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Author | Topic: The scientific method is based on a logical fallacy | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
Now suppose that we come across a white raven. So now we have a scientific falsification of our simple hypothesis that all ravens are black. We now have to do one of three things: (1) Find out whether we made an experimental or observational error:That's not a raven, moron, that's a swan! (2) Modify the original theory (and then test the modifications):All ravens are black except those that suffer from white fungus albinism. (3) Abandon the theory altogether under the weight of contrary evidence:Out of 1000 ravens in the sample, 700 were black, and 300 were white. I guess that not all ravens are black after all. Good post Chiroptera. What about (4)? (4) Stick with the theory despite the weight of contrary evidence. For example, rather than abandon the law of gravity, claim dark matter exists. So instead of evidence driving the theory, the theory starts driving the evidence.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
What "weight of contrary evidence" do you see in this example? The law of gravity predicts a different rate of expansion of the universe from what is observed.
but instead it was hypothesized that an as yet unknown planet was causing perturbations in Uranus' orbit -- sort of a 19th century version of "dark matter". Not quite. In your example of Uranus, no "new" science is being proposed. The adequacy of the law is truly being tested. "Dark matter", on the other hand is very much about banking on "new" science. What would it take to falsify the law of gravity?
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
I would not call gravity a "theory in crisis" ... Is your definition of "universal law" a theory that is "not in crisis"? Or is there some other relevance to this? Note, I merely added (4) to the list in Chiroptera's very well presented and illustrated post Message 10. I believe it needs to go in irrespective of how premature any choice is deemed to be.
A new theory that explains all the current evidence as well as the current theory AND explains the dark stuff effects, that can be tested and verified\validated and found to be a sound concept (that nasty scientific method again). Isn't this what creationists are accused of doing? Instead of addressing the flaws in their own argument they point out that other arguments are incompleteness or flawed. Hardly a good basis for falsification.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
But tossing out gravity is also being proposed just as you seem to think should be done. There are some suggestions for a replacement. They are exactly following the evidence but haven't figured out where it is leading them yet. Do you agree that its current status is "falsified". Should the "universal" law of gravity be taught in the science class?
Keeping General Relativity and it's newtonian subset seems like a reasonable thing to attempt to do since it is so well supported in other ways. But even though it is very, very reasonable other things are being considered. You are using very subjective terms here. "Seems" and "reasonable". What happened to the quantitative rigour? Falsification is falsification.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
There is a force between any two particles proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of their distance apart.
The constant of proportionality, G, is called the universal gravitational constant.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
Dark matter is the postulated explanation for the force keeping the outer reaches of rotating galaxies from flying off due to centrifugal force. Thank you, Percy. What balances the centrifugal forces in the rotating galaxy?
...but his gravitational equations work just fine in most circumstances. So it's not a law. Should it be taught as one?
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
I added (4) because I believe it actually happens in practice.
The example you give shows that this is the case with gravity, with the old theory being useful in limited cases, but superseded by the new one where necessary (I understand you can derive Newton's law within a special case of relativity, the special case that matches where we use it). Any new theory of gravity must also accomplish this trick, because we know that Newton's law does explain the motion of planetary objects at this scale, as will any new theory ... unless we are all deluded about gravity. But both Newton's and Einsteins's laws give the wrong distribution of matter within the universe (expansion in this sense rather than expansion of space). What is the new theory? OK, so each "law" has a domain of applicability. Would you accept a spiritualist's argument that your laboratory lies outside the domain of applicability of their powers?
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
You seem to be in some disagreement with cavediver, here. Message 32
Cavediver writes: Ah, that one - well it was "falsified" and replaced 92 years ago. Of course it's still good enough for most applications, as long as you are aware of its status. NosyNed writes: No, how foolish would that be! We don't overturn a well supported theory based on a mystery. We have to dig into the mystery first. That's how creationists think, too. FAITH that their beliefs will hold out against contrary evidence. Regarding centrifugal forces, they don't exist in inertial frames. In this case it's a disguise for gravitational force. In an inertial frame, the description would be that the calculated gravitational forces do not balance the observed centriPETAL accelerations. F <> m x a. Edited by sinequanon, : No reason given.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
Dark matter has not been verified. It has no validity beyond plugging the hole in gravitational theory. You are turning invalidity of one theory into evidence of itself + some total unknown called dark matter.
Regarding your questions about the falsification of theories, thinking more about this I'm hard put to think of any theories that have been falsified. Theories only become theories after a lengthy and extended period of validation and replication. I think it is much more the case that hypotheses get falsified. Given their prior successful validation, theories are much more likely to be modified or extended rather than replaced. Effectively, the theory gets "reinterpreted" as a special case of something else. Creationists use this tactic, too. When all is lost, "the holy book was right all along, but we should have interpreted it like this way, instead!".
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
Nope not at all. United front and all that, eh?
A difference being that they don't have any existing evidence based theory to work on. Instead of having to deal with a mystery they have to ignore a HUGE amount of very non-mysterious evidence. You invalidate ALL their evidence based on the gaps you find. But you won't invalidate ALL scientific laws in the same way, when you find gaps. You react differently in each case.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
Given that Ned and I are referencing different theories, I'm not sure how you can come to that conclusion! And which theory was do you think Ned was referencing, here Message 35?
NoseyNed writes:
No, how foolish would that be! We don't overturn a well supported theory based on a mystery. We have to dig into the mystery first. There are multiple competing explanations for the anomaly. If some turn out to be right gravity will be falsified. It will almost certainly be falsified in the same why the general relativity falsified Newtonian mechanics though. Even falsified as shadings.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
I think it might be best if you tried thinking this one through on your own, but I'll provide a couple hints. First, Cavediver and NosyNed do not see their statements as being in disagreement. Second, two different people are most unlikely to ever express the same concept in identical language, or even from the same perspective. Strange second hint, given that cavediver maintains they were talking of different things. Are you trying "proof by closing ranks"?
We strongly suspect that Einstein's theories will prove to be incomplete, but given that the validations have already taken place it's impossible to imagine how Einstein's theories could actually be wrong about the precession of Mercury's orbit or the deflection of light by gravity or the relativistic effects of spinning masses to the accuracy available today. Well, I hope you also accept the proof, "it is impossible to imagine otherwise", from creationists and everyone else.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
All you have is a effect no one understands. Until you demonstrate your MACHOs and WIMPs in the laboratory, you do not have a valid theory. You don't accept "God exists" as verified just because it explains some effect.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
There is a logical fallacy called affirming the consequence. It goes like this: Premise 1 If A, then BPremise 2 B. Conclusion Therefore A. Premise 1 If dark matter exists, then gravity explains the observed distribution of matter in the universe. Premise 2 Gravity explains the observed distribution of matter in the universe. Conclusion Therefore dark matter exists. This is what is going on. What other reason is there for dark matter. Premise 2 and conclusion, two shaky statements, justify each other. Refer to either one and claim it is "backed up" by the other one. Newtonian mechanics and GR don't predict the correct spread of matter in the universe. Whatever choice there is a red herring.
I would agree with that. What we have at present concerning dark matter are hypotheses. No. Dark matter IS the hypothesis. What you have is a problem with the gravitational effect of matter. Edited by sinequanon, : No reason given.
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sinequanon Member (Idle past 2895 days) Posts: 331 Joined: |
At Cambridge, analysis is covered in a Part IA course (1st year) and is very thorough. Diplomatically put, cavediver. Chiroptera clearly doesn't know what mathematical analysis and mathematical proof entails. Now, I don't hide behind jargon. If there is a simple way of describing something I use that. I'm not here to prove I am some sort of clever clogs. I am not a physicist, but I know that existing laws of physics predict an incorrect distribution and behaviour of matter in the universe. I used the appropriate term "expansion" with regards spacial distribution as matter is seen to be moving away from the origin. Someone then decided expansion meant something else despite the obvious context. I'm getting off-topic comments (Chiroptera - personal gripe about what happened in another thread), cronyism (pretending you're all on the same page), nit-picking (complaining about semantics when the problem is well-known), and defensive responses (groundless accusations that I am "defending" creationism). If the politics of this thread is anything to go by, scientific "logic" is prone to all manner of fallacy. A quick google reveals this as a summary - http://space.newscientist.com/...enses-with-dark-matter.html Looks like there were problems a little closer to home, too, with the Pioneer spacecraft.
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