Experts - chocolate teapot

JohnRo

talexuser wrote: »

On the other hand theory of incompetents being in charge of the banks and financial stability a few years ago has a lot going for it.

Not sure incompetence has much if anything to do with it, greed and corruption on the other hand..

colsten

veryintrigued wrote: »

What's the collective noun for a group of gravity experts?

Too rude for MSE.

Gadfium

talexuser wrote: »

I thought Newtonian gravitational theory had been proved to be "accurate" (or at least a very good approximation) only in a specific range of circumstances, but not at all accurate at subatomic. It is no longer a "force" but the side effect of mass/energy fields distorting the space time continuum?

Likewise what is still the theory of evolution has a lot more evidence going for it than the "theory" of creationism, which does not need a huge amount of thought about the evidence to dismiss it.

On the other hand theory of incompetents being in charge of the banks and financial stability a few years ago has a lot going for it.

Newtonian Laws of Motion and his theory of gravity works fine for most applications, but breaks down when you start working in large gravitational wells. Discrepancies with the forecasted outcomes of the theory and what is observed began to appear when Verrier observed the motion of Mercury. Newtonian theory's prediction did not match the precession of the planet's orbit and this was not solved until Einstein's theory of General Relativity.

This thread shows that the general public do not understand what is meant by a scientific theory. What many people call a theory is really, at best, a hypothesis but more likely a supposition.

A hypothesis is either a suggested explanation for an observable phenomenon, or a reasoned prediction of a possible causal correlation among multiple phenomena. In science, a theory is a tested, well-substantiated, unifying explanation for a set of verified, proven factors. A theory is always backed by evidence; a hypothesis is only a suggested possible outcome, and is testable and falsifiable.

This is quite different from how the term "theory" is used in common parlance, which is closer to the scientific term "hypothesis" or "educated guess".
Some people get confused about theories in science and believe they "grow up" to become laws.
A law, by contrast;

A scientific law generalizes a body of observations. At the time it is made, no exceptions have been found to a law. Scientific laws explain things, but they do not describe them. One way to tell a law and a theory apart is to ask if the description gives you a means to explain 'why'. The word "law" is used less and less in science, as many laws are only true under limited circumstances.

Freecall

Spot on Gadfium. Whilst it is probably unreasonable to expect everybody to have a thorough understanding of such issues, the level of basic scientific understanding is sometimes woefull.

How did we end up with an education system that results in people making statements such as the following?

atush wrote: »

Both evolution and gravity are facts, not theory

Ok, I may have had the benefit of a classical scientific education but some of this stuff is so basic it should really be considered general knowledge.

Gadfium

Freecall wrote: »

How did we end up with an education system that results in people making statements such as the following?



Ok, I may have had the benefit of a classical scientific education but some of this stuff is so basic it should really be considered general knowledge.

I've much less of a concern about this than people that think that creationism is as valid as evolution because both are "just theories". That is a whole new level of stupid!

Freecall

Well I certainly agree with that.

I suppose that they are both theories it's just that one has been discredited and is unsupported by any evidence whereas the other is the only well-supported explanation for life’s diversity. Not much difference really

Ultimately it comes down to weight of evidence and the consequential acceptance by the scientific community.

Even evolution is not a 'fact' however. Evolutionary science is a work in progress just like all other sciences. While we don’t know everything about evolution (or any other scientific discipline, for that matter), we do know a great deal about the history of life, the pattern of lineage-splitting through time, and the mechanisms that have caused these changes.

Denying that these things are theories and terming them as simply 'facts' somehow devalues the on-going research which seeks to improve our understanding of the world around us.

An understanding which ultimately enriches all of our lives.

badger09

atush hasn't commented recently, but just so you guys know, she is/was a scientist. Medical research IIRC:o

veryintrigued

badger09 wrote: »

atush hasn't commented recently, but just so you guys know, she is/was a scientist. Medical research IIRC:o

That'll be a real help on gravity, evolution and chocolate teapots I expect.

badger09

veryintrigued wrote: »

That'll be a real help on gravity, evolution and chocolate teapots I expect.

You miss the point I was trying to make.

Several posters have suggested, quite strongly, that atush doesn't understand the concept of scientific theory. I simply suggested that with her background, she probably does.

Moving on....

Glen_Clark

Part of the problem is that common sense conventional economics (what the 'Experts' have been taught) has been turned on its head by QE. Everything we know is wrong. Where bad economic news used to lead to a fall in share prices, now its more likely to lead to a rise in share prices in anticipation of more money printing. Rising house prices, which used to be called Inflation, is now counted as 'Growth' instead.
To some, its the economics of the madhouse.