The Most Important Part of Science

  • Thread starter Thread starter putongren
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Important Science
AI Thread Summary
The discussion centers on the fundamental aspects of science, debating whether math, theories, experiments, or the scientific process itself holds the most significance. A key point raised is that the interpretation of experiments is crucial, as it shapes scientific understanding. Reproducibility is emphasized as a cornerstone of scientific validity; if results cannot be replicated, they lack value. The conversation also touches on the importance of cultural stability in science, which allows knowledge to be passed down through generations. There is a recognition of the interplay between theory and experimentation, with some participants expressing a preference for theoretical work while acknowledging the necessity of empirical research. The role of the scientific community in refining individual interpretations and maintaining objectivity is highlighted, alongside the idea that personal biases and gut feelings can influence scientific inquiry. Ultimately, the dialogue suggests that while various elements contribute to science, the process of inquiry and the ability to critically assess and reproduce findings are paramount.
putongren
Messages
124
Reaction score
1
What is the most important part of science? Math, Theories, Experiment, Etc...?

I'll paraphrase what a friend's answer.

"Process ... the rest of what you said changes -but the process above it all (which comes from how to think about things) is what determines the quality of reiteration and refinement."

I thought about this question and I thought that a scientist's interpretation of experiment is the crux of science.

Any thoughts? Comments?
 
Physics news on Phys.org
Doubt
 
Objectivity.
 
Not getting mad when your stuff breaks or you screw up your computations.
 
Thinking.
We wouldn't go far without it.
 
Important to who? Mankind or particular scientists?
 
The most important is reproducibility. The notion is that if a result can't be reproduced it is worthless. If someone gives you a bit of scientific information you can go and test it yourself, this is the most important aspect of science.

Then I have faith in those who do experiments and prefer theory myself, but that do not mean that I don't recognize how important they are for the whole structure. I love reading about experiments done but actually doing them is a snooze fest.
 
I'm very tempted to say ***s. After all, biology is dependent upon them, if only to make interesting posters. Were it not for them, all of the pioneers of science would have starved to death as infants. I bet that a lot of early scientists made it through school by the grace of a sheep and dreams of Marie Curie.
Hell, I think of her now and then myself. Of course, she can evoke only "dry dreams", but at least she isn't forgotten.:rolleyes: Oh, crap... I hope that Pierre's hearing hasn't improved since he died...
 
Unbiased experimentation.
 
  • #10
the most important thing is a stability of culture that allows you to pass down info from one generation to the next.
 
  • #11
Proton Soup said:
the most important thing is a stability of culture that allows you to pass down info from one generation to the next.

Very good point. In a way, it's ridiculously obvious, but it never crossed my mind as an element of the process rather than merely a circumstance of it. It needn't even be a "constant stability" (if that makes any sense), nor need every generation be involved, as long as some thread of continuity exists.
 
  • #12
Fixing your experiment to match your theory.

oops did I just say that...
 
  • #13
Pengwuino said:
Fixing your experiment to match your theory.

oops did I just say that...

damn birds! Where is my slingshot?

As for the op: What is most important for survival; food, or water?
 
Last edited:
  • #14
Asking poignant questions
 
  • #15
Grant money.
 
  • #16
I think you'd need to address which facet of science is to be analyzed.

The most important part to mankind as a whole, or the most important aspect of how science inherently "works"?

Based on how the rest of the responders have already replied, I'd have to agree. The way we humans interpret the experiments we set up is in my opinion the most fundamental part.
 
  • #17
Ivan Seeking said:
damn birds! Where is my slingshot?
Feel free to herd him in my direction with your slingshot. I have a 10-gauge lying in wait.

Ivan Seeking said:
for the op: What is most important for survival; food, or water?
Although that is supposed to be a trick question, I'm going to say "water". Having water allows you more time to find food than having food provides for finding water. (I didn't quite say that properly. What I mean is that you can survive longer without food.)
 
  • #18
The waste paper basket. It's the difference between science and philosophy.
 
  • #19
Evo said:
Grant money.
or paycheck. Other than compensation - curiosity and education.
 
  • #20
A paraphrasing of a defoliation slogan:

YOU! Because only you can prevent scientists!
 
  • #21
Jimmy Snyder said:
The waste paper basket. It's the difference between science and philosophy.

What?
 
  • #22
Jarle said:
What?

I might be misinterpreting it myself, but my take is that scientists throw out anything that proves erroneous; philosophers keep everything.
 
  • #23
Danger said:
I might be misinterpreting it myself, but my take is that scientists throw out anything that proves erroneous; philosophers keep everything.

That's how I understood it as well. But do they?
 
  • #24
Jarle said:
That's how I understood it as well. But do they?

I don't know; I am neither.
 
  • #25
Ivan Seeking said:
damn birds! Where is my slingshot?

As for the op: What is most important for survival; food, or water?

Water :P
 
  • #26
Ivan Seeking said:
damn birds! Where is my slingshot?

As for the op: What is most important for survival; food, or water?

Shelter is more important than either (in a survival situation, anyway).
 
  • #27
Jarle said:
What?
It's a joke meaning scientists only care about what is meaningful, philosophers don't care if it's meaningful. And that's the nicer interpretation.
 
  • #28
Logical reasoning, the only way to prove she is a witch.
 
  • #29
Evo said:
It's a joke meaning scientists only care about what is meaningful, philosophers don't care if it's meaningful. And that's the nicer interpretation.

Yeh. I think that's hogwash though. Scientists are interested in a certain way of looking at things; it's by coincidence that most of a scientist's work is meaningful.

Scientific method is hogwash too (I'm speaking from the perspective of a single scientist, not the whole science community). We fiddle with systems and phenomena because we're interested in it. Meaningfulness and accuracy are byproducts of genuine interest, but so are misconceptions and grandiose ideology. It is at the community level that the scientific method becomes important, because in helps to wash away those misconceptions and grandiose ideology.

A single scientist has little understand of the whole reality in terms of direct personal exploration. Instead, it's the scientific community, like a partition of gases, that nudges each individual scientist's works into a uniform perspective of reality. We keep each other in check.
 
  • #30
Pythagorean said:
Shelter is more important than either (in a survival situation, anyway).

Protection - Location - Acquisition - Navigation ( PLAN ). I think those are the most important things they teach in an army of this world for outdoor survival.
 
  • #31
DanP said:
Protection - Location - Acquisition - Navigation ( PLAN ). I think those are the most important things they teach in an army of this world for outdoor survival.

The Coast Guard in Alaska, in conjuction with the Alaska Marine Safety Education Association teaches the "Seven Steps of Survival" in order of importance:

Recognition
Inventory
Shelter
Signals
Water
Food
Play

RISSWFP... rolls right of the tongue...
 
  • #32
Pythagorean said:
...most of a scientist's work is meaningful.
Ah, if only...
 
  • #33
Pythagorean said:
The Coast Guard in Alaska, in conjuction with the Alaska Marine Safety Education Association teaches the "Seven Steps of Survival" in order of importance:

Recognition
Inventory
Shelter
Signals
Water
Food
Play

RISSWFP... rolls right of the tongue...

What's "Play" standing for ?
 
  • #34
DanP said:
What's "Play" standing for ?

It doesn't. Quite literally, the seventh step is play: have fun. Do things you enjoy, reduce stress levels, get good sleep. Essential to keeping your wits about you.
 
  • #35
Evo said:
It's a joke meaning scientists only care about what is meaningful, philosophers don't care if it's meaningful. And that's the nicer interpretation.

Can you give an example of something meaningless that philosophers care about?
 
  • #36
Jarle said:
Can you give an example of something meaningless that philosophers care about?

Meaning is subjective. Somebody could just as easily come up with something that physicists care about that is meaningless... to someone.
 
  • #37
Jarle said:
Can you give an example of something meaningless that philosophers care about?

Just about everything they do ? :devil:
 
  • #38
The most important part of science, to stick to it. Science only, no guts feeling, no ideals, no politics, No relaxation of standards when dealing with the attractiveness versus the correctness of any conclusion, no decisions about what 'the right balance is between being effective and being honest'.

The most important part of survival is health, get out of threatening situations and treath injuries first, seems not to play in RISSWFP

It may be hard to harmonize the most important part of science with the most important part of survival.
 
Last edited:
  • #39
Pythagorean said:
Meaning is subjective. Somebody could just as easily come up with something that physicists care about that is meaningless... to someone.

Meaningless can be interpreted in many ways. Some more operational interpretations are; useless, impossible to understand, or genuine nonsense.

Either way, the fact that a group of people care about something, write about it and think about it automatically makes it meaningful. These same things might be meaningless to others, but surely; higher mathematics is meaningless to a 3-year-old, but that's not the point.

What I find is that many consider some or all philosophical problems and topics to be genuine nonsense or erroneous thinking, rather than only meaningless to their view (thus not granting it respect as a meaningful subject at all); a perspective which I think the joke portrays.

...
DanP said:
Jarle said:
Can you give an example of something meaningless that philosophers care about?
Just about everything they do ? :devil:

...
Andre said:
The most important part of science, to stick to it. Science only, no guts feeling,

I think you will find that that "gut-feeling" is an important part of being a research scientist. The same might go with attractiveness. To search for attractive simplicity and elegance is not irrational and anti-scientific just because it has it's roots in aesthetics (and it might have practical advantages). Of course these feelings only serve as inclinations, and not as reasoning.
 
Last edited:
  • #40
Evo said:
It's a joke meaning scientists only care about what is meaningful, philosophers don't care if it's meaningful. And that's the nicer interpretation.
That may be so, but it's not what I meant. I suppose scientists are no less prone to lousy ideas than philosophers are. But I perceive a difference in the way they react to those bad ideas. Scientists will toss them out.
 
  • #41
Jarle said:
(...)
Andre said:
The most important part of science, to stick to it. Science only, no guts feeling...

I think you will find that that "gut-feeling" is an important part of being a research scientist. The same might go with attractiveness. To search for attractive simplicity and elegance is not irrational and anti-scientific just because it has it's roots in aesthetics (and it might have practical advantages). Of course these feelings only serve as inclinations, and not as reasoning.

Right, the last sentence that's it. I think we agree. There is no doubt that "gut-feeling" (experience) can play an important part in processing and problem solving, but is that the science as intended?

What I intended to say is if science is the process of finding out how things work then it's conclusion should be about how those things work and nothing else. If it is found out that there are more ways that things could work, a selection/decision should not be made based on gut-feelings, aesthetics, occam razor, desirability of a pet-solution or we would still be dealing with a flat earth, phlogiston, aether and things like that. There has been a lot of gut-feeling going on trying to cling on to those erring concepts.
 
  • #42
Evo said:
Grant money.
Hah!



My answer: logic. Try and do science without it. ;)
 

Similar threads

Discussion on the science-literature relationship and more
Replies
14
Views
3K
News Post-Scientific Technocratic Methodologies
Replies
12
Views
3K
Are Quantum Mechanics Interpretations Misrepresented in Fiction?
Replies
1
Views
2K
Question about observation and the sense theory
Replies
16
Views
2K
Focus all of your ire on me, if you would
Replies
4
Views
2K
New paper about online harassment and participation in science threads
Replies
3
Views
2K
Most commonly mispronounced scientists' names
2
Replies
51
Views
7K
Philosophy of Science: Discussing Maths, Physics, Mind, & AI
Replies
3
Views
3K
Finding support to complete a UK charity registration application
Replies
4
Views
218
Most Important Thing In Science : Asking The Right Question
Replies
4
Views
5K

Hot Threads

Recent Insights

Back
Top