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 Kickle
Wanderer
Registered: 12/16/06
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 Is the scientific method a ritual?   2
#15862064 - 02/25/12 02:23 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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Seems to me like it is.
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Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction?
Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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audiophoenix
Find Peace
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Posts: 4,107
Loc: Upstate NY
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle]
#15862156 - 02/25/12 02:47 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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Guess that depends on what you mean by ritual. If you mean simply something that you do over and over again to serve a purpose, then yeah.
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 Diploid
Cuban
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle] 1
#15862158 - 02/25/12 02:47 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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The scientific method is a general method. The specifics of its implementation vary with the experiment. It requires careful planning and execution and intelligent interpretation of the results.
A ritual is done the same way with the same implements, often at the same time of day without thinking.
For example, ruling out placebo effect in a new diet drug is an application of the scientific method. It varies from the validation method for other drugs because say your diet drug has a side effect of making you thirsty. Well, you can't just give the control group a regular placebo because it won't make them thirsty. So if your drug makes your test subjects lose weight, you can't tell if it's because it inhibits hunger or because your test subjects were full of water. So to test the efficacy of your drug, your placebo has to also cause thirst in the same proportion as the test drug.
Brushing your teeth each morning is a ritual. You just do it the same way every day. There's no methodology to it, no variables to account for, and no thinking is required.
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Republican Values:
1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.
4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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Kickle
Wanderer
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Diploid]
#15862183 - 02/25/12 02:53 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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By your definition I might agree. However, this is from wiki:
"A ritual is a set of actions, performed mainly for their symbolic value. It may be prescribed by a religion or by the traditions of a community. The term usually excludes actions which are arbitrarily chosen by the performers."
To me the scientific method is performed for its symbolic value and has a community which revolves around it. Not only that, but the actions are arbitrarily chosen by the practitioners. 
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Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction?
Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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Diploid
Cuban
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle]
#15862198 - 02/25/12 02:57 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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From your definition of ritual:Quote:
The term usually excludes actions which are arbitrarily chosen by the performers.
From your observation of the scientific method: Quote:
the actions are arbitrarily chosen by the practitioners.
Seems you just demonstrated that the scientific method is NOT a ritual.
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Republican Values:
1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.
4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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Kickle
Wanderer
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Posts: 17,978
Last seen: 3 days, 1 hour
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Diploid]
#15862225 - 02/25/12 03:03 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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You're right there. That was a misread on my part 
Although I can argue either way. None of the steps of the scientific method are arbitrarily chosen. The method itself was laid down long before many of the modern practitioners took it up. They did not choose the steps, they follow them.
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Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction?
Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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White Beard
Registered: 08/13/11
Posts: 6,325
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle]
#15862372 - 02/25/12 03:50 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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I once had a lab where we were testing the quality of water. The TA showed us the method. First he filled up the beakers, put some dye in them, put the beakers in a funky machine, pressed a button and got a number on the read out which he wrote down. I have no idea how the machine worked. It could of been a random number generator for all I know.
To test my hypothesis, i.e. what was in the water, I would have to know exactly how that funky machine worked, otherwise I'm going on faith that the machine can actually do the job properly.
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blingbling
what you chicken stew?
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle]
#15862466 - 02/25/12 04:14 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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this is an interesting idea. i think the scientific method could be thought of as a kind of ritual but not a religious ritual.
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Kupo said:
let's fuel the robots with psilocybin.
cez said:
everyone should smoke dmt for religion.
dustinthewind13 said:
euthanasia and prostitution should be legal and located in the same building.
White Beard said:
if you see the buddha on the road, rape him, then kill him. then rape him again.
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Kickle
Wanderer
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: blingbling]
#15862492 - 02/25/12 04:21 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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I was thinking cultural ritual but I'm having a difficult time separating a cultural phenomena from a religious one 
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Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction?
Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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redgreenvines
irregular verb
Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 38,173
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: blingbling]
#15862503 - 02/25/12 04:25 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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it's a good ritual or practice for establishing repeatable verifications of hypotheses,
it is not useful for all things.
but being apprised of scientific activity will solidly round out your next bout of hypothefication.
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_  🧠_ 
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blingbling
what you chicken stew?
Registered: 09/04/10
Posts: 2,987
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle]
#15862529 - 02/25/12 04:34 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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i think it depends on who is engaging in the ritual. for the physicists that believe that the laws of physics are essentially the mind of god, their use of the scientific method could be thought of as a religious ritual. for others it may be different.
I was thinking cultural ritual but I'm having a difficult time separating a cultural phenomena from a religious one
it depends on how you view culture. becker would probably say that culture is inherently religious as it's used to deny death. Durkheim would probably argue that culture is inherently profane while religious ritual are inherently sacred. culture is a funny word with a lot of meanings, most of them being quite fuzzy.
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Kupo said:
let's fuel the robots with psilocybin.
cez said:
everyone should smoke dmt for religion.
dustinthewind13 said:
euthanasia and prostitution should be legal and located in the same building.
White Beard said:
if you see the buddha on the road, rape him, then kill him. then rape him again.
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Diploid
Cuban
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: redgreenvines]
#15862560 - 02/25/12 04:43 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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hypothefication
I don't think that's a real word. 
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Republican Values:
1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.
4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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redgreenvines
irregular verb
Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 38,173
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Diploid]
#15863140 - 02/25/12 07:16 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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do you have a good theory that would make a word like that one sitting right in front of you not real.
it has a clear meaning
a consistent spelling
a natural phonetic
reasonable grammar,
and a visitor's visa from my brain to yours
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_ 🧠_
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Diploid
Cuban
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: redgreenvines]
#15863172 - 02/25/12 07:23 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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Are you asking me to theorificate? Sorry, I don't do that in public? 
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Republican Values:
1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.
4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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DieCommie
Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 29,258
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: redgreenvines]
#15863173 - 02/25/12 07:24 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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No, I don't think its a ritual. A key component I like from the definition of ritual is 'symbolic'. I think you would have a better chance arguing that science education is a ritual. Science is more wild in my experience, not ritualistic.
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Kickle
Wanderer
Registered: 12/16/06
Posts: 17,978
Last seen: 3 days, 1 hour
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: DieCommie]
#15863893 - 02/25/12 09:49 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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I find it highly symbolic. What is the word "hypothesis" if not a symbol for educated guessing? A symbol that builds on what has come prior, as most rituals do.
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Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction?
Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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4896744
Small Town Girl
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Posts: 5,128
Loc: United States
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle]
#15863911 - 02/25/12 09:53 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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Thinking and language as a whole are symbolic.
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Live your Life! 
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Kickle
Wanderer
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Posts: 17,978
Last seen: 3 days, 1 hour
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: 4896744]
#15864004 - 02/25/12 10:17 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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Right. But the scientific method takes specific words and makes a system of them. And more than a system I would say a ritual. The steps are followed over and over and over again.
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Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction?
Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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DieCommie
Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 29,258
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: Kickle] 3
#15864005 - 02/25/12 10:17 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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Yea, if you are just going to argue that all words are symbols then of course all endeavors are rituals then. You have the answer you wanted and its a closed and shut case.
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Kickle
Wanderer
Registered: 12/16/06
Posts: 17,978
Last seen: 3 days, 1 hour
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Re: Is the scientific method a ritual? [Re: DieCommie]
#15864009 - 02/25/12 10:18 PM (12 years, 1 month ago) |
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I'm not just arguing that words are symbols 
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Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction?
Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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