One Culture is also the home of courses I offer occasionally at OLLI-USM, the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at the University of Southern Maine. To find the readings for your course, click on its title in the right-hand column, under One Culture Courses at OLLI.
I welcome comment on all these materials.
... there are two paths to knowledge,
1) science, and 2) making stuff up.
Don't get me wrong;
not all forms of making stuff up are bad --
poetry and democracy, for example.
Definition
Science: The communal process of building reliable,
useful knowledge of the world around us—
knowledge that we can use to guide our actions.
Understanding science includes knowing how it fits with other knowledge. In essays at One Culture, I aim to flesh out relationships between science and other forms of knowledge. This work has produced the essays Reflections on Science and the Humanities. I also look for literary works, particularly poems, that give specific examples of such connections. For example, we might find scientific metaphors that illuminate meaning in a poem; we might find ideas from outside of science that make powerful analogies to things scientific; or we might see in the literary work that the author's world view incorporates scientific ideas and concepts. This work has produced the essays in Poetry and Science.
As for science itself, I offer you an opportunity to learn about recent scientific findings that are important to you as citizens, medical patients, consumers, seekers of intellectual entertainment, and human beings with a sense of wonder. This effort has resulted in the little science textbook Biochemistry for Citizens. Particularly if you feel the need to build some scientific background against which to see more clearly the possible connections to the humanities, Biochemistry for Citizens is for you.
In all One Culture materials, I offer deeper insight into what science is, how it works, how scientists think (when they are being scientists), and—of great importance—how they know what they know. For example, we can never see molecules, yet scientists know the structures and workings of all sorts of molecules, from the simplest, like water, to the fantastically complex, like proteins, DNA, and the other molecules of life. Scientists can even design and engineer molecules with desired properties, even though they never directly see the fruits of their labors. Instead, they use the tools of their science to decide whether the molecules perform as desired.
Among other features at One Culture, this thinking is slowly producing the site's newest section, How Scientists Know... , pages with links to readings and videos I hope will illuminate the lines of experiment and thinking that lead to reliable scientific knowledge. I am aiming especially of elements of our world and universe that are not accessible simply to our senses, but that we know very indirectly. I believe that creativity in scientific work is most clearly revealed in how we know, more than in what we know.
IMAGINATION and SCIENCE
We do not experience the world directly, but rather through our senses, which receive signals of quite varied kinds (for example, light, sound, and airborne chemicals) and process them for interpretation. Convincing mental interpretations are imaginative constructs that are consistent with a rational consensus of what all of our senses tell us. We also check those interpretations by trying to reach rational consensus with interpretations made by other people. Thus we adeptly—almost unconsciously—seek agreement with others on such basic things as the presence and properties of common objects—plants, animals, furniture—all around us.
In the same way, scientists do not see the world directly, particularly the atomic and molecular aspects on which so much of our understanding and actions are based. Science entails reaching rational consensus throughout a community of scientists working on common and related problems. These areas of rational consensus, at any moment, are called the findings of science. These findings are always open to question and revision, but they represent our best source of guidance as to the consequences of our actions in the physical world.
SCIENCE and VALUES
Certain principles of morality are required of scientists if science is to work. Doing science requires honesty in observing and reporting, freedom from bias in forming beliefs, tolerance of the views of others, suspension of belief until evidence warrants, and attention to detail in all things. People who are not meeting these requirements—no matter what they say they are doing—are not doing science. A fraud, whether posing as a scientist, a priest, or an investment manager, is—first and foremost—a fraud. There is no such thing as fraudulent science; if it's fraudulent, it's not science.
With insight into how scientists learn about the world, it becomes clear that science is a human and humble form of knowledge. Its power comes from its openness and self-correcting nature, and from the willingness of scientists to suspend judgment until evidence provides convincing support for answers to their questions.
PATHS to KNOWLEDGE
I believe there are two paths to knowledge, 1) science, and 2) making stuff up. Don't get me wrong; not all forms of making stuff up are bad: poetry and democracy, for example. But when it comes to understanding and managing the physical world we live in, I like science’s track record. That's why I support and promote science.
What kind of knowledge does science produce? In the words of philosopher John Searle, science constructs
knowledge that is true, objective, and universal: true, despite all truth being subject to revision; objective, despite the presence of subjective elements in the judgments that accept it; universal (true in all times and places), despite having been discovered in specific instances.
••••••
All matters raised in this brief introduction are treated in more depth at this site.
One Culture Readings are provided at the links in the right-hand column. There are several categories of readings, with many internal links among them.
Please join me in thinking about how science and the humanities constitute One Culture, by reading and commenting on these essays, and by suggesting other appropriate materials.
••••••••••••
All matters raised in this brief introduction are treated in more depth at this site.
One Culture Readings are provided at the links in the right-hand column. There are several categories of readings, with many internal links among them.
• Poetry and Science essays usually focus on a single poem (or sometimes, other literary work) and its connections to science or a specific scientific topic.
• Reflections on Science and the Humanities are essays on science, its nature, and its relationship to other forms of knowledge. Works of literature, art, or music are often featured as examples of this relationship.
• Each of page of How Scientists Know (under development) presents one element of our universe that we can never see directly, but that we know because flashes of insight gave scientists hints of its existence. Examples of such elements are genes, electromagnetic radiation, and gravitational waves.
• Biochemistry for Citizens is a textbook of readings in life science, at a beginner's level, emphasizing how the structure of biological molecules gives rise to functions as diverse as digestion, immunity, and consciousness. These readings should help you to understand not only what scientists know, but how they know. A number of questions are featured. What are enzymes, antibodies, and hormones—and how do they work? What are genes, how do they influence your traits and your susceptibility to disease, and how do they reveal your relationships to each other and to all forms of life? What is cancer, how do cancer treatments work, and how do cancer cells evade treatment?
• Other links in the Readings column lead to information that might interest you.
Please join me in thinking about how science and the humanities constitute One Culture, by reading and commenting on these essays, and by suggesting other appropriate materials.
 |
Contact Information
• My email address is shown in the right-hand column.
• My email address is shown in the right-hand column.
••••••••••••
