Re: The "Science can't explain this" fallacy

On 7/2/06, Nadav Har'El <nyh-TS7m/[email protected]> wrote:
> Often us "science types" find ourselves talking to supporters of
> "alternative medicine", to sellers of all sorts of "tosafei mazon" advertised
> on TV and sold in pharmacies; We also talk to supporters of astrology,
> to religious people, and all sorts of other "quacks" (as we see them).
>
> When we ask them to justify their beliefs (or the product they have been
> selling), and tell them that their claims have never been scientifically
> validated, often they give a very short and, they think, conclusive, answer:
> "Science doesn't yet understand everything. One day science will know
> we're right".

Hi Nadav, all

I agree and share your distaste of this claim, that 'science still
can't explain'. "Science", however, needs a proper definition.

From the American Heritage dictionary:
Science n.

   1.
         1. The observation, identification, description, experimental
investigation, and theoretical explanation of phenomena.
         2. Such activities restricted to a class of natural phenomena.
         3. Such activities applied to an object of inquiry or study.
   2. Methodological activity, discipline, or study: I've got packing
a suitcase down to a science.
   3. An activity that appears to require study and method: the
science of purchasing.
   4. Knowledge, especially that gained through experience.
   5. Science: Christian Science.

I'm afraid that most people in this context refer to definition no. 4
- the knowledge attained from the scientific study. I would like to
concentrate on no. 1 - the process of "doing science".

The scientific method is a process in which you increase the amount of
knowledge that you have. The way you do it is by going through the
following steps:

1. Data collection. You collect the available data that you have, and
make it available to you.

2. Hypothesis. Here the scientist's creative mind comes into play. You
take this information and generate some new piece of information. One
way to do it is by applying DEDUCTION on the data you already have by
applying logic or inferring a necessary result. If X is true and X -->
Y then Y is true. This process is not creative in the sense that the
new information comes out of nowhere. The creativeness is in the
initiative for applying the correct logic and deducing the correct
result. If done properly, this kind of hypothesis is correct.

Another way to generate a new hypothesis is by induction. This is
really where the magic happens - where you say that if X is true, Y is
also true because "it looks like" it should be this way. There doesn't
need to be an explanation at this stage. The hypothesis can be, and
often is, a shot in the dark. Its existence is purely the result of
the intuition of the scientist, the creative human mind. It may rely
on some half-proven theory, it may rely on some gut feeling. It may
simply be the result of being hit on the head by an apple.

3. Test. Experiment. Look for proof - or, more often perhaps -
contradictory evidence that will either strengthen or weaken the
hypothesis.

Once you have enough evidence that the hypothesis is indeed true, you
can include it in the body of knowledge that you accumulated and treat
it as true data. You then go over the process, generating more
hypothesis and so on and so forth.

Using a hypothesis as fact after you think it has been sufficiently
proven does in no way mean that it is actually fact. It just means
that it is "good enough". Yes, a subjective, fallible BELIEF in your
ability to prove that it is true. Take for example Newtonian
mechanics. We learn them in school, they were considered true for
centuries, yet they are WRONG, they are just an approximation. We know
that today. This is also science. Challenge the "proven" hypothesis by
performing more and more experiments, which is what Einstein did. He
asked the question: What if what people believed for 200 years to be
true is in fact not true? Now go back and see how that affects the way
you view the world.

After this intro, let's go back to alternative therapy.

The affects of medicine are notoriously difficult to verify
scientifically. First, medicine affects different people differently.
Second, and perhaps more important, the body is a very complex
machine, and people's brain or mind participate what's going on.

That later aspect is both frustrating to scientists and hopeful to
people who seek healing. Frustrating, because results are more
difficult to replicate. Scientists have a name for it - the placebo
effect. The most you can say about a medicine today is that, in most
cases, it is more effective than a placebo. Granted, some medicines
are MUCH more effective than a placebo. But people can die from
placebo poison and can be cured by placebo antibiotics.

Now here's something that I find frustrating. I'll call it the
religion of science. Many people, and I have to admit that I belong in
this group more often than not, reject a hypothesis accompanied by
proof because they don't like it, because it goes against an existing
collection of facts that they believe in, because the hypothesis
involves fickle human factors like 'mood', 'belief' and 'feeling'.

I've seen many instances of research where it has been shown, in a
scientific method, double-blind, control group, the whole deal, that
people's immune system works better when people feel good, measured by
the T-cell counts in people's saliva. Not only that, doctors recognize
that, and they'll tell you that if you have a one-on-one conversation
with them, that people with a positive attitude to life have a higher
chance to get well than people with a negative attitude to life. That
keeping moderately busy and productive is better than being idle. That
people with depression are more sickly.

If CFC is found out to cause the ozone layer depletion, it's soon
phased out. Laws are made, manufacturers change processes, and that's
why today your air freshener doesn't contain greenhouse-containing
gasses. Instead it contains an energetic and flammable carbohydrate
(propane-butane) but that's a different story. All this - based on the
hypothesis, to which some evidence has been gathered, that CFC causes
ozone layer depletion.

Why don't we have mood clinics as part of the conventional medicine?
Why don't we have belief-change workshops subscribed like we have
physical therapy sessions?

I think that the religion of science is highly biased against these
forms of healing, because of the way they are applied, because they
are more difficult to measure, because they're "unscientific". I
believe that they are "scientific" in the sense that they can be
measured and quantified using the scientific method. I also believe
that scientists don't do it because the scientific community rejects
it on an emotional rather than a rational basis.

What's more, because conventional, science-based medicine rejects
these aspects of healing, it opens the door for quacks, charlatans,
astrologers and snake-oil merchants. The line of reasoning for the
non-scientific community is that the "conventional" medicine just
ignores it because it's "new", because the drug industry doesn't want
them to, because of some other conspiracy theory, and they turn to
these people. And you know what, sometimes it works, and in a
surprising number of the cases, because people believe that it works
and their mind takes part in their healing process.

I would like to see these methods put to the test, have the scientific
method applied to them. I heard about a study in acupuncture, where
people who were treated by a person taught the technique of inserting
needles and choosing the locations at random were experiencing
improvement in about the same number of the cases of people who were
treated by acupuncture experts, putting needles in their meridians or
wherever they put needles. So acupuncture is bunk... but the study
completely ignored the fact the some of the people showed marked
improvement. Hey, if I feel better, I don't care if it's the placebo
effect. My headache is gone.

I heard an interview on NPR, about the Caterina victims. Some group of
people treating with some technique called EFT was helping Caterina
victims get over some of the psychological aspects of having a
traumatic experience. Apparently it works. So they interviewed a
psychologist, and the psychologists said, on the air, that these
people who were treated are not better, they just FEEL better. Duh!

I believe we need to be more pragmatic in our approach to what works
and what doesn't.

-- Arik


 
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