12 Science: A product of human creativity and discovery
Scientific knowledge is a description of the real world we have created from observations and interpretations
This is the thirteenth post in this series. You may want to read the Introduction titled The Myth of Scientific Uncertainty, and posts numbered 1-11 first.
Scientific findings are usually conveyed to students and the public as disembodied facts. Most presentations lack the story of how that knowledge came about. But for those who produce scientific knowledge, as with artists, their work is a personal creation. Research scientists in every field are aware of who first developed the concepts they now rely on. It has always been this way. Laura Snyder[1] tells us how 18th century natural philosophers coined the term ‘scientist’ as a parallel to ‘artist’ thus recognizing its creative aspect.
It is reasonable to think that if the laws of nature we have discovered are true, they would be the same regardless of who revealed them or where or when the work was done. This concept of scientific research is analogous to a treasure hunt where there is creativity in deciding where to look and how to interpret the clues, but the objects to be found are predetermined.
The concept of our form of scientific knowledge as a universality leads to thinking that equations etched into a metallic disc sent out in a space capsule would be recognized by intelligent extraterrestrials. Humans created the concepts of work, entropy, and energy and scores of other quantities. But are most other sentient species likely to have organized their observations of nature in the same way?
Jacob Bronowski doesn’t think so:[2]
Knowledge grows because human minds work at that, and it is a workaday job which we have to get on with; no stroke of luck will find knowledge for us, for it is not there to be stumbled on, ready-made, like a lost corridor. It is not even there to be put together from its parts like a prefabricated building. None of these metaphors describes the reality of scientific knowledge because all of them suppose that there is somewhere a structure of knowledge which is closed. But knowledge is not a structure in this sense at all; it is not a building, or any piece of architecture; you could not put the roof on it or close it with a keystone. Our discoveries are creations, not preordained conclusions, and the raw materials that go into that process are likewise not predetermined.
From this point of view, not only is our organization of knowledge specifically human, there is also no consistent pattern in its creation. In my experience, breakthrough realizations have most often come when I was just waking or doing some semi-autonomous thing, like taking a shower. It’s as though my mind has been working in “background” mode and is most successful when unimpeded by stress and undirected by effort. I don’t know how to trigger such events, so I’m just grateful when they occur.
Carlo Rovelli[3] sees it as having a vision. “Science begins with vision. Scientific thought is fed by the ability to ‘see’ things differently that they have previously been seen.” The last part, coming up with an explanation for what is discovered, involves imagination. The word itself is derived from the making of images in the mind, which then, through analogous processes, extends our knowledge.
The stories of scientific intuition and revelation in the history of science are as fascinating as they are varied, which is not surprising since we all are wired differently from the moment of our arrival and then individually shaped by personal experience. Despite the often-monolithic characterization of scientists, we are a remarkably varied lot. The mentors we worked with were significantly disparate in their backgrounds, interests, and methods.
Then there are all the non-technical experiences that factor in, such as being handy with tools, having an interest in gardening, photography, or music. These individual qualities and life stories unavoidably affect how we go about our investigations and where our interests and imagination will take us.
Creating science is making sense out of our observations of natural phenomena. We can only see what our senses (often aided by instruments) tell us. Even among creatures on earth, these vary greatly. Surely the world view of whales is vastly different from our own. The stuff from which we infer our laws is bound by what we can experience. Then, regarding explanations, they can only ‘make sense’ if they correspond to other behaviors with which we are familiar.
Even though scientific knowledge is the result of a creative process and likely not universal, it works for us, and our lives are, for the most part, the better for it.
In the next post, we will explore a less worthy aspect of the fact that humans do science, i.e., bias.
Please spread the word that there are some things we know for sure, and we can logically demonstrate how we know that.
[1] Snyder, Laura J., The Philosophical Breakfast Club, Broadway Books, New York, 2011. p. 165.
[2] Bronowski, Jacob, A Sense of the Future, Essays in Natural Philosophy, MIT Press, Cambridge Massachusetts, 1977.
[3] Carlo Rovelli, Seven Brief Lessons on Physics, p. 21.
Beautiful discussion.
Re bias, be sure to include the Union of Concerned Scientists' Disinformation Playbook. https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/disinformation-playbook This is the intentional bias present in, for instance, the electromagnetic radiation bioeffects science, and in other science as well. The inconvenient truths. Despite scientists' efforts to get information out to the public that could protect them from EMR harm, the wireless industry has continually pumped false information in an attempt to protect their products. They've used the same playbook since 1980s and 90s. Non-experts in the field spread that false information unwittingly or for a consultant's fee.