To refer to Duncan’s latest post, do you seriously claim that I don’t mean that with science (I’m certainly part on anyone)?
No. I mean the customary meaning of that phrase, which, I think, would be maybe something like “anyone except a few people.”
It’s certainly possible for you (or someone else) to redefine science, but then the criticism is that what-is-customarily-meant-by-science doesn’t fulfill the criteria of what-the-speaker-redefined-the-word-science-to-mean, which might be true, but I don’t see how is it important.
A better criticism would be that science that’s not useful shouldn’t be produced (rather than that it’s not true science), but then the obvious problem is that the usefulness or uselessness of science can’t always be judged in advance, and that it might take decades (or even centuries) for scientific knowledge to become useful, and humans trying to optimize for usefulness (rather than for science-quality-and-correctness) would curtail those scientific papers that have no obvious use today.
That would lead to being stuck in a sort of local maximum.
Okay, so it’s saying untrue things for rhetorical impact.
that it might take decades (or even centuries) for scientific knowledge to become useful, and humans trying to optimize for usefulness (rather than for science-quality-and-correctness) would curtail those scientific papers that have no obvious use today.
When you send a paper to a journal, that journal does ask itself “Is this paper useful to the people who read this journal and helps advance the field or is it pointless for the readers of the journal to read it.” Given that this is how our scientific system works, following Larry McEnerney advise about writing to actually create value for the readers of the journal does help produce better papers.
Thomas Kuhn did distinguish scientific fields from fields that aren’t by the fact that scientific fields progress. If the changes of a field are due to fashion and not progress, it’s not a science but in Kuhns sense if the change it is. For progress to happen you need to solve problems that help the field progress.
In Viliam’s proposal, having students train “science” with something Kahn Academy like is having train skills that are not about producing anything on which other people or even themselves can build. I used the term real-world to contrast it with the world of school.
Okay, so it’s saying untrue things for rhetorical impact.
It’s saying something literally untrue (how the English language often works) but not for rhetorical impact, but simply because that’s what the phrase means.
When you send a paper to a journal, that journal does ask itself “Is this paper useful to the people who read this journal and helps advance the field or is it pointless for the readers of the journal to read it.”
If that was the case, the suggestion to change the process of producing science would be pointless, because science would already work that way.
In Viliam’s proposal, having students train “science” with something Kahn Academy like is having train skills that are not about producing anything on which other people or even themselves can build. I used the term real-world to contrast it with the world of school.
The understanding from textbooks (or Khan Academy) is very much needed to create something other people can build on. The reason there is no obvious pathway from the former to the latter is because science is extremely complex with many layers of abstraction.
When you send a paper to a journal, that journal does ask itself “Is this paper useful to the people who read this journal and helps advance the field or is it pointless for the readers of the journal to read it.”
If that was the case, the suggestion to change the process of producing science would be pointless, because science would already work that way.
To refer to Duncan’s latest post, do you seriously claim that I don’t mean that with science (I’m certainly part on anyone)?
Or for that matter Larry McEnerney that defines knowledge in the linked talk as being something that’s actually valuable to other people?
In our times of great stagnation, there are many people who don’t think that science is about producing value. That position is part of the problem.
No. I mean the customary meaning of that phrase, which, I think, would be maybe something like “anyone except a few people.”
It’s certainly possible for you (or someone else) to redefine science, but then the criticism is that what-is-customarily-meant-by-science doesn’t fulfill the criteria of what-the-speaker-redefined-the-word-science-to-mean, which might be true, but I don’t see how is it important.
A better criticism would be that science that’s not useful shouldn’t be produced (rather than that it’s not true science), but then the obvious problem is that the usefulness or uselessness of science can’t always be judged in advance, and that it might take decades (or even centuries) for scientific knowledge to become useful, and humans trying to optimize for usefulness (rather than for science-quality-and-correctness) would curtail those scientific papers that have no obvious use today.
That would lead to being stuck in a sort of local maximum.
Okay, so it’s saying untrue things for rhetorical impact.
When you send a paper to a journal, that journal does ask itself “Is this paper useful to the people who read this journal and helps advance the field or is it pointless for the readers of the journal to read it.” Given that this is how our scientific system works, following Larry McEnerney advise about writing to actually create value for the readers of the journal does help produce better papers.
Thomas Kuhn did distinguish scientific fields from fields that aren’t by the fact that scientific fields progress. If the changes of a field are due to fashion and not progress, it’s not a science but in Kuhns sense if the change it is. For progress to happen you need to solve problems that help the field progress.
In Viliam’s proposal, having students train “science” with something Kahn Academy like is having train skills that are not about producing anything on which other people or even themselves can build. I used the term real-world to contrast it with the world of school.
It’s saying something literally untrue (how the English language often works) but not for rhetorical impact, but simply because that’s what the phrase means.
If that was the case, the suggestion to change the process of producing science would be pointless, because science would already work that way.
The understanding from textbooks (or Khan Academy) is very much needed to create something other people can build on. The reason there is no obvious pathway from the former to the latter is because science is extremely complex with many layers of abstraction.
Can you elaborate on this?
If only real-world-useful science was published in journals, it would be pointless to suggest that only real-world-useful science should be produced.