Moving in the wrong direction: rejecting science

The attacks on science are as bold and far-reaching as never before. They include huge cuts in research funds, which will stymie current programs and will block the careers of future scientists. And now they directly attack the American health and life span with the sabotage of the very processes of our extensive public health system, exemplified by the destruction of the CDC. 

I am not an expert on medicine or public health, but I am a scientist and engineer. So I thought it might be a good time to remind readers about the essence of science: what it actually is, and why it is so important – and that it’s not just as the basis for the next iPhone advance (though it’s behind that too, of course).

What is science anyway?

At its fundamentals, science is NOT a set of approved facts. At any given time, and in every legitimate scientific discipline, the accepted models are always under scrutiny and open for change^[1]. Peer review can be brutal – we love to find the flaws in what someone else has done and propose what we think is better. But out of the turbulence of criticism from others in your field can come the best current model for something in our physical or virtual world. The fact that we know it can change is what gives us confidence, as we can generally trust it as the product of sincere efforts to find the truth. 

It is that process, the generation and scrutiny of models, that is the essence of science (and of science-driven engineering). The backbone of it is the scientific method: observing a phenomenon, proposing a model for it along with a way of testing that model, testing it (not just by the proposer, but by others qualified to do the testing), assessing the results of the testing, and modifying the model to reflect those results. And so on, ad infinitum.

How science functions

Peer-review of all of that is an essential element that our society has developed. It’s far from infallible. I certainly have had my share of complaints about reviews of my grant proposals and research papers.  But it’s the best we’ve got.

Science, most fundamentally, is a process for moving forward in a world we never entirely understand. It is the best approach for dealing with uncertainty that we know. It is an active process, a methodology, and NOT a set of approved facts. It is a system for rational thought and decision-making which is one of the key advances of modern civilization. 

It is a measure of our progress that we no longer imprison scientists for holding unpopular ideas, as happened to Galileo. He was put under lifetime house arrest for noting that the earth revolves around the sun rather than the other way around. Let’s hope we don’t go back to those dark days.

When you don’t know something with 100% certainty, you can just dream up whatever you want, or you can favor the most likely answer. Sometimes it will be wrong, but it’s better than throwing up your hands and saying aliens did it. Science provides a demonstrably better process for assessing the most likely answer. 

Wrong way on our one-way street

Science is under attack as never before in our country. We need to defend it. And move the country back to a direction that is not endangered by all the oncoming “traffic” (like pandemics to come).

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^[1] I’ve always loved the quote from British statistician George Box, “All models are wrong, but some are useful.” We go with the ones that are helpful in what we are trying to accomplish.