Have you ever come across that guy who is just sure that he’s right? He doesn’t discuss, he proclaims. Sometimes, when you’re only kind of sure about something, this guy comes along and makes a bold proclamation, and you maybe back off a little bit? Then, by dumb luck, maybe you hear one of these proclamations on a subject where you really know your stuff. The guy is wrong, and you pound him with facts, and only after you present overwhelming evidence does such a guy back off even an inch. I’ve met a few. They really annoy me. But that’s just day-to-day life and can’t really screw things up on a world-wide scale.
We have learned that unfounded confidence is a dangerous thing in a leader. This recent post by Ed Brayton makes the case that Sarah Palin is possessed of that sort of dogmatic certitude that has gotten us into trouble over the past few years. And, as a bonus, a guy from Palin’s home town is claiming that, when pushed on the specifics of her beliefs on the age of the earth and creationism, Palin said that she believed the earth was really less than 7,000 years old and dinosaurs and people walked the earth at the same time. She’d seen images somewhere of dinosaur fossils with human footprints in them.
I, for one, want the leader of our government to really embrace the notion that the scientific method is an excellent way to discover how the world works and that, if push comes to shove, and scientific observations contradict the stories of Middle Eastern Bronze Age shepherds; probably the scientific observations are where the smart money goes.
Briefly, the scientific method includes these characteristics:
To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning.[1] A scientific method consists of the collection of data through observation and experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses.[2]
Although procedures vary from one field of inquiry to another, identifiable features distinguish scientific inquiry from other methodologies of knowledge. Scientific researchers propose hypotheses as explanations of phenomena, and design experimental studies to test these hypotheses. These steps must be repeatable in order to dependably predict any future results. Theories that encompass wider domains of inquiry may bind many hypotheses together in a coherent structure. This in turn may help form new hypotheses or place groups of hypotheses into context.
Well, she’s walked next to Senator McCain, so she’s had some first-hand experience with dinosaurs.
I assume these are the pictures she is talking about.
I think the scientific method is great for research and some other things. We don’t, however, runs out lives by it. It shouldn’t be the only way we make decisions.
For example, at some point a parent must trust their children, even if by the scientific method they shouldn’t.
I don’t want my leaders to make all of their decisions on faith or gut instinct, but I don’t want them to be robots, either. For those that have seen the film version of “I, Robot”, consider Will Smith’s example of how the robot made the right, logical decision that was the wrong human decision.
Scientific can’t be the only way to make a decision because it answers only a subset of the issues with which we have to contend. But, where scientific observation provides data, you’d better have an excellent reason if you choose to ignore it.
So, if the fossil record indicates that the world is several billion years old, I want a leader who has a worldview that makes him or her figure that the world is probably billions of years old and not thousands.
All things equal, I want a leader who says that scientific evidences point to an old earth and universe.
But all things aren’t equal. I’m sure we’ve had politicians who believe in horoscopes and the strange religious belief that the number 13 is “unlucky”.
And I know we have politicians who believe all sorts of loopy things about public policy. Although wrong beliefs are not irrelevant– and may not be trivial– seemingly these would be trumped by policy concerns.
If I hear that woman say “we cannot blink” (or any derivation thereof) one more time, I will scream.
My concern is less that she knows or cares about science (although I’d prefer it if she did) but that she seems to believe that absolute certainty is the same as leadership. THAT, my friends, is frightening.
Those footprints don’t even look real. The rest of the rock is weathered, and there are smooth footprints in it? It would take the eye of someone who already believes the earth is young to buy that those footprints are real.
Even if our leaders don’t understand the scientific method, I would hope that they at least learn from experience and value evidence. I would expect the same from our voters. An example: If one of the Keating Five continued to favor deregulation such that another banking crisis occured, perhaps the voter should recognize that that politcian had not learned from his first experience, and shouldn’t be allowed to call the shots this time around. Also, the same people who brought us the Iraq War (McCain’s present advisors) should not be brought back for an encore.
Citizens need not know the scientific method. They should at least know the “Fool me once…” rule. The one our current president couldn’t state without mangling, and has proven he has no knowledge of.
I would absolutely love to see scientific method applied to policy. I think we’d see a lot of programs disappear.
Speaking of narrow minded bigots who have little tolerance for hearing opposing views…
Richard Dawkins has decided that the Royalty Society’s education director has to go.
Reason?
The rascal is a Church of England minister.
Never mind that Michael Reese is a committed evolutionist. The fact that embraces religion at all is enough get him canned.
Said Dawkins, “a clergyman” at the Royal Society to “a Monty Python sketch.”
Atheists, British atheists in particular, should understand the devices of irrational bigotry.
Student Thomas Aikenhead was hanged in 1697 for voicing the view that the Bible was “a rhapsody of ill contrived nonsense.”
As intolerance waned, George William Foote got away with a mere one-year prison sentence in the late 19th century for publishing blasphemy in his periodical, The Freethinker.
It seems everyone is for everyone else being tolerant.
If atheists have been hanged or imprisoned, it sounds like that Church of England guy got off easy…