3 ms·

I'm afraid science is more complex than that. It's true that you don't have a proven theory, verified to the point that it can be considered settled, until you

I'm afraid science is more complex than that. It's true that you don't have a proven theory, verified to the point that it can be considered settled, until you have a statistically significant sample, a control group, and several replications. But a lot happens before you get to that point. You can't test every hypothesis you come up with; there's no time. The hypotheses that are worth testing have to be sorted from those that aren't. In fact, the medical literature is full of case studies. Do they prove anything? No. But they suggest things to try in subsequent cases that seem similar -- and if a technique finds enough success in practice, maybe it's worth doing a study on.

sliverstorm 12y ago
I guess I could have been more exact: If you don't have a statistically significant sample size and a control group, and you think it proves something, you are conducting bad science.
- ScottBurson 12y ago
  Okay, but the passage 'conception quoted said nothing about proving anything. I don't know what source that was quoted from or what other claims that document might make. (The quoted passage doesn't even tell us what theory its anecdote is being presented in support of.) But to claim that this passage in itself establishes that the source is "pseudoscience" or "bad science" is, frankly, ridiculous. You know, the scientific method has no special dispensations for orthodoxies -- if anything, the very notion of an orthodoxy should be repellent to a scientist. But scientists are human, and many people are attracted to orthodoxies. Yet if there's anything we know, it's that all theories, orthodox or not, have their limitations. Given that, isn't it a good thing that there are people willing to explore unorthodox possibilities even if most of them are wrong? I'm not suggesting credulity. I'm suggesting humility: a keen awareness of how much we still don't know.

sliverstorm 12y ago

I guess I could have been more exact: If you don't have a statistically significant sample size and a control group, and you think it proves something, you are conducting bad science.

ScottBurson 12y ago
Okay, but the passage 'conception quoted said nothing about proving anything. I don't know what source that was quoted from or what other claims that document might make. (The quoted passage doesn't even tell us what theory its anecdote is being presented in support of.) But to claim that this passage in itself establishes that the source is "pseudoscience" or "bad science" is, frankly, ridiculous. You know, the scientific method has no special dispensations for orthodoxies -- if anything, the very notion of an orthodoxy should be repellent to a scientist. But scientists are human, and many people are attracted to orthodoxies. Yet if there's anything we know, it's that all theories, orthodox or not, have their limitations. Given that, isn't it a good thing that there are people willing to explore unorthodox possibilities even if most of them are wrong? I'm not suggesting credulity. I'm suggesting humility: a keen awareness of how much we still don't know.