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Re: PSEUDO-SCIENCE ? (rambling but not long)



"Computer science" is not a natural science any more than are
"political science" or "Christian Science". The academic fad
of appending the term "science" to a topic to make it somehow
more acceptable is quite old. It is difficult for us to realize
the magnitude of the intellectual impact that science made on
society starting with Galileo and Newton. There has really been
nothing comparable since this dawning of what has been called
"The Age of Reason". Many scholars in other disciplines have
tried to emulate the methods of the scientific revolution or,
failing that, to adopt vocabularies which give them superficial
traits resembling those of the sciences.

Is Physics a natural science? Is chemistry? Is biology? A good
taxonomic rule of thumb is that if an academic discipline is
explicitly labeled as a science then it likely is not a science,
or at least some effort has been put into "improving" its image.
That said, let me emphasize (as the father of a both practicing
philosopher and a practicing anthropologist) that there is
nothing at all wrong with academic disciplines that are not
sciences, and it is encouraging to see that many scholars
consider what they do to be respectable even though it is not
scientific. My university would be a much less interesting and
very much less pleasant place without my "nonscientific"
colleagues. While not wishing to muddy local waters, I find few
of the computer scientists here to be among my most interesting
colleagues. I frequently converse with a colleague here in
history (who also has a PhD in chemistry) and I have collegial
interactions with other faculty outside physics as well.

I think what I might call "science envy" started about three
centuries ago and has been reinforced from time to time since
then by "spinoffs" like the winning of WWII and the ready
availability of "Walkmans" courtesy of Bardeen, Brattain and
Shockley. Up to about twenty years ago science had a positive
public visage that has now been considerably damaged by the
"ecologists" who misappropriated the name of a real science,
and by some other know-nothing and neoLuddite movements.

Well, I suppose I should get back on the track of this thread.
I decided not to wipe out the previous two paragraphs, however,
because they are opinion of a related sort, and I feel strongly
about the matters mentioned therein. I also thought of a
computer scientist whose work I do enjoy on an intellectual
level. His name is Douglas Hofstadter, and he does not need to
pretend that what he does is science for two good reasons: he
has a PhD in a science (and his late father had a Nobel Prize
in physics), and his own work is of the highest quality (he has
a Pulitzer Prize and undoubtedly others - I haven't kept up).
He is also a nice fellow, even though he is not "a Scientist".

Science envy is a disease. Few talented programmers suffer from
it. At least three of my children's school friends have become
multimillionaires by writing clever code. None of these people
suffers from science envy (I keep in touch with them). I'm
quite sure that one of my own could have done so had he elected
to, but he chose to become a scientist instead, and he is very
successful. I'm pleased to report that he doesn't suffer from
rich geek envy; he's quite happy with his choice.

Leigh