Souvenirs for scientists

I love these Matryoshka dolls: Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Sagan and Hawking

Matryoshka dolls are great ornaments – and kids, especially the very young ones, love to play with them. I have been aware that the whole idea of these traditional dolls has been extended to produce sets of politicians, for example, as souvenirs. However, this is the first set I have seen of scientists.

A great idea – along the lines of standing on the shoulders of giants. Just the thing for a scientist’s desk.

Now, I wonders of there are sets for biologists,chemists, mathematicians, . . .

Thanks to Rachana Bhatawdekar  @astrogeek03

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Thanks also to Darcy who hunted down the original source. These dolls were constructed by Nate Bellegarde as a gift for his girlfriend who was majoring in astronomy. He talks about it on his post Astronomatryoshkas

The “supernatural” and dogmatism in science

Another post repeated from 18 months ago:

Do scientists ever concern themselves over terms like ‘materialist,’ ‘natural,’ or ‘supernatural’? I don’t think so – at least those scientists working at the coal face. I have never heard any scientist posing the question – “is this phenomenon ‘natural’ or ’supernatural’?” before investigating something.

Yet today science is attacked by some people for limiting itself to only ‘natural’ phenomena. Intelligent design (ID) proponents (and they aren’t the only ones) rail against the ‘materialism’ of science. They demand that science should be changed to include ‘supernatural’ explanations.

These are attempts to introduce dogma into science.

Dogmatism of the “supernatural”

Because of the summer solstice/New Year holidays I am reposting some older articles. This one from last June.

Do scientists ever concern themselves over terms like ‘materialist,’ ‘natural,’ or ‘supernatural’? I don’t think so – at least those scientists working at the coal face. I have never heard any scientist posing the question – “is this phenomenon ‘natural’ or ’supernatural’?” before investigating something.

Yet today science is attacked by some people for limiting itself to only ‘natural’ phenomena. Intelligent design (ID) proponents (and they aren’t the only ones) rail against the ‘materialism’ of science. They demand that science should be changed to include ‘supernatural’ explanations.

These are attempts to introduce dogma into science.

Prostituting science

One thing that disappoints me is the way that some scientists prostitute their science. The way that some scientists use their academic qualifications or reputation to support unscientific messages. I realise that everybody who does this has their own reasons and these are usually related to ego, ideology or money.

This is something we should all be aware of when “experts” are rolled out to support questionable or controversial causes, as well as when they are used to advertise commercial products. A blatant example of this was revealed in a blog report on a recent debate about intelligent design (ID) (see ID Was Spanked In Fort Worth). The main speakers were Dr. Lawrence Krauss (opposing ID) and  Dr. David Berlinski (supporting ID). After the debate an audience member:

“heard Krauss ask Berlinski why he wasted his intellect advocating for intelligent design. To which Berlinski replied that he doesn’t believe a word of it, but is happy to cash the checks the Discovery Institute writes him. Strangely enough, this would be consistent with Berlinski’s odd statement early on in which he admitted that his own ethical orientation was focused on living as contentedly and as selfishly as possible. It was a weird aside at the time; realizing that he could be exercising that ethic by making chumps of the Discovery Institute seems somehow poetically appropriate.”

I realise that this is hearsay – and Berlinski may well deny these comments whether he made them or not. However, I think the report does illustrate the problem.

Dogmatism around science – the “supernatural.”

Do scientists ever concern themselves over terms like ‘materialist,’ ‘natural,’ or ‘supernatural’? I don’t think so – at least those scientists working at the coal face. I have never heard any scientist posing the question – “is this phenomenon ‘natural’ or ‘supernatural’?” before investigating something.

Yet today science is attacked by some people for limiting itself to only ‘natural’ phenomena. Intelligent design (ID) proponents (and they aren’t the only ones) rail against the ‘materialism’ of science. They demand that science should be changed to include ‘supernatural’ explanations.

These are attempts to introduce dogma into science.

Dembski, peer review and supernova

Bad Astronomy recently discussed (Birth cry of a supernova) the first time that “astronomers have unambiguously observed the exact moment when a star explodes.” When I first heard this news my immediate reaction was “That’s great. We have new information,” and “Does this new information conflict with our current theories of star explosion?”

That’s a normal scientific reaction. We are a curious and sceptical species – always looking for new information and always unsatisfied with our current levels of explanation. This reaction may even be self-serving. After all, if the new facts disclose inadequacies in our theory this gives the ambitious scientist an opportunity to fill those gaps by developing the theory, or even proposing new theories. It’s a way of rapidly advancing an honest scientific career. Of course it involves hard work – experiment and observation, participating in conferences, writing papers, participating in peer review and accumulating a publication record.

The intelligent design approach to peer review

This approach seems completely foreign to the proponents of intelligent design (ID).

I’ve just been reading about Bill Dembski’s use of information theory to derive evidence for design. He claims to have produced the “elusive fourth law of thermodynamics” which he calls the “Law of Conservation of Information.” His ID mates have lavished praise on him for this efforts dubbing him “the Isaac Newton of information theory” (Robert C. Koons on the back cover of Dembski’s Book Intelligent Design).

Well, Dembski has yet to publish a peer-reviewed paper in information theory. He claims to prefer writing books because they come to press quicker than scientific journal papers. But, books also avoid the discipline of peer review, don’t they. Even so, Dembski’s ideas have been extensively discussed by scientific critics and found seriously lacking. Pity. If he had accepted peer review, and publication in a scientific journal, he may have been encouraged to develop his ideas into a more credible theory.

In fact, if Dembski is really on to something this would be the logical way to go. If he has discovered a “Law of Conservation of Information” and can use it to justify a design explanation then peer review, involvement in scientific conferences and a credible record of publication in scientific journals would win him recognition by scientists – not just fellow ID activists and sycophants.

Dembski’s “explanatory filter”

As for Dembski’s current ideas. He does tend to dress them up in unnecessary mathematical formalism – probably aimed at impressing the mathematically challenged reader. They can, however, be simply described.

For example, Dembski’s “explanatory filter” is a way of “proving” design and hence intelligent design. It says simply that in considering a phenomena assume that there are only three explantions:

1. Resulting from natural law;
2. Resulting from chance;
3. Resulting from design.

So firstly consider the natural law explanation. If you can’t think of one then consider chance, the probability explanation. If that doesn’t work for you then assume it results from design!

The flaws in this a pretty obvious – not the least of which is that design is the default explanation requiring no testing or evidence. Just imagine operating the filter in the reverse order – we could derive a natural explanation without any evidence!

However, this “explanatory filter” is seriously presented by ID proponents as a way of proving design!

I suppose if someone is silly enough to take this “filter” as serious evidence of design, they could be silly enough to see Dembski as today’s “Isaac Newton.”

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Intelligent design – a war on science

Intelligent design (ID) and its defeat in the 2005 Dover trial, in Pennsylvania USA, are old news. It’s sad that we in New Zealand had to wait until Sunday evening to see the BBC documentary “A War on Science” which covered the Dover trial and its background. If you missed the programme it is available online. Meanwhile a new film , Judgment Day, a reconstruction of the Dover trial, screened in the US last week. It is now also available online.

Isaac Newton and intelligent design

A modern parable about the search for truth. (You can download a pdf version here)

Background: The great scientist Isaac Newton (1643 – 1728) developed a few simple equations descring the effect of gravity and how bodies move. He went on to explain the motion of the moon around the earth and the planets and comets around the sun, using these equations. His work showed the planets moved in a common direction and in a plane, whereas comets move more randomly. He could not explain why movement of the planets was so ordered and ended up attributing this “design” to God. He wrote: “This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent Being.”

In this parable we imagine how Newton may have carried out his research in a modern scientific environment. He works in the Physics Department of a modern university.