A winning poker player only needs a tiny edge to be long-term profitable. Yet there will be swings in his bank account, no matter how good his play; there is even a real chance of bankruptcy in his lifetime.
The question I would then ask to the author: is science (in its current form) a winning, long-term player?
That is, let's grant that most of science is wrong (i.e., not replicable). Let's grant that entire paradigms -- which are objectively better than their successors -- can be wiped out by garbage fads and the fraudsters that perpetuate them. Let's even grant that it's possible for scientific understanding to net regress over the course a lifetime.
The interesting question to me is whether the human practice of science (inclusive of its politics and fraudsters) is still on a long-term, upward trajectory towards truth (not strictly monotonic, but upwards as n goes to infinity). Even after reading horrifying accounts of how bad science is in 2016, I would still be shocked if the answer to this question was no.
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[ 0.27 ms ] story [ 15.0 ms ] threadThe question I would then ask to the author: is science (in its current form) a winning, long-term player?
That is, let's grant that most of science is wrong (i.e., not replicable). Let's grant that entire paradigms -- which are objectively better than their successors -- can be wiped out by garbage fads and the fraudsters that perpetuate them. Let's even grant that it's possible for scientific understanding to net regress over the course a lifetime.
The interesting question to me is whether the human practice of science (inclusive of its politics and fraudsters) is still on a long-term, upward trajectory towards truth (not strictly monotonic, but upwards as n goes to infinity). Even after reading horrifying accounts of how bad science is in 2016, I would still be shocked if the answer to this question was no.