The Importance of Pseudosciences

Gawdzilla Sama said:
They confuse "theory" and "law" due to willful ignorance.
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Interesting point. I suppose a "law" is usually an empirically verified pattern or relationship in nature, often quantitative and frequently given the name of the person who enunciated it. So it can be seen either as a summary of observations (which are a matter or fact) or as the first step towards building a theory out of a set of observations.

But even "laws" can be shown to be false or only approximations. After all Newton's 2nd law does not survive contact with relativity - or at least has to be modified (re-expressed in terms of relativistic momentum) in order to do so. And Newton's law of gravitation is shown to be inaccurate, and is completely replaced, in GR.
 
exchemist said:
All theories in science remain permanently unproven. This is intrinsic to science.
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While I agree with the principle you're making, I too think that's an overstatement.

Many theories are now fact.
The theory of evolution is an empirically observable fact. (what is still theory is Evolution by natural selection).
The germ theory of medicine is fact. (We now have sensors powerful enough to see then and watch them operate)
The atomic theory of matter is fact. (ditto)
 
exchemist said:
Not at all.

Here we go again.... This is something I and others here have often been called upon to explain, to people unfamiliar with the nature of science. But no problem to repeat - it is one of the reasons a forum like this one exists.

In science, the only proven facts are reproducible observations of nature. All the theories that attempt to explain observations, and to predict what further observations can be expected, are models of nature that are strictly speaking only provisional. History shows us that the models (theories) of science are occasionally shown to be either wrong or incomplete. Newtonian mechanics is a classic example. We still use it for the vast majority of mechanical problems, with great success, but we know it cannot account properly for the behaviour of entities at the atomic scale, or for objects travelling relative to one another at close to the speed of light. For such phenomena we need quantum theory and special relativity respectively.

Does that mean Newtonian mechanics is "wrong"? Well yes and no. It is just that we have found it seems to be only an approximation, valid under certain conditions and needs to be supplemented by these more complete theories, once one moves away from those conditions. So it is an incomplete description of nature.

It was Karl Popper who pointed out that any theory in science can in principle be "falsified", i.e. shown to be wrong or incomplete, by a new and unexpected observation that does not fit the theory. Whereas, regardless of how many millions of observations one makes that do fit the theory, none of those can ever possibly prove that tomorrow some new and unexpected observation will not occur that overturns it. A scientific theory is therefore falsifiable but never provable.

Now, in practice there are many, many theories that are so successful, and that have never been found unable to account for observations, that we accept them from day to day as if they are "true". But this "truth" remains only provisional, even if we as scientists "believe" it to be "true" for practical purposes.

Where pseudoscience fails, by comparison, is that the theory is not supported by reproducible observations. My earlier post 50 on this thread summarises the difference.
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Well explained. Does it also apply to medical science?
 
DaveC426913 said:
While I agree with the principle you're making, I too think that's an overstatement.

Many theories are now fact.
The theory of evolution is an empirically observable fact. (what is still theory is Evolution by natural selection).
The germ theory of medicine is fact. (We now have sensors powerful enough to see then and watch them operate)
The atomic theory of matter is fact. (ditto)
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The evolution one has come up before. I would contend that if something is an observable fact it is an observation, not a model and not a theory. (As you rightly point out, the concept of evolution by natural selection is a theory, and that I think is what is generally meant, when people today speak of the Theory of Evolution.)

The germ "theory" of disease is perhaps a case of something that was originally, several hundred years ago, a theory, but is now an observed fact, due to the development of microscopy etc. Atomic theory is close to that status too perhaps (though I was taught 6th form physics by an excellent teacher who professed himself agnostic about the existence of molecules.)

Perhaps hard cases make bad law, but I think I stick to my guns, your counterexamples notwithstanding. I quote Stephen Jay Gould on the subject: " "...facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world′s data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts."
 
KUMAR5 said:
Well explained. Does it also apply to medical science?
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Of course.

But be careful not to draw the false conclusion that rubbish like homeopathy or reflexology is therefore on an equal footing, in some way, with proper medicine. The theories used in proper medicine are very strongly evidence-based, so while they can't be proved, in the strict logical philosophical sense I have been taking about, there is very good evidence for them. For obvious safety reasons, there are highly rigorous requirements for evidence before medical theories are put into practice.
 
exchemist said:
Of course.

But be careful not to draw the false conclusion that rubbish like homeopathy or reflexology is therefore on an equal footing, in some way, with proper medicine. The theories used in proper medicine are very strongly evidence-based, so while they can't be proved, in the strict logical philosophical sense I have been taking about, there is very good evidence for them. For obvious safety reasons, there are highly rigorous requirements for evidence before medical theories are put into practice.
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Yes but when both are unproven, whether side affects from both should not be one major deciding modality? One gives more affects and more side affects, other lesser affects and lesser side affects. In this sense, will they both not balanced to provide net benefits?
We can also do rough estimation in percentage. Can you give rought idea?
Say, 1.non proven scientific: Real effects+placebo. - side effects - misc factors i.e. cost, ease, misprescription, negligences etc. 2. Non proven non scientific:.real effects+placebo +- side effects, +- misc. factors.
 
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KUMAR5 said:
Yes but when both are unproven, whether side affects from both should not be one major deciding modality? One gives more affects and more side affects, other lesser affects and lesser side affects. In this sense, will they both not balanced to provide net benefits?
We can also do rough estimation in percentage. Can you give rought idea?
Say, 1.non proven scientific: Real effects+placebo. - side effects - misc factors i.e. cost, ease, misprescription, negligences etc. 2. Non proven non scientific:.real effects+placebo +- side effects, +- misc. factors.
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There is no point whatsoever in a drug without side effects, if it doesn't work. One might as well dispense pure water!

Oh sorry, that's what people actually do in homeopathy. :D
 
exchemist said:
There is no point whatsoever in a drug without side effects, if it doesn't work. One might as well dispense pure water!

Oh sorry, that's what people actually do in homeopathy. :D
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It is not like unproven agent, as you told commonly about science. Moreover nothing can be said for sure till scientific understandings become absolute and final.
 
KUMAR5 said:
It is not like unproven agent, as you told commonly about science. Moreover nothing can be said for sure till scientific understandings become absolute and final.
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Scientific understandings are seldom absolute and final. We go on the best evidence we have.
 
exchemist said:
Facts are the world′s data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts."
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Yeah. I was going to follow up with something akin to this.

Theories, generally, are models. They model what we observe. But in that sense, they are abstracts - they cannot be 'proven' because a model can always be refined. It is impossible, even in principle, to "prove" such things as evolution occurring by natural selection, or Einsteins Relativity, because they're not things in the real world.
 
Gravity is a fact.

How it works is currently a theory.

Saying gravity works because because angels push things together is unsupported pseudoscience.
 
DaveC426913 said:
Yeah. I was going to follow up with something akin to this.

Theories, generally, are models. They model what we observe. But in that sense, they are abstracts - they cannot be 'proven' because a model can always be refined. It is impossible, even in principle, to "prove" such things as evolution occurring by natural selection, or Einsteins Relativity, because they're not things in the real world.
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Just so.
 
KUMAR5 said:
Hence, still doubtful.
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No, that is tendentious. "Doubtful" implies there are reasons to think something may be wrong.

Whereas what we have, with most scientific theories, is no reason to think them wrong (and in some cases we have reasons to think they have limited applicability). It is merely that we cannot prove them absolutely right.

That does not make them "doubtful".
 
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