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You mean like gravity? As far as I'm aware, that hasn't exactly been fully understood yet either... Modern psychology is very much a science today, and if anyt

You mean like gravity? As far as I'm aware, that hasn't exactly been fully understood yet either... Modern psychology is very much a science today, and if anything, it's like the relativity to neurology's QM. Both are useful and ultimately related aspects, we're just still in the middle of working out the details right now. It's disingenuous to deem either more/less valuable than the other so prematurely.

richardjordan 13y ago
That's a nonsensical analogy. We understand gravity to staggering levels of precision. Psychology may be a science but to suggest that we have anything like the detailed models and level of experimentally verifiable understanding of it, that we do for the laws of Physics, is what is disingenuous. This is partly because psychology is such a young science in comparison, and possibly partly because by the nature of complex systems we are less able to create such precise mathematical models which describe it. It is nothing like relativity and neurology has no analog in QM. I am not sure if it's psychology/neurology or relativity/QM you lack a firm grasp of but it appears to be at least one or the other.
- oblique63 13y ago
  > We understand gravity to staggering levels of precision. If I understood the parent correctly, the argument was that the brain was still a 'black box' in that we don't understand how/why exactly it works, therefore it's sketchy to use it without the public knowing that it's 'just a model'. The point is not that gravity is anything like psychology, but that they both seem to share the same predicament with regards to their origins. It'd be naive to say that we don't know much about it, but if I'm behind on some findings that detail what gravity is, that would be helpful feedback. > This is partly because psychology is such a young science in comparison Exactly. This is why discrediting it as a legitimate science when it needs all the cross-disciplinary help it can get is so unnerving. We aren't gonna make inroads into understanding ourselves too quickly if we raise a generation of people to dismiss it like that. >I am not sure if it's psychology/neurology or relativity/QM you lack a firm grasp of but it appears to be at least one or the other. Both my good sir! (academically speaking anyway). The point I was emphasizing was the relationship, not either science -- thus, unless I'm wrong and we're convinced the effects of relativity are not emergent from QM, I'm not sure how it makes a difference? What seems to be disingenuous is dismissing the metaphor (read: literary analogy) for not being in complete 1:1 correspondence in practice -- it was a conceptual point. I was talking about forests, and you seem to be talking about trees. But if you feel I lack some critical knowledge about said trees, please do try to clarify your point, because I've received a fair number of upvotes for that comment so I think a good number of us 'laypeople' would benefit from such an analysis.
  - foobarbazqux 13y ago
    I think I understand where you're coming from: an apple hit Newton on the head because "gravity", students chose cake after memorizing a long number because "brain". The difference is that you can measure the force gravity exerts and quantify it directly, but with psychology (as opposed to behavioral biology) you have to ask the brain to tell you what is going on in English and then make guesses about the circuitry inside of this complex system that you have no way of verifying (e.g. "why did you choose the cake?"). Anyway, just to clarify, psychology is valuable without being science, and it has been for thousands of years. It's our society's insistence that science is the only valid way of understanding the world that is the problem.
    - oblique63 13y ago
      > you have to ask the brain to tell you what is going on in English and then make guesses about the circuitry inside of this complex system that you have no way of verifying Ah, but this is where neurology steps in (when possible), no? There are ways of objectively observing the physical phenomena that are associated with such abstract actions after all, we just don't quite know what they mean or how exactly they fit together yet -- but that shouldn't matter because everything will still be just as correct, since we're speaking in terms of macro-level abstractions. Not knowing about atoms didn't hinder our development of insight into classical mechanics after all. > psychology is valuable without being science... It's our society's insistence that science is the only valid way of understanding the world that is the problem. See, this is odd. I think it would help a lot of people if you explained your definition of "science" a bit instead of just giving us your conclusions, because to me it feels like we're speaking different languages right now. As far as I've understood it, Science is a process (adhering to the Scientific Method), and I recognize that there exists good science and poor science, and that results can be qualitative or quantitative, but your definition of "science" seems to convolute all these different concepts into a set of arbitrarily rigid conditions. Science can be of totally bad quality + with no quantitative measurements and still be "Science". But your definition of "Science" seems to be based around the exclusion of such endeavors (hence getting reactions that link it to a negative connotation). I'm confused. I think it would be beneficial to see an elaboration on what you mean here.

richardjordan 13y ago

That's a nonsensical analogy. We understand gravity to staggering levels of precision. Psychology may be a science but to suggest that we have anything like the detailed models and level of experimentally verifiable understanding of it, that we do for the laws of Physics, is what is disingenuous. This is partly because psychology is such a young science in comparison, and possibly partly because by the nature of complex systems we are less able to create such precise mathematical models which describe it. It is nothing like relativity and neurology has no analog in QM. I am not sure if it's psychology/neurology or relativity/QM you lack a firm grasp of but it appears to be at least one or the other.

oblique63 13y ago
> We understand gravity to staggering levels of precision. If I understood the parent correctly, the argument was that the brain was still a 'black box' in that we don't understand how/why exactly it works, therefore it's sketchy to use it without the public knowing that it's 'just a model'. The point is not that gravity is anything like psychology, but that they both seem to share the same predicament with regards to their origins. It'd be naive to say that we don't know much about it, but if I'm behind on some findings that detail what gravity is, that would be helpful feedback. > This is partly because psychology is such a young science in comparison Exactly. This is why discrediting it as a legitimate science when it needs all the cross-disciplinary help it can get is so unnerving. We aren't gonna make inroads into understanding ourselves too quickly if we raise a generation of people to dismiss it like that. >I am not sure if it's psychology/neurology or relativity/QM you lack a firm grasp of but it appears to be at least one or the other. Both my good sir! (academically speaking anyway). The point I was emphasizing was the relationship, not either science -- thus, unless I'm wrong and we're convinced the effects of relativity are not emergent from QM, I'm not sure how it makes a difference? What seems to be disingenuous is dismissing the metaphor (read: literary analogy) for not being in complete 1:1 correspondence in practice -- it was a conceptual point. I was talking about forests, and you seem to be talking about trees. But if you feel I lack some critical knowledge about said trees, please do try to clarify your point, because I've received a fair number of upvotes for that comment so I think a good number of us 'laypeople' would benefit from such an analysis.
- foobarbazqux 13y ago
  I think I understand where you're coming from: an apple hit Newton on the head because "gravity", students chose cake after memorizing a long number because "brain". The difference is that you can measure the force gravity exerts and quantify it directly, but with psychology (as opposed to behavioral biology) you have to ask the brain to tell you what is going on in English and then make guesses about the circuitry inside of this complex system that you have no way of verifying (e.g. "why did you choose the cake?"). Anyway, just to clarify, psychology is valuable without being science, and it has been for thousands of years. It's our society's insistence that science is the only valid way of understanding the world that is the problem.
  - oblique63 13y ago
    > you have to ask the brain to tell you what is going on in English and then make guesses about the circuitry inside of this complex system that you have no way of verifying Ah, but this is where neurology steps in (when possible), no? There are ways of objectively observing the physical phenomena that are associated with such abstract actions after all, we just don't quite know what they mean or how exactly they fit together yet -- but that shouldn't matter because everything will still be just as correct, since we're speaking in terms of macro-level abstractions. Not knowing about atoms didn't hinder our development of insight into classical mechanics after all. > psychology is valuable without being science... It's our society's insistence that science is the only valid way of understanding the world that is the problem. See, this is odd. I think it would help a lot of people if you explained your definition of "science" a bit instead of just giving us your conclusions, because to me it feels like we're speaking different languages right now. As far as I've understood it, Science is a process (adhering to the Scientific Method), and I recognize that there exists good science and poor science, and that results can be qualitative or quantitative, but your definition of "science" seems to convolute all these different concepts into a set of arbitrarily rigid conditions. Science can be of totally bad quality + with no quantitative measurements and still be "Science". But your definition of "Science" seems to be based around the exclusion of such endeavors (hence getting reactions that link it to a negative connotation). I'm confused. I think it would be beneficial to see an elaboration on what you mean here.