12-07-2009, 11:07 AM
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#344
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God of Hating Twitter
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
The one thing that I really love about science is that the unassailable theory or position today becomes tommorrows junk science.
I was watching the discovery channel yesterday which was pretty much a dinosaur day, and all of the theories around dinosaurs from my days in school have been completely thrown out.
As the technology and math and measurements change so does everything else.
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You might enjoy this letter by Issac Asimov.
Quote:
In short, my English Lit friend, living in a mental world of absolute rights and wrongs, may be imagining that because all theories are wrong, the earth may be thought spherical now, but cubical next century, and a hollow icosahedron the next, and a doughnut shape the one after.
What actually happens is that once scientists get hold of a good concept they gradually refine and extend it with greater and greater subtlety as their instruments of measurement improve. Theories are not so much wrong as incomplete.
This can be pointed out in many cases other than just the shape of the earth. Even when a new theory seems to represent a revolution, it usually arises out of small refinements. If something more than a small refinement were needed, then the old theory would never have endured.
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http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScien...ityofWrong.htm
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Allskonar fyrir Aumingja!!
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