It’s not often that Something For the Weekend - BBC2′s Sunday morning easy-watching offering – completely changes one of my fundamental beliefs. Though that may because it’s not often that I watch it. The truth is, that had it not been for this tweet by @profbriancox, the ragged trousered cosmologist, I’d have no doubt been out walking the hills. I digress.
You see, Brian made a statement that really hit home with me. In the midst of almost dumping the wrong ingredients into a blender he announced that there are no facts in science, only theory. And he’s right.
It struck a chord with me because it something I’ve been thinking about for quite some time: How do we know that science is right?
But first some economics – it will all make sense shortly.
I studied 3 years of economics and on the whole found it pretty dry, until I got to my dissertation. Once free of the set texts, I was fortunate enough to discover evolutionary economics, and particularly the concept of path-dependency. The skinny on path-dependency is that in progress we don’t always have the optimal, or correct solution to a problem because history gets in the way.
Here’s a quick example, then I’ll get back to the science bit:
Some time before you are reading this, thoughts have passed from my brain, through to my fingers and into the QWERTY keyboard on my netbook. Now, that same QWERTY keyboard was designed,” in part, to reduce mechanical jamming on an early typewriter design that quickly went out of use” (1). The keys are laid out in a diagonal pattern – that is to say that they don’t fall exactly under one and other – the reason being to accommodate the key levers on early typewriters.
Now here’s the money shot: it’s argued (because this is only a theory) that there are more optimal layouts for keyboards. Think about it: we certainly don’t use devices that need to prevent mechanical jamming or accomodate cumbersome levers – so why had the QWERTY layout stuck?
Evolutionary economists will tell you it’s down to the amount of investment in the technology. And that’s not just about the money. Think of all the training that would have to be done to get typists used to a new – albeit more efficient design. Think of all the QWERTY keyboards that are in existence. It can be argued that the best technology (or theory) doesn’t necessarily prevail. Betamax vs. VHS anyone?
Let’s move away from social science, back to physical science. It was whilst reading Professor Brian Greene’s (different Professor Brian) excellent tome on string theory, almost a decade ago that I began to question the maths. There is something very beautiful about the way maths can describe our universe, but something very dangerous too.
String theory resonated with me when I first started reading about it. But it wasn’t without issues. But what are issues when you have the maths? It seemed that the more problems string theory came up against, the more it could beat with a few more equations and another dimension (I believe to work it requires 11 dimensions). Now I don’t doubt science is all about the maths, but I started getting the sneaky feeling we could make some pretty complex equations theorise some pretty outlandish stuff and still make accurate predictions. So long as we can get the maths to work.
It occurred to me that maybe string theory is just wrong. I hope not as it’s lovely. However, maybe so much time and effort (and cash) has been devoted to it that it is too hard to turn back. Moreover, if the maths keeps bringing the answers, it’s easier to keep on pushing with it. In it’s own corner of science string theory – and other prevailing theories – may have become locked-in. Path-dependent if you like.
But surely the best minds wouldn’t make such errors of judgement. Surely they would! Einstein termed the “cosmological constant”, a bit of maths he stuck in his equation to make it work, as the biggest mistake of his life. Turns out he didn’t need it, but nevertheless he was so locked into his line of enquiry and his belief that the universe was static that he fudged the numbers and arguably wasted the latter two decades of his life.
Macbeth, the competitive, but increasingly weary anti-hero of Shakespeare’s play sums it up in a darkly poetic fashion:
“I am in blood stepped in so far that should I wade no more, Returning were as tedious as go o’er.”
Sometimes our journey has taken us so far it’s easier to go on that turn back.
So can we trust science? Of course we can. The beauty of science is that it will always be theory. The important thing is that it becomes increasingly accurate at predicting things and continues to chanllenge itself.
Science is about fallibalism (2). It’s an infinite cycle of conjecture and testing. A good theory only needs one bad prediction and it’s out the window. But that means a great mind goes back to the start and tries again, or maybe even a greater mind finds the discarded theory and knocks it into shape.
There probably isn’t a right path for science. Just ones that suit the scope of our knowledge at the present time and, more importantly, make correct predictions that can be tested.
That is, unless of course your in a parallel universe in which case your theories may well be following a completely different line of path-dependency.
Reference.
1: David, Paul A. 1986. “Understanding the Economics of QWERTY: The Necessity of History.” In W.N. Parker, ed., Economic History and the Modern Economist. Oxford: Oxford University Press
2: Fallibalism: a definition in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosphy http://www.iep.utm.edu/fallibil/
