22
votes
Is scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)?
Ernest Rutherford said:
"If your experiment needs statistics, you ought to have done a better experiment"
which is deeply ironic, given that his subject (atomic/nuclear/particle physics) ...
- 1,368
15
votes
Are we at the end of scientific paradigm shifts?
The Paradigm shift Wikipedia page lists all the paradigm shifts
It does not list all of them. At the beginning of the list:
Some [emphasis added] of the "classical cases" of Kuhnian ...
- 251
10
votes
Is scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)?
The experimental portion of the scientific method requires statistics. The model-building process, on the other hand, relies instead on mathematical formalism.
- 7,453
7
votes
Is scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)?
I mean, yes but also no. Statistics is very useful for science, and philosophers have made attempts to formalise the process of science in terms of the logic of inductive inference etc. But in reality ...
- 181
5
votes
Are we at the end of scientific paradigm shifts?
In the physics world, there are at least two big shifts going on, as follows.
First, the particle-physics-as-strings paradigm hit a dead end some years ago and the particle physics community is ...
- 7,453
4
votes
Is scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)?
Bayesians sure like to pretend it is!
There have been many attempts to try to describe the scientific process as a knowledge-accumulating process based on rational, formal (or formalisable, read: ...
- 188
3
votes
Accepted
Books on the philosophy of quantum mechanics
I am not an expert in the field of philosophy of quantum mechanics. However, I would like to recommend some books that draw my attention from these authors' discussions.
An Introduction to the ...
3
votes
Accepted
Is the existence of God a question within the purview of science?
"... the existence of a theistic God, one who can do miracles, > is definitely a scientifically testable notion."
A Popperian would say that science requires all hypotheses to be not ...
- 1,368
3
votes
Is there any “stability metric” for scientific fields?
Paradigm shifts are Kuhn's model of such change, as JD has referenced. His picture of a power struggle and a kind of 'democracy' of most popular ideas or frameworks taking over, is highly disputed. ...
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3
votes
Are we at the end of scientific paradigm shifts?
I suppose the OP limits its scope to physics, because there has been recent paradigmatic shifts in history (e.g. école des annales, whose members studied the socio-economics of history away from a ...
- 684
3
votes
Are we at the end of scientific paradigm shifts?
Let's begin with a few quotes, to clarify Kuhn's description.
“Paradigms are not corrigible by normal science at all. Instead, as we
have already seen, normal science ultimately leads only to the
...
- 19.8k
3
votes
Are we at the end of scientific paradigm shifts?
Perspective from a practicing scientist: Not even close :)
You can see the areas which are not well handled by existing theories, either in places where existing theories contradict each other (...
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2
votes
Early Modern Science vs Aristotelianism
In Dark Ages and Byzantine Europe mostly only commentaries on Aristotle's 'Organon' were widely available. Through shifting frontiers in Spain Islamic translations of more of his works became ...
- 19.8k
2
votes
Early Modern Science vs Aristotelianism
The claim that "Early Modern Science wanted to resist the aristotelianism of the Catholic church" is more or less on target, if by "aristotelianism" is understood the catholic ...
- 419
2
votes
Accepted
Early Modern Science vs Aristotelianism
Early Modern Science wanted to resist the aristotelianism of the Catholic church
That's not quite right, because the Condemnations of 1277 by Bishop Étienne Tempier of Paris attacked some ...
- 7,782
2
votes
Does Bayesianism give an out for pseudoscience that it shouldn’t deserve?
TL;DR Bayesianism clearly isn't giving pseudoscience an out - if performed even vaguely competently
I'll give a worked example to demonstrate how a Bayesian might actually analyse this problem:
It is ...
- 1,368
2
votes
Why care about scientific realism?
"What is the significance of the debate on scientific realism?"
I don't claim to be able to identify "the" significance of such a debate, but would like nonetheless to point out ...
- 419
2
votes
Why care about scientific realism?
My sense of why it matters to those who oppose it, is their feeling that under scientific realism they will lack a certain intellectual 'elbow room' for the things they find precious, like a role of ...
- 19.8k
2
votes
Is there any “stability metric” for scientific fields?
Yes. As far as my limited knowledge permits, there are two domains where you might search for this related to the idea that comes from the Kuhnian attack on the objectivity and linearity of scientific ...
- 20.5k
2
votes
Are the concepts of reductionism and first principles the same?
First principles means that we take whatever knowledge there is and try to find routes from that to the principle, in an unbroken chain of logical connection. There is no a priori preference.
...
- 13.1k
2
votes
Is scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)?
If I am correct the scientific method is an application of induction to science.
You are not correct.
Is the scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)? (I guess so, ...
- 7,305
2
votes
Is scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)?
No. There are at least three important counter-arguments to the claim that "the scientific method is entirely based on statistics", roughly in order of importance according to me:
Many ...
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2
votes
Is scientific method entirely based on statistics (statistical inference)?
Bayes
If you take the Bayesian view of the world, all knowledge is inherently statistical. It's just that some knowledge involves statistics at the extremes (probability 0 and 1). Human brains seem to ...
- 539
2
votes
Are we at the end of scientific paradigm shifts?
In the world of astrophysics there appears to be a big paradigm shift coming up. Because there are several phenomenon that can not be explained by the current models:
The inability to determine the ...
- 354
2
votes
Does the incomputability of kolmogorov complexity imply that we will never have a final theory of everything?
No, the incomputability of Kolmogorov complexity merely means that we probably won't know for sure if we have the right TOE. We may indeed one day have a theory that explains the whole universe in a ...
- 10.7k
1
vote
Are we at the end of scientific paradigm shifts?
What you seem to be asking is will there be more paradigm shifts? The answer, if you look at history, is almost certainly yes. Radical transformations in worldviews, even by carefully considered ...
- 20.5k
1
vote
Would a reformulation of Sherlock Holmes’s statement on impossibility be valid?
That statement is a fallacy It's called the Holmesian fallacy.
See the post: Fallacy by Sherlock Holmes: "Eliminate the impossible, and what remains must be the truth".
A simple one minute ...
1
vote
What philosophers have touched upon the inability to qualify data as being representative of evidence in support of a scientific theory?
You say:
It appears that in any effort to qualify data that has been experimentally collected as evidence in order to support or refute a scientific theory, there is the possibility that the ...
- 20.5k
1
vote
Are evolution and reinforcement learning related?
We can say that both reward/punishment and evolution increase or decrease the prevalence of certain patterns. In reinforcement learning, reward increases ("reinforces") the prevalence of the ...
- 10.7k
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