10 ms·

Wronger Than Wrong

137 points by Agraillo 4y ago

t344344 4y ago
Science is about money and publishing. We find sponsor, we publish, we get money. There is nothing hard to understand about this business model!
- Version467 4y ago
  You are confusing science with the social process of science and how it is applied in academia. Science is a way to get to the truth. It has no concept of money or grant makers, or academic institutions. The social process of science is more complicated and yes, academia has developed some perverse incentives to keep the publishing mill running, regardless of scientific insights. But that has nothing to do with the article. I'd recommend that you actually go and read the relativity of wrong, it's not that long and most of it is just as accurate today as it was then.
  - t344344 4y ago
    > You are confusing science with ... academia. Academia is the science. You can not separate those two. Not after last three years. I get the idea and process, read Asimov, have PhD etc...
    - HPsquared 4y ago
      Scientific institutions vs. scientific method. Pravda vs istina.
      - t344344 4y ago
        Yeah, people have to fight for the truth, to give legitimacy to large corporations!
    - agentgumshoe 4y ago
      I think more so the last three years tried to convince us that the Government is the science. Academia just went along.
  - friendzis 4y ago
    Yes, science and academia are not the same, but this distinction is largely meaningless precisely because as you yourself say "the social process of science is more complicated" as in science does not happen in a vacuum. Science is largely by product of academia, if you will. While the theoretical scientific method itself may be a way to get to actual truth, the published science - knowledge that will be known, preserved and built upon - is a result of academic process, not some ultimate truth-seeking. In a practical sense science is the social process of science even if there is innate ontological difference.
PrimeMcFly 4y ago
[dead]
marginalia_nu 4y ago
What's wronger than wrong is not even being wrong. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong
- agentgumshoe 4y ago
  If you actually read the Wikipedia article you'll see it specifically refers to Wronger than Wrong being worse than Not Even Wrong.
  - marginalia_nu 4y ago
    That's literally just one person's opinion though.
    - agentgumshoe 4y ago
      So? Your post suggests you're adding a new idea, but it was already referred to.
      - marginalia_nu 4y ago
        It doesn't though.
glenstein 4y ago
I find this concept to be helpful in countering the epidemic of false equivalences, or the pennywise pound foolish contrarianism that you see so frequently in internet comment sections. My favorite example is probably whenever there's articles about sitting being bad for your health. You tend to get a couple of contrarians replying, "Well standing more may sound like good advice but standing can cause lower back pain, so it's not so simple!" However, that reply completely loses grasp of the relative scale of the two things, inviting you to consider the inconveniences of lower back pain as being on the same level as heart disease. I think the more serious examples of Wronger Than Wrong relate to authoritarian states. A year ago when the Russian invasion started, some people suggested the Russian crackdown on dissent was unremarkable, and compared it to the United States during the Iraq war. And it's not wrong, in that they might fit into a similar category, but it represents a complete failure to assess the relative scale of those two things.
- baxtr 4y ago
  I’m not sure if the example fits to the concept. Your example describe a poor trade-off discussion. The wiki article describes a “spectrum of wrongness”, on which you can sort wrong things. My 5c at least. But maybe I’m wronger!
  - glenstein 4y ago
    You are right. With the sitting example, the ideal case is perfect health. The trade-offs have different distances from the ideal case. You are correct that those distances are not strictly distances of wrongness, but they are nevertheless something you can be "Wronger Than Wrong" about if you treat them the same.
- xg15 4y ago
  I noticed something similar in popsci articles and a lot of (soft) sci-fi: They are often enamoured by a particular set of subfields in physics, namely particle physics, relativity and quantum theory. But they rarely make an attempt to make those fields accessible to a casual reader or clear up apparent contradictions - on the contrary, they usually highlight the counterintuitive or paradox aspects and maintain an air of arcane knowledge and mysticism: Only Einstein could understand relativity because he was imbued with the spirit of genius, us normal mortals can only marvel at the beauty of knowledge made for minds greater than us! This always seems to me more like "anti-science journalism" because while it superficially celebrates "science", it also strongly discourages the reader from trying to make sense of it. My pet conspiracy theory is that some groups (i.e. religious groups and panpsychism folks) are very invested in the idea that human consciousness exists separate from the physical universe - or at the very least is a fundamental force that cannot be explained by any other physical phenomenon. Connected with this is the religious notion that humans are sort of the "main characters" of the universe and the rest of it is made specifically for them. Quantum theory introduced some technical terms which were very unfortunately named and gave the impression that the theory would support that view - when in reality it was just a misunderstanding. Those groups took this apparent backing of "science" and ran with it - and have little interest in the general public understanding enough of physics to realise the mistake.
flybrand 4y ago
“If you think [X] about the pandemic and [Y] about the response, then that is WTW.”
- agentgumshoe 4y ago
  Please explain? I don't understand your point at all here
- Vecr 4y ago
  That's not related to the concept at all, that's to do with first order and second order effects, not theories or descriptions about the same thing. Zvi Mowshowitz and Zeynep Tufekci (if that's really how their names are spelled) have written about the pandemic response problem, but I'm not sure how general their ideas are. They might be overfitted.
phrotoma 4y ago
One of my favourite things on youtube: “You Have No Idea How Wrong You Are” https://youtu.be/E8V8rtdXnLA https://youtu.be/E8V8rtdXnLA
- agentgumshoe 4y ago
  As evidenced across the social media spectrum in that so many people are convinced of how right they are now.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 4y ago
  Good video. Though I always think to myself when I see someone who isn't Dunning or Kruger explaining the Dunning-Kruger effect, that they themselves are likely subject to the very effect they are explaining by assuming they are more knowledgeable about the subject and the effect than they really are.
tokai 4y ago
Funny how the example of people one believing the earth is flat is also wrong.
jrootabega 4y ago
As interesting and good as that concept is, it doesn't seem notable enough for a wikipedia article.
callesgg 4y ago
Descriptions are models. All models have a validity-property, validity is a property that describes how well the model manages to model the thing that it is modeling. The less validity a model has, the more "wrong" it is. A description of the earth as flat, seamingly has a lower validity than a description as the earth as a perfect sphere. But ultimately it depends on how one measures validity.
wink 4y ago
I'm not sure the shape of the earth is good example here, because I, as someone not doing any geodesy professionally or at all, can accept the "sphere" as such a good enough approximation, like probably millions do. Every model you've seen at school, or in books, or planetariums are (to the human eye) indistinguishable from a sphere, which makes this very much a "well, actually". Yes, I guess after elementary school you'd add some "it's nearly a sphere" and "perfect spheres don't usually exist in the real world", but for all intents and purposes, it looks like a sphere. So maybe it's a good example after all ;)
- d23 4y ago
  Yeah I mean that’s basically the exact point of the example.
3pt14159 4y ago
At the risk of being derided as violating another top level comment[0] I'm going to try to evaluate the implied premise of this concept to try to show something I've been trying to put to words over the past couple years. For simplicity and brevity sake, let's say that there are two possible options that someone is weighing, having ruled out all the other competing options. The first option is Christianity. The second option is atheism grounded in scientific inquiry. You can call the second option empiricism or naturalism if you like. According to the first option, it is through faith with all your heart, soul, and mind that one is saved and that truth is found. Testing God, is explicitly forbidden. According to the second option, it is by testing falsifiable premises that the truth is found. The answer to unknowns is to admit that they're unknown, at least for now. Thomas Aquinas and the first mover argument is implicitly denied as an area of inquiry. Many proponents of the second option say "Well look! The distance of the light of the stars proves that the universe is billions of years old!" And proponents of the first option can respond in any number of ways ranging from testing the assumptions of modern scientific understanding of light (that it's speed is symmetrical from A to B and from B to A, despite already being relative in other ways) to pointing out Bible verses about how the Lord stretched out the heavens or cursed all of creation (and hence, possibly even history or time), many even apply the same type reasoning as the atheists when questioned about what caused anything to be and simply say "it's a mystery." Where I'm going with this is that conversations about what is wrong and how wrong it is depend so heavily on the very first thing you put your faith in and I believe this is something too many people shrug at. Basic, foundational theological or philosophical questions like "can a mind know a truth?" shouldn't be swept under the rug. They're more foundational than questions like "what caused the big bang?" [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35421355 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35421355
- circlefavshape 4y ago
  > Basic, foundational theological or philosophical questions like "can a mind know a truth?" shouldn't be swept under the rug. They're more foundational than questions like "what caused the big bang?" I think whether they are foundational or not is irrelevant. What matters is the effect pondering questions like these can have on people. Both kinds can have material consequences - theological/philosopical questioning can affect social behaviours and have wide-ranging societal effects, empirical questioning can result in new technologies which can do the same
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
aimor 4y ago
An example of plagiarism on Wikipedia. Even though it's well cited, the wiki authors are paraphrasing to pass off the original article's content as their own. Wikipedia: "It was described by Michael Shermer as Asimov's axiom.[1] The mistake was discussed in Isaac Asimov's book of essays The Relativity of Wrong[2] as well as in a 1989 article[3] of the same name in the Fall 1989 issue of the Skeptical Inquirer: When people thought the Earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the Earth was spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the Earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the Earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together. Asimov explained that science is both progressive and cumulative. Even though scientific theories are later proven wrong, the degree of their wrongness attenuates with time as they are modified in response to the mistakes of the past.[1] For example, data collected from satellite measurements show, to a high level of precision, how the Earth's shape differs from a perfect sphere or even an oblate spheroid or a geoid.[1]" The cited article: "Not even wrong. What could be worse? Being wronger than wrong, or what I call Asimov's axiom, well stated in his book The Relativity of Wrong (Doubleday, 1988): "When people thought the earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the earth was spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together." Asimov's axiom holds that science is cumulative and progressive, building on the mistakes of the past, and that even though scientists are often wrong, their wrongness attenuates with continued data collection and theory building. Satellite measurements, for instance, have shown precisely how the earth's shape differs from a perfect sphere." https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/wronger-than-wrong/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/wronger-than-wron...
- Agraillo 4y ago
  Thanks for the article, the ending is interesting because it mixed "Not Even Wrong" and Wronger than Wrong" (still wrapping my head around it): "But if you believe that thinking science is unbiased is just as wrong as thinking that science is socially constructed, then your view is not even wronger than wrong."
ngvrnd 4y ago
This reminds me of "all models are wrong, but some models are useful." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_models_are_wrong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_models_are_wrong) Outside of formal math, all we have are models, so there will often (always?) be an ordering of "less wrong" on model-based knowledge. So "wronger than wrong" is putting a heavy spin on the truth. More wrong models might still be useful.
- drbig 4y ago
  > be an ordering of "less wrong" on model-based knowledge. I'm of the _opinion_ that this is the only way of knowledge itself: less wrong as time spent on understanding approaches infinity. Math and models are between language and tools, the fundamental essence is the same though. Also, any predictive ability should ever be a side-effect, the core of inquiry is explanation. This is why a good-enough explanation of seasons on Earth is perfectly applicable to any other planet (in any solar system). And this is why ML models like AlphaGo are not helpful (you can't learn anything from them, including "how to be a better Go player"). In other words I stand with Deutsch, Popper and Everett on the interpretation of reality.
- the_af 4y ago
  > So "wronger than wrong" is putting a heavy spin on the truth Why do you think you are arguing against the concept? "Wronger than wrong" argues against believing everything is "equally wrong", which is precisely what your comment is also arguing against. In other words, you agree with Asimov that equating all thing as equally wrong is "wronger than wrong", since there will always (or often) be an ordering of "less wrong".
  - ngvrnd 4y ago
    I wasn't arguing against it. I was commenting on it, sharing a thought. Peace.
ogurechny 4y ago
We shouldn't stop at that. If you actually try to apply your knowledge of “real shape of the Earth” to your regular activities (say, checking the ground level correction before making each step), you become thrice wrong. Confusing models of reality with reality is a sure way to get to the madhouse (I am sure there are stories about people thrilled to the core by the reality of being placed on a giant rotating ball instead of just the concept of the same). At the same time, it's something we all do each moment.
csours 4y ago
I really liked rational skepticism when I became an adult and re-evaluated the dogma of my childhood. I still really like it. Rational skepticism is a great tool to learn about the world. It is not a great tool for understanding what is "wrong" with people, or for communicating with people who are wrong. Flat earthers are not wrong because of science, they are wrong because of society. That is, most flat earthers turn away from our shared perception of the world because of some trauma in their lives. They have lost trust in something that they felt was solid. You may think that you believe in science because you are a logical person, but you really believe in science because people you respect believe in science. Science also has the benefit of actually working, which is nice, but many things can LOOK like they are working (epicycles of the planets, flat earth, miasma theory of disease). You can make scienticious (sic) sounding observations about all of these things. The point is that when you want to understand why people are wrong, you need to think about motivation and deeply held beliefs, not proof. Scientific proof is obviously very useful, but before you use that, you have to get them to come closer to you. Imagine a person standing on a hill. If they are shoved and fall down, they roll down the hill. Using the strongest arguments feels like the most effective thing to do. Strong arguments do move people, but you don't get to choose the direction they move.
- biomcgary 4y ago
  I believe & doubt science for the same reason, my experiences as a scientist. For example, I once reviewed a paper submitted to one of the big two science journals by a famous author at the top of their field. The self-reported statistics made it clear that the data was 95% noise. Although I and other reviewers torpedoed the paper, it was still published at top end paper with the statistics removed. Nothing like watching the sausage being made to understand why some choose to be vegan. Like soylent green, science is made of people.
- ouid 4y ago
  I believe you have made a subtle error. The people who do not "believe in science" and the people who reason socially are non-trivially correlated. There are three groups. People who claim to (believe/not believe) in science for social reasons, and those who actually practice science. The third group is the smallest, but it is not vanishingly small, and addressing your audience as if they "only think they practice science for logical reasons" is itself a social appeal. If you are describing yourself, say so. Don't engage in unfounded anti-intellectualism.

137 points by Agraillo 4y ago

Science is about money and publishing. We find sponsor, we publish, we get money. There is nothing hard to understand about this business model!

Version467 4y ago
You are confusing science with the social process of science and how it is applied in academia. Science is a way to get to the truth. It has no concept of money or grant makers, or academic institutions. The social process of science is more complicated and yes, academia has developed some perverse incentives to keep the publishing mill running, regardless of scientific insights. But that has nothing to do with the article. I'd recommend that you actually go and read the relativity of wrong, it's not that long and most of it is just as accurate today as it was then.
- t344344 4y ago
  > You are confusing science with ... academia. Academia is the science. You can not separate those two. Not after last three years. I get the idea and process, read Asimov, have PhD etc...
  - HPsquared 4y ago
    Scientific institutions vs. scientific method. Pravda vs istina.
    - t344344 4y ago
      Yeah, people have to fight for the truth, to give legitimacy to large corporations!
  - agentgumshoe 4y ago
    I think more so the last three years tried to convince us that the Government is the science. Academia just went along.
- friendzis 4y ago
  Yes, science and academia are not the same, but this distinction is largely meaningless precisely because as you yourself say "the social process of science is more complicated" as in science does not happen in a vacuum. Science is largely by product of academia, if you will. While the theoretical scientific method itself may be a way to get to actual truth, the published science - knowledge that will be known, preserved and built upon - is a result of academic process, not some ultimate truth-seeking. In a practical sense science is the social process of science even if there is innate ontological difference.

PrimeMcFly 4y ago

[dead]

marginalia_nu 4y ago

What's wronger than wrong is not even being wrong. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong

agentgumshoe 4y ago
If you actually read the Wikipedia article you'll see it specifically refers to Wronger than Wrong being worse than Not Even Wrong.
- marginalia_nu 4y ago
  That's literally just one person's opinion though.
  - agentgumshoe 4y ago
    So? Your post suggests you're adding a new idea, but it was already referred to.
    - marginalia_nu 4y ago
      It doesn't though.

glenstein 4y ago

I find this concept to be helpful in countering the epidemic of false equivalences, or the pennywise pound foolish contrarianism that you see so frequently in internet comment sections. My favorite example is probably whenever there's articles about sitting being bad for your health. You tend to get a couple of contrarians replying, "Well standing more may sound like good advice but standing can cause lower back pain, so it's not so simple!" However, that reply completely loses grasp of the relative scale of the two things, inviting you to consider the inconveniences of lower back pain as being on the same level as heart disease. I think the more serious examples of Wronger Than Wrong relate to authoritarian states. A year ago when the Russian invasion started, some people suggested the Russian crackdown on dissent was unremarkable, and compared it to the United States during the Iraq war. And it's not wrong, in that they might fit into a similar category, but it represents a complete failure to assess the relative scale of those two things.

baxtr 4y ago
I’m not sure if the example fits to the concept. Your example describe a poor trade-off discussion. The wiki article describes a “spectrum of wrongness”, on which you can sort wrong things. My 5c at least. But maybe I’m wronger!
- glenstein 4y ago
  You are right. With the sitting example, the ideal case is perfect health. The trade-offs have different distances from the ideal case. You are correct that those distances are not strictly distances of wrongness, but they are nevertheless something you can be "Wronger Than Wrong" about if you treat them the same.
xg15 4y ago
I noticed something similar in popsci articles and a lot of (soft) sci-fi: They are often enamoured by a particular set of subfields in physics, namely particle physics, relativity and quantum theory. But they rarely make an attempt to make those fields accessible to a casual reader or clear up apparent contradictions - on the contrary, they usually highlight the counterintuitive or paradox aspects and maintain an air of arcane knowledge and mysticism: Only Einstein could understand relativity because he was imbued with the spirit of genius, us normal mortals can only marvel at the beauty of knowledge made for minds greater than us! This always seems to me more like "anti-science journalism" because while it superficially celebrates "science", it also strongly discourages the reader from trying to make sense of it. My pet conspiracy theory is that some groups (i.e. religious groups and panpsychism folks) are very invested in the idea that human consciousness exists separate from the physical universe - or at the very least is a fundamental force that cannot be explained by any other physical phenomenon. Connected with this is the religious notion that humans are sort of the "main characters" of the universe and the rest of it is made specifically for them. Quantum theory introduced some technical terms which were very unfortunately named and gave the impression that the theory would support that view - when in reality it was just a misunderstanding. Those groups took this apparent backing of "science" and ran with it - and have little interest in the general public understanding enough of physics to realise the mistake.

flybrand 4y ago

“If you think [X] about the pandemic and [Y] about the response, then that is WTW.”

agentgumshoe 4y ago
Please explain? I don't understand your point at all here
Vecr 4y ago
That's not related to the concept at all, that's to do with first order and second order effects, not theories or descriptions about the same thing. Zvi Mowshowitz and Zeynep Tufekci (if that's really how their names are spelled) have written about the pandemic response problem, but I'm not sure how general their ideas are. They might be overfitted.

phrotoma 4y ago

One of my favourite things on youtube: “You Have No Idea How Wrong You Are” https://youtu.be/E8V8rtdXnLA https://youtu.be/E8V8rtdXnLA

agentgumshoe 4y ago
As evidenced across the social media spectrum in that so many people are convinced of how right they are now.
Eddy_Viscosity2 4y ago
Good video. Though I always think to myself when I see someone who isn't Dunning or Kruger explaining the Dunning-Kruger effect, that they themselves are likely subject to the very effect they are explaining by assuming they are more knowledgeable about the subject and the effect than they really are.

tokai 4y ago

Funny how the example of people one believing the earth is flat is also wrong.

jrootabega 4y ago

As interesting and good as that concept is, it doesn't seem notable enough for a wikipedia article.

callesgg 4y ago

Descriptions are models. All models have a validity-property, validity is a property that describes how well the model manages to model the thing that it is modeling. The less validity a model has, the more "wrong" it is. A description of the earth as flat, seamingly has a lower validity than a description as the earth as a perfect sphere. But ultimately it depends on how one measures validity.

wink 4y ago

I'm not sure the shape of the earth is good example here, because I, as someone not doing any geodesy professionally or at all, can accept the "sphere" as such a good enough approximation, like probably millions do. Every model you've seen at school, or in books, or planetariums are (to the human eye) indistinguishable from a sphere, which makes this very much a "well, actually". Yes, I guess after elementary school you'd add some "it's nearly a sphere" and "perfect spheres don't usually exist in the real world", but for all intents and purposes, it looks like a sphere. So maybe it's a good example after all ;)

d23 4y ago
Yeah I mean that’s basically the exact point of the example.

3pt14159 4y ago

At the risk of being derided as violating another top level comment[0] I'm going to try to evaluate the implied premise of this concept to try to show something I've been trying to put to words over the past couple years. For simplicity and brevity sake, let's say that there are two possible options that someone is weighing, having ruled out all the other competing options. The first option is Christianity. The second option is atheism grounded in scientific inquiry. You can call the second option empiricism or naturalism if you like. According to the first option, it is through faith with all your heart, soul, and mind that one is saved and that truth is found. Testing God, is explicitly forbidden. According to the second option, it is by testing falsifiable premises that the truth is found. The answer to unknowns is to admit that they're unknown, at least for now. Thomas Aquinas and the first mover argument is implicitly denied as an area of inquiry. Many proponents of the second option say "Well look! The distance of the light of the stars proves that the universe is billions of years old!" And proponents of the first option can respond in any number of ways ranging from testing the assumptions of modern scientific understanding of light (that it's speed is symmetrical from A to B and from B to A, despite already being relative in other ways) to pointing out Bible verses about how the Lord stretched out the heavens or cursed all of creation (and hence, possibly even history or time), many even apply the same type reasoning as the atheists when questioned about what caused anything to be and simply say "it's a mystery." Where I'm going with this is that conversations about what is wrong and how wrong it is depend so heavily on the very first thing you put your faith in and I believe this is something too many people shrug at. Basic, foundational theological or philosophical questions like "can a mind know a truth?" shouldn't be swept under the rug. They're more foundational than questions like "what caused the big bang?" [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35421355 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35421355

circlefavshape 4y ago
> Basic, foundational theological or philosophical questions like "can a mind know a truth?" shouldn't be swept under the rug. They're more foundational than questions like "what caused the big bang?" I think whether they are foundational or not is irrelevant. What matters is the effect pondering questions like these can have on people. Both kinds can have material consequences - theological/philosopical questioning can affect social behaviours and have wide-ranging societal effects, empirical questioning can result in new technologies which can do the same

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

aimor 4y ago

An example of plagiarism on Wikipedia. Even though it's well cited, the wiki authors are paraphrasing to pass off the original article's content as their own. Wikipedia: "It was described by Michael Shermer as Asimov's axiom.[1] The mistake was discussed in Isaac Asimov's book of essays The Relativity of Wrong[2] as well as in a 1989 article[3] of the same name in the Fall 1989 issue of the Skeptical Inquirer: When people thought the Earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the Earth was spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the Earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the Earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together. Asimov explained that science is both progressive and cumulative. Even though scientific theories are later proven wrong, the degree of their wrongness attenuates with time as they are modified in response to the mistakes of the past.[1] For example, data collected from satellite measurements show, to a high level of precision, how the Earth's shape differs from a perfect sphere or even an oblate spheroid or a geoid.[1]" The cited article: "Not even wrong. What could be worse? Being wronger than wrong, or what I call Asimov's axiom, well stated in his book The Relativity of Wrong (Doubleday, 1988): "When people thought the earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the earth was spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together." Asimov's axiom holds that science is cumulative and progressive, building on the mistakes of the past, and that even though scientists are often wrong, their wrongness attenuates with continued data collection and theory building. Satellite measurements, for instance, have shown precisely how the earth's shape differs from a perfect sphere." https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/wronger-than-wrong/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/wronger-than-wron...

Agraillo 4y ago
Thanks for the article, the ending is interesting because it mixed "Not Even Wrong" and Wronger than Wrong" (still wrapping my head around it): "But if you believe that thinking science is unbiased is just as wrong as thinking that science is socially constructed, then your view is not even wronger than wrong."

ngvrnd 4y ago

This reminds me of "all models are wrong, but some models are useful." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_models_are_wrong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_models_are_wrong) Outside of formal math, all we have are models, so there will often (always?) be an ordering of "less wrong" on model-based knowledge. So "wronger than wrong" is putting a heavy spin on the truth. More wrong models might still be useful.

drbig 4y ago
> be an ordering of "less wrong" on model-based knowledge. I'm of the _opinion_ that this is the only way of knowledge itself: less wrong as time spent on understanding approaches infinity. Math and models are between language and tools, the fundamental essence is the same though. Also, any predictive ability should ever be a side-effect, the core of inquiry is explanation. This is why a good-enough explanation of seasons on Earth is perfectly applicable to any other planet (in any solar system). And this is why ML models like AlphaGo are not helpful (you can't learn anything from them, including "how to be a better Go player"). In other words I stand with Deutsch, Popper and Everett on the interpretation of reality.
the_af 4y ago
> So "wronger than wrong" is putting a heavy spin on the truth Why do you think you are arguing against the concept? "Wronger than wrong" argues against believing everything is "equally wrong", which is precisely what your comment is also arguing against. In other words, you agree with Asimov that equating all thing as equally wrong is "wronger than wrong", since there will always (or often) be an ordering of "less wrong".
- ngvrnd 4y ago
  I wasn't arguing against it. I was commenting on it, sharing a thought. Peace.

ogurechny 4y ago

We shouldn't stop at that. If you actually try to apply your knowledge of “real shape of the Earth” to your regular activities (say, checking the ground level correction before making each step), you become thrice wrong. Confusing models of reality with reality is a sure way to get to the madhouse (I am sure there are stories about people thrilled to the core by the reality of being placed on a giant rotating ball instead of just the concept of the same). At the same time, it's something we all do each moment.

csours 4y ago

I really liked rational skepticism when I became an adult and re-evaluated the dogma of my childhood. I still really like it. Rational skepticism is a great tool to learn about the world. It is not a great tool for understanding what is "wrong" with people, or for communicating with people who are wrong. Flat earthers are not wrong because of science, they are wrong because of society. That is, most flat earthers turn away from our shared perception of the world because of some trauma in their lives. They have lost trust in something that they felt was solid. You may think that you believe in science because you are a logical person, but you really believe in science because people you respect believe in science. Science also has the benefit of actually working, which is nice, but many things can LOOK like they are working (epicycles of the planets, flat earth, miasma theory of disease). You can make scienticious (sic) sounding observations about all of these things. The point is that when you want to understand why people are wrong, you need to think about motivation and deeply held beliefs, not proof. Scientific proof is obviously very useful, but before you use that, you have to get them to come closer to you. Imagine a person standing on a hill. If they are shoved and fall down, they roll down the hill. Using the strongest arguments feels like the most effective thing to do. Strong arguments do move people, but you don't get to choose the direction they move.

biomcgary 4y ago
I believe & doubt science for the same reason, my experiences as a scientist. For example, I once reviewed a paper submitted to one of the big two science journals by a famous author at the top of their field. The self-reported statistics made it clear that the data was 95% noise. Although I and other reviewers torpedoed the paper, it was still published at top end paper with the statistics removed. Nothing like watching the sausage being made to understand why some choose to be vegan. Like soylent green, science is made of people.
ouid 4y ago
I believe you have made a subtle error. The people who do not "believe in science" and the people who reason socially are non-trivially correlated. There are three groups. People who claim to (believe/not believe) in science for social reasons, and those who actually practice science. The third group is the smallest, but it is not vanishingly small, and addressing your audience as if they "only think they practice science for logical reasons" is itself a social appeal. If you are describing yourself, say so. Don't engage in unfounded anti-intellectualism.