Re: [Phys-l] nature of science

["John Clement" <clement@hal-pc.org>]

And don't forget that the idea of theories turning into laws was actively
taught in school and is still in some textbooks.  This "theory" of the
scientific method is still around and kicking.

The word law is certainly still around as such, it can be useful.  One needs
words to refer to ideas and a law is certainly a word attached to a number
of ideas.  Once this happens, the law is immutable in the sense that it does
not change much, but the applicability is often not general.  A good example
is Hooke's law, which only applies to ideal springs, but is not absolutely
accurate and is easily seen as being inaccurate once the stretch is beyond
the permananent deformation point.  Laws are also used in the same fashion
even when there are better representations for the science.  This is because
the laws despite their inaccuracies are very useful for analyzing physical
situations.

Good authors who write the entire book do not repeat the canard about
theories and laws, but unfortunately they do not generally adequately weave
a realistic view of the nature of science into the text.  Most lower grade
books have a committee of authors and are actually in the end written by
anonymous editors.  As a result they often take a rigid view of science.  In
addition the elementary school teachers take precisely the view that science
is absolute.  Many of them are actually not capable of believing otherwise
because they think at the concrete operational level.

Anyone who has judged a science fair contest can easily see that most of the
contestants do not really have a clue.  The very rigid format of the contest
denies a more mature view of science.

Is it no wonder that science teachers at many levels may not have a mature
view of the nature of science?  Certainly many of the politicians and state
curriculum writers do not.  As a result politicians feel free to ignore
scientific studies that contradict their cherished misconceptions.

One solution would be to integrate the NOS into the curriculum.  Of course
this need to be done in the context of a researched inquiry based course.
The lecture course is in a way denying NOS by its very format.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX


> At 01:19 PM 3/19/2006, Robert Cohen,  you wrote in answer to
> > Mangala Joshua's question:
> > > 1. What is the basic difference between a theory and a law
> > > in science?
>
> > ///
> > It seems to me that the "Theory of Gravitation" refers to something that
> > is different from the "Law of Gravitation," at least according to the
> > way those phrases are typically used nowadays.  When I hear "Theory of
> > Gravitation" I think of relativity and explanations for why there is
> > gravity whereas when I hear "Law of Gravitation" I think of the inverse
> > square relationship between the gravitational force and the separation
> > distance.
> >
> > My question is: Is there any reason why we call one "law" and the other
> > "theory" or is it simply because we can't use the same word for both?
> > If the latter, could we just as well be referring to the inverse square
> > relationship as the "Theory of Gravitation" if we hadn't already settled
> > on arbitrarily calling it the "Law of Gravitation" (or visa-versa)?
> >
> > P.S. I think the original request may have come out of the common
> > impression that laws are theories that have been proven to be true.  Is
> > there general agreement that this is *not* the case?
> >
> > ____________________________________________________
> > Robert Cohen, Chair, Department of Physics
>
>
> Since Robert asked, I will offer my response - the idea of Laws
> in science is reactionary - in that it conveys the idea that there
> are some scientific  statements one can make that are cast in stone,
> rather than uttered as provisional.
>
> The idea of "Laws" goes together with the picture of scientists
> who seek "Truth" - another unhappy construction.