Re: Bias in Science, Part 2

Wayne,

   1) Nothing in my analysis depended on whether the conclusion was right or wrong. The methodology is not sound and therefore no conclusion can be drawn in either case. If "a serious flaw in our well established model" really exists, it needs to be shown through the most rigorous and disciplined methodology and repeated by independent labs. (Note that Baumgardner's paper only uses references to papers published by the authors of his paper--no independent results.) I have no vested interest except that the results and conclusions be accurate, whatever the consequences may be. Confidence depends on how thoroughly the authors followed high quality scientific procedures.

    Let me pursue your hypothetical reasoning a little further and suppose that the best methodology showed a very young age for these samples and that independent results confirmed such a result. Until and unless there is a corresponding understanding and interpretation of all the data and experiments to the contrary, the result should remain in the "unexplained" category. Historically, radical new ideas do not contradict but encompass past observations. Quantum mechanics did not invalidate the results of classical mechanics but helped us understand those results better.

    2) The same approach must be used for everyone, no matter how respected. If a highly respected scientist advocates an erroneous result due to poor methodology, he or she will be quick to correct it when that is clarified. For example, one day a very highly respected scientist in our lab came to me to report the discovery of room temperature superconductivity. Skeptical but excited, I went to his lab and watched him repeat the experiment. Very impressive and carefully done. The next day another colleague spent a day examining the experiment and found a defective Zener diode in the lock-in amplifier. There went the Nobel prize. The incident was forgotten--almost. Only the three of us knew about it until now.

    Einstein was wrong--though we don't know if it was when he added the cosmological constant or when he withdrew it--maybe the latter. John Bardeen, the only person to get two Nobel prizes in Physics, was wrong on some other phenomena. I'm nowhere in that league but I've been wrong a lot. In the late '80s I championed a lot of research in copper interconnects for silicon technology. In 1990 I declared it would never happen and cited 3 fundamental reasons for it. In 1997 I was able to proclaim on national TV that we were commercializing it. What's the point? The issue is not whether a respected scientist is wrong or not, it's the process of discovering truth about nature. In science, we cannot be respecters of persons. The same rigor and careful logic must be applied to all ideas, independent of who champions it and what the consequences are. Of course, we are more likely to pay attention to someone with a strong track record but in all cases, the ideas themselves must be tested and not accepted on the basis of who says it.

    Don't get the impression I'm opposed to new ideas. We thrive on new ideas. I'm just saying that new ideas must be based on sound methodology and that, if we can't determine the thoroughness of the methodology, we're justified in rejecting ideas that directly contradict past experiments that were carefully done.

    Randy

----- Original Message -----
  From: Dawsonzhu@aol.com
  To: asa@calvin.edu
  Sent: Tuesday, May 31, 2005 11:38 AM
  Subject: Re: Bias in Science, Part 2

  Randy Isaac wrote:

    Let us pretend that we are peer-reviewers of Baumgardner's paper. I'm not an expert in the field, haven't taken a lot of time to do the analysis, nor have I consulted with the author so this must be viewed as a high-level first-pass perspective rather than an in-depth, definitive assessment.

  I fully agree with your analysis [deleted to shorten the
  post], but let me play the
  devil's advocate for a moment. Most of us on this list
  are down right fed up and tired of creationism
  masquerading as science, so I can certainly feel some cheap
  satisfaction in seeing this kind of tripe thoroughly
  thrashed.

  But it might be useful to give some thought to the following
  questions:

  (1) Let's just say for sake of argument that the creationists
  are right (as you know, I don't believe they are, but let's
  just suppose that they are right). In what way would the paper
  be different if the reported discrepancy revealed actually
  is a serious flaw in our well established model?

  (2) Suppose that someone in our own ranks that we all respect
  and care about is promoting nonsense. First, what is our
  typical response and second, what do we say when we find
  after considerable reflection that we really cannot agree?

  I don't think these are minor points either. There are times that
  other scientists we really do respect, are wrong. Sometimes
  very wrong. Likewise, we ourselves can be very wrong as well.
  A problem as prosaic as creationist writing seems to almost insure
  automatically that it is wrong, but we must also be careful not to
  reject everything simply because it is different and does not
  test every imaginable avenue.

  By Grace alone we proceed,
  Wayne
Received on Tue May 31 21:28:59 2005