How much of science is fact?

[Et3rnalLegend64]

Theoretically, nothing can be proven as absolute fact but everything can be dis-proven eventually. What science tells us are just educated guesses that make a whole lot of sense at the moment. We just wait for the day that something comes up that tells us that it really doesn't make as much sense as we think.

 

[Booze Zombie]

Science is finding the facts, not setting them in stone.

 

[Deacon Cole]

With that said, I don't know if science can be trusted. What was fact a hundred years ago is now seen as naive hypotheses. Atomic theory used to be a joke, and even then the model of an atom became outdated within a few years. In physics, there are particles that make up protons and neutrons. From what we ?know? they are composed of quarks. It?s interesting, but I?ve never seen atoms, let alone quarks. And even if they do exist, how do we have a measurement of their mass? I don't know if I can trust if the speed of light is 300,000,000 meters per second. I don't see how it is possible for anyone to know that.

The idea of dinosaurs is also ridiculous. How can they date fossils? How do we know how accurate carbon dating is? Three million years is a long time and provides a large chance of error. The way dinosaurs look has changed a lot also. What was fact ten years ago is now outdated. Our knowledge of dinosaurs is changing at a steady rate. Theory that will never be fact is constantly changing and will always be accepted by the scientific community as well as the public.

/rant

Boy, some people simply do not understand science.

 

[rainman2203]

So the fact that science is an ever-evolving subject is something to be frowned upon? Maybe we should have left it at the world being flat and still have blood-letting be a regular medical practice.

 

[KarumaK]

I view many fields of science the same way I view religion. People say shit, other people agree with said shit, shit is now true. The only people with any real understanding are scientist/efficienadoes/experts/whatever that actually do the studies and experiments. Lot's of other people just go with it.

That said I go with it before religion. At least science is willing to change for the sake of our relationship.

/wandering thoughts

SNIP*
In short; who really gives a shit, but scientists?


EDIT - Before I get quoted, let me changed that to "Who's really going to worry, but scientists?" It sounds nicer. Otherwise I'll get angry, angry comments, and their stinging, stinging rebuttals.

But yeah this^. Personally I ask the first one.

 

[A Pious Cultist]

Three million years is a long time and provides a large chance of error.

Three million years? Anyway, unless I'm quite mistaken carbon dating isn't used on fossils due to the age (carbon-14 will completely decay 60,000 years but dinosaurs went extinct 64 million years ago, so different methods would have had to be used).

 

[Spacelord]

This is an old subject. Please read up on the philosophy of science OP. Or PM me and I might be bothered to give you a point by point explanation of how it all kinda works.

Also: man I hate rants! They make all kinds of assumptions and accusations and you don't know how you can possibly begin to react. Is there an English version of the Dutch saying "one fool can ask more than ten wise men can answer"?

 

[super_smash_jesus]

Science is only ever best guesses. A scientist never claims that his/her theories or hypotheses are 'fact'.

And, a lot of what you said up there is just simply ignorance. Ignorance isn't so much of an insult, it simply means you don't know. But thats ok, it gives you a lot of chances to learn.

I couldn't have said it better...or as nice.

 

[philosophicalbastard]

In fact there is no such thing as facts.

 

[Laughing Man]

Hmm

Science is a contiuious process that works on a dual nature of finding new information that helps support your theory but also on the bais of taking the work of other to help prove your own findings.

Now the problem is that given that all science is indeed a process in work very little can be taken as fact.

The thing is a lot of people have commented and made some funidmental mistakes.

A hypothesis, is an idea.

Fundimental tests are then conducted to PROVE this hypothesis. Once these basics have been done it then becomes a hypothesis with the potential of being wrong. I.e it then becomes a theory.

The theory of evolution is a good one because in all aspects the proof is there to suggest that it should be fact but their are still gaps that could potentially dis prove it. A theory can only be made a fact when all attempts to dis-prove the theory have been performed. In some cases the very test and knowledge to dis proven a theory do not yet exist. In this case the biggest is the concept of an intelligent designer. The tests and evideance to dis prove an intelligent designer will never exist so the theory of evolution will always remain a theory. Even in if the final missing 'link' where to be found we could never dis prove the intelligent designer theory and ergo cannot ever 'prove' the theory of evolution.

It will become an accepted theory based on very strong evideance.

It situations where the tests and knowledge do exist and their is no question as to alternatives to dis prove a theory it is only then that it becomes fact. The speed of light is a fact because we have tested it and those tests will have dis proven that it can be anything else. We could assume that light is made of super charged cheese particles that mean the speed of light isn't what it is but since we have no means to test that you have to place a limit on it and that limit is what can you prove and dis prove with the knowledge and abilites you have at hand.

Like I said though it is a constant process and the more we learn the more the facts will change. Does saying the speed of light is 3 to the 8 make me an more wrong than saying the fastest purchasable road car is a Bugatto Veyron? No, they are both facts and as things move on we will learn more things that will make these facts change.

Thatis what is great about science it is always moving on.

 

[Dottie]

Okay,there's one example,not even a good one.I can do this with EVERY STORY IN THE BIBLE pretty much. That's what makes this an impossible game to win for you religious freaks that think they need to preach on a gaming forum.

 

[Lavi]

Science doesn't need trust. If you think something may be innaccurate in science (fails to explain properly), then you test and theorize and think up something else to do a better job. A theory isn't fact, just an educated guess.

While doing a project on brain disorders, I ended up discovering that current hypotheses about Alzheimer's, the ones people use regularly, are contradicted by work done by less prominent scientists. Since when should where someone works depict how much weight their work carries? (The hypotheses usually used comes from Western scientists while the couple contradictory experiments came from Russia)

Scientists are humans, don't assume them to be any less flawed than you. Take everything with a grain of salt recognizing it as a theory, not a fact.

Also, kudos to this one page (3), it shows more intelligence than what usually pops up on here.

EDIT: I take that back, stupid religious comment above this.

 

[meece]

Science builds upon itself.... that's why paper references are so important whenever someone publishes and so much is "theory" - which is how science grows, someone puts forward a theory to support the data available at the time, then someone a while later conducts another experiment which proves the theory wrong so another better and more correct theory has to be made.... etc. etc.

I'd say most of chemistry is "fact" , ditto with physics (excluding some of the odd stuff like string theory) and the same with biology (if you ignore medicine and similar areas)

Anyway science is fact until proven wrong - and the being proven wrong simply allows science to become even and more correct and accurate. If we're not right then someday we will be....assuming nothing goes wrong, the world doesn't end.....that sorta thing.

 

[dark-amon]

With that said, I don't know if science can be trusted. What was fact a hundred years ago is now seen as naive hypotheses. Atomic theory used to be a joke, and even then the model of an atom became outdated within a few years. In physics, there are particles that make up protons and neutrons. From what we ?know? they are composed of quarks. It?s interesting, but I?ve never seen atoms, let alone quarks. And even if they do exist, how do we have a measurement of their mass? I don't know if I can trust if the speed of light is 300,000,000 meters per second. I don't see how it is possible for anyone to know that.

The idea of dinosaurs is also ridiculous. How can they date fossils? How do we know how accurate carbon dating is? Three million years is a long time and provides a large chance of error. The way dinosaurs look has changed a lot also. What was fact ten years ago is now outdated. Our knowledge of dinosaurs is changing at a steady rate. Theory that will never be fact is constantly changing and will always be accepted by the scientific community as well as the public.

/rant

From the philosophical view (wich means to search for the truth through logic) I would say that your arguments suffer some faults. You ask if sciense can be trusted, but then you compare modern sciense with sciense from a time where we lacked tecknology and scientifical freedom from higher authoroties who wished to undermine science to keep ther legitimacy.
And when you mention atoms you seem to forget that the theory is already close to 2500 years old.
Your being sceptical, and there's nothing wrong with that, but I think you'l find much more solid arguments if you learned to use metholodical sceptism in your critisism on modern sciense.

 

[ThatJagoGuy]

This thread is pretty poorly informed, huh? Just to clarify terminology then;
Strictly speaking, theories are a consequence of science, not neccessarily science itself. Science is, essentially, the empirical study of things. 'Empirical' is the key word there as it means, observing the actual way of things (facts) (short of getting all philosophical about the nature of our realities, of course). Theories are built to tie empirical facts to reason.

My favourite recent quote is the Dalai Llama who said, "He who ignores empirical evidence does not deserve to be engaged in discussion"

Awesome. I love the fact that Buddhism gives greater importance to empirical fact than to scripture and doctrine. Christianity, I hope you're taking notes...!

 

[The Lost Big Boss]

With that said, I don't know if science can be trusted. What was fact a hundred years ago is now seen as naive hypotheses. Atomic theory used to be a joke, and even then the model of an atom became outdated within a few years. In physics, there are particles that make up protons and neutrons. From what we ?know? they are composed of quarks. It?s interesting, but I?ve never seen atoms, let alone quarks. And even if they do exist, how do we have a measurement of their mass? I don't know if I can trust if the speed of light is 300,000,000 meters per second. I don't see how it is possible for anyone to know that.

The idea of dinosaurs is also ridiculous. How can they date fossils? How do we know how accurate carbon dating is? Three million years is a long time and provides a large chance of error. The way dinosaurs look has changed a lot also. What was fact ten years ago is now outdated. Our knowledge of dinosaurs is changing at a steady rate. Theory that will never be fact is constantly changing and will always be accepted by the scientific community as well as the public.

/rant

From the philosophical view (wich means to search for the truth through logic) I would say that your arguments suffer some faults. You ask if sciense can be trusted, but then you compare modern sciense with sciense from a time where we lacked tecknology and scientifical freedom from higher authoroties who wished to undermine science to keep ther legitimacy.
And when you mention atoms you seem to forget that the theory is already close to 2500 years old.
Your being sceptical, and there's nothing wrong with that, but I think you'l find much more solid arguments if you learned to use metholodical sceptism in your critisism on modern sciense.

You have a point, back then we had almost no tech. and it was all theory. But lets take that statement and go into the future lets say 300 years. I think it is possible that everything we have been learning has been almost false and untrue because our tech. Every year better tech. is made and every year theories that have been fact for so long have been thrown out the window. So in a way as our ability to take a more closer look into reality increases, reality may not be what we expected.

 

[clicketycrack]

I feel the same way about Iraq. I've never seen an Iraq, HOW DO I KNOW THEY EXIST!?

 

[dark-amon]

You have a point, back then we had almost no tech. and it was all theory. But lets take that statement and go into the future lets say 300 years. I think it is possible that everything we have been learning has been almost false and untrue because our tech. Every year better tech. is made and every year theories that have been fact for so long have been thrown out the window. So in a way as our ability to take a more closer look into reality increases, reality may not be what we expected.

In truth on that point I will not argue with you. Science is not everchanging, I proclaim that because I base my vision of reality on that there is some ultimate scinetifical law.
BUT, the human knowlegde on science will change as it has changed due to the fact that different scientists will mean different things, and there will always come new proofs that states other things.
For example when we experienced the first supernova that was regristrated by modern sciense, the laws of fysics was challanged in ways that could destroy the modern science as it was back then (wich I belive was the 60's-70's)

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

With that said, I don't know if science can be trusted. What was fact a hundred years ago is now seen as naive hypotheses.

I bet that, when you were three years old, you thought that airplanes got smaller as they went into the sky. You didn't know that the "shrinking" of the airplane was the way your brain interpreted the airplane's greater distance from you. Therefore, you shouldn't be trusted because you didn't know that at three years old. Who knows what you could be wrong about now?

Much like your mind, science is a great body of information and suppositions. It is not "mature", and much like people, it will never "know everything". The fact that many people (including some scientists) interpret science as "rock solid" is not science's fault, but the fault of those who don't understand the scientific process- which, if condensed into a single sentence, could be considered as such:

"Question everything, including your answers to the questions."