Re: The End of Science

[karshner@stmarytx.edu (Karshner)]

> > John Horgan has written a book titled "The End of Science" --- was
> > interviewed by David Gergen on PBS recently. -- says that all the
> > science that is discoverable is already discovered -- any further answers
> > are not "provable" ie testable in a scientific method sense.  For example we
> > could never get to another galaxy to test any theory regarding galaxies.
> A letter to the NYT Book Review noted this, and gave the canonical
> quote from A.A. Michaelson at the Ryerson Labs dedication in 1894, that
> the future of science lay in the sixth decimal place.

Besides Michaelson - I remember a quote to the effect that the only things
we didn't understand were the origin of the specific heat of substances and
their resistivity. If you look at Rayleigh's and others work around the turn
of this
century they seem to feel similarly, as the major fundamental theoretical
discovers (i.e. magnetism, thermodynamics, Maxwell's equations were thirty years
before. I believe that it was Morley and not Michaelson that did not believe
their experiment.

>    The NYTBR reviewer had tried to be somewhat sympathetic, but did not
> entirely succeed. It seemed clear that the main (if not only) purpose of
> the book is to stir up controversy. It may be only incidental that this
> might inflate sales, and the author's royalties.

Besides inflated sales from the controversy, books like this can be used to
justify a disenvestment in basic research by funding organizations.

Gary