Homework from Week 30

Tuesday, April 22nd, 2014

Reading: "Crystal Truth and Crystal Balls," Richard Dawkins

& "The Fallacy of Scientific Objectivity," Hilary Lawson

1) Why does Richard Dawkins think that a scientific approach to understanding crystals is "more illuminating, more uplifting, and also stranger than anything imagined" by pseudoscience like mystics and New Age gurus?

Dawkins believes that pseudoscience is controlled by the magical power of language. People are able to fool others by using bombastic and much colourful words in order to convince the others of the truthfulness in their preaching. People with less education, or with a less keen and critical eye, would be more easily gullible to the words of a New Age guru who holds on to a claim and persuasively defends the veracity of the phenomenon he is explaining. On the other hand, the scientific approach observes phenomena as they are, without attempting to embellish the natural course of things. In the atomic level, or further down, there are particles, rays, that define and are in a constant show of wonderful things that are not necessarily visible to the naked eye. Of course, tools of high technological development might be necessary, but the evidence provided by others having witnessed the natural phenomena is proof enough for the people to at least imagine (or search up on Internet) what happens naturally, in a scientific point of view.

For example, people are sometimes tricked into believing star signs (ie astrology) is very much true. It is possible that there is a correlation between the positions of the stars and planets and the personality of an individual. However, instead of listening to a woman or man using their mystical powers and their persuasive eloquence to find out, the people might better seek out to look at the stars themselves, and try to find a relationship between  the two supposed factors.

Haven't many people experienced the placebo effect, where a patient believes himself cured because he was told he had ingested a medicine? Well, this is a clear example of humans' tendency to believe what we would like to believe, even though it is not necessarily true.

Alchemy might be another example. It is said that gold was tried to be produced in a man-made fashion. Instead of seeking this out of sole trial-and-error, it might be better to try finding the sources from where gold is produced in the earth, and then try to emulate this. If not, just enjoy the view and thought of how gold is produced, a fascinating process for some, I am sure.

Black holes are covered in myths, due to words and language that distorts the way they actually are. But when one delves into the core of the truth, maybe he will find the beauty from their terrifying power. Truth is not reflected by language, a medium through which scientific knowledge is spread.

2) Why does Hilary Lawson think that science is a "fiction" that tries to achieve objectivity but can't?

Lawson thinks that scientific knowledge is also tainted by bias. The scientist can present his thesis, his ideas, his data, and his evidence in such a light that makes his hypothesis seem right. People might be tricked by his skillfullness in presenting his research, and then adopt these faulty findings due to practicality. The common use of this knowledge incorporates it in everyday life until it is not questioned, and is bothered to be questioned, anymore.

For example, Galileo never offered concrete evidence that the world turned around. He had not observed this, yet everyone eventually accepted it. None of them carried conviction, yet we accept that the earth revolved around the sun as common knowledge. Or in physics. Many of us don't understand, grasp, or have witnessed the phenomena that we discuss, yet we accept them as true due to a certain dogma. We believe so because it seems right. Lawson suggests that science might lose credibility someday as well, as religion did in the past.

3) How can we square the circle? Create a theory of your own that allows for both "crystalline truth" and "scientific fiction."

The truth is, even though we have not been able to observe them with the naked eye, there are things that happen in the microcosmic world that we have to accept happen. For example, we are made of atoms, even though we do not see each individual particle. Are we going to start questioning that because we cannot see it? We could, but what would be the use? Of course, scientific knowledge can have a source of bias, but that is why we receive our own education, to be able to raise our skepticism when we feel something is not right. We have the right for judge for ourselves, choose what we want to accept and don't, and this is applicable to science as well. There are things that allow for imagination to take its course, and what allows this to happen is the veracity of the scientific knowledge that we have (or at least our conviction of their happening). After all, this does refer back to the question we had at the end of the Perception lesson: What would life be if "seeing" is not believing.