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One of those groups are massively more likely to deal in thruth though. Otherwise I agree; people are usually too keen on easy answers instead of complex correc

by croon 8y ago

One of those groups are massively more likely to deal in thruth though. Otherwise I agree; people are usually too keen on easy answers instead of complex correct answers.

81318536 8y ago
If you're insinuating that the 'scientists' group in that list is more truthy, I'd completely disagree due to the bias involved. If you're going to pick one group in that list for realism in understanding, it's obvious you'd choose the army and not purely academic modern scholars who consistently struggle with solving the most basic perverse incentives such as unavailability of open access peer review, Pagerank-as-tenure-prerequisites, and pervasive social norms of qualifying career success as 'results' driven rather than clarifying the scope of human knowledge through the overwhelmingly important outcomes of 'failure.' Sure, you're wouldn't trust a public figure who only has a short term length to contain a problematic national policy dogma informed by 'studies.' See the outcome of Lysenkoism in the Soviet era as an example of posturing dubious scientism as political party ideology. And past historical characters aren't really sources of truth due to the distorting lens of the incumbent narrative writers who need to legitimize policy either through hacking the populace's susceptibility to voice merging rhetoric or indoctrination of a national origin myth that gives meaning to most citizens who are actively seeking authoritative external confirmation of a double-truth to ease the cognitive-dissonance everyone feels when reality doesn't match the cherry-picked politically-harmonious model. But to trust the army, that's somewhat different. Similar to many imperial armies of antiquity, the US army's sole strength is logistical in nature and not tactical. We can't fight based on risky 'war genius' maneuvering and would completely flounder in a scenario of being overwhelmed in asymmetrical/low-tech/low-intensity/decentralized conflict scenarios, so we instead gain supremacy in being able to deploy massive amounts of resources to any location on Earth faster than anyone else and at a sustained rate. If reality didn't match predictions of our models in forecasting things such as cost-effective mitigation of nutritional demands for soldiers / displaced populations / war engine back home, long-term regional and global climatic patterns and short-term weather conditions, estimates of extractable fuels and necessary technologies to overcome resource shortages, etc, then you probably have much more to worry about on a very small timescale than pondering over truth in general and especially whether sugar is 'good' or 'bad' for you. Note that the army's view of certain scientific knowledge and distilled policies can be vastly different than what emerges from the mouths of the faces we see on TV be it consumer ads with white-coat actors or government ads with black-coat actors.
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watwut 8y ago
Many people who are labeled scientists are doing it to gain credibility. They often talk about things they did not study scientifically (or into detail) or did science while ago and don't engage with it much. For easy example, see forensic science. Also, scientists are same people as everyone else - incentives distorts, opinions distorts, peer pressure distorts. Science develops and is not perfect yet. A lot of past science would not be considered science anymore and is incorrect. There are also systematic biases - the way papers are chosen influences what we know. For example there is strong bias against negative results currently. Most cutting edge science is contradictory and consensus emerges only slowly. Who is right in that mess? You can not trust even single study, even by best intentioned and skilled scientist. People like to treat it as "truth", in particular when they like the result.

by croon 8y ago

One of those groups are massively more likely to deal in thruth though. Otherwise I agree; people are usually too keen on easy answers instead of complex correct answers.

81318536 8y ago

If you're insinuating that the 'scientists' group in that list is more truthy, I'd completely disagree due to the bias involved. If you're going to pick one group in that list for realism in understanding, it's obvious you'd choose the army and not purely academic modern scholars who consistently struggle with solving the most basic perverse incentives such as unavailability of open access peer review, Pagerank-as-tenure-prerequisites, and pervasive social norms of qualifying career success as 'results' driven rather than clarifying the scope of human knowledge through the overwhelmingly important outcomes of 'failure.' Sure, you're wouldn't trust a public figure who only has a short term length to contain a problematic national policy dogma informed by 'studies.' See the outcome of Lysenkoism in the Soviet era as an example of posturing dubious scientism as political party ideology. And past historical characters aren't really sources of truth due to the distorting lens of the incumbent narrative writers who need to legitimize policy either through hacking the populace's susceptibility to voice merging rhetoric or indoctrination of a national origin myth that gives meaning to most citizens who are actively seeking authoritative external confirmation of a double-truth to ease the cognitive-dissonance everyone feels when reality doesn't match the cherry-picked politically-harmonious model. But to trust the army, that's somewhat different. Similar to many imperial armies of antiquity, the US army's sole strength is logistical in nature and not tactical. We can't fight based on risky 'war genius' maneuvering and would completely flounder in a scenario of being overwhelmed in asymmetrical/low-tech/low-intensity/decentralized conflict scenarios, so we instead gain supremacy in being able to deploy massive amounts of resources to any location on Earth faster than anyone else and at a sustained rate. If reality didn't match predictions of our models in forecasting things such as cost-effective mitigation of nutritional demands for soldiers / displaced populations / war engine back home, long-term regional and global climatic patterns and short-term weather conditions, estimates of extractable fuels and necessary technologies to overcome resource shortages, etc, then you probably have much more to worry about on a very small timescale than pondering over truth in general and especially whether sugar is 'good' or 'bad' for you. Note that the army's view of certain scientific knowledge and distilled policies can be vastly different than what emerges from the mouths of the faces we see on TV be it consumer ads with white-coat actors or government ads with black-coat actors.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

watwut 8y ago

Many people who are labeled scientists are doing it to gain credibility. They often talk about things they did not study scientifically (or into detail) or did science while ago and don't engage with it much. For easy example, see forensic science. Also, scientists are same people as everyone else - incentives distorts, opinions distorts, peer pressure distorts. Science develops and is not perfect yet. A lot of past science would not be considered science anymore and is incorrect. There are also systematic biases - the way papers are chosen influences what we know. For example there is strong bias against negative results currently. Most cutting edge science is contradictory and consensus emerges only slowly. Who is right in that mess? You can not trust even single study, even by best intentioned and skilled scientist. People like to treat it as "truth", in particular when they like the result.