How much of science is fact?

[the_abhorsen]

That is technically the point of scientific method. Its why Evolutionary theory and Quantum theory etc, are called Theories. I.e. the're our best guesses at why shit is the way it is, until someone makes a better guess...

 

[the_abhorsen]

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 Atomic theory used to be a joke, and even then the model of an atom became outdated within a few years.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 What was fact ten years ago is now outdated.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

I have quoted in the hope to get your attention and so I can respond as thoroughly as possible. This isn't a fire post, it's a attempt to answer all your questions, then if you have more, to answer them as best I can. If you're interested try and survive the wall of text.

To start, everything within science is a theory, no good scientist will call something 100% certain fact, each theory and opposing theory has it's own supporting evidence (albeit in some cases very far fetched), then we have Ocams (Okams?) Razor, which says for two theories about the same thing the simplest one is more probably and to be accepted.

Atomic physics is very difficult, it borderlines the quantum barrier (which for all intensive purposes is like having your head crushed in a vice whilst being forced to watch barbie and have someone explain the rules of cricket all at once). Protons and Neutrons (both referred to as Nucleons) are said made up of two things, Leptons and Quarks, one having two of one and one of the third and the other vise versa. Proof of this is, honestly, beyond my expertise. All I know is they use very special scopes that use x-rays and genuinely spend millions of pounds on equipment to isolate 1 atom and cool it to a fraction of a degree above absolute zero.

The measurement of mass isn't so difficult. The combination of a mass spectrometer and maths does this, A mass spectrometer fires ionised (meaning positively charged) atoms and molecules via electo-magnetic fields at certain speeds based upon their weight, the atom then passes through a magnetic field, the heavier the substance the slower it moves and the more it will turn whilst passing through the magnetic field, lighter substances move faster and turn less. The impact is recorded on a detector and computer (now-a-days) and each impact is classed according to mass and charge.

This is where it can become more complicated (as to why, not the concepts), this is done for each element they found the mean average of mass for each one (as each element is made up of things called a isotopes, these have varying numbers of neutrons whilst retaining the same number of protons). They found that Carbon-12 is the most stable and simple element isotope to take relative mass measurements of. Now Carbon-12 is made up of 12 nucleons, 6 protons and 6 neutrons. Hydrogen is made up of 1 Proton and thus has approximately 1/12th the mass of carbon, which, was considered to be the mass of all nucleons for a few years. I can explain further developments if you wish.

Speed of light is complicated, when you look at it off first principles it's nice and Newtonian and relativity easy, but, because of Einstein, we have relativity making the maths a whole lot harder. We know that the electromagnetic spectrum goes from Radio wave -> Microwave -> Infrared -> Visible Light -> Ultraviolet -> X-Ray -> Gamma Rays, so it's producing these at one point and detecting them at another, we know the distance and the time, the speed, well velocity, is a calculation. Most recently this was done with lasers bouncing off the moon.

Dating fossils is all about radioactive decay, everything is radio active, being radio active it has what's called a "Half Life", the amount of time taken for half the isotopes to expel their unstable energy leaving you with half your sample. carbon dating is based off Carbon-14, which is a uncommon but still rather abundant element mixed in with carbon-12 that make up our bodies. I'm not going to pry any further into this bit, because I could easily be wrong and it's to late to check hyperphyics. However generally speaking Carbon dating is 95% accurate, meaning in 10 years the readings will be up to half a year out, and in 100 Million years, you're looking at up to 5 Million years out.

Yes science is ever evolving, with better equipment we can take more accurate measurements, with more powerful computers we can run more simulations and get even more numbers, and we can calculate larger equations faster giving answers faster. There are minds out there with unbelievable ideas that no-one else has yet to think of, they go on to University and are prized pHd. students.

If I've not explained something or you want to know more, PM me, I'll help if I can, or in some cases, point you in the right direction to find out

Lots of good points, one thing tho. you cant corbon date a fossil waaaaaaaaayyyyyy to old and im pretty sure any carbon within the bones gets replaced by minerals (I do physics not geology)

 

[sms_117b]

Lots of good points, one thing tho. you cant corbon date a fossil waaaaaaaaayyyyyy to old and im pretty sure any carbon within the bones gets replaced by minerals (I do physics not geology)

They do carbon date, from what I've read and been told, but I've never been able to conceive how, for one you would need to know howmuch Carbon-14 there was at the start and you don't..

 

[Zelist]

Science:use it to experiment and prove something false, if it can't prove it false it will be believed to be true, that,s why when an experiment is done 10000 times and it does the same thing 10000 times its believed it will do the same thing another 10000 times.

Atheists don't believe science to be 100% fact
Atheists believe..... THERE IS NO GOD

I believe in the scientific method.

 

[mrpenguinismyhomeboy]

To the OP: I must say, I find you misunderstand the exact point of science. Science is the study of knowledge, and is the study of how the universe works. Its facts go through extreme amounts of scrutiny by all sorts of people, and are tested to make sure they derive correctly form the general set axioms, which were agreed upon by consensus. As far as we know science is fact, unless otherwise proven. Stop being a conspiracy theorist.

 

[Datalord]

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

Ok, someone could ave mentioned this before me, but i digress...

All knowledge is subjective, which is why i put stock in quincy theory, go read 1984, it has some good insights towards "facts" near the end.
theories are just explanations that fit the observations, and you could "prove" or "disprove" anything if you tried hard enough, how do we know that Thor didn't create the world, exactly as it is, yesterday, giving us all memories of the past *insert age here* years of our lives?

(the speed of light in meters is actually easy, since a meter is defined on the speed of light in a vacuum devoid of gravitational forces)

to clarify, sceince deals with "what", what would happen if i put zinc in Hydrochloric acid, what would happen if i burned magnesium.
Facts, on the other hand, usually deal with "why", and when you get to "why", subjectivity joins the game, and the flame war starts all over again,

 

[Puzzles]

Science still explains it better and more plausibly than every other group of kooks.

Fact.

 

[Hiraeth]

Lots of good points, one thing tho. you cant corbon date a fossil waaaaaaaaayyyyyy to old and im pretty sure any carbon within the bones gets replaced by minerals (I do physics not geology)

They do carbon date, from what I've read and been told, but I've never been able to conceive how, for one you would need to know howmuch Carbon-14 there was at the start and you don't..

Carbon-14 dating only works for things less than 50,000 years old, and dinosaur bones are millions of years old. Dating dino bones is a bit more complicated:
http://science.howstuffworks.com/dinosaur-bone-age.htm

 

[ShadowKatt]

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.

You're right about that, because science IS always changing. That's why it's science. If someone put down their beliefs and claimed that it was immutable fact then it would be, well, religon.

Not just a thief, but the greatest thief in the world < (dream of mine)

And you can't be the greatest thief in the world. Carmen Sandiego is already the greatest thief in the world.

 

[terraNivium]

To be honest, the OP has a good point.
But it is not something to fear if science doesn't have the answers to everything, because it never claimed to. Science is about the progression of humanity, and if someone invalidates a theory, then are we not narrowing down the true solution?

 

[the_abhorsen]

Lots of good points, one thing tho. you cant corbon date a fossil waaaaaaaaayyyyyy to old and im pretty sure any carbon within the bones gets replaced by minerals (I do physics not geology)

They do carbon date, from what I've read and been told, but I've never been able to conceive how, for one you would need to know howmuch Carbon-14 there was at the start and you don't..

The process assumes that the levels of carbon-14 within the ecosystem has remained constant...ish

 

[eatenbyagrue]

None of it. Its only "accepted as fact" until it gets disproven by another scientist. While we generally accept the laws set aside by scientists (gravity, inertia, etc.), the fact of the matter is that no scientific law is an absolute.

Which is what gives science its strength (theoretically): because no law is absolute and immutable, a more "correct" theory can supplant it as a law, and the scientific community in general will accept it as such.

 

[Spacewolf]

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

Well the first one is a simple time distance calculation and thespeed of light is only 3x10^8 in a vacuum.
and carbon dating is based on the decay of the radoactive isotope 14C which has a known half life which can then be measured against the known levels of it.
as for the look of dinosaurs changing thats because 1 person besically made dinosaurs look like lumbering beasts i.e. the way iguanodon used to look with the horn on its nose. But recently more work has gone into it and they realised that it was incorrect and that iguanodon was a bipedal dinosaur.

 

[Private Custard]

What in the fuck is wrong with this forum recently? All these religion vs science threads are starting to piss me off.

Waste of space.

 

[Deacon Cole]

The original poster demonstrates a disturbing and all too common lack of understand of what science is and how it works. All science is based upon fact. Proven, tested, retested, reconfirmed, peer-reviewed fact. But we do not have all of the facts, which is why things change. As new information comes to light, science adjusts to fit the facts. Compare this to, say, religion where when new information comes about, the facts are adjusted to fit the dogma.

And new ways of find out these facts are happening every day. Take this for instance:

What you are looking at is a photograph of the molecular bonds in a molecule of pentacene. This is not a model, but an actual photograph taken using an atomic force microscope. LINK [http://gizmodo.com/5346964/ibm-takes-first-3d-image-of-atomic-bonds]

 

[lwm3398]

All of it that is proven is fact. Physics, the Elements, our Anatomy, Biology, and so on.

As for history, that's the study where you'd be looking for guess-work. That, coming from someone wanting a PhD in history, means something.

 

[Spacelord]

rant

You fail science forever.

Seriously, at least read up before you make retarded statements like this. Browse wikipedia for an hour or so, then come back to us. Come ON, man. You're making the rest look bad.