November Letters (Physics Today):
 

Teaching, Propaganda, and the Middle Ground Singhan replies

A set of common assumptions underlies nearly all of the responses to my article.

  An empirical world (known as "nature") exists that is external and objective.

  A clear distinction exists between experiment and theory.

  Experimental data serve as surrogates for nature.

  Theories can be evaluated by comparing their predictions with data.

This view of science is expressed in various ways by the letter writers.
Gary Powell says that "science is a framework built around observations in
nature." W. C. Morrey adds that science uses "data and deductions," and
Moorad Alexanian tells us that "such data are the sole input for
scientific theories," and "physics is essentially an experimental science
in which laws are arrived at by generalizing results obtained by
experiments." Hoi-Kwong Lo adds that all scientific theories must be
subjected to the same test, with the evidence "weighed objectively."

A hierarchy of knowledge structures is also postulated, with science rated
higher than others because of its empirical basis and its method of
operation. These two features make belief unnecessary because the data
(nature) force theories on us (or at least constrain them). Hence we
science teachers are not propagandizing but are justified in asking our
students to accept the theories of science because, as Morrey puts it,
"informed opinion is more valuable than uninformed, and experiment-based
systems are more valuable than belief-based." Phil Baringer points out
that we can safely rely on "experts [who] appear to have good evidence and
to have followed proper scientific procedures." According to Pantazis
Mouroulis, "Once proof has been achieved, belief becomes irrelevant."
Charles K. Sharnberger notes that science relies on "rational
interpretation of empirical evidence . . . as the pathway to truth."

Among scientists, this formulation of scientific endeavor is widely held
and seems so self-evident that people who disagree with it are perceived
as irrational or oppositional. But is the distinction between the
knowledge structures of science and nonscience really that clear-cut?

Clearly, science can make one particular claim: It works. Unlike any other
form of knowledge, science provides a means of constructing machines and
theories that are unequaled in their ability to predict and provide
control. Our modern technological society is a monument to its success.
Science also has created an intricate structure of knowledge to provide
coherent and self-consistent explanations of a wide range of phenomena.

But while this success is incontrovertible, it may well obscure the
subtleties of science's knowledge structure. Consequently, we may
construct
a model of scientific knowledge and evolution that makes science seem more
different from other forms of knowledge than may actually be the case.

Philosophers and science historians such as Thomas Kuhn and Imre Lakatos1
have wondered why science works so well. They have looked at its
structure, its evolution, and the mechanisms by which scientific theories
have progressed. Their analyses and conclusions will be unsettling to many
scientists. They find that experiment and theory are not distinct
categories, so that when one compares experimental data with theory, one
is not really testing a theory by comparing it with nature. Instead, one
is making a choice among competing theories, and no set of objective rules
governs such a choice. The scientific community arrives at its theories in
ways that are not entirely objective. No clear line of demarcation exists
between experiment-based knowledge systems and belief-based ones. Some
philosophers of science have even argued that the demarcation
problem--that is, defining science so that it can be distinguished from
religion--is inherently insoluble.

Scientists can ignore or summarily reject these conclusions by saying that
we know that scientific knowledge is objectively obtained even if we
cannot articulate exactly how we know this. But just as Mouroulis accords
his "cosmology colleagues the same respect and skepticism that he expects
from them," we should extend this courtesy to the philosophers and
historians of science. Their works are scholarly, peer-reviewed, and
critiqued by their colleagues. And these philosophers are admirers and
supporters of science, not opponents. We at least owe it to them to study
and understand their views. Otherwise we will be doing what we often
criticize nonscientists for doing: rejecting counterintuitive ideas (such
as wave­particle duality or time dilation) because they are "obviously"
untrue.

One other aspect of this discussion puzzles me. The scientific community
takes young-Earth creationists to task for holding irrational views but
tends to ignore the views of mainstream religions, when the differences
seem to be matters of degree and not of principle. Any theistic religion
typically asserts the existence of at least one scientifically
inexplicable supernatural event. Should scientists reject all such claims?

The committed naturalist would argue that we should, otherwise the entire
framework of science will collapse. Science starts with the assumption
that all natural phenomena are explainable by natural laws that can be
discovered using the methods of science. No deviation from these laws is
allowed. Miracles, which by definition are direct contradictions of the
workings of natural laws, presumably have no place in this framework.
Evolutionary geneticist Richard C. Lewontin2 says it plainly: "We cannot
live simultaneously in a world of natural causation and of miracles, for
if one miracle can occur, there is no limit." His point is well taken. If
the scientific community concedes even one miraculous event, then how can
it credibly contest the young-Earth creationist view that the world (and
all its fossilized relics) was created in one instant just 6000 years ago?
So if we reject creationist views on this basis, should we also reject any
supernatural claim from any religion?

These are thorny and nontrivial issues, which need the kind of extended
discussion that I have provided elsewhere.3 But for the present, I can
only echo letter writer Philip E. Kaldon, who sums it up beautifully:

It is easy to say that we physics teachers do not teach "belief" because
we are teaching science. It is not so clear-cut to the students--and
sometimes those of us teaching. And at the end of the day... I am grateful
to those who have spent the time to think about what they are being asked
to think about, no matter their personal conclusions.
 

References
1. T. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, U. of Chicago Press, Chicago (1970). I. Lakatos, The Methodology of Scientific Research
Programmes, Cambridge U. Press, New York (1978).
2. R. C. Lewontin, Scientists Confront Creationism, L. R. Godfrey, ed., W. W. Norton, New York (1983).
3. M. Singham, Phi Delta Kappan, 81 (6), 424. M. Singham, The Quest for Truth: Scientific Progress and Religious Beliefs, Phi Delta
Kappa Educational Foundation, Bloomington, Ind. (in press). Mano Singham Case Western Reserve University Cleveland, Ohio

 © 2000 American Institute of Physics

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