Dr. Siepmann:

Feel free to edit and use my item on Time [It's About Time]; by condensing it I'm afraid that I made it a little awkward in reading. I don't know if you've made the same observation, but it seems that physics, as a science, has turned into something of a religion complete with a creation, saints, mysteries and miracles. It's come that I take pride in being a school drop-out.

Regards, Marvin Cruzan  <mcruzan@mo-net.com>

Dr. Siepmann's response:  Thank you for your reply. Special Relativity Physics does seem to be like a religion to many, where anyone who questions its validity is committing heresy.  

Dr. Siepmann:

I have read your definition of science on this link http://www.journaloftheoretics.com/Editorials/Vol-1/e1-3.htm I am pleased there are other people concerned with broad definitions that truly cover all the bases. I have attempted to write a definition also:

Science: A many branched discipline that exclusively practices the asking, answering, and recording of verifiable questions about nature; it uses experiment, observation, mathematical modeling, laws, principles, theories , and open criticism to accomplish this goal.  (I go on to define these terms.)

I fully agree that there are too many people that don't even realize that it is a noun, and seem to think of it a specific process, almost if not, a verb.  Science is a discipline just as Karate is a discipline. Scientists practice Science. In a sense PhD's are the equivalent of a black belt in Karate.  Too many professors seem to be promoting the concept that Science is only the scientific method.  On that same page you wrote:

"Science: the field of study which tries to describe and understand the nature of the universe in whole or part. The field of study or discipline that we call Science is spelled with a capital 'S' as it is a proper noun in this use while science with a small 's' is the application of this discipline."

I'm a little confused about the capital S and small s versions (although it sounds intriguing). I would like to confer further with you on this for my own web page.

Sincerely, Lance May  <lanceimay@hotmail.com>

Response from Dr. Siepmann: 

Thank you for the email. It is always a pleasure to converse with someone who actually thinks rather than just repeating what they were taught (and had little if any depth to it).

In my definition of "Science" (capital "S") is the ongoing attempt to unravel (understand) the universe in its totality. The process by which we do this (the practical application) is "science" (little "s"). We practice science via a process of theory and experimentation/observation. A hypothesis is nothing but a conjecture which if satisfied will offer validity to the corresponding theory from which it came.

Scientific Method, as you correctly point out, makes no sense for much of science. Just think about how much of our scientific knowledge is based upon pure observation (astronomy, much of theoretical physics, etc.). It is for that reason that it makes no sense to define science by the application of the scientific method.

In my experience, I have come to think of PhDs as being the black belts of hypothesis/experimentation, but not of theory development. Just take a look at any science journal and it is full of nothing but articles with a simple hypothesis and a very narrow experiment that was done to validate or invalidate the simple hypothesis.

Theory development is much more complicated and demanding than just putting a bunch of hypotheses together. It takes a creative mind (one that can see the bigger picture in contrast to the specific mind of an experimentalist) to put together a theory from the available knowledgebase. It also demands that one use logic appropriately, so that the concluding theory comes from a valid argument. 

Using your definition, I would tweak it a little (note that this is a definition of "science" since it deals with the practice/method) to:

A multi-branched discipline that exclusively practices the asking (Science) and answering (thereby validating the theory which leads to the uncovering of the laws of nature) of verifiable questions about nature, via experimentation, observation, modeling, and other processes which can continue to validate (or invalidate) what has come before. [Being subject to invalidation, seems to me to be more specific and procedurally correct than the just word criticism.]

I would also differ about scientists practicing Science; scientists practice science. In other words, they procedurally follow the cookbook to answer hypotheses, they do not put things in perspective (theory that would evolve into a law) and therefore are contributing minimally to our overall understanding of the universe (Science).

I hope that this has helped in your understanding of my perspective and has advanced the discussion of Science and science.

Sincerely,
Dr. Siepmann

Response from Lance May:

Boy I like that part about the theory development! I also will incorporate the validation instead of criticism.  It probably doesn't reflect my anger at people (some of ISU's professors) that insist that science is only the scientific method with tidy little experiments that appear in journals that hardly anyone really gives a [****] about. And that observations by themselves are not science (how absurd). To me science is a huge dynamic discipline that provides broad meaningful answers (and narrow ones too) to how we got here and how this mysterious universe works.

If cigarette smoking is not the cause of lung cancer, why is it that every time I go to a funeral, and the person died of lung cancer, he/she smoked?  I think you are being paid off from the cigarette companies and GOD help you when you die.

Mary Back <maryback@email.msn.com>

Response from Dr. Siepmann:  Ignorance must be bliss you foolish child. Are you in grade school? Even though lifelong smoking has less than a 5% chance of developing lung cancer (far from a cause effect relationship which should have at least a 50% correlation), over 80% of lung cancers occur in smokers, hence your experience.  Just because lung cancer occurs in smokers does not mean that smoking causes lung cancer. That is logic 101, your conclusion is but a simple syllogistic fallacy. You should try to become knowledgeable about a subject before you start making such dispersions.

Tutorially,
Dr. Siepmann