(March 22, 2022 at 10:06 am)Istvan Wrote: I'm afraid I don't look at science through the same rose-colored glasses you do. We can teach schoolchildren that "the correct conclusions eventually arise, are tested, and are accepted," but anyone who understands the history and philosophy of science realizes that there are many other factors that influence which questions are asked, who gets to ask them, and what qualifies as a correct conclusion than the disinterested and noble quest for Truth.
Are you trashing science just because it clashes with your existential views? You don't sound much different from the theists that try to denigrate science because it clashes with their religious beliefs.
This is clearly a philosophy discussion, and not a science one. I have studied the philosophy of science, and I understand its limitations.
Yes, 100 years ago, women in science rarely got credit for their work. For that matter, anyone who wasn't a primary researcher often had their credit stolen. There are examples of people coming up with bullshit theories about race, gender, and doing bad science to justify their biases. Funding can skew the type of research that gets done in a politically-friendly direction.
That has nothing to do with the actual things we've learned. The current set of scientific "knowledge" is incomplete and has errors. Good scientists know that. It doesn't change the fact that theories continue to get better at providing a framework to predict nature.
Physics is undergoing a resurgence, despite us knowing a heck of a lot about reality. Dark matter, dark energy, black hole information paradox, quantum gravity, the nature of the big bang -- all these are open to smart people coming up with all sorts of new and testable ideas.
