But it’s really all that a wornout establishment can provide.
Science
COVID-19 and Vitamin D – data vs noise in science
Statistics analyst Gary Smith: Even if COVID-19 deaths are randomly distributed among the population (and they surely aren’t), data mining will, more likely than not, discover a geographic cluster of victims… (Lots of things can start to appear meaningful.)
The perils of data mining in science
Findings patterns in data is easy. Finding meaningful patterns that have a logical basis and can be used to make accurate predictions is elusive. We can see this from 18th-century attempts to cure scurvy through 21st century claims about the stock market or history.
Is COVID-19 the end of “Trust Science!!”?
Once we climb back out of the hole we have so furiously dug for ourselves, let’s start thinking more about ignoring the pack howls from “science.” After all, how many more of them can we afford?
Honest question at Space.com: Is string theory worth it?
It hasn’t produced the multiverse that shows there is no design in nature. It actually hasn’t produced much of anything after all these decades. At what point will people begin to wonder if this is really science?
Researchers: Many published psych studies lack validity
ScienceDaily: Chester and Lasko investigated 348 psychological manipulations included in peer-reviewed studies. They found that roughly 42% of the experiments were paired with no validity evidence, and that the remaining psychological manipulations were validated in ways that were extremely limited.
Sabine Hossenfelder says predictions are overrated; Rob Sheldon responds
Sheldon: … ironically, most of Sabine’s blogs are about the poor predictive power in particle theory, but in this blog she feels she has to reverse herself to defend the good name of global warming. My advice to her is to stick with what she has first-hand knowledge of, because 2nd-hand knowledge always suffers from authoritarian bias.
Will we turn science over to computers?
Some have prophesied better futures for science than does the futuristic guy at the Santa Fe Institute.
Science philosopher Imre Lakatos (1922-1974) on how science fails
In other words, on this view, string theory and Darwinism could be said to be waiting for that giant breakthrough that overwhelms all the preceding nonsense. In that case, it all comes down to who they can get to wait with them. Are they important people or not? And can they successfully suppress alternatives?
An eye-opening science-related COVID roundup
Reliance on expertise can, depending on the circumstances, be a form of superstition. And, in short, the numbers solemnly announced by the suits on TV are often just a crock. And none of this is doing the reputation of science any good.
So what really happened with COVID-19 in China?
Interest in COVID-19 is so high here, it makes sense to post a link/excerpt to a long, careful article by Heather Zeiger at Mind Matters News, trying to piece together what really happened (and yes, there is a big science hook):
Michael Egnor to Jerry Coyne: God’s existence can be shown by science methods
According to Michael Egnor, responding to Jerry Coyne, arguments for God’s existence can be demonstrated by the ordinary method of
scientific inference.
Isaac Newton and Richard Feynman on ancient sources who thought Earth is a sphere, orbiting the sun
So, unlike modern pundits, Newton and Feynman knew a lot about the actual carefully thought-out views of ancient astronomers. But what, after all, did they really know? None of those people had smartphones.
Myths about Christianity and Science – Part II with Mike Keas
There are so many awkward questions that the propaganda keeps people from asking.
Uploading ourselves into computers as a sort of religious vision
A tech writer suggests humans can escape Earth’s end by digitizing ourselves elsewhere in the galaxy.