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Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using only local information



Hi

There is also a certain amount of inspiration in doing science that is highly intuitive and creative. When Kekule reported on how he discovered the structure of benzene he reportedly said " he had discovered the ring shape of the benzene molecule after having a reverie or day-dream of a snake seizing its own tail” (Wikipedia). I am sure there are many other examples. I suspect a lot of science involves coming up with an idea (from dreams, drugs, movies, pictures, etc.) and then working like crazy to nail down the details, trying to prove what you “already [think you] know”. Many scientists have pet theories that they refuse to let go, even in the face of conflicting or ambiguous evidence. When they turn out to be right in the end we call them geniuses. If they turn out to be wrong we call them curmudgeons.

Sometimes we use theories we know are wrong (Newton’s laws) because for the situation at hand they give a close enough answer. We do not go all the way down the maze to the correct (relativistic) answer. Sometimes there is no better theory so we use what is at hand, knowing sometime down the road there will be something better (standard model).

kyle

On Sep 15, 2015, at 12:00 PM, phys-l-request@www.phys-l.org<mailto:phys-l-request@www.phys-l.org> wrote:

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Today's Topics:

1. Re: how research is done : exploring a maze using only local
information (Joseph Bellina)
2. Re: how research is done : exploring a maze using only local
information (rjensen@ualberta.ca)
3. Re: how research is done : exploring a maze using only local
information (John Denker)
4. Re: how research is done : exploring a maze using only local
information (LaMontagne, Bob)
5. Re: how research is done : exploring a maze using only local
information (Joseph Bellina)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 2015 13:10:28 -0400
From: Joseph Bellina <inquirybellina@comcast.net>
To: Phys-L <Phys-L@Phys-L.org>
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using
only local information
Message-ID: <CD93CA36-AD01-45C4-87C7-46A961B1BAC9@comcast.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8

John
I ran the maze for a while, but decided I don?t agree that it is a good model for research unless of course I am missing something. There are two observations that can be made about the process of doing science. One is that all theories are underdetermined, and the other is that all experiments are theory laden. It is the latter that provides the flaw in your model in the sense that, unless as I said I missed it, there is no underlying theory to guide my decisions, good or bad, it is rather a random walk, which I don?t think is really how science is done.

Have I missed something?

best,

joe
Joseph J. Bellina, Jr. Ph.D.
Retired Professor of Physics
Co-Director, Northern Indiana Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Collaborative (NISMEC)
Consultant I-STEM Network
574-276-8294
inquirybellina@comcast.net




On Sep 13, 2015, at 7:48 PM, John Denker <jsd@AV8N.COM> wrote:

On 08/31/2015 06:23 PM, I wrote:

it should be
possible to get it to run as a web-browser app, but that's
more work than I feel like doing at the moment.

Well, it was about 200 times harder than it should have been,
but I got the maze-exploration program to run interactively
in the browser.

http://www.av8n.com/physics/glorpy-maze.html

This is a metaphor for how scientific research is done. Even if
you explore the maze as wisely and efficiently as possible, you
will spend a goodly amount of time exploring dead ends. This does
not mean that you made a bad decision, or made a mistake. It's
just part of the cost of doing business. See
http://www.av8n.com/physics/research-maze.htm
for further discussion.

In absolute terms, the students who sign up for the physics
class are not completely afraid of a challenge, not completely
averse to risk. Otherwise they would have chosen an easier
course.

However, in relative terms, relative to the professionals on this
list, and relative to where they ought to be by the end of the
course, they are waaaaaay too risk-averse. They think that
making a wrong turn is Wrong with a capital W, in the same way
that stealing is Wrong. For years and years, they have been
trained that they should know the outcome before starting the
so-called ?experiment?. The idea of doing a real experiment
to *find out* the answer is foreign to them. Exploring a maze
is a nice way to give them experience with the idea that backing
out of blind alleys is part of the cost of doing business.

When doing research, you do not get to see an overview of the
maze. If you want to see what the maze looks like, you have to
earn that information by exploring. You don't know where the
cheese is, and you don't even know what it looks like ... and
you won't know until you find it.

Accordingly, my maze app does not give you an overview of
the maze. This makes solving it noticeably harder, and
noticeably more of an adventure.

The app has been tested under Firefox and Chrome on Linux.
It should be reasonably portable, although it is not expected
to work on smartphones or other touchscreen devices. The
whole point of making it run in the browser was to make it
convenient and portable.

See also next message.

_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l



------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 2015 11:39:57 -0600
From: rjensen@ualberta.ca
To: Phys-L@Phys-L.org
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using
only local information
Message-ID: <lp0evate9ob41af6vu3dmg02ebmu714uo6@4ax.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

John's maze analogy is good, but limited. The biggest limitations I
see is that, at every juncture, there are only two possible pathways
(or going backwards), and every pathway is equally 'good'.

I prefer a "lost in the woods" analogy. There may be two or more
trails at every juncture. You can only see a little down each trail,
but pick one based on some factor (how much use it has; the direction
it appears to be going). Many trails lead to dead ends. Other trails
lead you back to where you already were. Others still lead to a house
-- not your home, but safe. (These houses represent publishable
results.) One or more trails lead you to your home (your hypothesized
results, publishable). There are numerous challenges when lost:
safety, speed, efficiency, and overall survival. All of these mirror
aspects of research.

On another topic: if anyone has a Science Research Methods course at
their institution, I would *greatly* appreciate the instructor
contacting me off-list.

Thanks,
Dr. Roy Jensen
(==========)-----------------------------------------?
Lecturer, Chemistry
W5-19, University of Alberta
780.248.1808





On Sun, 13 Sep 2015 16:48:53 -0700, you wrote:

On 08/31/2015 06:23 PM, I wrote:

it should be
possible to get it to run as a web-browser app, but that's
more work than I feel like doing at the moment.

Well, it was about 200 times harder than it should have been,
but I got the maze-exploration program to run interactively
in the browser.

http://www.av8n.com/physics/glorpy-maze.html

This is a metaphor for how scientific research is done. Even if
you explore the maze as wisely and efficiently as possible, you
will spend a goodly amount of time exploring dead ends. This does
not mean that you made a bad decision, or made a mistake. It's
just part of the cost of doing business. See
http://www.av8n.com/physics/research-maze.htm
for further discussion.

In absolute terms, the students who sign up for the physics
class are not completely afraid of a challenge, not completely
averse to risk. Otherwise they would have chosen an easier
course.

However, in relative terms, relative to the professionals on this
list, and relative to where they ought to be by the end of the
course, they are waaaaaay too risk-averse. They think that
making a wrong turn is Wrong with a capital W, in the same way
that stealing is Wrong. For years and years, they have been
trained that they should know the outcome before starting the
so-called ?experiment?. The idea of doing a real experiment
to *find out* the answer is foreign to them. Exploring a maze
is a nice way to give them experience with the idea that backing
out of blind alleys is part of the cost of doing business.

When doing research, you do not get to see an overview of the
maze. If you want to see what the maze looks like, you have to
earn that information by exploring. You don't know where the
cheese is, and you don't even know what it looks like ... and
you won't know until you find it.

Accordingly, my maze app does not give you an overview of
the maze. This makes solving it noticeably harder, and
noticeably more of an adventure.

The app has been tested under Firefox and Chrome on Linux.
It should be reasonably portable, although it is not expected
to work on smartphones or other touchscreen devices. The
whole point of making it run in the browser was to make it
convenient and portable.

See also next message.

_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l


------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 2015 12:16:25 -0700
From: John Denker <jsd@av8n.com>
To: Phys-L@Phys-L.org
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using
only local information
Message-ID: <55F71D09.9090506@av8n.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252

On 09/14/2015 10:10 AM, Joseph Bellina wrote:

There are two observations that can be made about the process of
doing science.

One is that all theories are underdetermined,

Agreed.

and the other is that all experiments are theory laden.

Agreed.

It is the latter
that provides the flaw in your model in the sense that, unless as I
said I missed it, there is no underlying theory to guide my
decisions, good or bad, it is rather a random walk, which I don?t
think is really how science is done.

That is an excellent point we should discuss. See below.

On 09/14/2015 10:39 AM, rjensen@ualberta.ca made a similar point:

I prefer a "lost in the woods" analogy.

That's an excellent analogy. The maze is intended to touch on all
the same points. In particular, that's why I do *not* show an
overview of the maze. I want to convey the feeling of being lost.

John's maze analogy is good, but limited. The biggest limitations I
see is that, at every juncture, there are only two possible pathways
(or going backwards), and every pathway is equally 'good'.

You guys raise a good point. Two responses:

a) In my previous writeup, the discussion of this point was mostly
missing and partly wrong. My bad. Sorry.

b) However, the maze is a somewhat better model of reality than
you give it credit for. I insist that some decisions in the maze
are *not* 50/50 coin-toss decisions. At some crucial points there
is theoretical guidance, which the wise maze-solver will bring to
bear.

Just now I added a section that discusses how this works:
https://www.av8n.com/physics/research-maze.htm#sec-general



------------------------------

Message: 4
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 2015 21:20:55 +0000
From: "LaMontagne, Bob" <RLAMONT@providence.edu>
To: "Phys-L@Phys-L.org" <Phys-L@Phys-L.org>
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using
only local information
Message-ID: <1442265646037.15971@providence.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

There are theories to be tested. Most oft time maze runners are aware of quite a few. The most elementary is that one should always turn in the same direction at every juncture. This works for 90% of mazes.

Bob at PC


________________________________________
From: Phys-l <phys-l-bounces@www.phys-l.org> on behalf of rjensen@ualberta.ca <rjensen@ualberta.ca>
Sent: Monday, September 14, 2015 1:39 PM
To: Phys-L@Phys-L.org
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using only local information

John's maze analogy is good, but limited. The biggest limitations I
see is that, at every juncture, there are only two possible pathways
(or going backwards), and every pathway is equally 'good'.

I prefer a "lost in the woods" analogy. There may be two or more
trails at every juncture. You can only see a little down each trail,
but pick one based on some factor (how much use it has; the direction
it appears to be going). Many trails lead to dead ends. Other trails
lead you back to where you already were. Others still lead to a house
-- not your home, but safe. (These houses represent publishable
results.) One or more trails lead you to your home (your hypothesized
results, publishable). There are numerous challenges when lost:
safety, speed, efficiency, and overall survival. All of these mirror
aspects of research.

On another topic: if anyone has a Science Research Methods course at
their institution, I would *greatly* appreciate the instructor
contacting me off-list.

Thanks,
Dr. Roy Jensen
(==========)-----------------------------------------?
Lecturer, Chemistry
W5-19, University of Alberta
780.248.1808





On Sun, 13 Sep 2015 16:48:53 -0700, you wrote:

On 08/31/2015 06:23 PM, I wrote:

it should be
possible to get it to run as a web-browser app, but that's
more work than I feel like doing at the moment.

Well, it was about 200 times harder than it should have been,
but I got the maze-exploration program to run interactively
in the browser.

http://www.av8n.com/physics/glorpy-maze.html

This is a metaphor for how scientific research is done. Even if
you explore the maze as wisely and efficiently as possible, you
will spend a goodly amount of time exploring dead ends. This does
not mean that you made a bad decision, or made a mistake. It's
just part of the cost of doing business. See
http://www.av8n.com/physics/research-maze.htm
for further discussion.

In absolute terms, the students who sign up for the physics
class are not completely afraid of a challenge, not completely
averse to risk. Otherwise they would have chosen an easier
course.

However, in relative terms, relative to the professionals on this
list, and relative to where they ought to be by the end of the
course, they are waaaaaay too risk-averse. They think that
making a wrong turn is Wrong with a capital W, in the same way
that stealing is Wrong. For years and years, they have been
trained that they should know the outcome before starting the
so-called ?experiment?. The idea of doing a real experiment
to *find out* the answer is foreign to them. Exploring a maze
is a nice way to give them experience with the idea that backing
out of blind alleys is part of the cost of doing business.

When doing research, you do not get to see an overview of the
maze. If you want to see what the maze looks like, you have to
earn that information by exploring. You don't know where the
cheese is, and you don't even know what it looks like ... and
you won't know until you find it.

Accordingly, my maze app does not give you an overview of
the maze. This makes solving it noticeably harder, and
noticeably more of an adventure.

The app has been tested under Firefox and Chrome on Linux.
It should be reasonably portable, although it is not expected
to work on smartphones or other touchscreen devices. The
whole point of making it run in the browser was to make it
convenient and portable.

See also next message.

_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l
_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l


------------------------------

Message: 5
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 2015 08:20:22 -0400
From: Joseph Bellina <inquirybellina@comcast.net>
To: "Phys-L@Phys-L.org" <Phys-L@Phys-L.org>
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using
only local information
Message-ID: <6539A173-7587-4412-AA2E-C65FE24F3B9B@comcast.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8

Aha so I did miss something. So the maze is looking more like doing research.
I'm wondering however if the theory of how best to run the maze is analogous to theory in science. The later makes claims about the world not about how to learn about the world whereas the maze theory is about how to run the maze but makes no claim about the maze itself

Best

Joe

Sent from my iPhone

On Sep 14, 2015, at 5:20 PM, LaMontagne, Bob <RLAMONT@providence.edu> wrote:

There are theories to be tested. Most oft time maze runners are aware of quite a few. The most elementary is that one should always turn in the same direction at every juncture. This works for 90% of mazes.

Bob at PC


________________________________________
From: Phys-l <phys-l-bounces@www.phys-l.org> on behalf of rjensen@ualberta.ca <rjensen@ualberta.ca>
Sent: Monday, September 14, 2015 1:39 PM
To: Phys-L@Phys-L.org
Subject: Re: [Phys-L] how research is done : exploring a maze using only local information

John's maze analogy is good, but limited. The biggest limitations I
see is that, at every juncture, there are only two possible pathways
(or going backwards), and every pathway is equally 'good'.

I prefer a "lost in the woods" analogy. There may be two or more
trails at every juncture. You can only see a little down each trail,
but pick one based on some factor (how much use it has; the direction
it appears to be going). Many trails lead to dead ends. Other trails
lead you back to where you already were. Others still lead to a house
-- not your home, but safe. (These houses represent publishable
results.) One or more trails lead you to your home (your hypothesized
results, publishable). There are numerous challenges when lost:
safety, speed, efficiency, and overall survival. All of these mirror
aspects of research.

On another topic: if anyone has a Science Research Methods course at
their institution, I would *greatly* appreciate the instructor
contacting me off-list.

Thanks,
Dr. Roy Jensen
(==========)-----------------------------------------?
Lecturer, Chemistry
W5-19, University of Alberta
780.248.1808





On Sun, 13 Sep 2015 16:48:53 -0700, you wrote:

On 08/31/2015 06:23 PM, I wrote:

it should be
possible to get it to run as a web-browser app, but that's
more work than I feel like doing at the moment.

Well, it was about 200 times harder than it should have been,
but I got the maze-exploration program to run interactively
in the browser.

http://www.av8n.com/physics/glorpy-maze.html

This is a metaphor for how scientific research is done. Even if
you explore the maze as wisely and efficiently as possible, you
will spend a goodly amount of time exploring dead ends. This does
not mean that you made a bad decision, or made a mistake. It's
just part of the cost of doing business. See
http://www.av8n.com/physics/research-maze.htm
for further discussion.

In absolute terms, the students who sign up for the physics
class are not completely afraid of a challenge, not completely
averse to risk. Otherwise they would have chosen an easier
course.

However, in relative terms, relative to the professionals on this
list, and relative to where they ought to be by the end of the
course, they are waaaaaay too risk-averse. They think that
making a wrong turn is Wrong with a capital W, in the same way
that stealing is Wrong. For years and years, they have been
trained that they should know the outcome before starting the
so-called ?experiment?. The idea of doing a real experiment
to *find out* the answer is foreign to them. Exploring a maze
is a nice way to give them experience with the idea that backing
out of blind alleys is part of the cost of doing business.

When doing research, you do not get to see an overview of the
maze. If you want to see what the maze looks like, you have to
earn that information by exploring. You don't know where the
cheese is, and you don't even know what it looks like ... and
you won't know until you find it.

Accordingly, my maze app does not give you an overview of
the maze. This makes solving it noticeably harder, and
noticeably more of an adventure.

The app has been tested under Firefox and Chrome on Linux.
It should be reasonably portable, although it is not expected
to work on smartphones or other touchscreen devices. The
whole point of making it run in the browser was to make it
convenient and portable.

See also next message.

_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l
_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l
_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l


------------------------------

Subject: Digest Footer

_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@www.phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l


------------------------------

End of Phys-l Digest, Vol 129, Issue 10
***************************************

---------------------
“True teachers are those who use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross; then, having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create their own.”
--Nickos Kazantzakis

Kyle
kforinas@ius.edu<mailto:kforinas@ius.edu>
http://pages.iu.edu/~kforinas/