Amazing how the replies to my initial comment range from angrily calling me an idiot for saying something so obviously and egregiously wrong, to claiming it is so trivial and obvious that I should not have needed to mention it.
> The solution isn't less literacy.
Indeed, I can see how what I wrote could be taken that way, I also don't think so. The problem is combining an inadequate amount of literacy, with an almost religious belief in its absolute correctness, e.g. scientism.
To clarify, I'm not saying that it's trivial or obvious, just that it's fundamental. Just like derivatives aren't trivial or obvious but everyone who has taken Intro to Calculus knows about them.
> "e.g. scientism"
Isn't this just an anti-science term adopted by religious people and postmodernists?
> Isn't this just an anti-science term adopted by religious people and postmodernists?
Not at all, as a scientist, I find scientism to be very common and the biggest obstacle to the general public understanding science- more so than religious people and postmodernists which are at least openly anti-science, rather than just confused about what it is. It is a fanatical religious like belief in the correctness, completeness, and finality of "what science has already discovered" and an aggressive dismissal of e.g. things like creative though experiments or anecdotal observations that question current understanding. To people practicing scientism, the regular practice of actual science looks like heresy and pseudo-science and they would get angry if they were present, e.g. when Isaac Newton or Charles Darwin first mentioned their now accepted but once controversial ideas. They will say things like you don't know (and shouldn't think or talk about) anything until it is confirmed in a large study- without considering how scientists come up with the designs and ideas (and funding) for such studies in the first place.
Science in popular media and schools is taught as a bunch of authoritarian facts to memorize and believe without deeply and intuitively understanding, rather than a creative process of trying to deeply understanding and question things for yourself. When I mention something interesting or counter-intuitive I encountered in my professional research, or something interesting I have been thinking about recently- especially among young intelligent "skeptical and science loving" non-scientist programmers on this forum, I am often met with angry derision, because the process of talking about and exploring weird ideas- e.g. the actual how the sausage is made by working scientists, is seen as extremely unacceptable if it conflicts with what they heard in school, media, etc. I’ve mentioned things I’ve personally discovered on here- and been called an idiot and sent the wikipedia link for a field I’ve studied for decades, and is actually citing my older papers and work, by someone that only heard the field existed when they read my comment.
The pseudo-science conspiracy theory people ironically get the creative independent thinking part more right than the "Scientism-ists", but then miss the important second part of actually taking the responsibility to deeply understand for yourself, and critically question things.
There is something very wrong with science education when the people that say they love it, respond negatively when they encounter the real thing- and this can be fixed by redesigning science education. As an academic PI I don’t teach regular classes, but put students directly in the lab working on a new problem nobody has solved before, where they can’t look up the answer, and then mentor them 1 on 1 if they get really stuck. I then have them actually write it up and submit it to a real peer reviewed journal.
Oh okay, thanks for the response. I see more where you're coming from.
I don't think I'd describe what you're talking about as "scientism", it's more just a confusion about what science is.
There are a lot of critiques of so-called "scientism" but they focus on the assertion that there are ways of "knowing" things that are inaccessible to the scientific process. This more or less directly implies the supernatural (since we have to leave naturalism to understand it) or trolling (which is basically what postmodernism is).
Part of what you're running into in this site is that there is a political dislike of education, knowledge, and science in some coding circles. Your original comment brought out a few of them.
Scientism isn’t just a misunderstanding of science- but idolization and worship of it without practicing it… turning it into a sort of religion replacement, which serves some of the same psychological roles- giving them absolute confidence/faith, freedom from anxiety, etc.
I sympathize with the postmodernists and religious people here… and think we’re talking about the same thing- and literally to the same people. Someone is arrogantly dismissing something they’ve spent a lot of time on as nonsense, without really understanding what it is.
The “scientism-ist” says anything they don’t understand is nonsense or a lie, unless it comes from a “scientific authority.”
When I hear about a religious “truth” or similar idea, I don’t dismiss it, but try to understand what it means to them, and what its functional purpose might be. Religious truths are usually literally false- but they are not really factual claims about physical reality in the first place, but methods or psychological tools that are “true” if they work for the intended purpose. If you visualize God for prayer or meditation - you get to a certain internal state… arguing about if you can find physical evidence of this God misses the point entirely. The more intelligent religious people understand this, but don’t talk about it, because doing so makes it not work anymore for the people not able to understand it in a more nuanced way.
I don’t agree that what they are talking about cannot be understood scientifically in principle- but I may agree our current understanding is too primitive, and not yet able to do so in a useful way… whereas with scientism it is either already understood by an authority- or else there is nothing of value to be understood- anything new or different is just false. Scientism admits no limits to our current understanding, nor to any possibility of future discovery other than a hypocritical lip service to supporting “research funding” or whatever.
On a personal level I can accept that regular obnoxious religious zealots exist and just avoid them… but it really irks me when they are telling me that they are the real scientists and I am not, when it is what I have decided my life to.
Amazing how the replies to my initial comment range from angrily calling me an idiot for saying something so obviously and egregiously wrong, to claiming it is so trivial and obvious that I should not have needed to mention it.
> The solution isn't less literacy.
Indeed, I can see how what I wrote could be taken that way, I also don't think so. The problem is combining an inadequate amount of literacy, with an almost religious belief in its absolute correctness, e.g. scientism.