How does research function?
How does science, especially natural science, reach its results? The answer given is normally found in philosophy, and comes from a standard work of the philosopher Karl Popper with the title “Logic of Research” from the year 1934.
Popper says that science starts with a hypothesis. For example, they assume that matter expands when it is heated. Afterwards, the assumption is proven by experimenting. Now Karl Popper says:
“A hypothesis is only then a scientific hypothesis when it can be proven through an experiment.”
If you make a general statement about people without being able to prove it through an experiment then the statement, according to today’s scientific understanding, is totally irrelevant. If, however, you take a piece of metal and heat it, then you can measure the expansion of the metal and the hypothesis is verified. But what happens if you take synthetic material instead of metal and heat it? Then the synthetic material shrinks.
And this is the decisive step with Popper. He states that research only makes progress if you observe an experiment which contradicts your hypothesis. In this case, he speaks of falsification of observation. Exactly this procedure inevitably leads to a change of the hypothesis. Thus, you are now forced, able but also justified, to form a new hypothesis.
At this point, you start anew, because now you have a new hypothesis which must be verified or falsified by new experiments. When you have verified it, it is nice. But Popper says, only if you again have falsified it can you say: “Aha, now I can progress.”
And it is exactly this which Popper calls the logic of research. Factually it is this way when an average professor at an average university is asked how science is functioning and he will then make a similar statement like Popper’s.
Karl Popper wants to point out two things: First, the statement that science needs experiments and without them one cannot call it a scientific work, and on the other hand that a hypothesis only belongs to the scientific sphere if it has been proven through an experiment.
He also demands modesty from a scientist, because he cannot definitely know something because knowledge always remains hypothetical, because he never knows whether there is another observation which eventually falsifies his hypothesis, thus contradicting it.
For example, you can state that there are only red foxes, but only as long as one has not seen white foxes in the polar area.
The basic idea of Popper is that science only progresses through falsification, but is always caught up in hypothetical knowledge, and that this should contribute to modesty amongst the scientists, in contrast to the ever present arrogance of some university employees.
If you ask a few simple questions it becomes apparent down which wrong paths the present scientific logic has gone. The first question is whether there even is a nontrivial hypothesis which you can prove through an experiment. Naturally, you can prove this hypothesis if foxes are red but I am not so sure whether it is a scientific hypothesis.
The matter is much more complicated when you make really complicated statements, even if they sound simple. For example, the statement: “Bacteria have genes.” How do you want to disprove it through an experiment, just in one experiment? Or, how do you want to disprove the statement: “Genes cause aggression in people.” How do you want to disprove this statement through an experiment? I believe that behind these processes are more complicated mechanisms than only the survival of the fittest and the consequently resulting selection according to Darwin. I also do not believe that only genetics and the cultural imprint of a person in the cause of his life make him the way he is.
Another fact is known from history of science: If hypothesis and experimental results deviate from each other, you do not then change the hypothesis; but, the experiment is changed, until the hypothesis fits the experiment.
Always there is the possibility to reach falsification through false measurement results.
There are numerous examples: In 1905 Albert Einstein came up with a hypothesis how a certain movement, which you could observe under a microscope, can be deduced. Today you call this movement Brownian movement. Einstein explains the Brownian molecular movement by pushing small particles against big particles. The whole thing results in a complicated diffusion process, which can be proven through an experiment.
Under the direction of the later Nobel Prize winner, Jean Péron, a French laboratory examined Einstein’s hypothesis and found that it was wrong. Consequently, Péron wrote Einstein:
“Dear Mr. Einstein. We have examined your theory. It cannot be correct. Please, change your hypothesis.”
At that time Einstein was a young unknown employee of a patent office, and not yet famous at all, when he replied:
“Dear Mr. Péron. I reexamined your experiment and my theory as well. I am very certain that my theory is correct. I am simply satisfied with this theory. It makes me so happy that it has to be correct. Could it not be that your measuring apparatus malfunctioned?”
A week later Péron indeed admitted that the measuring apparatus was not correctly calibrated and he took everything back. Einstein’s theory was correct. According to Popper one had to abandon the theory and formulate a new one.
Another example is the famous American Nobel Prize winner and physicist Milligan. He wanted to prove that there is something like an elementary charge. Therefore, he measured drops of oil, which have a charge, between two capacitor plates by bringing them into levitation.
His idea was as follows:
If there is an elementary charge then it has to reach the drops of oil step by step. This process should not continually take place, but sporadically, such as a transmission by quanta is postulated. Even now, this experiment is still an important part of a practical course of physics for students. The result of this experiment is always contrary to the hypothesis because the measured values deviate. The experimenters only get half or three-quarter values, but never the complete elementary charge.
Today, one knows why, because the laboratory diaries by Milligan became accessible to the public. It turned out that Milligan only published the results which corresponded to his hypothesis. Deviating results he simply eliminated.
These experiments are extremely difficult to be carried out, and most of, all delicate. A small power drop, coughing in the neighboring room, or a small temperature difference are sufficient to cause such an experiment to fail. Milligan was totally convinced of his hypothesis.
Basically, he did not need these experiments. His hypothesis did not stem from logic or experience, but came from the depth of his subconscious. For this reason he told himself: I change the experimental situation until the hypothesis is proven through experiments. The described scenario has nothing to do with the research of logicians.
The next interesting question is:
How do I reach a new hypothesis through a falsified hypothesis? Who tells me where the new hypothesis comes from? Can this new hypothesis come from the laboratory diary, or does it result from the experiment? You can deny this because I need a new hypothesis. I practically need a new idea. But concerning an idea, you have the feeling that somebody is standing above you who tells you something, which then becomes my idea, even if I have a practical measurement. How do I reach a new theory from the found values, which has to be developed with terms and clear pictures? At this point this remains open.
Nobody less than Albert Einstein gives a hint. He wrote that physical theories, as well as hypotheses, are free inventions of the human brain.
This results in the question of where these free inventions come from, and if they already were stored somewhere and you already have to recall them.
During the 18th century many researchers stated that they do not need experiments in order to know that a theory is correct. There were always scientists who felt safe with certain ideas, and who knew that they were correct. Naturally, most of them experimented to find a confirmation, but basically they did not need them to be certain.
The bible quotes the preacher Salomo: “There is nothing new under the sun.” And it is meant that all knowledge is already there, one simply has to recall it.
Most of today’s scientists have not acknowledged this, for these thoughts do not correspond to the scientific codex. At the beginning of the 17th century there was a development in Europe, which is called the “birth of modern science”. Between 1600 and 1620, 400 years ago, the idea of the new science started.
This was the decisive step into the wrong direction:
Francis Bacon wrote his book “Novum Organum”, the new work. In 1596 he formulated the well-known statement: “Knowledge is power.” Bacon stated that we have to take nature in possession, and that we have to get to know and exploit it for the benefit of men. In order to do that, nature has to be something which I am not a part of anymore. I leave nature as a human and become an observer or an experimenter. Thus, I confront nature. Nature literally becomes my thing, expressed in Latin: my object.
„Thus, nature becomes an object, and from this idea evolved the imagination of an objective knowledge”.
An objective knowledge is present when describing the knowledge; the subject itself is of no importance. Thus, the objective knowledge is the highest aim of science.
If an observer then gained objective knowledge of nature, then the observer can use this knowledge to direct nature. Though I get to know the laws of nature through this cognitive process, and use them from time to time – nevertheless.
I have to submit to the laws of nature, because I originated from nature and cannot act against my own laws of nature.
I simply can use the laws of nature for my well being with the help of nature. Finally,
I have to get to know the laws of nature in order to submit to them. It is exactly this that many scientists don’t want to accept, and they fight against the laws of nature.
We want to call attention to the man-made river regulations, for example, which only accelerate many natural catastrophes, instead of defusing them, by leaving the rivers in their natural beds with their meanders. The one who submits to the natural laws becomes a subject. Bacon differentiates between the world as a thing, meaning as an object, and the scientist as a subject.
This was a decisive separation which occurred years ago, and people have stuck to it until the present. Today we are proud to speak of objective knowledge. Johannes Kepler, coming from Wuerttemberg, wrote his book “Astronomia Nova” during that time – The New Astronomy.
At the same time Galileo Galilei worked on his new scientific system. Galilei had the opinion that he knew in which language the book of nature is written. It is the language of mathematics. He who knows mathematics should be able to read in the book of nature. For this reason he suggested to fathom these laws of nature. Kepler, in fact, succeeded in this project. Unfortunately, Galilei did not succeed. But thanks to Galilei another advancement has been made: For the first time he wrote about thought experiments.
… to be continued
Taken from Magazine VIII/12, Paracelsus Health & Healing, October 2011
Contact:
Prof. E.H. Iwailo Schmidt BGU
Healing Practitioner and Lecturer for Naturopathy
Dora-Stock-Str. 1
01217 Dresden
Tel.+49(0)3514-71 75 68
info@naturheilpraxis-i-schmidt.de
www.naturheilpraxis-i-schmidt.de
Literature:
Iwailo Schmidt, The Subtle Naturopathy (Die feinstoffliche Naturheilkunde), Private Publishing House, Dresden 2007
Iwailo Schmidt, Textbook of Bio-Energetics (Lehrbuch der Bioenergetik), Private Publishing House, Dresden 2006
Iwailo Schmidt, Textbook of Ideational Realization (Lehrbuch der Bewusstwerdung), Private Publishing House, Dresden 2007
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