19 APR 2011 by ideonexus
Dissent as a Scientific Virtue
First, of course, comes independence, in observation and thence in thought. I once told an audience of school-children that the world would never change if they did not contradict their elders. J was chagrined to find next morning that this axiom outraged their parents. Yet it is the basis of the scientific method. A man must see, do and think things for himself, in the face of those who are sure that they have already been over all that ground. In science, there is no substitute for independ...Without dissent, there is no progress.
19 APR 2011 by ideonexus
Scientists Create and Thrive in a Stable Civilization
I take a different view of science as a method; to me, it enters the human spirit more directly. Therefore I have studied quite another achievement: that of making a human society work. As a set of discoveries and devices, science has mastered nature; but it has been able to do so only because its values, which derive from its method, have formed those who practice it into a living, stable and incorruptible society. Here is a community where everyone has been free to enter, to speak his mind,...Folksonomies: science culture science virtue
Folksonomies: science culture science virtue
There's a question of cause and effect in considering Bronowski's observation.