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One of my favorite ideas in Structure is Kuhn's observation that contradictory evidence seldom suffices to overturn a scientific theory. Contradictory evidence

One of my favorite ideas in Structure is Kuhn's observation that contradictory evidence seldom suffices to overturn a scientific theory. Contradictory evidence is the norm. What's required to overturn a scientific theory is both contradictory evidence and a better theory - and even then adoption is often grudging and uneven. I've found that idea to be very valuable when navigating disagreements at work (and in life generally). Refutation is seldom constructive in isolation - you also need to bring a constructive alternative if you want to keep things moving forward. I guess that sounds like common sense, but I'm surprised by how often people cleave to exclusively negative argumentation (particularly in political discussions).

andsoitis 3y ago
Couldn’t agree more. Dissent alone is usually not helpful, you should also want to collaborate on solutions. Be solution-oriented.
- ggm 3y ago
  This is precisely where the antiVax mob failed: they simply wanted to deny the science behind the epidemiology to refuse to vaccinate, and they had no alternate theory beyond lizard-people. Most of the "but there is no good evidence" arguing is not actually arguing in good faith. AGW isn't much different. People leap on 0.1C differences and say AHA fail without contextualising it and then argue anyone who contextualising is "lying" or "altering the data" its a bizarre reductionism, based on autodidact understanding of science. "Because I believe this is the scientific method all the other scientists are not scienting and this is not scientific therefore its trash therefore my theory based on lizard people wins"
oilchange 3y ago
> One of my favorite ideas in Structure is Kuhn's observation that contradictory evidence seldom suffices to overturn a scientific theory. That's not Kuhn's observation. Evidence immediately overturns a theory. What evidence doesn't do is get the scientific establishment to accept the new evidence. It's why paradigm shifts are rare and take a lot of time to happen. In many instances, society simply has to wait for the old to die and the new to gain power. > (particularly in political discussions). That was kuhn's point. Science operates more like politics and religion than science. Many times there is no reason, evidence or argument to change poeple's minds. You have to simply wait for the old guard to die off so that the new guard can usher in a paradigm shift. It's how einstein went to the grave believing "god does not play dice" regardless of all the evidence. And his death moved physics from the deterministic to the nondeterministic world ( paradigm shift ). For all the praise einstein gets, he was wrong about the most important and fundamental aspect of physics.

andsoitis 3y ago

Couldn’t agree more. Dissent alone is usually not helpful, you should also want to collaborate on solutions. Be solution-oriented.

ggm 3y ago
This is precisely where the antiVax mob failed: they simply wanted to deny the science behind the epidemiology to refuse to vaccinate, and they had no alternate theory beyond lizard-people. Most of the "but there is no good evidence" arguing is not actually arguing in good faith. AGW isn't much different. People leap on 0.1C differences and say AHA fail without contextualising it and then argue anyone who contextualising is "lying" or "altering the data" its a bizarre reductionism, based on autodidact understanding of science. "Because I believe this is the scientific method all the other scientists are not scienting and this is not scientific therefore its trash therefore my theory based on lizard people wins"

oilchange 3y ago

> One of my favorite ideas in Structure is Kuhn's observation that contradictory evidence seldom suffices to overturn a scientific theory. That's not Kuhn's observation. Evidence immediately overturns a theory. What evidence doesn't do is get the scientific establishment to accept the new evidence. It's why paradigm shifts are rare and take a lot of time to happen. In many instances, society simply has to wait for the old to die and the new to gain power. > (particularly in political discussions). That was kuhn's point. Science operates more like politics and religion than science. Many times there is no reason, evidence or argument to change poeple's minds. You have to simply wait for the old guard to die off so that the new guard can usher in a paradigm shift. It's how einstein went to the grave believing "god does not play dice" regardless of all the evidence. And his death moved physics from the deterministic to the nondeterministic world ( paradigm shift ). For all the praise einstein gets, he was wrong about the most important and fundamental aspect of physics.