a court of law.

Get sneaky. Let them put their offers and promises in writing, send your money and make them give you a receipt. Collect copies of the paper and go to court.

I don't care whether they are promising you their magnet stuck on you car's fuel line increases your mileage or they're promising eternal life. It's fraud.

Ed Weldon

Ummm, Ed, slow down; whoa!

You might be able to sue someone for a gas-saving gizmo that doesn't work, if you take enough data to prove it doesn't: the onus will be on you to prove that, since you are bringing the complaint.

But it's an entirely different matter to sue someone over their claims for the Hereafter. Something like a billion people on this the planet "know" that if a male dies for his faith, he gets seventy-two virgins for his own personal harem.

A much smaller group "knew" that an alien spaceship was following Comet Hale-Bopp and died so that they might ascend and join the crew.

On the flip side, tens of thousands of witches have been burned at the stake for consorting with the Devil. And each and everyone confessed to it, too. You might not like the tools by which the confessions were extracted, but confess they did.

Now Ed, if you're like most people, you don't give much credence to these beliefs. And that is your prerogative, at least until the adherents of the religion of peace and submission make all of us submit. But for right now, living in a civilized country, how are you going to prove, in a court of law, that they are wrong, and that they are frauds?

I believe you've bitten off a bit more than you can chew.

I'm still waiting to hear what country you live in?

Must be a wild & woolly place, no rule of law, some recent catastrophic event.

The stress of it all has apparently affected you deeply & caused you to repeatedly lash out seemingly for no reason.

You are correct on all accounts.

I now live in the same country that you do, as per my little identifier tag to the left of my posts, the same as all other posters have. I used to live in "fly-over-country," which for those on either coast was the "here live dragons" part of the world where the media felt they would have to send foreign correspondents in to figure out why we were so different and strange.

I haven't moved, it's just that again, per my little identifier info, on 20 January we all became ruled by the same left-wing gov't, whereas previously the northeast and the west coast did their own liberal thing, and left the rest of us alone.

So there you have it. Where I live, the catastrophic event and why I "lash out."

And just for the record, if you don't understand my posts and see them as "lashing out for no reason" I need to let you know that the way we see you is as barbarians at the gate.

Just so you know.

I grew up in the Midwest. I spent most of the last 20 years living in the central valley of California, the most conservative area in the state. This is what you would describe as fly over country... We are regularly subject to edicts handed down by the folks in LA, SF & Sacramento. The unbridled nonsense is just astounding. Unlike what most of the country believes California is simultaneously both the most conservative & liberal place in the country.

The conservatives values you seem to align yourself with are fine, the problem is which politicians or group actually represent these values?

The republicans lost the latest election(s), mostly because they got greedy & were more interested in the process [pork] than their core values [assuming they actually have any].

I'm registered independent myself & have voted for 3rd party candidates in every major election since 1980.

The democrats are now in the majority, get over it & make the best of it

Sour Grapes don't even make good wine

We need real change which won't come from either the republicans or the democrats!

There is no real difference between the two except the special interests that buy them.

Can't argue with any of that. I thought Mariposa was one of the most liberal areas. I read once that the marijuana crop there was one of the biggest in the nation, and that all the old hippies lived there, and got rich selling the stuff.

You are correct that the Republican party no longer represents conservatism. They are busy trying to ditch the conservative label, and all they are interested in is winning, which they don't do when they are running as me-too Democrats.

Conservatives didn't have a candidate in the last election, and it is just as well a real Democrat won, as opposed to a RINO.

This would all be massively off-topic unless we could tie it back to the original post. The unstated but implicit theme of that post was that Science is pure and without agenda and that therefore consensus statements coming from Big Science (as funded by big gov't) are not only correct, but are marching orders which may not be questioned by the non-anointed, which includes dissenters.

It was against this that I "lashed out" to use your terminology. Actually, that's not even true. I offered a philosophically opposing view, and was personally trashed by the OP. My subsequent responses, although measured and restrained in comparison to the attacks, (sorry folks, not debates) were characterized, not just by you, in negative terms.

It is a characteristic of the left in America, not the right, to engage on a personal not philosophical level. I understand and accept that not many, or even most, will agree with me, but I demand a response on my same level. Ad hominem slurs merely incur my contempt, and while I try to hide that, it clearly comes through in my posts.

As usual you throw about accusations.

I suppose I should follow your example, rant, rave & be insulted by the assertion that I grow or use illeagal drugs, as usual no attribution, for someone so very sensitive to personal attacks, you seem to have no problem slinging shit to see what sticks. The county you are thinking of is Mendicino, but hey it starts with an M & is in California, lets not let the facts get in the way of a good insult!

In post 331 more nonsense pulled from thin air, voters are stupid, public school teachers are unqualified.... blah blah.

You stomp around like a small child, having fits about how terrible everything is.

Do you ever have a positive thought, maybe a possible solution, to any of the myriad problems, you're so fond of pointing out?

Much easier to demolish than to build eh?

You are correct about one thing - I mixed up Mendocino & Mariposa counties. My bad. I haven't been to either, and as you say, they both start with M and are in CA, so pretty close, but no cigar.

As to the rest, I'm not sure whom you are addressing, but it's not me, or you haven't read my posts. My posts make concrete suggestions. I don't expect you to agree with them - I hope you don't - or I will start to question them myself.

You can judge a man not only by his friends, but his enemies as well. With you and Mr. Pink making ugly personal attacks, as opposed to debating issues, I feel quite comfortable that I'm on the right side.

Not that I really needed the validation, but thank you.

Typical,

You claim I'm picking on you & make more assumptions about me & who I'm affiliated with & the nature of those affiliations.

I've read plenty of your posts, when you write about business or politics, any even minor dissent from what you consider the gospel according to emc c & you become abusive & irrational.

You blather on about the "agenda" of academia.

What is your agenda, besides nihilism?

You claim years of experience working with government agencies & how horibble they are. How about a positive suggestion of how to improve them? Abolishing them isn't realistic, some small positive incremental improvements would be.

As expected no response, just yet another personal attack

Feigned indignation.

My last post, I definitly took a shot at you, but then asked for you input in a positive way....

I know your not going to respond in any positive or meaningful way.

Ah so then perception is reality.

You see the carrot. I see the stick. The fellow yonder may see them both but wonder why they're there.

I say potato, you say potahtow, etc, etc.

Truth is stranger than fiction and the white rabbit is having tea with Cheshire cat.

If we all just drop some of that acid we can climb the golden stairs together.

Dear emc c, So what if the onus is on you to prove something? Why not complain when you hear a lie?

Really, why not sue someone for claiming you'll get 50 virgins in heaven if you kill yourself as a suicide bomber in a market?

If you really want a civilized world, it is sort of stupid to ignore stupidity. Turns out that it is worth a try to challenge ideas and beliefs that are only that, when they are used to justify murder.

Why not do it in the Courts?

We as Scientists can prove that the World is older than 6,000 years. Just because you believe something, that doesn't make it true.

Chew on it. Let us know how it goes down.

My point is that it is just as legitimate to go ahead and challenge them to prove that if I blow myself up I'll get 50 virgins, since I know that there is no way they can prove that, but I can prove with a jar of dirt, the world is older than the written word.

Of course I can turn around and prove that the dirt proves there is a God.

So what if I have to compare where I start from where from another starts? That is not an insurmountable problem for me, whereas apparently it is for you.

Just as you don't necessarily have to buy every idea, I have to sell, I don't have to buy every belief you hold, or want to sell me either.

Fact is we are born and die, so essentially I can point to that as a truth and further say we all do start and end at the same place.

P.S. I am not going to say that Christianity as understood to award eternal life in a paradise where all desires for toasters and big bank accounts are realized, is more sensible than an Islamic heaven where use of virgins is the primary reward. I am prepared to say that killing others for not buying either faith, is unethical.

All you say is true but this fanatic will still blow himself up as he believes that killing infidels is ethical. Go stand in a market place in Iran and start a monologue(in Arabic) on how religion is nonsense that there is no god, that science will prevail. I wonder how long it will before they show you physically the error of your ways.

In most part of the world, Faith is the truth, and scientist may have the real truth, but Imans, Priests, Rabi have a head-start in orator quality in swaying the masses to their cause

"Okay, now here is the big one: How can the Scientific Community best deal with smears and slanders that come straight out of Religious Institutions?"

Counter arguments by scientist that deeply believe in God who are also priests and also believe that evolution is true?

I have addressed this in part stating that abstract thinking does enable faith. So it is not at all out of the question for a Scientist to believe in God, and further it is often enough that the evidence could be construed either for or against.

The Buddhist are supposedly best on reconciling physics and spirituality. Of writers I think of CS Lewis, but not anyone current of good note.

Suggestions would be of interest to me.

P.S. I know CS Lewis less for his Sci Fi, than his work Sermon on the Mount.

God is attributed with the power to 'control' that which we can not. The things that we can not control are scoped by our belief or knowledge of what we can and can not control. The nature of the mind is that it can not distinguish between a powerful belief and 'reality. There are those who say there is no difference. Reality is simply the perfect belief of God.

So, we are a small circle of beliefs and powers within the larger or infinite circle of God's belief. The size of this circle is determined by us. The more we believe we can do, the more we can do. Life is a continuous learning and continuous expansion of our circle. This is Set theory if you like.

Once a belief becomes an act, and the act produces hoped for results, that 'belief' becomes cemented as knowledge and power within the individual. This is the point at which belief attains the level where it can not be distinguished in the mind as different from reality.

I think both science and 'faith' are both guilty of not understanding the action mechanism. Science tends to focus on effects and phenomena, as well as mathematical constructs for the same. As those events are caused by something else not clearly understood, it is outside of the circle of the investigator. Faith tends to focus on the power to do things which are outside of circle, otherwise faith would not be required to accomplish them.

No one has EVER been able to isolate or define the mechanism by which a person (or animal) is able to act... say move their arm, based on a desire to do so, or the idea. Yet, this power is taken for granted as being within their circle of belief, because it is inherent to our existence as humans.

My point is; Science could easily show that once a human has accomplished the ability to act based on prior experience, that they tend to retain that capacity to act. The fact of action exhibits inherently all the motor skills and mechanistic capacity to act, combined with goal oriented programmable behaviour.

Scientific study could also show that a class of mental actions of visualization and prayer tends to exhibit statistically improbable results, some remarkably so. When those results are far beyond coincidence, and are somewhat statistically reliable, and the techniques for prayer and visualization are practiced and believed in, then the quality of result increases. Science is supposed to be dispassionately investigating the universe... and I think to start, this study should investigate the capacity of imagery and prayer by an observer to affect the outcome of statistically known subjects or experiments. The Observer is an important factor in quantum mechanics.

What this may show is that the mind has an 'improbable' interface with the quantum universe. The study of quantum computing is giving some clue as to how this might work. I think that what needs to be studied is 'action probabilities' where the probability of a given action or behaviour produces a given result, repeatably. After sufficient study, a solid statistical baseline should be well established, and results which are at extremes on the bell curve can be studied to determine what effects and phenomena or actions probably produced those results.

What we would end up with is a schematic layout of the mechanism of the human mind. A cause and effect understanding that certain actions produce certain results. I suggest that belief, desire or intentionality will be shown to be a factor. Therefore, science and religion can ask; "What is the difference between programmable goal oriented behaviour, which science has no objection to, and faith based actions, which are not acceptable or 'provable' in the view of science?"

Here is where I think the lines begin to blur.

Chris

On the wall of a 19th-century Parisian lavatory was written:

"God is dead - F.W. Nietzsche"

Nearly a year later, another writing appeared below:

"Nietzsche is dead - God"

So, who wrote on the wall? Nietzsche or God?

Do you believe everything you read on bathroom walls?

-sorry, couldn't help myself.

Didn't used to believe that people would lie so much out of self interest, but recognize that I was naive.

Here's another angle on this discussion.

Perhaps we should not address misconceptions about science. Might we'd be better advised to keep secrets and use the knowledge to defend our science enhanced way of life with the better weapons advanced science can offer? If those who hate us or would try to impose their value system, laws and way of life on us are limited to less sophisticated weapons they are at a disadvantage. They may be at a further disadvantage if their own system prevents them from making best use of their resources.

However; if we choose to give them the "formulas" for advanced weapons systems or worse, sell them for our own profit we are fools. Another act of fools is to allow our enemies to use ancient weapons technologies in clever ways against us while we fumble around doing little or nothing to mount a defense falsely confident in our ability to turn their base of operations "into a parking lot".

Could I make a case for this line of thinking? I fear I don't have the stomach for that and indeed I think the case is weak. But it's still worthy of some passing thought.

Indeed in our advanced societies the extent to which an understanding of scientific principles enables individuals to achieve higher economic status may offer the means by which we prevent our governments from being dominated by those who would impose religious doctrine on the rest of us who might otherwise stand in disagreement.

I am not a religious person, as some of you in these forums may already may already have gathered. But I greatly respect the role of the world's religions in what they offer to people and the good they have done. I just wish some of them would reject conflict as a strategy, whether to gain adherents or for other purposes.

Conflicts with the well founded findings of the scientific process serve only to stoke the power and egos of religious leaders who seem unable to find the divine inspirations to reinterpret their old teachings. Such positions only serve to undermine the real purposes of their existence. As I said, I wish it were so. Our religious leaders have too much good to do for any to be distracted by arguments with provable scientific fact.

Ed Weldon

Ed Weldon,

You certainly have a right to your oppinion. It's too bad our 'religious' leaders lend so much credence to that oppinion but the knife cuts boyh ways.

Can you sincerely disagree that there have been numerous 'scientists' wishing for fame or fortune who have padded the results of one experiment or another; skewing the results toward their own ends.

Yes 'religion' has been it's own worst enemy from time immemorial. It was, after all, the 'religious leaders of the day' that stoned, beheaded and otherwise put to death the prophets. It was they who gave the thumbs down for Pilate to crucify Jesus Christ.

In fact every time there is a move of God man first tries to kill it outright and failing that then organizes it into a joke.

That IMHO has also happened to science. I believe science has a real place investigating and clarifying the creation but men wanting to make a name, a fortune or some power over others have used science in ways that ought not be.

Thank you Ed,

I gave you a GA for your well expressed point of view. (carrot?)

There is much left unsaid in my previous post.

As Pogo said: We have met the enemy and he is us. We don't need weapons against "wrong thinking" furriners as much as we need defense against those at home who may vote but don't understand. Remember, half the votrers are below average intelligence, and they've been taught in gov't schools by teachers who were near the bottom of their class.

Why don't you tell us what you really think!? Feel free to tell us all how it really is...

I think that a person with a compulsion to group people into categories rated below themselves has clear mental issues, and can be understood to be psychotic and antisocial with visions of grandeur.

There is no Value in what you have to say here. What is your point? You yourself make the the last group. If you sign up, just call yourself "Claymore", to match your intent to hurt other people. (made of explosives but little balls)

Chris (Hick I think..lost now, and not sure where I fit in the new social hierarchy.)

Wow chrisq288 my "want-to-be-American" friend what can I say to that outburst? If you are wondering what group you belong to then I suggest you need read no further than group 1 in my previous post.

Clearly this thread has turned out to be absurd. You surely see that, right?

The person that replied previously to my post indicated that there was some truth in what I had written - perhaps, as the saying goes, the truth hurts, and you actually see yourself in one of the groups.

Regarding your assertion that my intent was to hurt people: Now are you really that sensitive? Perhaps it is true what they say about canadians (lower "c" intended)

Perhaps you may wish to consider your position and engage you brain before you use your feet to type the next response.

I await your apology for "hurting" my feelings .

Chris,

Suffice to mention that our "Guest" did not express his say on the subject (that is if he/she has any) other than a mere vague negation of everyone and everything on this "...337th comment in this absolutely absurd thread..." - as he calls it.

Of course, for this, and in order to distinguish himself form other anonimous "Guests", he would have to be logged-in and named...

This alone says more about him than about the thread or it's participants:

"When you point a finger at someone, you still point three at yourself" - Kabir, the 14th century poet

There's something wrong with your keyboard. It should have read ;

5. Trolll: That would be me.

Well all righty then!

Certainly bad form!

I am reminded of Balloon Wars at Stage Poetry Company, and an era of conflicts in my past.

Nice to have visits from knuckle dragging misanthropes hiding behind anonymity.

Certainly I am all for Guests posting helpful secrets.

We are aware that some Guests show up because they have been kicked off.

Others show up that way because they lost or forgot their password.

At some point when a Guest calls Roger a buffoon, or me a whiner, I feel that I am duty bound to laugh remembering how I taught my daughter to whine one day as a joke.

I think I told her it was an important skill.

As far as "kernals of truth" are concerned, well, not much on the cob worth eating.

I am impressed that not even emc c approves of the Guest.

In a way this is hopeful, for it illustrates how we can agree to together repulse an outside threat.

In the Naked and The Dead, Norman Mailer did capture a certain character type to which we have been exposed. That character is the Sargent to Lieutenent Hearn.

How Should Scientists Address Misconceptions About Science: Stick or Carrot?

That depends on your perspective. Are you a bully or a leader. Currently our government bullies because it can't lead. Bullies create enmity that is counter productive to the goal. When the enmity over runs reason the bullies fall.

The stick can do the job but not well. The problem is the bullies in charge and you are in his sandbox. Create a logical paradigm and he will despise you.

Change is possible but too fast you create a situation where the public is out of it's comfort zone. If you don't have a new comfort zone for them to fall into they will revert to the older known zone even if it is base.

Scientist lack of street "politics" are their own failing. They have their own version in the halls of science and sometimes it is neither pretty or altruistic.

Still we have come a long way.

Brad