danoEoboy said:

When scientists have accepted a theory as satisfactory, they are deeply unwilling to admit that there might be anything wrong with it. They ignore small conradictions, but get furious if the contadictory facts grow larger.

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The church of England / CSICOP (the supposed body for study of paranormal! Ironic!) and many others have been shown to of omitted important data pointing to the likelyhood of the existance of many disregarded phenomenas.

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orechron said:

Maybe the reason is that the paranormal is "beyond science" is that science is founded in reality.

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In The Origin of Continents and Oceans Wegener proposed the theory of continental drift against the prevailing theory that the earth was formed by cooling from a molten state and contractions. "Wegner's mode of reasoning lent itself to criticisms and counter-arguments. Wegener made assertions that could be checked and refuted as further evidence came in. He left room for his speculations to be superseded" (Radner & Radner, 92). Wegener did not have disciples, but sympathizers who "acted like scientists." Yet, Wegner's idea that continents move was rejected by most scientists when it was first proposed.




Stephen Jay Gould notes that when the only American paleontologist defending the new theory spoke at Antioch college (where Gould was an undergraduate at the time), most of the audience dismissed the speaker's views as "just this side of sane" (Gould, 1979, 160). A few years later, all the early critics of the new theory would accept it as true. Why? Was it simply a matter of Wegener and a few others jumping the gun by accepting a new theory before the evidence was sufficient to warrant assent? Were the latecomers 'good' scientists, waiting for more facts to confirm the theory? Gould's view is that dogmatic adherence to the view that the ocean floor is solid and unchanging was the main stumbling block to acceptance of the new theory. Most scientists rejected continental drift because it did not fit with their preconceived ideas about the nature of the earth's crust. They assumed that if continents did drift they would leave gaping holes in the earth. Since there were no gaping holes in the earth, it seemed unreasonable to believe that continents move. The theory of continental drift, says Gould, "was dismissed because no one had devised a physical mechanism that would permit continents to plow through an apparently solid oceanic floor." Yet, "during the period of nearly universal rejection, direct evidence for continental drift--that is, the data gathered from rocks exposed on our continents--was every bit as good as it is today." Continental drift was considered theoretically impossible by some, even if it were physically possible for continents to move. The new theory could not be made to fit the theoretical model of the earth then universally accepted.




The theory of plate tectonics was then proposed--the idea that the continents ride on plates which are bounded by areas where new crust is being created from within the planet and old crust is falling into trenches. This provided a mechanism which explains how continents drift. Continental drift, according to Gould, came to be accepted not because more facts had been piled up, but because it was a necessary consequence of the new theory of plate tectonics. More facts were piled up, though--facts for the new theory of plate tectonics, of which the theory of continental drift is an essential element. Today, it is taken as a fact that continents move. Yet, the exact mechanism by which plates move is still incompletely understood. This area of science will no doubt generate much debate and theorizing, testing of hypotheses, rejection and/or refinement of ideas.




The continental drift episode is a good example of how science works. To someone who does not understand the nature of science, the early rejection of the idea of continental drift might appear to show how dogmatic scientists are about their pet theories. If scientists had not been so devoted to their belief that the earth's crust is solid and immovable, they would have seen that continents can move. That is true. However, the fact that Wegener's theory turned out to be correct does not mean that he and his few early followers were more reasonable than the rest of the scientific community. After all, Wegener did not know about plate tectonics and he did not provide an acceptable explanation as to how continents might move. Wegener argued that gravity alone could move the continents. Gould notes: "Physicists responded with derision and showed mathematically that gravitational forces are far too weak to power such monumental peregrination." Alexis du Toit, a defender of Wegener's theory, argued for radioactive melting of the ocean floor at continental borders as the mechanism by which continents might move. "This ad hoc hypothesis added no increment of plausibility to Wegener's speculation," according to Gould (1979, 163).




It is true that the idea that the earth's crust is solid and immovable has been proved wrong, but Wegener didn't prove that. What his theory could explain (about rocks and fossils, etc.) other theories could explain equally well. However, in the end, the idea of continental drift prevails. It prevails because the dogmatism of science--the tendency to interpret facts in light of theories--is not absolute but relative. Gould notes with obvious admiration that a distinguished stratigraphy professor at Columbia University (where Gould did graduate work), who had initially ridiculed the theory of drifting continents, "spent his last years joyously redoing his life's work" (Gould, 1979, 160). It is hard to imagine a comparable scene involving any of the scientists admired by Milton.

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danoEoboy said:

When scientists have accepted a theory as satisfactory, they are deeply unwilling to admit that there might be anything wrong with it.  They ignore small conradictions, but get furious if the contadictory facts grow larger.

They are unaware that anything wrong about this reaction; they feel that it is the natural attitude of a reasonable man in the face of time-wasting absurdities.  New 'paradigms' are always seen as time-wasting absurdities.

All this is natural as the urge to self-preservation; in fact, it is part or the urge to self-preservation.  William James made the same point in the essay called 'On a certain blindness in human beings'.  Cart-horses used to be blinkered to stop them from shying in the traffic; human beings need blinkers to keep them relaxed and sane.

Kuhn tells a story of an experiment using playing cards, in which some of the cards were deliberate 'freaks' - black hearts and red spades.  Subjects were asked to call out the suits as they were shown to them.  When the freak card was shown for just a moment, nobody noticed anything wrong.  But if exposure was slightly longer, they became puzzled and upset; they knew there was something wrong but didn't know what it was.  Some suffered 'acute personal distress'.  When they farthomed what was wrong, the distress was replaced by relief.  A few that failed to spot the deliberate mistake, experienced an increasing build-up of anxiety.

According to Kuhn, the demand to introduce new factors into our belief systems causes the same distress and anxiety - and encounters the same resistance!


The church of England / CSICOP (the supposed body for study of paranormal! Ironic!) and many others have been shown to of omitted important data pointing to the likelyhood of the existance of many disregarded phenomenas.

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