I'm about to embark on a major project for this blog, but before I do, I thought I should touch on science itself: its role, and its responsibilities.
I'm a scientist. I say that not because I do academic research (I don't), or because I hold degrees in some branch of science (I do), or because I work for a company doing scientific R&D (again, not the case). I call myself a scientist because I believe science is a powerful tool that can be applied to many parts of our lives, and a means to answering many questions (some of which have real and immediate impact). I call myself a scientist because I use science nearly every day, on a personal level.
Science is a process. You don't need a lab or even a formal education to use it; the only special equipment required is a brain. It is a process of observation, analysis, projection, and deduction which makes sense of the world around us. That's all. Like any tool, you need to understand how it works, and use it properly, to get a good result, but when you get down to the process itself, it's not complicated.
The first step is to find something you want to know about. It might come about from seeing something in your backyard and thinking, "That's odd. Why is this happening?" You look a little closer, and observe it. You ask somebody who might know a little about it. Then, from what you see and hear about it, you form an idea. "This must be why it's happening." Many people stop there, and go on to other things.
Science takes it further. You figure out a test which would show whether you're right or not. "If that's why it's happening, then this other thing must be going on." You try to gather more observations to show that your deduction, your
hypothesis, is right. If you can't support it, then you can't say that you were right in the first place (but you might not be wrong). If the evidence does back you up, then you can conclude that your original idea is correct. If a bunch of different tests still show you were right, you can say you've proven a
theory. It's backed up by facts, and it's as solid as all your tests can make it.
We talk loosely about the laws of physics, but science doesn't actually have "laws", it has theories. Unlike a guess that you might make offhand, some of those scientific theories are supported by so much evidence, and so many tests, that they're about as close as you can get to law. Theories aren't set in stone, though: they can be disproven. Someone can always challenge a theory. Keep in mind the word "disproven" -- to take down a proven theory, it must be proven wrong in a manner equally convincing.
This is the heart of the tug-of-war at the heart of the scientific community. People are always making new theories, and their fellows are pulling the theories this way and that, trying to show any holes or see whether they'll come apart. Old, established theories have new experiments picking away at them, to find out whether there are cracks in them in the light of what we know now. It's dynamic, sometimes chaotic, often full of arguments, but out of that process -- the scientific method and the discussions that follow -- comes a robust understanding of how the world works.
There is such a thing as bad science, where the process isn't applied correctly. When you only accept evidence which says you're right, that's bad science. Using the wrong equipment, or limiting yourself to small groups or places, can bring in errors that lead to bad conclusions. To get the sort of solid, reliable results that you can depend on like fact, the tool of science has to be used properly, from beginning to end. Making sure of that takes more than having a couple of other scientists look over what you did, which is what "
peer reviewed" means. It takes getting what you did out there, into the scientific community, so that everybody can see it and decide whether you did it right. Only by that sort of teamwork can science build on our knowledge.
There are those who say that science is a kind of religion, that scientists have faith in science like a Christian has faith in God. That's not really true. We have confidence in science. We have
trust in science.
One
difference between trust and faith is that a subject must prove that it
is worthy of trust to earn it, but must prove itself unworthy of faith
to lose it. It's a question of on which side of the line the burden
lies.
The fact that trust is so easily lost is why scandals about the scientific community can be so damaging. Finding out that a prominent scientist falsified his data, or that the authors of a published paper don't actually exist at all, make us wonder about all the other scientists and papers out there. It throws doubt on the whole field of science. It's fair to ask, "Did this person use the evidence they gathered properly?" It's good to wonder whether the way we accept formal papers and seek consensus is useful. What we shouldn't fall into is a doubt of the scientific method itself.
Science is a tool, one which has proven its usefulness time after time. If something goes wrong, it's not the tool that's at fault -- it's the person using it. We all make mistakes, and there are people who will try to deceive others; the tug-of-war in scientific discussion is how we find those out and expose them. The community as a whole wants to find the truth, which is the ultimate goal. What one person wants, or wishes, has to give way to that.
As a scientist, I want to find the truth, as best we can understand it. As someone who writes about science, I strive to stay impartial, and set aside my own biases in the pursuit of that truth. I do have very strong feelings about some issues, but those feelings have no place here, except as a driving force. What I put here, on this blog, is my best effort to distill facts into a form everyone can understand, without opinion. I take pride in doing it well. The sole exception is in pieces like this editorial, which are my own thoughts, lacking the usual references. I promise these editorials will be well-labeled.
As you read about the science I explore here, ask questions. "Where did she get that?" "Is that really what happens?" Challenge what you read. Check up on it. I offer references; if you can find evidence that says my conclusion is wrong, call me on it. All I ask is that you use the most fundamental evidence you can, from what is called "primary sources": research papers, government figures, impartial investigators without an axe to grind. I drill down to primary sources for my conclusions; to make a convincing argument, you'll need to do likewise. If you do that, I promise not to be offended if you tell me I'm wrong. (Just be ready for me to come back with why I might still think I'm right.)
Always think, question, analyze, challenge. It's what makes us strong.
