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Wake-up call for science

By Andrew Baker - posted Wednesday, 8 July 2009


For many modern thinkers both in and out of science, this goes too far. Yet in any case, for practical reasons it surely will not do, since science is a public pursuit needing a unified approach.

But why must we settle for the naive objective dogma championed by some scientists that runs counter to a view of smug, subjective impracticality expressed by certain science critics? Both extremes are perilous. Instead, why don't we explore the oft-ignored middle ground?

No matter how we try, we cannot be truly objective as science so sternly demands because we cannot escape our frailty as human navigators piloting the helm of scientific exploration. The scientific approach we use today is arbitrary, albeit steeped in history, and since it is also flawed, we must find out if there is a better one. Science works, but if we don't know how, can we ever hope to improve it?

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It is true that in essence, issues raised by the likes of Hume are general problems, but we may not blithely ignore them. There is only one certainty: we won't discover any alternatives if we simply ignore science's limitations.

Human knowledge itself is at stake. Consider that the field of physics now struggles mightily in search of a unifying theory to understand our world.

In its relentless search for truth, physics has delved into the "unseen" sub-atomic world where science as we presently define it does not easily fit. In this unseen physical world, which we may investigate only indirectly through experiment, we witness the limitations of humanity starkly exposed; experimental results may differ depending on whether we observe operating equipment or not.

This suggests our very act of "observing" changes the world, a notion hearkening back 2500 years to the ancient Greek thinker Plato, who maintained that everything we observe is merely a decaying version of its true form.

Mysterious stuff. It may well require a complete rethink of science and reason to make inroads into this realm of knowledge.

I hold concerns that deep questioning of "how we know" in science, sketched in rough outline above, is rarely encountered at university or high school. Indeed, recent years have seen the closing of many university arts faculties across the globe where explorations into the vibrant history of scientific knowledge were traditionally undertaken.

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Teaching curricula at all levels of education have been "rationalised". Some few scattered university departments or schoolteachers with initiative remain, valiantly flying a tattered flag to the honour of a fallen scientific ideal.

Scientists, now more than ever, in their dual role as researchers and teachers, must take responsibility for producing our next generation of deep scientific thinkers. Yet who else is more qualified to examine the method of science and practically apply such knowledge?

There couldn't be a timelier wake-up call for science than this year, which marks the 150th anniversary of Darwin's landmark publication On the Origin of Species.

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This article was first published on July 1 in the" Higher Education Supplement" of The Australian



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About the Author

Andrew Baker works in the School of Natural Resource Sciences at Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane. His book Questions of Science (Revised Edition) is forthcoming from Pearson Prentice Hall. Andrew teaches in the Environmental Science and Ecology majors at all levels of the undergraduate and postgraduate program. His research interests are varied and broad in scope, including: environmental management, biodiversity, population genetics, systematics/taxonomy, palaeontology, philosophy of science and learning/teaching methodologies.

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