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Models help test test our understanding of past events. If you can create a model that reproduces past events, there is a chance that you have understood someth

Models help test test our understanding of past events. If you can create a model that reproduces past events, there is a chance that you have understood something about those events. Equally, however, there is a chance that you have created a model that only coincidentally works, because you forced it to do so. When "scientific" articles write that a model "confirms" some conclusion, they are just wrong. Given enough free variables, you can construct a model that does anything you want. Models confirm nothing. "The results confirm the North African Humid Periods occurred every 21,000 years" No, they don't. Did the Sahara green every 21000 years? except when there were ice sheets? Only physical tests can confirm that. Do these greening phases correspond with orbital precession? Statistics can confirm that correlation. Running a model can test hypotheses of causality, but it doesn't "confirm" anything, least of all physical facts.

goatlover 3y ago
It's like how the model for a snow slab doesn't prove there was a snow slab that slipped over the Dyatlov Pass tent that night, despite what the media claimed about the case being solved. It only shows that it could have, assuming the data and assumptions are correct for that specific location. Or models showing some solution to the Fermi Paradox, and proponents claiming that the mystery is finally solved. How do they know the model is accurate?
- ImHereToVote 3y ago
  Because the only thing you can ever have is a theory. The strongest theory is the one that gets chosen. Theories vary in strength over time. Nothing is ever solved or proven. Theories get stronger and stronger evidence. Believing in a theory doesn't in any way help you make sense of the world. We just do it for expediency of communication.
  - strogonoff 3y ago
    Theories being ultimately all we have, there is (or should be) no “chosen” one. People are free to believe whatever—this is a pre-requisite for theories to evolve. There may be a theory that enjoys better predictive success for a while, but if everyone always believed in a singular “chosen” theory then we’d get nowhere: to evolve a better theory, you have to come up with and believe in something other than the preexisting one. Thus, it is normal for multiple theories to coexist at any given time. Crucially, a theory is all map no territory, always and necessarily. It describes something we do not understand in terms of something that we do understand. At its core, it is a metaphor—and more than one metaphor can be useful, each in a slightly different context.
    - meheleventyone 3y ago
      The chosen explanation should be held to be contingent and corrigible but that doesn’t mean all explanations should be held to the same regard particularly when some can be harmful as well as contradictory.
      - strogonoff 3y ago
        It is not abnormal for multiple theories or hypotheses to contradict each other. In strictly natural sciences it is usually possible to experimentally rule out some of them, but not always so (for example, sometimes the technology is not there). In philosophy it is often not the case (no experimental means available where concepts like “objective reality” are involved).
        meheleventyone 3y ago
        For sure but that should change how much regard we hold them in right? The example given by your sibling comment is a great one because we know that there is something we're missing in the explanations given by General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics and that's okay. It doesn't mean that neither are useful just that we understand their explanatory limits. In comparison flat-earth theory is basically completely contradictory to vast swathes of evidence and explanations.
        strogonoff 3y ago
        Flat Earth is more of a sign of protest masquerading as a theory rather than an actual theory. It appears to be more focused on finding elaborate ways to deny other theories rather than seeking truth. It is inelegant, illogical, and cannot be stated without involving a host of conspiracies of low probability. (The fact that one can only adopt it given values/traits/issues that let one seriously believe in those conspiracies may also make it useful for social signaling.) What I find tragic is that STEM-inclined crowd might have sort of triggered that defensive reaction by supplanting religion directly with natural sciences. Sometimes when you point out something similar to this thread (that physics does not make statements of absolute truth, there are only models of which none can be fully provably correct and complete, etc.) you encounter vicious insistence that the world is literally the way it is described in physics textbooks or Wikipedia—and it will stay that way until we are blessed with a new explanation for how things really are. You can notice how to a religious person this might feel indistinguishable to a competing religion, rather than an orthogonal aspect of worldview (it is completely possible to be both religious and a natural scientist). Come to think about it, even your comment sounds slightly off to me in this way, primarily due to the mention of “explanatory limits”. I would prefer another term (possibly “predictive limits”). Again, “explanatory limits” makes it sound as if GR or QM (or X or Y) is capable of “explaining” something. Taking a model, just one metaphor that fits how some aspect of apparent reality behaves in response to input or another observation, and using that metaphor to explain how things are in some objective sense (which is what I take “explanatory” means) is, to me, a misuse of the model. The fact that the model works for some of our purposes makes it useful, but does not grant it explanatory powers. I wish more of us techies resisted the urge to see in natural sciences explanatory powers that they do not possess, and instead branched a bit into philosophy—which can actually provide some grounds for meaningful discussions on topics that are out of scope of natural sciences per se. (As a side-effect, this might also make us more understanding and bearable to talk to for someone on a different bandwagon than ourselves.)
  - grog454 3y ago
    > Because the only thing you can ever have is a theory. Here's mine: there is a "correct" set of theories (or truths) that the universe adheres to, we're just nowhere close to even guessing at them yet. But current theories can be closer or farther to them
fklewjflkew 3y ago
[flagged]
- bradley13 3y ago
  Probably I shouldn't bother responding to your post, but I have a spare minute, so... This has nothing to do with "religion", except perhaps the religion of people who place far too much faith in models. You can, quite literally, construct a model to do anything you want. Cold fusion? The Fermi Paradox, either side? The sun about to go supernova? No problem. Of course, scientists generally build models honestly. However, when the models don't do quite what is wanted, it is all too easy to "tweak" them until they do. The scientists know what conclusion they believe in. Their models validate this conclusion. News at 11:00.

goatlover 3y ago

It's like how the model for a snow slab doesn't prove there was a snow slab that slipped over the Dyatlov Pass tent that night, despite what the media claimed about the case being solved. It only shows that it could have, assuming the data and assumptions are correct for that specific location. Or models showing some solution to the Fermi Paradox, and proponents claiming that the mystery is finally solved. How do they know the model is accurate?

ImHereToVote 3y ago
Because the only thing you can ever have is a theory. The strongest theory is the one that gets chosen. Theories vary in strength over time. Nothing is ever solved or proven. Theories get stronger and stronger evidence. Believing in a theory doesn't in any way help you make sense of the world. We just do it for expediency of communication.
- strogonoff 3y ago
  Theories being ultimately all we have, there is (or should be) no “chosen” one. People are free to believe whatever—this is a pre-requisite for theories to evolve. There may be a theory that enjoys better predictive success for a while, but if everyone always believed in a singular “chosen” theory then we’d get nowhere: to evolve a better theory, you have to come up with and believe in something other than the preexisting one. Thus, it is normal for multiple theories to coexist at any given time. Crucially, a theory is all map no territory, always and necessarily. It describes something we do not understand in terms of something that we do understand. At its core, it is a metaphor—and more than one metaphor can be useful, each in a slightly different context.
  - meheleventyone 3y ago
    The chosen explanation should be held to be contingent and corrigible but that doesn’t mean all explanations should be held to the same regard particularly when some can be harmful as well as contradictory.
    - strogonoff 3y ago
      It is not abnormal for multiple theories or hypotheses to contradict each other. In strictly natural sciences it is usually possible to experimentally rule out some of them, but not always so (for example, sometimes the technology is not there). In philosophy it is often not the case (no experimental means available where concepts like “objective reality” are involved).
      - meheleventyone 3y ago
        For sure but that should change how much regard we hold them in right? The example given by your sibling comment is a great one because we know that there is something we're missing in the explanations given by General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics and that's okay. It doesn't mean that neither are useful just that we understand their explanatory limits. In comparison flat-earth theory is basically completely contradictory to vast swathes of evidence and explanations.
        strogonoff 3y ago
        Flat Earth is more of a sign of protest masquerading as a theory rather than an actual theory. It appears to be more focused on finding elaborate ways to deny other theories rather than seeking truth. It is inelegant, illogical, and cannot be stated without involving a host of conspiracies of low probability. (The fact that one can only adopt it given values/traits/issues that let one seriously believe in those conspiracies may also make it useful for social signaling.) What I find tragic is that STEM-inclined crowd might have sort of triggered that defensive reaction by supplanting religion directly with natural sciences. Sometimes when you point out something similar to this thread (that physics does not make statements of absolute truth, there are only models of which none can be fully provably correct and complete, etc.) you encounter vicious insistence that the world is literally the way it is described in physics textbooks or Wikipedia—and it will stay that way until we are blessed with a new explanation for how things really are. You can notice how to a religious person this might feel indistinguishable to a competing religion, rather than an orthogonal aspect of worldview (it is completely possible to be both religious and a natural scientist). Come to think about it, even your comment sounds slightly off to me in this way, primarily due to the mention of “explanatory limits”. I would prefer another term (possibly “predictive limits”). Again, “explanatory limits” makes it sound as if GR or QM (or X or Y) is capable of “explaining” something. Taking a model, just one metaphor that fits how some aspect of apparent reality behaves in response to input or another observation, and using that metaphor to explain how things are in some objective sense (which is what I take “explanatory” means) is, to me, a misuse of the model. The fact that the model works for some of our purposes makes it useful, but does not grant it explanatory powers. I wish more of us techies resisted the urge to see in natural sciences explanatory powers that they do not possess, and instead branched a bit into philosophy—which can actually provide some grounds for meaningful discussions on topics that are out of scope of natural sciences per se. (As a side-effect, this might also make us more understanding and bearable to talk to for someone on a different bandwagon than ourselves.)
- grog454 3y ago
  > Because the only thing you can ever have is a theory. Here's mine: there is a "correct" set of theories (or truths) that the universe adheres to, we're just nowhere close to even guessing at them yet. But current theories can be closer or farther to them

fklewjflkew 3y ago

[flagged]

bradley13 3y ago
Probably I shouldn't bother responding to your post, but I have a spare minute, so... This has nothing to do with "religion", except perhaps the religion of people who place far too much faith in models. You can, quite literally, construct a model to do anything you want. Cold fusion? The Fermi Paradox, either side? The sun about to go supernova? No problem. Of course, scientists generally build models honestly. However, when the models don't do quite what is wanted, it is all too easy to "tweak" them until they do. The scientists know what conclusion they believe in. Their models validate this conclusion. News at 11:00.