It takes longer to accurately recall counterintuitive theories.
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The Wisdom of Psychopaths
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In one sense, science educators have it easy. The things they describe are so intrinsically odd and interesting — invisible fields, molecular machines, principles explaining the unity of life and origins of the cosmos — that much of the pedagogical attention-getting is built right in. Where they have it tough, though, is in having to combat an especially resilient form of higher ed’s nemesis: the aptly named (if irredeemably clichéd) ‘preconceived idea.’ Worse than simple ignorance, naïve ideas about science lead people to make bad decisions with confidence. And in a world where many high-stakes issues fundamentally boil down to science, this is clearly a problem.
Naturally, the solution to the problem lies in good schooling — emptying minds of their youthful hunches and intuitions about how the world works, and repopulating them with sound scientific principles that have been repeatedly tested and verified. Wipe out the old operating system, and install the new. According to a recent paper by Andrew Shtulman and Joshua Valcarcel, however, we may not be able to replace old ideas with new ones so cleanly. Although science as a field discards theories that are wrong or lacking, Shtulman and Valcarcel’s work suggests that individuals —even scientifically literate ones — tend to hang on to their early, unschooled, and often wrong theories about the natural world. Even long after we learn that these intuitions have no scientific support, they can still subtly persist and influence our thought process. Like old habits, old concepts seem to die hard.
Testing for the persistence of old concepts can’t be done directly. Instead, one has to set up a situation in which old concepts, if present, measurably interfere with mental performance. To do this, Shtulman and Valcarcel designed a task that tested how quickly and accurately subjects verified short scientific statements (for example: “air is composed of matter.”). In a clever twist, the authors interleaved two kinds of statements — “consistent” ones that had the same truth-value under a naive theory and a proper scientific theory, and “inconsistent” ones. For example, the statement “air is composed of matter” is inconsistent: it’s false under a naive theory (air just seems like empty space, right?), but is scientifically true. By contrast, the statement “people turn food into energy” is consistent: anyone who’s ever eaten a meal knows it’s true, and science affirms this by filling in the details about digestion, respiration and metabolism.
Shtulman and Valcarcel tested 150 college students on a battery of 200 such statements that included an equal and random mix of consistent and inconsistent statements from several domains, including astronomy, evolution, physiology, genetics, waves, and others. The scientists measured participants’ response speed and accuracy, and looked for systematic differences in how consistent vs. inconsistent statements were evaluated.
If scientific concepts, once learned, are fully internalized and don’t conflict with our earlier naive concepts, one would expect consistent and inconsistent statements to be processed similarly. On the other hand, if naive concepts are never fully supplanted, and are quietly threaded into our thought process, it should take take longer to evaluate inconsistent statements. In other words, it should take a bit of extra mental work (and time) to go against the grain of a naive theory we once held.
This is exactly what Shtulman and Valcarcel found. While there was some variability between the different domains tested, inconsistent statements took almost a half second longer to verify, on average. Granted, there’s a significant wrinkle in interpreting this result. Specifically, it may simply be the case that scientific concepts that conflict with naive intuition are simply learned more tenuously than concepts that are consistent with our intuition. Under this view, differences in response times aren’t necessarily evidence of ongoing inner conflict between old and new concepts in our brains — it’s just a matter of some concepts being more accessible than others, depending on how well they were learned.
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Add CommentYet we have many that not only continue with the Old OS but install in their children a bronze age OS. I have been talking about the ALL curriculum for years. Instead of the 3Rs, reading, righting and 'rithmatic you have Arithmetic, Literacy and Logic. The other subjects, excluding physical education, are there to apply the knowledge gained by these core subject. With the addition of logic, less emphasis is placed on teaching "facts" and more is placed on reasoning and the ability to evaluate data sources. The best thing you can do for your child's future is to teach them the benefits of delayed gratification, I believe the second best is to teach them critical thought. One of the worst thing to teach them is that faith is a valid replacement for knowledge, and that faith is more important that evidence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm more concerned with unsupported superstitions that scientists, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, believe. For instance "The simplest answer is most likely the correct one" is almost never correct and requires herculean feats of rationalization to defend, yet this misunderstanding of Occam's Razor (not even close to what his intent was when he wrote it) pervades science and our society as a whole. These are the real dangers to science, not that we have to think an extra second in order figure out the correct answer to distinguish between colloquial and scientific definitions.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you teach your children critical thinking, and teach them to apply it to everything, you don't need to teach them that faith is not a valid replacement for knowledge - it's self-evident to anyone who has ever thought critically about their own beliefs.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOf course, critical thinking among the general population is anathema to religious and political leaders. It's so much harder to control a populace that questions what it sees and hears and challenges established ideas. Hence the lack of logic and critical thinking in school curricula, and the inclusion of (un)intelligent design and "teaching the controversy".
You ( the SI editing staff ) continue to refer to some people as "you". When I read that, it refers to me, and anybody else reading it. It gets annoying at times.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am fully aware that even the best scientific reasoning can be flawed, and the flaws are therefore generally of greater scope than imagined. I can anticipate weaknesses in any of my notions and make allowances regarding language and so forth. Like a good engineer, I imagine what total breakdown could look like in every phase of an operation.
Still in all, I do not assume imperfection in others as an exorcise in respect. I assume adults have performed to their peak capacity and any failure would be directly related to the complexity of the task and/or their ability to perform it.
Assumed perfection is an unavoidable flaw in reasoning, but without it no reasoning is possible. Without evidence to the contrary, many arguments, however ridiculous in hindsight are daily tried in trepidation. Many humans will retry pet ideas well beyond the point of reason fearing the alternative, this is a form of psychosis, with the exception of legal circles. An open mind respects all attempts at reasoning.
Religious people are granted by the constitution, the right to assume in a benign fashion certain unprovable concepts. Science does not allow this argument, but many scientists share dual loyalties. In effect much scientific knowledge became possible because of biblical teachings. Multiple interpretations of phenomena are not always contentious.
Any good scientist must be comfortable with the circumstance of many possibilities in order to progress without the stigma of prejudice. It is good exorcise to imagine the possibility of these " unprovable concepts " if just to " cleanse the palette " for new endeavors.
I applaud you for knowing that "The simplest explanation is most likely the correct one" is not Ockham's Razor nor correct. It actually derives from Newton. But it is not a danger to science, because scientists don't use it in theory evaluation. It comes up in apologetics, usually atheist apologetics. What Ockham meant was not to add hypotheses to descriptions of phenomenon. His example, from his time, was "objects move because of an impetus". Ockham argued that movement was change in space over time, so all you needed to say was "objects move". That "because of an impetus" was a hypothesis that was not necessary to explain the phenomena.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo Derrick: not all religious leaders or politicians deride reason. To say that they all do is to violate reason and critical thinking. Nor is faith necessarily an absence of evidence or reason. It can be, but often is not. Faith is belief in the absence of PROOF. We all believe things we cannot scientifically demonstrate. That does not mean we lack evidence or reason. For instance, the idea that democracy is a good form of government is not scientific nor "proven" by scientific evidence. Yet it does have evidence and reasons behind it.
"It is important to recognize that not all "facts" are susceptible to scientific investigation, simply because some observations and experiences are entirely personal. I cannot prove that someone loves his or her child. The emotions that any individual claims to have are not susceptible to scientific documentation, because they cannot be independently verified by other observers. In other words, science seeks to explain only objective knowledge, knowledge that can be acquired independently by different investigators if they follow a prescribed course of observation or experiment. Many human experiences and concerns are not objective, and so do not fall within the realms of science." Douglas Futuyma, Science on Trial, the Case for Evolution, 1995, p 167.
My children have faith that I love them. That faith is based upon evidence. But it's not science and it's not "proof". Millions of people have evidence for the existence of deity. It's faith, but not without evidence or reason.
I wonder what the researchers would have seen had they done brain scans as people answered the questions. Just speculating, maybe the pre-conceived notions that people grow up with correspond to different parts of the brain. So an answer that is consistent doesn't need to be checked, but one that is inconsistent has somehow be "tagged" so that the answer gets shunted off to a different part of the brain for consideration.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am not sure I would read too much into the longer time it took people with a good science background to respond to the inconsistent statements. A simple explanation would be that they are trained to look for subtleties and not accept the obvious. For example when I looked at the statement about air and matter I stopped to think of the various definitions of matter and which one might best apply. I think it's a good think that trained minds stop and ponder.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"For instance, the idea that democracy is a good form of government is not scientific nor "proven" by scientific evidence. Yet it does have evidence and reasons behind it."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDemocracy is not, necessarily a good form of government, nor does it have evidence behind it.
Historically, democracies have been short-lived. We have only been a democracy since we legislated universal suffrage. It's true that we are betting our lives on it, but I don't think most of us are comfortable making that bet; we just don't seem to have much choice.
As to "reasons behind ..." your belief that democracy is good, that's demonstrably wrong. We already see evidence of the idea that 50% can get what they want by making the other 50% pay for it, is alive and growing.
"My children have faith that I love them. That faith is based upon evidence. But it's not science and it's not "proof". Millions of people have evidence for the existence of deity. It's faith, but not without evidence or reason."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhatever this evidence based faith tells your children and whatever this "evidence" is for existence of a deity, it is not a process well recommended for making good decisions or finding the actual truth. Children have faith Santa will leave presents under the tree for them, and evidence backs them up on it. The fact is that faith easily misleads people, even if they use some facts to rationalize their faith. If people want to take a statue that cries blood as "evidence" their faith is valid, and don't bother to look at the rusty plumbing in the ceiling above the statue, it says a lot about the value of their faith in reaching a true conclusion, but very little about the actual existence of a deity. A bit of science would go a long way into clearing up such delusions, but hey, by your stated standards, better to declare areas that are unprovable by science and just romanticize faith (backed up by "evidence") as holding the key.... what sillyness.
"We all believe things we cannot scientifically demonstrate. That does not mean we lack evidence or reason. "
Perhaps you are right that the one thing doesn't necessarily directly mean the other, but it does demonstrate a willingness to believe things that actually may not be true. Just because we all do it, doesn't mean it is a good way to reach a good conclusion. The beauty of the scientific method is that the process gets around our natural inclination to just believe all sorts of silly things, whether the evidence in front of our eyes seems to back it up or not, and instead makes us go through a strict process that strips away our biases and brings us ever closer to knowing what is actually happening around us. It isn't a perfect process, and usually takes time and many iterations to get past our built in preconceptions and misconceptions and human failings, but it is the best tool ever devised for eventually getting at the truth of things.... and I imagine before very much longer, will even have a scientifically verifiable way of scanning your brain and actually proving you love your kids.... although I agree most kids won't be much interested in such proof of something that seems obvious to them.... but it isn't the obvious nature of it (that you describe as faith) that makes it true... plenty of obvious seeming things actually aren't true.
Yeah, it seems that Abrahan Maslow was the first in pointing that any new knowledge is put on the basis of the previously existent info on the field the subject has, be it a conjecture, a prejudice, or anything lacking an experimental basis. This would be one of the reasons learning things for an examination by reviewing old multiple choice questions on the subject is very dangerous: your mind records at the same level, and associated with the question, all the possible answers offered, and when in an actual situation, it will present to your conscience at similar levels of certainty the false and the right answers, in real life decision making this can lead to dangerous mistakes hard to notice until you're confronted with its consequences.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this" YOUR SCIENTIFIC REASONING IS MORE FLAWED THAN YOU THINK " is the lead article in this weeks SA. Please read it Dr. Clancy.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEmpty your mind of bias too? Certainly the big bang model was held up for many years due to the preconceived, and completely illogical, idea that matter had been in motion, uncaused, to avoid a Creator.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActual physical objects that scientist Knew were composed of smaller matter had no origin? Like you popped in tape of a football game in the middle of play? The ball is just in the air on its way from what?
It is atheistic ideas that have slowed down things. It was believers who started science as soon as the telescope and microscope were developed---many by them.
Now, the same lack of imagination that Einstein and others had is pathological with fine tuning. The public is being fed utter nonsense masquerading as science--just as it was fed the steady state model.
So many of us take exception that it is the public that needs to empty their heads. In the medical field there is much talk about not trusting anything from the field of origins now. Most of us are believers and think its time for the blatant bias to stop.
Dont even get me started on DNA composing itself and spelling out the exact spacial coordinates of the 4 chamber heart, its electrical current, and pressure system. Thinking evolution was mindless when there is not a chance in upteen zillion that it was is just nonsense to most doctors.
This hypothesis of conflicting naive versus scientific ideas isn't well demonstrated by these studies. Indeed, one would expect under this model that more learning of scientific concepts would actually reduce the effect of inconsistent info on reaction times, as the process of continually thinking about and retrieving scientific information would likely make the process more automatic and thus faster.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA more parsimonious explanation is that "inconsistent" and "consistent" statements differ in how difficult they are to answer. For example, "people turn food into energy" is apparently true both at a superficial level and at a conceptual (scientific) level, whereas "air is composed of matter" is not superficially true but most certainly is scientifically true. Reaction time differerences then may be produced by consistent statements relying preferentially on superficial evidence which is more automatically processed than by more complex conceptual evidence. Competition between these forms of evidence is in no way implied.
Similarly, in the other studies you cite it is clear that the same effect may take place--namely, that performance may be augmented in the condition that is "consistent with childish intuition" because rapid responses rely heavily on intuitive interpretations of semantic meaning. Again, however, this implies nothing about people being unable to "replace old ideas with new ones".
This critique should have been obvious to the researchers, as these studies rely heavily on reaction time, which induces people to make immediate, unreasoned judgments.
Sci Am really needs to start questioning some of these papers a little more, seeing as the journal reviewers are so clearly falling asleep on the job.
What is meant by scientific thinking? Normally, scientific thinking is interpreted as thinking which conforms to deductive logical thinking and observational evidence. Interpretation of observational evidence has also to be done by that aspect of mind which deals with logical thinking. So it is the logic which rules the world of scientific enquery. But the assumption that scientific enquery per is the only methodology to know truth and reality per se is unscientific and irrational. Horizon of reality is too deep and wide to be bound by scientific enquery only
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut is logic the only aspect of mind to know truth? Logical reasoning has its own territory to deal with. There may be many areas of nature where logic may be quite ineffective to know the reality. Problem arises when some people believe that logic and reasoning are the only tools to ascertain reality in all areas of Nature. When they use logic to know reality in such prohibited areas, this may lead to logical but irrational solutions. Irrational thinking is different and superior than pure logical thinking.
There may be innumerable definable and undefinable aspects of human mind to know the reality. Many of these aspects have yet not been fully explored and studied. Intuition, hunch, insight, past experience, faith, conviction, emotions are some of the aspects of mind which do not come in the category of logical thinking and yet not fully explored but sometimes quite powerful to know the reality. There is a large area of feelings which up to date remain unexplored. This area belong to subjective domain and whatever scientific objective studies have been conducted to study and explore this area are quite ineffective. Reason? In subjective domain, it is the subject only who knows where the shoe pinches. A person "A" knows that person "B" loves or hates him. In knowing this reality, logical reasoning and empirical observational evidence, however powerful it may be is quite ineffective and lead to wrong results. However, some intuition and empathetic feeling by "A" can lead to correct results.
Scientists are first human beings and than scientists. So to expect from them that they may deal with their world only with logical reasoning shall be too much and amount to transform them to robots.
You beat me to it, Will (in BC). I feel that I, for instance, have trained myself to read very slowly, not as a scientist but as a reader and critic of poetry.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNot that I don't still too often read too fast.
Lucaspa - "Millions of people have evidence for the existence of deity. It's faith, but not without evidence or reason."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow did you find your way to this science blog? Just curious?
Saint Augustine Argued "Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe."
This is weird in today's science.
Doesn't this mean that we should be teaching children more carefully, like not using misleading structural analogs like the atomic model on the same page as this article. Since first learnings are so important, should we focus on getting it right from the get-go?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI couldn't agree more with your comment concerning the teaching of logic. It not only provides a more realistic view of the world but allows us to seperate the informational "wheat from the chaff" that we are bombarded by through all forms of media.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPerhaps, an immediate case in point would be that of the medical advisor to Congressman Todd Akin.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat a terrific response to lucaspa. It is pretty obvious that some terms we use such as evidence means different things to a large majority of our population than what it means to scientists. Just like "theory" the common understanding confuses the actual meaning. I congratulate you on the logic included in your well written response.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMaking the assumption that scientific thinking isn't flawed has it's obvious problems; ie: it's not always as correct as most assume.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisConsidering it took fifty years for geo-scientists to accept a weatherman, Alfred Weggener was correct about plate tectonics it does make one wonder how long it may take to get some in other fields of science in line with facts, not simply theories.
Perhaps studying law and tested investigative methods might help in urging some along the way because in the realm of flawed thinking; getting some of you near the edge of the box, let alone out of it, is a painstaking and at times nearly impossible process.
And let us remember, you're always right until someone proves you wrong, provided you're still alive when the truth meets the light of day.
It's true, we can learn from you, but who are you learning from? Can you grasp the concept of positive thinking in working through your problems or gather a glimpse into another realm of science to aid you in how you solve problems in your particular field of interest?
Truly, it's all there for you, but you're looking at us while the issue of critical thinking which results in problem solving lies in you and how you approach problem solving.
You folks are really tough acts to follow, intellectually speaking :-).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'll let this chestnut from Mark Twain do my talking:
“It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.”
In essence, one of the best articles in recent times. In detail, and based on my daily experience, it suffers itself in part from what it is about:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisa) the problem extends to the highest echelons of scientific research; although at that level it becomes more subtle when highly acclaimed scientists for example develop tunnelvision from the accolades or social comparison bias from their publicly warranted self-importance; -> Higgs
it's hard to expect from the lower levels what the higher ones can't achieve themselves
b) I've rarely read as many good comments lately as here; yet, the use and interpretation of "simple" falls prey to exactly the problem described:
"Simple" is NOT the same as "easy" or "obvious" etc, "simple" is often the result of complex or painful research. Even a Eureka moment is always only the conclusion of a long and complicated process.
A mind that can think simply is not the same as a simpleton. What Einstein liked about his main formula was its simplicity. So?
A simple design is actually the hardest to achieve; KISS, the "keep it simple, stupid" acronym is demanding that things gone off into complication wonderland be brought back to intelligence -> simplicity -> wisdom (which is the ultimate simplicity).
The work of Braun's designer Dieter Rams was pure KISS, Picasso's bull on glass is mind-bogging simplicity (try to draw it yourself), Apple, which never invented anything but was always good at "copying" and assembling their piracies into a coherent aesthetic concept, copied and admitted to copying Rams' "simple" designs and now pretends that Samsung stole their own theft; if reduced to its most simple expression their present legal claims are therefore ultimately ridiculous.
Real elegance comes from simplicity, which in itself proves that simplicity is the hardest thing to achieve. How many truly elegant people do you know or see? To write something very complicated so that everyone can understand it makes the text look simple but does that mean anyone could have written it? You wrote something simple when your reader believes he could have written it himself. Which he could not have, but that's another story.
If simplicity was as simple as it looks we wouldn't have AGW, the criminal bankers, Iraq and the Hummer.
The article is therefore one of the best in a long time, except that it lacks a certain - simplicity. A bit simpler and its few flaws would have been a bit more evident, allowing the author to notice them (better).
Ah, but what do I know? I'm a simple mind.
IOW a simple mind may reply faster, a simple conclusion may take longer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this(see time diff between previous and this one)
This is not all bad. We are all too quick sometimes to declare an idea wrong only to be harshly reminded of our own fallacies later on. I well remember how the textbooks of the 70's mocked Lamarkian evolution but now we quietly accept it fundamental premise under the moniker of Epigenetics. Had Lamark access to our current knowledge base he would have been miles ahead of all of us on this issue. So he was not wrong in a universal sense, he explained his observations in terms of what was known of the world in his time, just as we do now. Ultimately we will be just as wrong or right as he was.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn fact using terms like "right" and "wrong" misses the point completely. Research on information cascades shows that particles of truth can lie in the most unlikely places. Consequently labeling old ideas with absolutist terms in detrimental. I think us moderns who are often a bit smug in our own estimation of our knowledge would do well to take a chill pill from the past where there was by necessity a healthier respect for all that is not known.
One big problem with teaching science at the fundamental level is the idea that everything has to be demonstrated and evaluated with mathematical precision. Scientific writing doesn't need to be so convoluted. I remember well my first high school chemistry class. It was taught at the same time as my first high school level algebra class. I was of course not yet ready for the math that was being used in the course and on that score alone my mind was intimidated every day and I did poorly at first. By the second semester I had a better grasp on the math and was able to catch up and I actually passed the course with a respectable grade. Many others did not and it was not because of a lack of ability, but rather a teacher that was more interested in 100% mathematically correct answers as opposed to a basic understanding if principles in chemistry.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGood science fundamentals starts with teaching the basics without trying to justify every single factor. Scrutinizing every single detail is what scientists do after they have a thorough grasp of the basics and the math needed to produce practical results; especially when they are getting paid for accurate results.
As jctyler points out, "A simple design is actually the hardest to achieve..." and so to is teaching sound scientific principal. Only too often science publications are far to complex and convoluted for 99% of the population and for this reason we have people everyday in the news and on the science forums making statements that reflect political or religious convictions that contradict even simple logic.
It's an interesting idea, but statements like, "university biology professors were found to take longer to classify plants as living relative to moving nonliving things" make me wonder if the real problem isn't that the more aware you are of the nuances of the question, the more carefully you look for gray areas or trick questions.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease post the whole article in a single page. It is irritating to keep going to page 2, page 3 etc.. to read an article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisyour comment looks like a simple conclusion from something bothering you - but if you think about it for a moment, the solution is simple: click on print and:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisa) you see the whole article on one page
b) and in its most readable -> simplest form too;
c) the irritating floating toolbar has gone
d) and you can even print it that way, either as a doc or save it as a pdf.
And if you think about it, your comment just disproved something in the article about inconsistent statements and quick thinking.
I may have missed a point here, but it seems to me that what we are writing about is the difficulty that we have giving up ideas learned earlier. My favorite example, drawn from my experience with jr. high students, is that they had much difficulty reconciling light theory (black is the absence of light, for example) with pigment theory (black is the presence of all colors). They had a tendency to test correctly at the end of time spent on color and light and then revert to the longer held concepts of color they learned in elementary school.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRE: “people turn food into energy” is consistent: anyone who’s ever eaten a meal knows it’s true... That statement is not true. People convert the chemical energy stored in food to other forms of energy including chemcial, mechanical, and heat. We don't "turn food into energy." I hope the other questions asked in the study are better.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIronically, what trips me up in affirming that "air is composed of matter" is that the referent of that word, "air," as I normally mean it includes not just the molecules of nitrogen, oxygen, etc. but also the space containing them. If it were just the matter alone, then a solid chunk composed of the same molecules would also be called "air". So perhaps really what is going on here is that to our brains, the word "air" means two different things. In a scientific context, of course the scientific definition is more valid; in a colloquial context, "air" means something slightly different, and it is not so clear in that context that air is made of matter. Could it be that the half-second delay is due to our having to locate the question in an appropriate frame of reference?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCharles Eisenstein
Yes. The statement about air was problematic too (see comment below). But it really depends on what we mean by "turn into energy." One could translate that into terms in which the statement is true, if we say, "What we mean by that phrase is that we convert potential energy stored in the chemical bonds of food into the kinetic energy of body movement" or something like that. Perhaps the delayed responses were due to the necessity of making these kinds of interpretations and settling on a frame of reference, not to the unconscious influence of pre-scientific intuitions. Words like "air," "turn into," etc. have different meanings in different contexts. It is quicker to affirm a statement that is true in both obvious contexts than it is to affirm a statement that is true only in one of two obvious contexts.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEnergy for everybody: www.eco-energysource.com
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEnergy for everybody: www eco-energysource com
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEnergy for everybody: www eco-energysource com
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Certainly the big bang model was held up for many years due to the preconceived, and completely illogical,"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Was"?? So the Big Bang theory has been disproved Brain1? When was that, and what was it replaced by? What is the evidence supporting the new theory?
“people turn food into energy” is consistent: anyone who’s ever eaten a meal knows it’s true
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThen what "anyone who's ever eaten a meal knows" is false.
People turn the low entropy chemical energy stored in food into high entropy heat energy.
Those with the best command of scientific concepts are probably also those who tend to analyze questions instead of simply reciting some recalled fact (or falsehood wrongly believed to be fact). To actually think about a question, as opposed to it simply triggering recollection, takes longer. I'll take truth over speed any day.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHuman being not adapt to change so fast and equipped with a thought system that would definitely reject any idea not compatible or irrelevant with the system functioning.Born with inherit biological system requirements(food,shelter,procreation) as the basic driving force,the degree of rationality is optional to the system.Driven by rational appreciation of outside world by "human" intelligence specifications have given us the normal science.Now this so called objective reality only a "HUMAN"version 'cos measuring sensor's working range is finite. Television &computer screen and cinema picture is there 'cos of our inability to recognize picture frames moving faster than 18per sec.And in the case of the television, picture frame itself is only a very fast up & down moving picture line across the screen of 15625 lines per sec.(PAL System ),so now what is the reality?Any "eye"system out side these specs won't see a picture in the screen.(cf.seeing frost for trees).Although this is a human made for human needs, natural phenomenon can occur similar to this.Quantum mechanics has such irrational observations for the human version.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNow take a very very familiar example:is earth goes around the sun? or the otherwise?Which is the most useful in our day to day activities?It is intuitive feeling of the sun position around us to guess the day's position.So unscientific idea still useful daily and no need to become rational here unless you are interest in astronomy.
SO when we investigate the out side of us with our 'human' equipment and all the other manufactured ones we can have a limited version (relative to human being)of the reality,now what if we investigate ourselves with the center of the 'human' equipment:MIND? Then comes the real gem of the knowledge,but not easy to come out from that thick jungle when we would enter in this arena,full of illusions,confusions,yet it has its own working principles such as faith,power of a positive/negative belief,sixth sense...etc not available anywhere else. Though these subjective experiences are 100% human, irony is that they cannot bring to a common platform as in the case of out side investigations simply 'cos it the variable itself we are investigating.A kind of GODEL situation is here.So we must have independent model of a human being with its all profiles without resorting to the religious concepts though there may be parallels.
Regarding the reaction time diff when making decisions, see Thinking fast&slow,D.KAH.
I agree. It seems like a bad idea to base quickness of response as a sign of mastery or intellectual maturity. The results, that mastery was related to slower response, seem totally reasonable given that intellectual maturity is involved with reflection. Quickness of response may be a sign of guessing, or blurting out the first thing one thinks of. Reflection, pondering, so on, somehow aren't given much priority. That's a big problem in my view. Entertaining big ideas and flexing the philosophy muscle are subordinate to the reflexive spouting of trivia and preferences.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm not one who believes in the paranormal. But, I do find it an entertaining topic. That said, I watched the documentary, "The Eyes of The Mothman" the other night. It was presented, pretty much, without bias one way or the other -- presenting the history and accounts of the thirteen months that occurred in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, between 1966 and 1967.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI was enjoying the documentary until this one guy, supposedly a *physics professor*, made a comment: ".. in the 4.5 billion years that the Earth has existed, Human Beings have only been intelligent for the past 2000 years." Yep. He said that! That *really* interrupted the flow of the documentary. So yeah, humans were just too unintelligent to build the pyramids, and the vast city that surrounded it 4500 years ago! Or, just too caveman-stupid to have erected Stonehenge 5000 years ago -- precisely aligned to mark solstices. Or, just too damned beastly to create clever stone tools dating back thousands more years. How long have we controlled fire now? 10,000 plus years? I don't see any of the other primates building camp fires.
That guy needs to turn in his PhD.
Game break.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe first sentence from "A very short intro" (subtitle) of a script I received a month ago:
"The Universe must be coherent else it falls apart"
?
It's brought down to an ultimative yes or no.
How does that rate in this context?
<Saint Augustine Argued "Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe." This is weird in today's science.>
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour comment actually came at the right time to help me understand something weird somewhere else.
Note the saint's saying. From a very different angle: the driving force in physics is energy. Another jump: what drives a society? Its ideals, its beliefs. Ideal, belief, faith = the energy which drives society.
Example: if someone can make you believe in "the American Dream" you will see it. And you will work your butt off for it. Even if in reality it is a cynical chimera based on some serious brainwashing in the name of, another religion, "free market". And what you see from BELIEVING will make you in fact - blind to reality.
So this blind faith of the mass in what it believes drives society in the same E drives physics. (In fact, what else is the motor of election talk?)
When physics is seen from the saint's point of view, somehow:
Religion would be society's Strong Force? The human equivalent of fundamental physics' engine?
I've got to re-read that script.
From the abstract of the paper itself I can see where some questions take longer simply because of nuances of language: “The Earth revolves around the sun” is not a very accurate statement depending on what one means by "revolve around". The Earth revolves around itself and ORBITS the sun. Since these questions were given to scientifically literate adults, I can see where poor construction would lead to a pause.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Participants verified the latter significantly more slowly and less accurately than the former across 10 domains of knowledge (astronomy, evolution, fractions, genetics, germs, matter, mechanics, physiology, thermodynamics, and waves), suggesting that naïve theories survive the acquisition of a mutually incompatible scientific theory, coexisting with that theory for many years to follow."
Another brilliant statement of the obvious. Mom and dad tell you things, your friends tell you things, and Stephen your science teacher tells you things. ANY of it may be correct or false. It is better to keep all of it, compartmentalized, and eventually as time and interest permit decide what is true and what is not.
Obviously, if the question has an answer in more than one "compartment" it will take longer to choose the contextually appropriate answer as several answers will exist, but one will be "more correct" in a particular context.
The obvious application is religion but also anything LIKE religion, such as a global warming dispute where persons with legitimate credentials are saying one thing or another. For now, I heed BOTH paths of reasoning even though eventually only one can be scientifically correct (or more likely, neither is completely correct and both sides have some correctness).
"If you teach your children critical thinking, and teach them to apply it to everything, you don't need to teach them that faith is not a valid replacement for knowledge"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suspect ALL scientists have faith, otherwise they would not endeavor to prove the thing they already believe.
I suggest that faith is a prerequisite for knowledge. One must have faith in teachers and professors, faith in the validity of the scientific method, faith in the measuring instruments one uses.
Faith is the motivator, critical thinking the method, and knowledge is both the foundation and the result in a never-ending cycle of increasing knowledge.
Quoting an exchange:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"We all believe things we cannot scientifically demonstrate. That does not mean we lack evidence or reason."
Perhaps you are right that the one thing doesn't necessarily directly mean the other, but it does demonstrate a willingness to believe things that actually may not be true. Just because we all do it, doesn't mean it is a good way to reach a good conclusion.
I am amazed that simple things require repeated explanations. The writer is saying that not everything in the world or in life is "scientific" or requires a scientific explanation or is even amenable to the scientific method.
The scientific method cannot be used on history, works poorly on sociology and psychology, is totally inapplicable for ephemeral phenomenon and fails in any situation where a test and repeat cannot actually be devised -- such as "global warming".
It's a wonder that we can use the scientific method on very much at all.
My favorite pet peeve pre-conceived notion is the false idea that giving college students tests amounts to doing science. When will social scientists ever learn?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThey may seem to be teaching well, but like many people find, teachers or parents that use big words that you might not understand are "smart" and you may think that your child is learning, but its just fancy talk.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActually, scientists endeavor to disprove the things they already believe. That's how you make a name for yourself and start getting the big-bucks grants in science. :)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThese days if you don't understand a word there's little excuse for not simply Googling it. With the popularity of smartphones, many can do so on the spot. Don't know how to spell the word? Both Android and (so I understand) iPhone can take voice input.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs for children, if you never use new words around them they won't ever learn them. Our toddler handles "big" words like "refrigerator" and "glockenspiel", and pretty much and two-digit number you show him just fine, thank you. A child's mind is a high-powered learning machine. Don't hold it back.
"...pretty much and..." -> "...pretty much any..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisthariss: "Whatever this evidence based faith tells your children and whatever this "evidence" is for existence of a deity, it is not a process well recommended for making good decisions or finding the actual truth."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's the same process used by science! So yes, it is a process recommended for making decisions or finding the actual truth.
"If people want to take a statue that cries blood as "evidence" their faith is valid, and don't bother to look at the rusty plumbing in the ceiling above the statue, it says a lot about the value of their faith in reaching a true conclusion, but very little about the actual existence of a deity. "
But who says that is what I was referring to? Making a strawman argument is not a good process for determining truth. One can critically evaluate evidence of deity. The one you proposed would be rejected under such evaluation. However, that is NOT the evidence I'm talking about. Do you not critically evaluate the evidence the people in your life love you? Do not they critically evaluate the evidence you love them?
Science is a subset of critical thinking. Yes, critical thinking helps us strip biases and get closer to truth. However, a bias you have is that people can't use critical thinking on religion and still believe. But the empirical evidence is that they have and do.
Science is a limited tool. It is limited to 1) the physical universe and 2) intersubjective experience. That is, science is limited to experiences that are the same for everyone under approximately the same circumstances. Within those limitations, science is extremely reliable. The problem is that much of our lives don't fall within the limitations. An example I use in class is: what is the taste of Brussel's sprouts? I get several different answers, ranging from "extremely bitter and disgusting" through "bland" to "sweet". The experiences are not the same. Who is wrong? Who is right? Both. Neither. Each BELIEVES the taste of Brussels sprouts based upon their evidence. In many areas of our lives we don't want the experiences to be the same for everyone. After all, if I test whether your wife loves you, you don't want me to have the same experiences with her that you do!
You seem to think that by saying that theists have evidence and reason, that makes theism true. I never said the latter. I only said that that faith can (and usually does) have evidence and reasons.
Petra: "Making the assumption that scientific thinking isn't flawed has it's obvious problems; ie: it's not always as correct as most assume."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn science, we always have a way to check our thinking: the physical universe. IF our thinking is flawed, eventually the physical universe will tell us. This is the basis of science:
"1. All our theory, ideas, preconceptions, instincts, and prejudices about how things logically ought to be, how they in all fairness ought to be, or how we would prefer them to be, must be tested against external reality --what they *really* are. How do we determine what they really are? Through direct experience of the universe itself." Kitty Ferguson, The Fire in the Equations, pg. 38.
" The only rule of the scientific method is that we must discard any scientific statement if the evidence of our senses shows it to be wrong. To be scientific, we must be able to go to nature to see if an idea works, to see if it fits. If we cannot go out and test the validity of a notion directly, we can take a more circuitous route: if an explanation about the world is correct, it must imply some further consequences that we can observe in nature. If we fail to find these predicted consequences, if instead we observe something else, then our explanation can't be correct. If we *do* make the predicted observations, temporarily the explanation has defied our attempts to show it false."
Niles Eldredge, The Monkey Business, A Scientist Looks at Creationism, 1982, pg. 27-28.
So, individual scientists can have flawed thinking. They can even stick to it. There were phlogiston chemists who went to their grave without admitting phlogiston was wrong. Einstein never gave up strict determinism. However, SCIENCE progresses and flawed ideas are discarded, whether every individual scientist agrees or not.
mggordon: "The scientific method cannot be used on history, works poorly on sociology and psychology, is totally inapplicable for ephemeral phenomenon and fails in any situation where a test and repeat cannot actually be devised -- such as "global warming". "
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhile I appreciate the help in explaining what I was saying, I have to say that this is not correct. The evidence required for science is not so much a "test and repeat" as in a laboratory, but rather that everyone looking at the evidence will perceive the same thing. Thus, Meteor Crator is a one-time event and no one was there to see it. However, everyone going to Meteor Crator will see the same things and those things all support the hypothesis that the crator is the result of a meteor impact.
In global warming, everyone can look at the temperature records, at the climate models, and the consequences of global warming (such as melting glaciers) and see the same things. All those things support the theory of anthropogenic warming caused by increased emission of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Thus global warming does meet the limitations of science and is a scientific theory. A strongly supported one.
Ramaus: "How did you find your way to this science blog? Just curious? Saint Augustine Argued "Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe." This is weird in today's science."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI found my way to this blog because I am a scientist and subcriber to Scientific American. Do you realize that the source for this quote -- Sermones 4.1.1 -- cannot be found? So we can't take this too seriously as an end-all description of faith, can we? Interesting that you didn't check the authenticity of the quote.
There isn't the length available to give you the entire description of personal experience of deity. I strongly suggest you look it up yourself at Kitty Ferguson's The Fire in the Equations, pp 248- 251 We are not talking about fundies or proselytizers here. Mostly quiet, reflective people who have personal experience of deity.
"The experience is usually not 'spooky'. ... The experience doesn't establish a hot-line to God, ... People are quick to point out that, though they think their experience really is of God, it is, even at its clearest and best, only a partial, human, inadequate view of what God really is ... it's more often the accumulation of more subtle experiences over a period of time.
"Others on the contrary battered the gates of heaven .. with very sceptical demands for answers, IF such a heaven existed. Their uncompromising intellectuality led them to try to pin God to the wall ... Their requirements for evidence and proofs were seldom met exactly as specified, but there was a moment in the process when they realized to their astonishment that they were wrestling with a real being who couldn't be contained in human descriptions or standards, not a concept or an abstraction. This God was something out of their control, something not fashioned in the image they had formed in their mind ...
"Some direct quotes: 'My relationship with God has been by far and away the most demanding relationship in my life." "The Lord has been my strongest support, but also my most frustrating opponent." 'If I didn't absolutely know this is the only game in town, I'd sure as hell get out of it!' 'The best evidence isn't some 'wonder' or 'miracle', and it certainly isn't success, happiness, or the peace of having my prayers answered in ways which suit me. It's the extraordinary, topsy-turvy, interesting course my life has taken since I've engaged in this -- once begun, virtually inescapable -- dialogue with God.' "
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