5 ms·
Science works when it embraces the unconventional and the unknown, anything that steps away from this limits the power of science to shine the light of a theory
by 1arity 11y ago
Science works when it embraces the unconventional and the unknown, anything that steps away from this limits the power of science to shine the light of a theory and an experiment onto something mysterious.
It is positive, constructive and it works for outsiders to be included in science and art. it is also positive and correct to critically look at thing when you hold the highest potential of those things as important. Nothing is sacred beyond critical inquiry, that way lies dogmatic extremism. Being an apologist for a broken culture doesn’t help that culture, nor the context in which it operates.
If you choose to pretend that outsider art is all good and outsider science is all bad, and that the culture of art, science and math ( and tech ) are beyond reproach, and that the points raised have no value as opportunities to create improvements, and that scientists ( or mathematicians, or the establishment ) are poor fake victims who are suffering hardship for considering whether their cultures possess opportunities for improvement, if this is the case then I can understand how pretending that seems to make it easier for you, since you can hold to an unchallenged perspective and not experience the disruption that comes with questioning the lay of the land under your feet. Tho that choice isn't as likely to lead to reflection, as being open to questioning. And without reflection, no improvement.
And without questioning, no science.
Science is inspiring. Science isn't about protecting yourself from reflection, science is brave, science embraces reflection and self critical thinking, and science embraces belief in the face of the unknown, science embraces acknowledging the unknown, and running the experiment. Science embraces the question. Science is the opposite of dogmatic. Anything that claims to be science and shies away from openness, is the mere color of science.
Science is that very ideal : that strength is open vulnerability, and not dogmatic inflexibility.
Science is an inspiration.
I believe the very sensitivity of these comments ( and the fact that they created the accusation in their interpreting, fabricating a connection to an accusation that was not stated ) reveals clearly that this issue is on people’s minds, and that in expectation of it being raised, and in expectation of its raising being troubling, they are not only defending against it, they are prematurely defending against it, and creating themselves the accusation that was not present and which they have hallucinated in their fear of it.
To be afraid of something is to suspect it.
So the very ideas I have raised have triggered this apparition to be conjured in these minds giving life and proof to the very questions I raised, and expanding the scope of relevance of the critique. It's not just about maths, clearly. It's about science as a whole. The argument was never "could this occur?" for we all know it could, and we have seen it, as have we all seen the kind of reflexive apologist rhetoric get triggered that was triggered here in denial of anything wrong with these culture’s held beyond question. The argument instead was a warning against the very defensiveness seen triggered in response to it, and a warning put now in clearer relief against the background of comments that display that very inflexibility and refusal of critical questioning that can lead to the exclusionist frightened culture warned about.
These comments are then nothing except my loyal supporters, they stand beside my warning as additional support for its importance, and in them we can see how the beginnings of dogmatic inflexibility take hold : through defensive denial of divergent ideas and refusal to question the conventional.
Let the ad-hoc groups of intellectual collaborators be like democratic meritocracies not frightened fascist states.