Rich Blinne wrote 13 Aug
P.S. I know this will probably open a can of worms but historical evidence can be properly science. It just takes more ingenuity on the part of the scientist to device something that is testable. But, as I stated above you need to announce that this is science after you have been ingenious and not before.
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In reply to Richard surely it is controversial NOT to accept that "historical evidence can be properly science". If one adopts that position one rejects all historical science such as geology as science. That is as absurd as rejecting all experimental science as non-science.
The trouble is that too often only the so-called experimental sciences are seen as science. Science includes a variety of types, and not to accept ALL types of science as science is provocative in the worst sense and indicates an ignorance of what science is.
To accept all types of science from physics to taxonomy to geology (I am sorry I focus only on natural sciences and not the human sciences though those would be included in a broader understanding of wissenshaft aand of course half of me deals with these) is very traditional and old-fashioned as it was argued very strongly by the philosopher of science Rev William Whewell in the 1840s who wrote both of the experimetal sciences and palaeoaetiological science (i.e. historical sciences)in his study of INDUCTIVE sciences as both being truly science, and of equal status. He was of course influenced by his fellow evangelical the Rev Adam Sedgwick the geologist. (I will not necessariliy agree with these being purely inductive and empirical!)
To say otherwise and even to make the false distinction of operational and origins science reduces our understanding of what science is to zero.
Below is my own popular take on the matter where I consider the range of what science is and includes all of what is called natural science.
There is Experimental Science where a researcher artificially selects something to test under controlled experiments. Then, much of science is Observational, especially the earlier and classic forms of natural history, mineralogy and astronomy. These depend on detailed observation, classification and measurement. There are the Historical sciences, which attempt to work out the historical order of past events. Geology and palaeontology are classic historical sciences, and that was my main scientific discipline. Within all these is Measurement, in which some kind of mathematical approach is used to order the subject matter being studied. This may be anything from simple counting to the most complex calculus.
There is one major difference between Historical sciences and the Experimental and Observational sciences, and that is the former deals with non-repeatable events in the past, and the latter with potentially repeatable observations.
At times, some have questioned the reliability and philosophical soundness of historical sciences like geology on the grounds that they do not deal with repeatable events (what's history is history!) and one cannot make predictions. The doubts have been expressed as follows;
Most sciences, including chemistry and physics, are empirical (or experimental) in nature; theories can be tested by experiments in the laboratory and/or by observations of the world. Some disciplines, like origins science, are historical in nature; that is, they attempt to explain events and processes that have already taken place in the distant past. Theories in historical sciences cannot be verified experimentally, so the explanations are always tentative.
At first sight, that sounds very convincing, but it contains several flaws. First, it implies that the ultimate in science is experimental thus ignoring observational science. The statement is confused over this. It has not clarified what historical sciences are, but by saying that "Theories in historical sciences cannot be verified experimentally", it expresses a dangerous half-truth. Of course, one cannot test most geological ideas experimentally - e.g. whether T Rex could run at 20 m.p.h. or could only trot, or whether the direction of the Precambrian rivers in the Stinkfontein Formation in South Africa flowed towards the west, as I found from the measurement of cross-bedding in the sandstone. Neither can one make predictions for the future. However theories in geology can be tested rigorously and to a considerable degree of certainty. Much can be worked out about T. Rex from comparative anatomy - using the same principles that a human anatomist would use in identifying the age and sex of a human skeleton. From the study of the Stinkfontein sandstone, especially of its cross-bedding and grains of sand, a geologist would not make a prediction but a retrodiction and suggest that in that period of time (1000 m.y. ago) there was a source of the sand to the east and that these older rocks were very rich in quartz and were probably either quartzites, gneisses or granites. In fact twenty miles to the east these Stinkfontein rocks lay unconformably upon older rocks, which were quartzites and gneisses of the Kheis. Geologists perform these "tests" on their work continuously and when, as happens often, they are wrong, they have to revise their theories, which in turn are tested. Now geology is about 250 years old as a science, and theories have been tested rigorously in that period, so that much of geology is now certain not tentative.
When practiced properly, all these different scientific methods have great rigor as there is a careful methodology but they also need theory, which is very different from speculation. There is a popular misunderstanding that theory means something abstract and unproven, whereas to a scientist a theory is what interprets their data and seeks to make sense of it. The theory changes as further research is carried out.
Science has not been an unchanging study of the material world and Scientific Method has not remained constant over the centuries. We should not speak of THE Scientific Method as today there are many Scientific Methods and these have changed over time. At the risk of over-simplifying, in the Ancient World the emphasis on scientific method was on observation, classification and measurement rather than experiment as we know it. This outlook continued until the mid-16th century when Copernicus almost unwittingly began the Scientific Revolution.
One of the results of the Scientific Revolution Experiment was to play down the authority of learned tradition. During the period 1500 to 1700 there was a diminishing respect for authorities for their own sake and a greater recognition of primary observation and experiment. By the end of the period scientists would no longer defer to the authority of an Aristotle or a Galen only because of their status. Their opinions had to be demonstrable. Galileo was one of the first to challenge ancient authorities if their statements could not be verified. This represented a marked break with tradition, but even into the 19th century scholars from the humanities still deferred to ancient authorities whether of antiquity or a previous generation. At times they were hostile to the methods of scientists.
The effect of the Newtonian Age was to consider that Experiment was the most important scientific method and that anything else was inferior to it. That prejudice is still prevalent today both in popular and academic circles. As a result it is easy to downplay the importance of descriptive biology and the rise of the historical sciences, such as geology and paleontology in the 18th and 19th centuries.
The can of worms is to deny historical science as science.
Michael
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Received on Sun Aug 24 02:14:57 2008
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