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> "parenting science" is like "nutritional science." It's almost entirely bullshit, and little to no progress has been made in the field ever. Your analogy is

> "parenting science" is like "nutritional science." It's almost entirely bullshit, and little to no progress has been made in the field ever. Your analogy is a good one, but it goes a layer deeper than I think you realize. "Parenting science" is like "nutritional science" in that, based on what you can get out of the popular sources, it is almost entirely bullshit. It's also similar in that the science has continued to make progress, but you never really hear of it because very little of what's being discovered is the kind of thing that will sell books or attract advertisers.

rayiner 8y ago
I disagree with that characterization, for the reasons stated here: https://www.vox.com/2016/1/14/10760622/nutrition-science-complicated https://www.vox.com/2016/1/14/10760622/nutrition-science-com.... In my view, if you can't develop mathematical models and test them against properly conducted experiments, then your field is not a "science." Nutrition is not a science, neither is parenting, or anything else that relies primarily on observational studies and lacks a theoretical model to connect observations together into a coherent theory. That is not to say that observational research may not be valuable. Both nutrition and and parenting could, in theory, be developed into sciences. But until then, the fields are just collections of (often unreproducable) observations. They cannot provide general principles for say raising kids, in the same way that fluid dynamics can provide general principles for building airplanes.
- bunderbunder 8y ago
  It seems like we part ways at the last point in that article, or at least, what you're saying here would seem to be at odds with it. I'm inclined to agree with it, myself. It's true that these are messy problem domains, and that does make it harder to conduct and draw firm conclusions from scientific research. That inhibits progress, but it doesn't render the whole enterprise a lost cause.
- snowwrestler 8y ago
  I think this comment says more about your understanding of science in general, than about what science can tell us about raising children.

rayiner 8y ago

I disagree with that characterization, for the reasons stated here: https://www.vox.com/2016/1/14/10760622/nutrition-science-complicated https://www.vox.com/2016/1/14/10760622/nutrition-science-com.... In my view, if you can't develop mathematical models and test them against properly conducted experiments, then your field is not a "science." Nutrition is not a science, neither is parenting, or anything else that relies primarily on observational studies and lacks a theoretical model to connect observations together into a coherent theory. That is not to say that observational research may not be valuable. Both nutrition and and parenting could, in theory, be developed into sciences. But until then, the fields are just collections of (often unreproducable) observations. They cannot provide general principles for say raising kids, in the same way that fluid dynamics can provide general principles for building airplanes.

bunderbunder 8y ago
It seems like we part ways at the last point in that article, or at least, what you're saying here would seem to be at odds with it. I'm inclined to agree with it, myself. It's true that these are messy problem domains, and that does make it harder to conduct and draw firm conclusions from scientific research. That inhibits progress, but it doesn't render the whole enterprise a lost cause.
snowwrestler 8y ago
I think this comment says more about your understanding of science in general, than about what science can tell us about raising children.