Long time readers are aware of my definition of science being The study of reality. However, a recent book review of philosopher Angela Potochnik’s book Idealization and the Aims of Science in NewScientist (3 March 2018, paywall) has brought another facet of science to the fore in my mind:
But philosopher Angela Potochnik’s ambitious book Idealization and the Aims of Science is an antidote to the view that the philosophy of science tries to pronounce grandly on what scientists ought to do. Even so, many might still resent her assertion that “science isn’t after the truth”. But she’s right. While our picture of the universe is in some sense truer than it was in the Middle Ages, and science typically does work its way closer to some sort of truth, that isn’t what scientists are trying to achieve.
What they want are useful, comprehensible, workable theories of the world. Understanding trumps truth: scientists will generally settle for a less accurate model if it is more cognitively transparent. They don’t strive to map models perfectly onto reality. This doesn’t seem so controversial. Even Hawking agrees, indulging in a bit of philosophy himself when he states: “There is no model-independent test of reality.”
Potochnik’s strength is in stressing the human dimension of the enterprise. Ultimately, scientists use simplified models because, as she says, our theories and models “are designed to facilitate human cognition and action”. It’s not a question of them being mere social constructions or fashion statements. She means we are looking for what works for us. Our theories must fit the human mind, although the universe need not. “Scientists’ cognitive characteristics and interests,” she writes, “can never influence what is true, but these can shape what generates understanding.” I’d like to think that the more thoughtful philosophy sceptics, like Weinberg, would have some sympathy with that.
Unmentioned, but lurking right under the surface, is the shark labeled Can we understand the Universe? Does the human mind, at its best, have the capability to understand the how this Universe works? Or are there phenomena for which we’ll never be able to account? Perhaps the orbital mechanics of galaxies, which supposedly betray the existence of dark matter, will be one of those phenomena, seeing as there is no direct evidence of dark matter. Or the small matter of consciousness, and how anesthesia extinguishes it.
So it’s a good point – we undoubtedly massage our observations to permit them to be processed in some rational manner by us, and we’re aware of this, but does this mean we can’t understand, fully, the Universe? Or we just need to keep working on that problem?
Just what are our limitations?
