Science

110
Introduction to Scientific
Thought
Spring
2010
 My heart leaps up when I behold
A Rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is father of the man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety

by William Wordsworth
 Flower in the crannied wall,
I pluck you out the crannies,
I hold you here, root and all, in my hand,
Little flower – but ‘if’ I could understand
What you are, root and all, and all in all,
I should know what God and man is.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Introduction to Scientific
Thought
 Introduction to Scientific
Thought
• The Scientific Method
• Discuss Syllabus
• Course Project-Original Scientific Experiment
• Teams
• Email Addresses
• Test Your Scientific Literacy
• The Shroud of Turin
• Nature of Evidence and Good Science
• Suicide of Reason
COURSE OBJECTIVES:

1. Acquiring critical thinking skills.

Critical thinking is deciding rationally what to or what not to believe

2. Comprehending how scientists discover basic laws of nature.

3. Obtaining knowledge of the history and philosophy of science.

The Philosophy of Science is concerned with science - specifically, how science operates, what the goals of
science should be, what relationship science should have with the rest of society, the differences between science
and other activities, etc. Everything that happens in science has some relationship with the Philosophy of Science.

4. Gaining ability to distinguish real science from pseudo-sciences.

Pseudoscience begins with a hypothesis then looks only for items which appear to support it.
Generally speaking, the aim of pseudoscience is to rationalize strongly held beliefs, rather than to investigate or to
test alternative possibilities. Pseudoscience specializes in jumping to "congenial conclusions," grinding ideological
axes, appealing to preconceived ideas and to widespread misunderstandings.

5. Adding skepticism to your intellectual kit.

 The Scientific Method
Science employs the scientific method. No, there's no such
method: Doing science is not like baking a cake. Science
can be proved on the basis of observable data. No, general
theories about the natural world can't be proved at all. Our
theories make claims that go beyond the finite amount of
data that we've collected. There's no way such extrapolations
from the evidence can be proved to be correct. Science can
be disproved, or falsified, on the basis of observable data.
No, for it's always possible to protect a theory from an
apparently confuting observation. Theories are never tested
in isolation but only in conjunction with many other extra-
theoretical assumptions (about the equipment being used,
about ambient conditions, about experimenter error, etc.).
It's always possible to lay the blame for the confutation at
the door of one of these assumptions, thereby leaving one's
theory in the clear.
 JABBERWOCKY
Lewis Carroll
Through the Looking-Glass

• `Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
• Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
• All mimsy were the borogoves,
• And the mome raths outgrabe.
• One, two! One, two! And through and through
• The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
• He left it dead, and with its head
• He went galumphing back.

• "Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

• "And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
• The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
• Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun • Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
• The frumious Bandersnatch!" • O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
• He chortled in his joy.
• He took his vorpal sword in hand:
• Long time the manxome foe he sought -- • `Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
• So rested he by the Tumtum tree, • Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
• And stood awhile in thought. • All mimsy were the borogoves,
• And the mome raths outgrabe.
• And, as in uffish thought he stood,
• The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
• Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
• And burbled as it came!
 COURSE TOPICS

The nature of Evidence. What is the relationship between observation and hypothesis?
History of Science
What is science? Is there such a thing as science?
The Art of Observation – Optical Illusions, Modern Art and Gestalt Formation
Philosophical foundations of science
Good Science, Bad Science and Pseudo-Science
Great Ideas in Science
Alternative medicine, medical quackery, and hoaxes
Scientific literacy
The Precautionary Principle
Religion and Science
Ethics and science- Tolerance and intolerance
Observation – art and illusions
Science and art
Technology - applied science
Limitation of Science
Serendipity in Science
Required Texts:
The Scientists, John Gribbin, Random House, New York, 2003

The Borderline of Science, Michael Shermer, Oxford University Press,

New York, 2002

You are responsible to read the text on your own. Once a week there is a
quiz based on the text and lectures. Lectures will not only supplement
textural material covered, but also discuss topic not found in the text.
CLASS SCHEDULE

Lecture Reading Assignment Homework Assignment Date: week of

Discuss Syllabus and Science Project. Copernicus ŅMy heart Leaps UpÉÓ 1/23
Introductory Lecture pp 1 to 32 Bathroom mirror experiment First day of class
Shroud of Turin Brahe / Kepler Shroud of Turin
Bowen Massage pp. 33 to 67 Is Bowen good medicine?
The universe and the Standard Model Galileo/Descartes Garbage bag experiment 1/30
pp 68 to 148 Rainbows, clouds, sunsets Quiz 1

History of science Newton pp 149 to 241 NewtonÕs methodology 2/06

Independent, dependent, and control How does a Greenhouse work and Quiz 2
variables. Pendulum. how explains global warming
Hot & Cold Experiment
History of Science Chemistry/ Periodic table Describe how a calendar works, 2/13
pp 241 to 318 Solar time, GMT, sidereal time, lunar Exam 1
time
Philosophical foundations of science Sky in a bottle 2/20
Logical fallacies Quiz 4

What is science? Induction/deduction Geology/Darwin pp 319 to 358 Debate: Creative Design vs. Evolution 2/27
connection between observation and Number series Quiz 5
Theory Origin of bipedalism
The origin life -What is man?

Philosophers of Science- Mb ius Strip 3/06

Scientific Method Red and Green Quiz 6
Diffraction

Observation Š art and illusions Atoms/ molecules Chromatography of leaf or black 3/13
Gestalt Formation Pp 359 to 399 marking pen Exam 2
Shape of cumulus clouds
Color of sunrise or sunset
Science and art Is the horizon curved? 3/20
Quiz 7

Bad science: Electromagnetism pp 400 to 441 1. Invent a code 3/27

1.Polywater 2. Who is Leonard Horowitz? Exam 2
2.Cold Fusion Thermite explosion in class

Scientific Literacy Prove the Earth is not flat. 4/06

Applied science
Limitation of Science
Pseudoscience
& alternative medicine,
& medical quackery, hoaxes, ESP
Steel is denser than water, yet steel
ships float: explain
Plate tectonics pp 442 to 486 Pro/con:
Is Wegener a pseudo-scientist? 4/17
Quiz 8

Pseudoscience Match Jet 4/24

&Logical deceptions Slime Exam 3
Urban Legends

Skepticism Planck, Bohr, Einstein Pro/Con discussion ethical questions: 5/01

Ethics and science pp 487 to 528 abortion; cloning; euthanasia; animal Quiz 9
rights
NI3 explosive
The Precautionary Principle What are you taking? Find whatÕs in 5/08
Limitation of Science that stuff. Science Project
Serendipity

Religion and Science Life pp 529 to 572 5/15

Anthropic Principle Last day of Class
Tolerance and intolerance
Science Project Due 5/22
 Test Your Scientific Literacy
1. Scientists usually expect an experiment to turn out a certain way.
2. Science only produces tentative conclusions that can change.
3. Science has one uniform way of conducting research called “the scientific method.”
4. Scientific theories are explanations and not facts.
5. When being scientific one must have faith only in what is justified by empirical evidence.
6. Science is just about the facts, not human interpretations of them.
7. To be scientific one must conduct experiments.
8. Scientific theories only change when new information becomes available.
9. Scientists manipulate their experiments to produce particular results.
10. Science proves facts true in a way that is definitive and final.
11. An experiment can prove a theory true.
12. Science is partly based on beliefs, assumptions, and the non-observable.
13. Imagination and creativity are used in all stages of scientific investigations.
14. Scientific theories are just ideas about how something works.
15. A scientific law is a theory that has been extensively and thoroughly confirmed.
16. Scientists’ education, background, opinions, disciplinary focus, and basic guiding assumptions
and philosophies influence their perception and interpretation of the available data.
17. A scientific law will not change because it has been proven true.
18. An accepted scientific theory is an hypothesis that has been confirmed by considerable evidence
and has endured all attempts to disprove it.
19. A scientific law describes relationships among observable phenomena but does not explain
them.
20. Science relies on deduction (x entails y) more than induction (x implies y).
21. Scientists invent explanations, models or theoretical entities.
22. Scientists construct theories to guide further research.
23. Scientists accept the existence of theoretical entities that have never been directly observed.
24. Scientific laws are absolute or certain.
 Psychic for Pets
• Part medium, part mediator,
she began doing readings
that gave voice to the needs
of the Weber family dogs.
Kindly don’t throw us in the
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
car without telling us where
are needed to see this picture.
we’re going, an irritated
golden retriever named
Palomino requested through
Ms. Agro. Skye is such a big
baby, vented a pup named
True about a rival.
Choose a Destination in Koko's World

In Brooklyn, a Psychic for the

Famous, or Rather, for Their Pets
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
“Animals don’t really
have the ability to tell
their people what’s
going on, said Ms. Agro,
a young-looking 42
(which she attributes to
diligent managing of
her energy, just as
others attribute that
good fortune to smart
managing of their
diets). This is a way for
them to have someone
advocate for them.
 Can You Identify This
Individual?
• Was worshipped as a Good Shepherd, the Way, the Truth and the Light,
the Redeemer, the Savior, and the Messiah.
• Was believed to have been born of a virgin.
• Birthday celebrated yearly on Dec. 25.
• Was visited by shepherds and by Magi.
• Traveled through the countryside, taught, and performed miracles with his
12 disciples.
• He cast out devils, returned sight to the blind, healed the lame, etc.
• Symbols associated with him were a Lion and a Lamb.
• Held a last supper, was killed, buried in a rock tomb.
• He rose again after three days later he later ascended into heaven.
• Rituals include a Eucharist and six other sacraments.
Shroud of Turin an Illustrates of the Conflict Between Belief and Skepticism

The Shroud of Turin is a centuries old linen cloth that bears the image of a
crucified man. A man that millions believe to be Jesus of Nazareth. Is it
really the cloth that wrapped his crucified body, or is it simply a medieval
forgery, a hoax perpetrated by some clever artist? Modern science has
completed hundreds of thousands of hours of detailed study and intense
research on the Shroud. It is, in fact, the single most studied artifact in
human history, and we know more about it today than we ever have before.
And yet, the controversy still rages.
Face Negative and Positive
Images
Front View Shroud of Turin
 Carbon-14 in Living Things
• The carbon-14 atoms that cosmic rays create combine with
oxygen to form carbon dioxide, which plants absorb naturally
and incorporate into plant fibers by photosynthesis. Animals and
people eat plants and take in carbon-14 as well. The ratio of
normal carbon (carbon-12) to carbon-14 in the air and in all
living things at any given time is nearly constant. Maybe one in
a trillion carbon atoms are carbon-14. The carbon-14 atoms are
always decaying, but they are being replaced by new carbon-14
atoms at a constant rate. At this moment, your body has a
certain percentage of carbon-14 atoms in it, and all living plants
and animals have the same percentage.
 Turin Shroud confirmed as
a fake
"A medieval technique helped us to make a Shroud," Science & Vie (Science and Life) said
in its July issue. The Shroud is claimed by its defenders to be the cloth in which the body of
• Jesus Christ was wrapped after his crucifixion.

• It bears the faint image of a blood-covered man with holes in his hand and wounds in his
body and head, the apparent result of being crucified, stabbed by a Roman spear and
forced to wear a crown of thorns.

• In 1988, scientists carried out carbon-14 dating of the delicate linen cloth and concluded
that the material was made some time between 1260 and 1390. Their study prompted the
then archbishop of Turin, where the Shroud is stored, to admit that the garment was a
hoax. But the debate sharply revived in January this year.

• Drawing on a method previously used by skeptics to attack authenticity claims about the
Shroud, Science & Vie got an artist to do a bas-relief -- a sculpture that stands out from the
surrounding background -- of a Christ-like face.
 Turin Shroud confirmed as
a fake
• A scientist then laid out a damp linen sheet over the bas-relief and let it dry, so that the thin cloth was moulded onto the face.
Using cotton wool, he then carefully dabbed ferric oxide, mixed with gelatine, onto the cloth to make blood-like marks. When
the cloth was turned inside-out, the reversed marks resulted in the famous image of the crucified Christ.

• Gelatine, an animal by-product rich in collagen, was frequently used by Middle Age painters as a fixative to bind pigments to
canvas or wood.

• The imprinted image turned out to be wash-resistant, impervious to temperatures of 250 C (482 F) and was undamaged by
exposure to a range of harsh chemicals, including bisulphite which, without the help of the gelatine, would normally have
degraded ferric oxide to the compound ferrous oxide.

• The experiments, said Science & Vie, answer several claims made by the pro-Shroud camp, which says the marks could not
have been painted onto the cloth.

• For one thing, the Shroud's defenders argue, photographic negatives and scanners show that the image could only have
derived from a three-dimensional object, given the width of the face, the prominent cheekbones and nose.
 Turin Shroud confirmed as
a fake
• In addition, they say, there are no signs of any brush marks. And, they argue, no pigments could
have endured centuries of exposure to heat, light and smoke.

• For Jacques di Costanzo, of Marseille University Hospital, southern France, who carried out the
experiments, the mediaeval forger must have also used a bas-relief, a sculpture or cadaver to
get the 3-D imprint.

• The faker used a cloth rather than a brush to make the marks, and used gelatin to keep the rusty
blood-like images permanently fixed and bright for selling in the booming market for religious
relics.

• To test his hypothesis, di Costanzo used ferric oxide, but no gelatin, to make other imprints, but
the marks all disappeared when the cloth was washed or exposed to the test chemicals.

• He also daubed the bas-relief with an ammoniac compound designed to represent human sweat
and also with cream of aloe, a plant that was used as an embalming aid by Jews at the time of
Christ.
 Turin Shroud confirmed as
a fake
• He then placed the cloth over it for 36 hours -- the approximate time that Christ
was buried before rising again -- but this time, there was not a single mark on it.

• "It's obviously easier to make a fake shroud than a real one," Science & Vie
report dryly.

• The first documented evidence of the Shroud dates back to 1357, when it
surfaced at a church at Lirey, near the eastern French town of Troyes. In 1390,
Pope Clement VII declared that it was not the true shroud but could be used as
a representation of it, provided the faithful be told that it was not genuine.
Turin shroud 'older than
thought'
Tests in 1988 concluded the cloth was a medieval
"hoax”

The Shroud of Turin is much older than suggested by

radiocarbon dating carried out in the 1980s, according to
a new study in a peer-reviewed journal. A research
paper published in Thermochimica Acta suggests the
shroud is between 1,300 and 3,000 years old.The
author dismisses 1988 carbon-14 dating tests which
concluded that the linen sheet was a medieval fake.
 Homework Problem
• Does data supports the age of the shroud at
2000 years old?

• Have you stopped believing in Santa Claus?

What were your reasons?
Or do you still believe? What are your
reasons?
The controversy over the Shroud of Turin Illustrates
several issues in the nature of Science and Pseudoscience
 Issues
• What is evidence?
• What is the relationship between evidence
and hypothesis?
• How does one verify a hypothesis?
• Does inductive verification work?
• How does one know anything?
 Proper Science
• Consistent
• Parsimonious
• Retrogressive
• Progressive
• Testability
• Avoidance of supernal explanations
• Tentative
• Changeable
• Falsifiable
MARKS OF PSEUDOSCIENCE
• Has religion impeded or aided the progress
of science?
• Does religion encourage the adoption of
ideas without reason or evidence?
 Sam Harris: Science Must Destroy Religion

• 80% of Americans believe that Jesus rose literally to heaven.

• 22% are sure that he will return within the next 50 years.
• Another 22% think he probably will return in the next 50 years.
• 28% of Americans who believe in evolution.

Despite the ecumenical efforts of many well-intentioned people,

these irreconcilable religious commitments still inspire an appalling amount of human conflict.

Our fear of provoking religious hatred has rendered us incapable

of criticizing ideas that are now patently absurd and increasingly maladaptive.
It has also obliged us to lie to ourselves — repeatedly and at the highest levels — about the
compatibility between religious faith and scientific rationality.
 Sam Harris: Science Must Destroy Religion

The success of science often comes at the expense of religious dogma; the maintenance of religious
dogma always comes at the expense of science.

It is time we conceded a basic fact of human discourse: either a person has good reasons for what he
believes, or he does not. When a person has good reasons, his beliefs contribute to our growing
understanding of the world. We need not distinguish between "hard" and "soft" science here, or
between science and other evidence-based disciplines like history. There happen to be very good
reasons to believe that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. Consequently, the
idea that the Egyptians actually did it lacks credibility.

Every sane human being recognizes that to rely merely upon "faith" to decide specific questions of
historical fact would be both idiotic and grotesque — that is, until the conversation turns to the origin
of books like the bible and the Koran, to the resurrection of Jesus, to Muhammad's conversation with
the angel Gabriel, or to any of the other hallowed travesties that still crowd the altar of human
ignorance.
 Sam Harris: Science Must Destroy Religion

read words Sam Harris Mon Jan 2,11:25 AM ET

Science, in the broadest sense, includes all reasonable claims to knowledge about ourselves and the world. If
there were good reasons to believe that Jesus was born of a virgin, or that Muhammad flew to heaven on a
winged horse, these beliefs would necessarily form part of our rational description of the universe. Faith is
nothing more than the license that religious people give one another to believe such propositions when
reasons fail. The difference between science and religion is the difference between a willingness to
dispassionately consider new evidence and new arguments, and a passionate unwillingness to do so.
The distinction could not be more obvious, or more consequential, and yet it is everywhere elided, even in the
ivory tower.
Religion is fast growing incompatible with the emergence of a global, civil society. Religious faith — faith that
there is a God who cares what name he is called, that one of our books is infallible, that Jesus is coming back to
earth to judge the living and the dead, that Muslim martyrs go straight to Paradise, etc. — is on the wrong side of
an escalating war of ideas. The difference between science and religion is the difference between a
genuine openness to fruits of human inquiry in the 21st century, and a premature closure to such
inquiry as a matter of principle. I believe that the antagonism between reason and faith will only grow more
pervasive and intractable in the coming years. Iron Age beliefs — about God, the soul, sin, free will, etc. —
continue to impede medical research and distort public policy. The possibility that we could elect a U.S.
President who takes biblical prophesy seriously is real and terrifying; the likelihood that we will one day confront
Islamists armed with nuclear or biological weapons is also terrifying, and it is increasing by the day. We are
doing very little, at the level of our intellectual discourse, to prevent such possibilities.
 Sam Harris: Science Must Destroy Religion

Sam Harris Mon Jan 2,11:25 AM ET

In the spirit of religious tolerance, most scientists are keeping silent when they should be blasting the hideous
fantasies of a prior age with all the facts at their disposal.

To win this war of ideas, scientists and other rational people will need to find new ways of talking about ethics
and spiritual experience. The distinction between science and religion is not a matter of excluding our ethical
intuitions and non-ordinary states of consciousness from our conversation about the world; it is a matter of our
being rigorous about what is reasonable to conclude on their basis. We must find ways of meeting our
emotional needs that do not require the abject embrace of the preposterous. We must learn to invoke
the power of ritual and to mark those transitions in every human life that demand profundity — birth,
marriage, death, etc. — without lying to ourselves about the nature of reality.

I am hopeful that the necessary transformation in our thinking will come about as our scientific understanding of
ourselves matures. When we find reliable ways to make human beings more loving, less fearful, and
genuinely enraptured by the fact of our appearance in the cosmos, we will have no need for divisive
religious myths. Only then will the practice of raising our children to believe that they are Christian, Jewish,
Muslim, or Hindu be broadly recognized as the ludicrous obscenity that it is. And only then will we stand a
chance of healing the deepest and most dangerous fractures in our world.
Science―
•Systematized
observations and tests of
proposed explanations
•Full-time specialists
•Explanations accepted
only with tests
Religion―
•A formalized system
with detailed beliefs,
•full time specialists,
•social arbiter,
•explanations
accepted without test
Ways of Knowing:
The Nature of
Science
 A Private Universe

Why is this important

for this class?

Why are there

seasons?
Students build on their understanding that they
developed over the years before they walked into a
classroom.

Students do not discard old beliefs due to new.

Students learn and adjust their worldviews on a daily

basis.

Students provided with information that is believable

and useful are likely to keep it in mind and to continue
to use it when learning other information.
Research indicates that preconceptions need to
be examined and worked into the educational
process

Several problems may occur when prior

knowledge and new knowledge clash:

•Amnesia: the students forget the material

or even forget learning it

•Fantasia: the students misremember what

they have learned in such a way as to make
it compatible with prior knowledge with
which it originally conflicted

•Inertia: the students are unable to

synthesize or apply the facts they have
learned
The amazing thing about the clashing of new and old ideas
is that people can compartmentalize information, learn it
(usually memorize it) for the short term, and then snap back
to their previous beliefs.

To break this cycle requires examining original beliefs in

light of the newer learnt material.
 Three steps for dealing
with the unknown

Explanation―
developing relationships between the known and the
unknown: stories, myths, tales, theories

Prediction―
if/then statements: taboos, adages, hypotheses

Control―
gives confidence and power that if you do certain things,
you will get a certain result: rituals, experiments
How do we respond?

Magic―
•A "black box"
•Part-time specialists
•difficult to control
•Accepts explanations without
question
 Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
The argument that language defines the way a person
behaves and thinks has existed since the early 1900's
when Edward Sapir first identified the concept. He
believed that language and the thoughts that we have
are somehow interwoven, and that all people are
equally being effected by the confines of their
language. In short, he made all people out to be
mental prisoners; unable to think freely because of
the restrictions of their vocabularies.
Ways of Knowing

"Received" wisdom
•Simple parental training
•Oral tradition
•Written word
•Faith
We face the ultimate brute question:
How you answer questions depends on your needs.
•Something is explained when it is the result of a general law
 Example? “What goes up, must come down” results from the law of gravity

•Something is explained when it is an example of a commonly understood

principle
 Example? Why is this water going downhill? Because water always flows
downhill.

•Something is explained when identifying the factors that connect two

or more events.
Example? The tree and house came down at the same time because a storm
came along with very high wind and hit both of them.
But how do we know what we know?

Epistemology
the nature of knowledge, its
presuppositions and
foundations, and its extent
and validity
the way that knowledge
claims are justified
How do people deal with the unknown?
The big problems?
We are conscious of our mortality.
We are aware of the limitations of our
knowledge…or should be.
We propose relationships between the known
and the unknown…
by using only terms and concepts of the
known.

An Unknown Man
cast glass with pate de verre inclusions
Linda Either info@lindaethier.com
Ways of Knowing

Perception
•The senses
Ways of Knowing
Science
Demands evidence, which makes
it materialistic
Hypotheses ― testable
statements of relationships
Tests are meant to falsify the
hypothesis (prove them wrong)
A theory is a body of interrelated
hypotheses that have been
difficult to falsify.
Truth vs. Validity

Truth is a matter of
belief or faith.
Validity is a matter of
how well an argument
meets the
requirements of the
system of logic within
which it operates.
 For scientists truth is an
unattainable goal, and in
fact, is dangerous.

However, scientists
constantly question validity.
In this class we’ll be doing science!