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I think you're understating the difficulty. No amount of math can tease apart the indiscernibly complex. We observe correlations naturally. Assumed relations
by Empact 17y ago
I think you're understating the difficulty.
No amount of math can tease apart the indiscernibly complex.
We observe correlations naturally. Assumed relationships. The sort which suggested God wanted us to dance to bring on rain. But without controls, and without repeatable experimentation, we can not have a true scientific method. The scientific method requires hypothesis, predictions, and repeatable experimentations. One successful dance is an anecdote, many is a theory, decades of them is a law, still questionable. But how can you repeat an experiment which takes place over a whole society of people, millions strong, with life constantly intervening?
This isn't only about soundbites, it's about having no means to achieve anything more definitive than soundbites.
- camccann 17y agoNo amount of math can tease apart the indiscernibly complex. If there's any structure at all, you can find it with enough math and enough data; that's exactly the purpose of statistics. But without controls, and without repeatable experimentation, we can not have a true scientific method. The scientific method requires hypothesis, predictions, and repeatable experimentations. No, this misunderstands science. All the scientific method requires is testable predictions. Predicting the outcome of a controlled experiment is merely a very efficient way to go about it. There are plenty of scientific fields where simple controlled experiments aren't really viable, and people get by. It's just more difficult, and requires more discipline from researchers.