Shortest Response: Why do scientific theories work?
John Wilkins of Evolving Thoughts conjects in response to The Inherihent Problem with Scientific Theories:
As theories, along with techniques, protocols, and schools of thought, compete for attention and resources, those that are more empirically adequate will tend to be adopted, reducing the space of possible models. Who cares if it’s still infinitely differentiable? We know more than we did.
I can compose an infinite responses. I write this one. Have I produced useful information? Yes.
Can I compose viable responses infinitely? Yes —that’s called “blogging.” Buy Google stock.
Science produces useful information, but the process of science has no end, nor does a single perfect theory exist. Yes, this is semantics, but in the past (until about the 1930’s) scholars believed that the universe could be fully understood and a perfect model could be known. This is no longer the contemporary belief.
Think Gene at Technorati
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