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It's quite normal to deny something the entire scientific community is saying. In everywhere except math it's business as usual. Most of our current scientific

by vlehto 11y ago

It's quite normal to deny something the entire scientific community is saying. In everywhere except math it's business as usual. Most of our current scientific knowledge was originally someone disagreeing with the majority. It's weird you are attacking someone who agrees with you in policy. Just because he does not think "correctly". Given that your argument is out of authority, it's bit alarming. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

acqq 11y ago
In this case that you seem to support the skepticism is based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance#Argument_from_self-knowing_.28auto-epistemic.29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance#Argume... "If P were true then I would know it; in fact I do not know it; therefore P cannot be true." For example, it's not that Einstein in 1905 made Newton's formulas from around 1700 unusable, quite the opposite, for a lot of purposes they are still used: it's just that for the very high speeds they need adjustment factors and more complicated math to express what's going on. The expected improvement in the science certainly won't make "everything we know wrong." Such formulations are just spammy titles. There will be only refinements. For the current state, see: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10693784 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10693784
- vlehto 11y ago
  I didn't say anything about climate change on the above comment. I only said the argument was not solid. I'm not "climate skeptic", I'm true believer. I just try to combat these authority heretics.
  - gnaritas 11y ago
    Argument from authority is not always invalid; especially when virtually all of the authorities on the subject agree. In fact you can't find a statement I made in the original post you objected to, that isn't true. It is factually true that if you disagree with most scientists on a subject, you are probably wrong. I didn't say you were definitely wrong, I said it was near 100% certain that you were wrong. > It's weird you are attacking someone who agrees with you in policy. Just because he does not think "correctly". No, it isn't weird. It's perfectly rational to disagree with people because they reach the right conclusion for the wrong reasons because "thinking" wrong is often dangerous and leads to superstition.
    - vlehto 11y ago
      Argument from authority is not invalid when it can be backed with fact. It's often unnecessary, because you need the fact anyhow. In some cases it's justified to save time. Like in the military.
      - magicalist 11y ago
        > Argument from authority is not invalid when it can be backed with fact. Your line of argumentation doesn't make sense here. We can look for backing up an authority with facts which come from...that same authority, who we then have to believe or not, short of replicating their study. Or we can get someone else to replicate the study, and someone else to replicate that study, and...suddenly we're talking about scientific consensus again. You do not have time to replicate and verify the work of every scientist. At some point you are going to have to choose to take some authority's word for it.
        vlehto 11y ago
        You have good point here. The person I choose to believe is the one who talks about radiation balance and p-values and confidence intevals. Then I expect to see peer revieve publication and some peer revieved confirmation. It's also possible to establish somekind of authority to conduct meta-study. This works nicely in medical field. Someone talking about "99%" of scientists is just distracting. Link the IPCC document and call it a day.
gnaritas 11y ago
> It's quite normal to deny something the entire scientific community is saying. By other scientists when doing science sure, that's cool; by the ignorant public when working on policy, that's just ignorance. > Most of our current scientific knowledge was originally someone disagreeing with the majority. No, if you are not a scientist in the field, your disagreements are just ignorance. Science can and should be challenged by those actually doing the science, not arguments from ignorance from the general public.
- vlehto 11y ago
  If you agree because someone says so, that's just another form of ignorance. If you really wish to know the shit, you find the facts science has provided. There are facts. This "99% of scientists" stuff is making the signal/noise ratio quite bad.
  - gnaritas 11y ago
    > If you agree because someone says so, that's just another form of ignorance. No it isn't, it's not possible to educate yourself to the depth required on a great many things without becoming a professional in the field and while that's cool for those that want to; it's utter arrogance and ignorance to ignore the entire scientific community as a laymen and pretend you know better. Quite simply, if you are not a climate scientist, you're talking out of your ass. The people educated enough in the evidence to have the rational debate, have already had it, the intelligent debate is over and the conclusions have been publicized. The only people still debating are the few scientists in the extreme minority (which is fine), and the utterly ignorant (i.e. the public).
    - vlehto 11y ago
      You have to be philosophist with a degree and specialization in philosophy of science to consistently make that argument. Are you?
      - gnaritas 11y ago

by vlehto 11y ago

acqq 11y ago

In this case that you seem to support the skepticism is based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance#Argument_from_self-knowing_.28auto-epistemic.29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance#Argume... "If P were true then I would know it; in fact I do not know it; therefore P cannot be true." For example, it's not that Einstein in 1905 made Newton's formulas from around 1700 unusable, quite the opposite, for a lot of purposes they are still used: it's just that for the very high speeds they need adjustment factors and more complicated math to express what's going on. The expected improvement in the science certainly won't make "everything we know wrong." Such formulations are just spammy titles. There will be only refinements. For the current state, see: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10693784 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10693784

vlehto 11y ago
I didn't say anything about climate change on the above comment. I only said the argument was not solid. I'm not "climate skeptic", I'm true believer. I just try to combat these authority heretics.
- gnaritas 11y ago
  Argument from authority is not always invalid; especially when virtually all of the authorities on the subject agree. In fact you can't find a statement I made in the original post you objected to, that isn't true. It is factually true that if you disagree with most scientists on a subject, you are probably wrong. I didn't say you were definitely wrong, I said it was near 100% certain that you were wrong. > It's weird you are attacking someone who agrees with you in policy. Just because he does not think "correctly". No, it isn't weird. It's perfectly rational to disagree with people because they reach the right conclusion for the wrong reasons because "thinking" wrong is often dangerous and leads to superstition.
  - vlehto 11y ago
    Argument from authority is not invalid when it can be backed with fact. It's often unnecessary, because you need the fact anyhow. In some cases it's justified to save time. Like in the military.
    - magicalist 11y ago
      > Argument from authority is not invalid when it can be backed with fact. Your line of argumentation doesn't make sense here. We can look for backing up an authority with facts which come from...that same authority, who we then have to believe or not, short of replicating their study. Or we can get someone else to replicate the study, and someone else to replicate that study, and...suddenly we're talking about scientific consensus again. You do not have time to replicate and verify the work of every scientist. At some point you are going to have to choose to take some authority's word for it.
      - vlehto 11y ago
        You have good point here. The person I choose to believe is the one who talks about radiation balance and p-values and confidence intevals. Then I expect to see peer revieve publication and some peer revieved confirmation. It's also possible to establish somekind of authority to conduct meta-study. This works nicely in medical field. Someone talking about "99%" of scientists is just distracting. Link the IPCC document and call it a day.

gnaritas 11y ago

> It's quite normal to deny something the entire scientific community is saying. By other scientists when doing science sure, that's cool; by the ignorant public when working on policy, that's just ignorance. > Most of our current scientific knowledge was originally someone disagreeing with the majority. No, if you are not a scientist in the field, your disagreements are just ignorance. Science can and should be challenged by those actually doing the science, not arguments from ignorance from the general public.

vlehto 11y ago
If you agree because someone says so, that's just another form of ignorance. If you really wish to know the shit, you find the facts science has provided. There are facts. This "99% of scientists" stuff is making the signal/noise ratio quite bad.
- gnaritas 11y ago
  > If you agree because someone says so, that's just another form of ignorance. No it isn't, it's not possible to educate yourself to the depth required on a great many things without becoming a professional in the field and while that's cool for those that want to; it's utter arrogance and ignorance to ignore the entire scientific community as a laymen and pretend you know better. Quite simply, if you are not a climate scientist, you're talking out of your ass. The people educated enough in the evidence to have the rational debate, have already had it, the intelligent debate is over and the conclusions have been publicized. The only people still debating are the few scientists in the extreme minority (which is fine), and the utterly ignorant (i.e. the public).
  - vlehto 11y ago
    You have to be philosophist with a degree and specialization in philosophy of science to consistently make that argument. Are you?
    - gnaritas 11y ago