Program 2

Lesson 1.2

Physical Science

Music

It might be possible to describe everything in scientific terms, but it would be useless.

Music

Before we're done with this program we will know what we mean when we speak of physical science. We will see that there is more to science than is generally thought as we search for answers to the question, What is science? We will discover that science is many things and that it is not unlike other human activities in many ways because it involves the same distinctly human qualities as does art, music, literature, dance philosophy and religion. We will define a few basic ideas of science, then look at what science is not good for.

Finally, we will seek a rationale for studying science for those of us who are not scientists, and will not be scientists. Be sure to read these Objectives in the Study Guide and refer to them as you study the lesson. Focusing on the Learning Objectives will help you to study and understand the important concepts. Compare the Objectives with the Study Questions for this lesson to be sure that you have the concepts under control.

Physical science, its the study of the behavior and interactions between matter and energy. The word, physical, refers to the material world. Those things which we detect with our five senses . But, you know, this really is not a very satisfying definition for at least three reasons. First of all, we've not defined what we mean by matter and energy. This we'll do later in the program then well continue to elaborate throughout the course as we study the behavior of matter and energy and their interactions.

Secondly, there's a great deal of ambiguity in the meanings of the words, physical and science. The definition above fits the modern disciplines of astronomy, physics, chemistry, geology, and meteorology. All of these fields of study deal with the interactions between matter and energy. But they do so from very different, yet complementary, perspectives. They're obviously not the same science, although there's a certain amount of overlap between them.

Geology and meteorology are further classified into earth sciences because of the specific application of the physical science principles to understanding the earth and its physical and chemical and biological processes. So, all together, these things constitute the physical sciences. The method of study in the natural laws which are common to all these areas is what we mean by physical science. Are we getting closer to understanding what we mean by physical? Science is one of those words that we use freely with the concept of committing very clearly in our minds, but it means different things to different people. But before we get too deeply into the course, we want to be sure that all of us are speaking the same language about science in general, and especially about physical science.

The third thing that makes that not a good definition is that it doesn't take into account the interactions of consciousness and the nonmaterial world with the physical world. This is an important aspect and its one well take up in the next program. So, you know, although this isn't a good definition, its not really a bad definition, either.

OK. Well, its time now to introduce my colleague and my personal assistant who will introduce the next segment of the program.

OK, Silico, you're up. Let's go, remember what I told you? Speak clearly, speak slowly. OK, lets go, you're on.

We will know a ____ working definition of physical science and try to expand upon it. We hope you will gain a better sense of what science is as you view this program and study the lesson.

That really was very good. Very good.

The friendly dictionary. Here are some words which will be used in this program which may be unfamiliar to you. They are in the Study Guide. Take a few minutes not to look them up in the dictionary and consider their meanings. A few minutes investment now will pay off big dividends in comprehension in our future programs.

So, what is physical science? Now awaiting further definition of matter and energy, suppose we just say at this point that physical science is the study of the dynamics of the physical universe. As opposed to the spiritual, psychological, religious, or biological universe. We'll see in the next program that these universes overlap to cause uncertainties about reality and its nature. Since different individuals have different realities, we might define physical science as the study of the shared reality or the common reality. Those things which we can verify, and which others following the same steps can independently verify, define this common reality for us.

The common reality is the only thing which could be said to be truly subjective. An object is either here or it isn't. Illusions and tricks aside. If something is there, all of us can see it, hear it, feel it, taste it or smell it. We can detect it with our senses and we would generally agree upon its size, its shape and its state of motion. This is what we mean by physical. But before I get ahead of the story, at this point, let's just think of matter as 'stuff'. We have an intuitive concept of matter as substance. We can feel it, it has mass and it occupies space. That's all we need to know for right now. Let's think of energy as the ability to cause motion. This is not a particularly good definition, but it will have to do for now. We'll study the concepts of matter and energy in great detail later in the course, but for now, lets just leave it at this level. When we use the word, science, we're specifically referring to physical science (that is, after all, the topic of this course), which may share certain characteristics with other areas of endeavor. The word, used in many different contexts today, the word, "science", that is; as in political science or social science. But the way of thinking which characterizes science is used in many different areas. It's so integrated with our lives, in fact, there can be little question that we live in the age of science. The methods of science are largely the methods of physical science.

The first scientific studies, after all, were studies of the physical universe. For this reason its the scientific studies and the methods of physical science which other sciences tried to emulate and to duplicate. Physical scientists were able to study these methods and make their methods work because they study relatively simple systems. Obviously, the more complicated the system under consideration, the more difficult it is to simplify it and try to reduce it to its assets. So, the process of making something less complicated, is called reductionism. In science we use reductionism to simplify our models by trying to eliminate everything that's not necessary. We try to find the simplest model which explains our observations and which is also consistent with our experiments. Later in this program well return to the concept of the scientific model.

For now, lets take a look at some of the things that science is. First and foremost, science is a human activity. By this we mean it involves all the aspects of humanity in the same way that other human activities do. For example, when we watch children at play, unencumbered by the responsibilities and restrictions of the adult world, we see all these aspects of learning which are formalized in science. We see these at work. We see the presence of an active, curious and imaginative mind. We see each child gaining experience through the senses and using logic, to aid in solving problems, as they build a database of information about the universe. As the child grows, that universe expands to include more and more types of stimuli.

Unfortunately, by the time we're adults we often lose that curiosity. We spend much less of our time learning new things about the universe and more time simply dealing with life in it. We've not really lost those abilities as adults, we've just learned to apply them to different kinds of problems, having solved the basic problems of classification and categorization of experiences. We still have new experiences as adults, but the older we get the more we tend to classify those experiences and compare them with the past. So, what science really does is to take those same qualities f curiosity and inventiveness and so on and formalize them into a way of studying the physical universe beyond what our senses will normally tell us.

We extend our senses by the use of instruments or we apply statistical techniques to find patterns which might escape us otherwise or we do other things to formalize that learning process. So, science, like any other human activity, requires a mind. Not just a brain, but a mind, to organize and store information. Science also requires an imagination. Like art or literature, most of science is in the mind of the beholder. Visualizing relationships and imagining how things would change if something were different, like gravity, for example. And seeing beyond superficial characteristics are all examples of the use of imagination in science. There are many other examples which you can think of, I'm sure, if you try. Curiosity is also extremely important in science. Most higher life forms, like mammals and birds, and some reptiles, exhibit this curiosity. Its certainly present in the early years of humans, as any one who has witnessed a child at play can certainly attest.

Insight. Insight is the ability to see to the heart of a problem. Its an understanding that comes without explanation and without planning. Each of us possesses insight of different types, at different times, in different situations. No ones insightful all the time, in every situation, but some of us just seem to have more of it than others. These people often grow up to become artists, writers and musicians, mathematicians, philosophers, or scientists. In fact in every field of human endeavor, you'll find insightful people, and science is no exception. Part of the learning that we do is the acquisition of experience.

We are born without experience, but begin acquiring it immediately after birth. As we learn, our minds organize experiences, each person slightly differently, but with much common ground. The way experiences are organized depends upon our culture, our language and our genetics. The more experience we accumulate, the less attention we pay to small details. For example, I'll bet none of you has to think much about tying a shoe lace. But think about how hard it was to learn that when you were five or six years old. But you know, like it or not, we all use logic. I don't mean to imply that everything we do all the time is logical, to the contrary, much of what we do as humans is quite illogical. That's what makes it interesting to be human. Much of the thematic material of the television series, "Star Trek", dealt with that interplay between logic and emotion which makes us so human. Think about this.

Behavior based entirely on emotion would leave the world in a state resembling feeding time in the carnivore cage. On the other hand, a behavior based entirely on logic would leave us as cold as a silicon chip, (no offense). In fact, behavior based entirely on logic may not even really seem particularly logical at times, but everyone uses it. If someone tries to pull the wool over your eyes, he or she might use what sounds like logical statements to do so. Most people will be skeptical of statements that do not sound logical. I am sure you can think of examples. Though logic can help us navigate through that which may seem to be contradictory, it can also help us organize our thinking. But, beware of false logic. Statements which sound logical, may not be in reality. For example, all cats have four legs. Garfield has four legs. Therefore, Garfield is a cat. Is this logical? Well, of course not, but its true. So, don't get confused with truth and logic necessarily. A logical statement can be no truer than the statement from which it is derived. We will talk a little bit later on about the idea of unwarranted assumptions and that sort of thing. So, can you think of other examples of things that sound like logic, which is not really logic? So, what is this formalized learning that we spoke of in the previous segment? We often hear of something called the scientific method.

Now one aspect of science is that it is a formalized method for learning about the physical universe, but there is no recipe or prescription for doing science . If this sounds contradictory, its really not, if we think about it. What I mean is that there are generally accepted ways by which an idea or a theory can be tested to see if it conforms to reality. But, there's still no prescription for doing it. Now, this is not really strange, nor is it unique to science. It's similar to the rules of a game, for example, like basketball. There's no one method of playing basketball, but there certainly are rules that serve as guidelines that define which kinds of things that you can do and which kinds of things you can't do. There are laws in science that tell us what are permitted and what is not. The rules are subject to interpretation by a skilled observer. In the case of sports, its the referee; in the case of science, its the peers of the scientist. There's enough complexity in the rules to allow infinite possibilities. Because there can never be a rule to cover every possible situation. The game will be very dull, if there was a rule and a way to do exactly everything. So that every game would be exactly the same. But science is different from sports and other things having rules. Only really that the rules are not as specific.

Now, I want to take a minute here to remind you. Don't fail to distinguish at this time between the rules of science and the laws of nature. These are two different and distinct concepts. So, take some time now or at the end of the program to resolve this difference in your mind. Make a note to do it. Write it down someplace right now in the margin of your text or something. Otherwise, you'll forget.

OK. In the late 17th century, Sir Isaac Newton, a mathematics professor at Cambridge University in England, stated certain definitions, guidelines and axioms of science which became the basis for our modern viewpoint. We will study these in detail in the second section of the program. But since Newton's time, there have been new discoveries which have forced us to expand the definitions and stretch the paradigms a little. Scientists like Newton are very often right about the rules, but seldom specify exactly how the game should be played. Although the recipe for a particular experiment must be quite specific, there are no particular specifications which dictate how an experiment in general should be performed. Its sort of like there are recipes for cooking, but there's no way to tell you exactly how you cook . If that makes sense. A particular experiment, or the results of that experiment, may be scrutinized by other scientists.

Like a referee making a call during a game. Further discussions amongst the scientists may criticize and offer suggestions and a rules committee might occasionally modify a rule in sports. See the parallels there? The rules help us find solutions because they affect the ways in which we design our experiments in science and the kinds of questions we ask. Well see many examples throughout the course which demonstrate that asking the right question is often more difficult than answering it. In fact, asking the right questions is very often the key to understanding a new scientific principle. So, in science, were not so concerned with rules as we are with procedures and guiding principles. The development of these guiding principles has a long and complex history, which we will trace in future programs as we go throughout the course.

OK. One of the most important criteria of good science is that of repeatability or reproducibility. A guiding principle, based on this criteria might be stated something like this. For conclusion from an experiment to be accepted as factual, the experiment must yield the same results when performed by anyone at anytime at any place or else there must be a logical and accepted principle which shows the relationship between the two situations. Huh? Its simply saying that anybody ought to be able to do the same experiment under the same conditions and get the same results. Or if you do something on the moon and on earth, we have to know what the difference in gravity is that makes the two give you different results.

OK. So, you can see that an event that happens only once and is not reproducible cant really be studied scientifically, no matter how interesting or important or how many people see it. A mass hallucination that takes place and only happens one time cant be studied scientifically. There are criteria for defining acceptable science, but there is no official rule book. Its sort of like gardening. There's no official rule book for gardening, but you know if you're doing it right or wrong, b if you do it wrong, the plants die. If you do it right, the plants grow. Scientific ideas are much like the plants in a garden. Those which grow under the proper conditions will flourish and flower, and those which do not, will die and wither away.

OK. Although there are no formal rules, there are certain aspects that most scientists agree upon. The requirement for repeatability or reproducibility, in many cases, might seem to be a limitation of science. But its an important one because it promotes the idea of skepticism. Skepticism, that is, doubting results, is really one of the strong points, and one of the important differences between science and other humanized activities.

Now Einstein said that the process of doing science is really nothing more than an organized version of the natural learning process. We can see this in other areas like in psychology. The study of group dynamics, shows us that groups of people or animals, for that matter, may behave in ways much more predictable than any individual within the system. In other words, its much easier to predict what the group is going to do than what the individuals going to do. And similarly, scientists working in groups learn about the world in much the same way that individuals do, even though we don't have specific rules for doing so.

In many ways the progression of the human species from stargazing hunter/gatherer to sophisticated manipulator of materials and technological consumer of energy and resources, is like the growth and increasing sophistication of a child in the growth process. Science relies on sharing or communicating our results with others.

Since science represents cumulative knowledge, its important that the knowledge be available for anyone to use. It is the sharing of activities and results, among other things, which distinguishes the science of chemistry or alchemy, for example. We'll study these things a little bit later in the programs, near the end of these programs, I should say. Investigations or observations which are conducted in secrecy, for whatever reason, are not science. The best scientific ideas are those that are available to everyone and anyone who's curious about them. We'll see that the major advances in our understanding of the physical universe were made by individuals or groups of individuals who took shared knowledge from different areas and put it together to see things in a new way. The process of synthesis.

Isaac Newton, for example, who we'll study in some detail later, said, If I have seen further than others, its because I stood on the shoulders of giants. " What do you suppose he meant by that?

Science also carries a common language of units, terminology and classifications, although not everyone will agree at all times on the correct usage of these. Part of the evolution of science has been the changes in units, terminology and classification as more facts are discovered and shared among the community of scientists. But it also involves classifying and describing the behavior of things, both living and nonliving. In fact, this is usually necessary for any general theories can be put forth. In the absence of a system of classification, people often put forth supernatural qualities to their observations. We'll see some examples of that as we move into things.

Classification both involves recognizing similarities and also differences among the related groups of objects. For example, in botany, trees may be classified according to the shapes of their leaves and the way the leaves are arranged. In astronomy, objects in the sky can be generally classified as being either stars or planets. As well see, the ability to classify is important in the development of scientific understanding in any field.

As an example of this learning process, imagine a child learning the meaning of the concept, hot. No amount of explanation can convey the concept if you don’t know what the word means, but upon touching a hot dinner plate and hearing "don’t touch, its hot, " the concept begins to take shape. Later, while watching the bathtub fill, for example, the child may hear, "don’t touch the water, its hot. " Upon closer investigation, the child sticks the hand into the water, the concept is reinforced.

Now, here, even though the plate and the water are not the same situation, and the situations are not the same, what they do have in common is the concept of hot, which is shared between the two situations as a sensory impression to which mom or dad has given a name. In whatever language you give it, its still conveys the same message. Thus, we learn as children, to classify and generalize concepts such as hot and cold, big and small, wet and dry, and things like that. Then, of course, we do similar things throughout our learning process. We do the same in science. We're just more clear on what it is that were looking for and we often design elaborate experiments to find it, although there are a great many scientific discoveries which happen by accident.

Another aspect of science which is often overlooked is the community of scientists. In fact, we could say that physical science is the goal of defining a common physical reality. I think we already said that. The result of an experiment is no use to science if its known only to its creator. Secret science is not science. Its more like alchemy, and its difficult to interpret the results in any kind of an objective way. Literature, of course, abounds on the demented scientist whose secret experiments threaten the world in one way or another. This is the reason for the concept of the shared physical reality. The more people there are to be convinced, the more objective the conclusion. Part of the process of science is noting similarities and differences between objects and events. We need to know what kinds of similarities and differences are significant. For example, does the composition of a rock affect the way it falls through the air under the influence of gravity? Or what about its color? Or what about the kinds of things that its made out of? In order to understand something, its necessary to recognize what you're studying as being something.

[Silico: Could you say that one more time, please?]

I'll say it again. In order to study and understand something, its necessary to recognize it as being something For example, we cant study the properties of electrons until we know that they are electrons. And unless were fairly sure that the things were studying are electrons and not something else, it doesn’t make any sense to study them.

OK, got it?

I think so. OK. Is this what you mean? We have to classify things in order to understand their properties. We describe things so that we will be able to recognize them later. You got it. OK. Science also involves problem solving . In many cases problem solving involves both the right side and the left side of the brain. The problems are not just the kind of problems you would find in a mathematics or physics course. Although the methods are similar. By problem solving here I mean, problem solving in a more general sense. A problem in the larger sense is anything which is not understood or any obstacle which needs to be overcome. The more knowledge we have of the properties and behavior of things in our physical world, the more ways we can use those, that knowledge, to solve problem. Here I mean the entire range of problems that we encounter, from everyday problems like how to remove a stain from your favorite shirt to global problems like how to monitor and control global warming.

May I elucidate? The more tools at your disposal, the wider variety of things you can fix.

Yeah, that's it, that's a great metaphor. Wait a minute, computers don't do metaphors. Anyway, its not just that we can fix things with tools, we can also build things and design new things if we know the properties of things.

OK, OK, do not go too far, it was just a metaphor.

In science we find a polarity between what is usually called pure science and what's called applied science. Pure science is that which proceeds purely for the sake of new knowledge, whereas applied science is research designed to solve a particular problem. Pure science often comes under criticism from people who don't understand it, because its open ended. Its not directed toward solving any particular problem. Because funding for science comes primarily from people who do not understand it, applied science has been favored in the United States the past half century. Much of it, unfortunately, related to military equipment and national security. We do find a healthy interplay between theoretical and experimental science. Theoretical physicists, for example, develop mathematical models, in the form of equations, which attempt to derive new relationships from known ones. Often those who are skilled as experimentalists are not skilled as theoreticians and vice versa. Einstein is an exception to this, of course. He spent many years in the laboratory learning the laws of physics first hand. But as a physicist, he later worked in theory. Having gained a basic understanding of physical laws, he concentrated on deriving new relationships and new perspectives based on those physical laws.

OK, on the other side of the coin, from the theoreticians, or the theoretical physicists, are the experimentalists. They design experiments and equipment that put the theories to the test. Occasionally, in an experiment something new is discovered which requires a modification of the existing theory or, in some cases, even a whole new theory. This has happened very much in physics, especially in modern physics, which involves things like electromagnetic phenomena and subatomic particles where the results of the experiment are not directly observable. So, two important aspects of experimental physical science are figuring out how to design equipment which can detect and measure the specified behavior and then figuring out how to interpret the electric signals, computer images, vapor trails and other kinds of physical evidence. Intuition and logic interact with each other to combine facts and evidence into theories making conclusions from experimental results and observations. The processes of discovery and invention work hand-in-hand to formulate models or to forge paradigms.

The following diagram attempts to show these relationships. This diagram is in the Study Guide. So study it for a few minutes, following the arrows as you try to picture how these different components act with one another. Yes, it is a complex diagram, but then, the human brain is also complex. The human brain is nonlinear, because we have the ability to examine several different things at once or to examine the same thing from many different perspectives. Do not memorize this illustration, but use it, instead, as a road map.

Science is cumulative. It's not necessary to reinvent the wheel every time you want to roll something, or to rediscover fire every time you want to cook something. In the same way, its not necessary for every scientist to rediscover the laws of gravity in order to predict when the next full moon will occur.

The cumulative nature of science depends upon the sharing of knowledge. Sharing requires communication, which requires language and symbols. This is part of what we called earlier, the scientific community. Science is often said to be many brained as opposed to a single brained activity. You see, scientific discovery happens within a framework of a shared understanding. This common reality we've been talking about. Newton talked about standing on the shoulders of giants. We might say that we still probably would have a theory of gravity or a theory of relativity, even if Newton or Einstein hadn't come up with it. They might have developed in a slightly different way or a slightly different time, but the theories probably would essentially be the same.

On the other hand, we doubt that there would be a Fifth Symphony with Beethoven or a picture called Starry Nights without van Gogh, regardless of the social context in which the artists lived and the context which influenced their art. This idea of single versus multi-brained activities is an important concept which relates to what we spoke of earlier when we defined physical sciences in an attempt to define this common physical reality. The work created by artists is like scientific theories a product of the mind, and also a product of the culture that created it. But unlike science, its not bound by restrictions of provability. An individuals perceptions and feelings are not subject to the common reality test.

Feelings are not proven, they're experienced. So, there probably will never be a general agreement on the meaning or the quality of art, but for an idea to be accepted as a scientific theory, there must be repeatable proof of a particular behavior of matter under a particular set of conditions.

[Silico: May I sum this up for you?S scientific theories such as gravity and relativity are descriptions of those physical laws which govern the universe and which are independent of the mind that discovers them. Artistic works, such as painting and music are a description of the world which expresses the vision of the creator but which solicit different responses from different observers. ]

Good, I like that. Let me repeat that. Scientific theories are a description of the physical laws which govern the universe and which are independent of the mind which discovers them and the mind of the beholder. Artistic works are a description of the universe which expresses the vision of the creator and which solicit different responses from different beholders.

Science is also knowledge about the natural world. But its knowledge of a special type. A very important advancement of science was the realization that it's not necessary to explain why something works in order to understand how it works. For example we can calculate and predict the movement of objects under the influence of gravity without knowing anything at all about what gravity is or why it exists. We don't need to know the nature of gravity or why it causes objects to be attracted through many millions of miles of empty space. We know how to send objects to other planets, send satellites into space, land objects on the moon, predict eclipses and tides and calculate the trajectories of intercontinental rockets. All this and more without knowing, even today, what gravity is or why it works the way it does. What we do know is how it affects objects. In other words, we know what it does. We don't know how or why it does it. In fact, Isaac Newton, himself, recognized that he would never get anywhere in understanding gravity if he first had to know what it was. He was able to describe it without knowing what it was. The need to assign a cause to every phenomenon presented a formidable barrier to understanding the universe before the birth of the modern scientific method in the 17th century. Many ideas were not adequately explored in medieval times because of the peoples ability to get around the blockage of why something did what it did, or why something behaved the way it did. We've all seen examples of this sort of blocking in our daily lives. I think you can probably jot down some few examples from your own experience as they come to you during the rest of the program.

Our modern body of scientific knowledge consist of information about the nature and properties of millions of substances, a few natural laws, simple ones, and the understanding of many different processes. But do not confuse this knowledge with science, itself. That would be like confusing the dictionary with the language. Science is much more than just a collection of facts and data. Science is partly a body of knowledge, though. The original meaning of the word is derived from the Latin word, "scientia", which translates roughly as knowledge. Science is a collection of facts, but its also the knowledge of the relationships between the objects and substances for which we know the facts about. But the word in its modern sense still means even more than that. As science develops, in fact, it goes through a series of more or less regular stages which begins with the accumulation of facts. In reality, all of these different elements of the growth of a science are present at any given stage.

However, a stage of science may be thought of as a period during which one aspect dominates or is most effective. We'll trace in this course the development of physics and chemistry from their infancy, so watch for these stages as you proceed through the course. During the fact gathering stage of a science, that's the first stage, there's usually a lot of confusion. Its not clear how to classify observations. There are usually many competing theories, none of which is very good or predicting. Much of the classification is incorrect because not enough is known to really compare one observation or one thing with another. Remember that a classification requires that similarities and differences are discernible and recognizable. In any science, as more information is collected, c classification schemes and categories can be revised and refined. The next stage is after the observation and fact gathering.

In the development of a science involve the improving classification. Again, this involves, you might say, fine tuning the classification. Classifying things helps us to organize facts about the, something being studied and better organization of the knowledge allows generalizations about the category. This leads to laws which characterize the category, the system being studied. Again, some of this stuff I know, were getting a little ahead of things here, but I want you to be able to refer back to this program when were doing some of these things later on . I hope this stuff will, if it doesn't make sense now, will certainly come to make sense as you see it developing throughout the program. In this second stage, once we found out the laws, for example the law of gravity, this can lead to theories which can provide explanations for us about how the system actually works. Those theories then can guide more experiments and future observations which allows refinements of the categories, laws and theories.

Now, you see, its an interactive sort of thing. Its between theories and observation. This is what I was saying earlier about experimentalists versus theoreticians. These processes are rather abstract. so don't worry if its not immediately clear how it all works. Its part of the goals of the course, and well see examples of how it works all the way through it. Chemistry and physics have both gone through these early stages, and our understanding of the physical world, while far from complete, is adequate. We do find a few consistencies in the everyday applications, but those are mostly in situations that we don't observe directly. You know things like relativistic speeds and speeds near the speed of light and that sort of thing.

Biology, on the other hand, in the past 50 years has entered the stage of generalizations and laws. Previously, biology was mostly classifying things. The social sciences, because of the number of the variables and the complexity of their relationships, are still in their infancy, in the observational stage. Now, don't get me wrong, there are classifications in the social sciences, to be sure. But there's not a general agreement on the classification schemes. Because of this, there are many competing theories of behavior in psychology, anthropology, political science, economics, and so forth. It's worthy of mention here that there are complex relationships involved in all aspects of the universe. This is one reason why the physical sciences are better understood than the social sciences.

Science is empirical! What does that mean? Empiricism is the reliance on experiment or observation as the ultimate basis for the judgment of truth. Its the empirical nature of science as a way of gaining knowledge which really marks the transition between the medieval and modern periods. U until the 12th century or so, knowledge gained through the senses was entirely suspect. Since its so easy to fool the senses, as well demonstrate in the next program, all sensory information was regarded by them as totally flawed. Much of this was due to the philosophy of Plato, an ancient Greek philosopher, whose ideas have had far-reaching influence on our thinking. Before the concept of modern observational science, laws were determined by authority, not by experience.

Aristotle said that things fell a certain way and that's the way things fell, whether they fell that way or not. Its hard for us to imagine this mindset of people in a culture that had vastly different ideas from our modern ones, yet seemed so much like us in other ways. The concept of a natural law, such as the law of gravity or the law of motion, is a relatively modern one. Prior to the 17th century motion was thought to take place purely because of some innate desire of objects to attain a certain state of purity. In our modern world we agree that our scientific theories must agree with what we observe. No scientific theory can be held as valid which does not agree with observed behavior. If, for example, I come up with a theory that says that things will fall upward when I let go of them, that's not going to be a good theory, because obviously, things don't o that when you let go of them. This is one of the few rules of science on which all scientists would agree. No matter how good, logical, beautiful, parsimonious, or intellectually satisfying a theory is, its no good if it goes against what actually happens. Quantifiable and repeatable experience, not authority, is the final arbiter. No matter how eminent the individual who states the theory, its wrong if it does not match observations. Even the great Einstein whose quotes you'll be hearing a lot on these programs, once said of his theory of general relativity, that no amount of observation could prove the theory to be correct, but only one observation could prove it to be wrong. What do you think he meant by that?

OK. Science is both quantitative and qualitative. Its important to distinguish between these two. Its the quantitative aspect of science in which we have put the greatest faith. Since Newton's triumphant description of gravity, we believe in the power of numbers. We stand ready to accept as reality that which can be proven numerically, even if it turns out to be something incredible and contrary to popular opinion. We know that not everything is quantifiable, but sometimes we tend to forget and try anyway. The poem, How do I love thee, let me count the ways, " for example. In some types of situations we can collect data about our surroundings, and discover specific numerical relationships that allow us to make predictions about the behavior of things. Now there's nothing mysterious about this. Or is there? We can, after all, predict beforehand how much the fill up at the gas station will cost, and how many gallons it will take to fill it up, if we bought gas once before. We could also relate it a level of the fuel gauge, or the number of miles on the odometer.

To illustrate the difference between these two terms, let's consider a few examples. For example, how many grains of sand are there on a beach? You could say, "A lot. This is a qualitative answer. How much money do you have? "Not much. " This is a qualitative answer. So, one quantitative answer to the last question is, I have $2. Another is I have three quarters and one dime. " See the difference? Now its apparent that the more money you have , the more of a given something you can buy. This is a qualitative relationship. Exactly how much of something you can buy with a certain amount of money depends upon the price of the item. This is a quantitative relationship.

More examples. Good and beautiful are qualitative concepts. You may try to rate them on a scale of one to ten, or whatever . But they are subjective and they depend upon the individual who's observing them. From the time of the ancient Greek and Chinese philosophers, hundreds of years B. C. , people have argued about the nature of truth, the qualities of good and evil, and whether things like truth and beauty exist at all in the pure form in an objective sense. Plato argued conclusively about the nature of quality as having independent objective existence, although we may disagree about its nature. Sort of like the three wisemen and the elephant. That's the story I won't relate to you, but one that you, if you're not familiar with, you should look it up, someplace. Interesting story.

OK. As opposed to qualitative truths, quantitative truths are objective. Quantitative truths are true regardless of the state of mind of the observer. Either 4 times 2 is 8 or it isnt. There's no question about it. Two rows of 4 things contain the same number of things as 4 rows of 2. And we can count either way to verify that there's a total of 8. Two times 4 equals 8, as does 4 times 2. Kind of get a sense of the difference between qualitative and quantitative? Quantitative has numbers attached to it. Its objective. Qualitative relates to feelings, has no numbers and its very subjective. Qualitative relationships are interesting, but in complex systems, we have a hard time sorting out whether qualitative relationships mean anything or whether they're simply coincidence.

OK. Now in physical science when you find reality based on measurable quantifiable and numerical relationships , these allow us to make predictions which we can measure repeatedly and get the same results. You may say, This doesn't seem like the best way or the only way to gauge reality, " but it happens that its the best we have at the time. We will see many examples of the quantitative nature of physical science in the upcoming weeks. Just as there are things which cannot be quantified subjectively, its also possible to overuse numbers to prove things which are not true. Statistics are often misused in arriving in many unjustifiable conclusions. A quantitative relationship also does not necessarily mean a causal relationship. In other words, just because the numbers indicate that there's a connection, doesn't mean that there's a cause. For example, there's a very high quantitative correlation between adults who drank milk as children and the incidence of drug abuse, but I don't think its safe to say that all people who drank milk as babies will turn out to be drug users. Einstein said, for example, "As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."

Science is also very successful, like it or not. It has been used to control our environment, although not in always beneficial ways. Its also used to validate truth. How often, for example, have we seen the man or woman on television in the white coat declare that scientific tests have shown. . . and then give some explanation of something which proves that their product is the only one who can meet these expectations. In television ads they try to convince us that their product really does solve whatever problem they have just invented and try and convince us that we have.

The rapid growth of both knowledge and technology in the past three centuries is largely due to these methods of science. This is not to try to pretend that everything associated with science and the growth of knowledge is necessarily good for us. Some people might argue that we have lost as much as we have gained as a result of our fascination with science and the physical universe. We are not all agreed that progress and science is good. But as we progress through our study of science, its important to know that we cannot expect it, that is, that we cannot expect science to answer all of our questions and solve all of our problems. We never claimed that science can do that. It cannot relieve all of the suffering and remove all of the pitfalls and hazards of life. It cannot substitute for spirituality, love, family, comfort, satisfaction, and all the other emotions that make us human. We need to keep our perspective when studying science as well as when were being scientific. Science is not good for everything. Science is good for what its good for. We get in trouble when we try to apply science in areas where its not appropriate, such as in things like proving the existence of God. There's' a time to be scientific and a time not to be. There's a time to be subjective, and a time to be objective. Wisemen know the difference.

OK. Science is a part of human nature. In this section, well examine some of the qualities of human nature to see in what ways science is like or unlike them. Well see that science is not really so different in many ways from other human activities. Like Thomas Edison said, "Genius is 90% perspiration and only 10% inspiration". Well, one of the recurring themes in the original Star Trek TV series was the continual conflict between the rational and emotion side of humanity. The message was that both were necessary to achieve a well-balanced intelligence. This conflict manifests itself in the study of science, just as it does in the living of life. In 1959, C. P. Snow published a book called, Two Cultures, in which he commented on the existence of what he called two kinds of intelligence. He noted that intellectual life of Western society was increasingly becoming split into two polarized groups.

Now, Snow is an interesting character. He spent many years at Cambridge University where he worked along side some of the worlds greatest scientists and mathematicians of the 20th century. But as a writer he also spent a good deal of time with other writers as well. Having close friends in both groups and seeing how the two groups differed in their behavior and interests, caused him to become occupied with his concept of the two cultures. He said he felt he was moving among two groups comparable in intelligence, identical in race, not grossly different in social origin, earning about the same incomes and who had almost ceased to communicate at all. Who an intellectual more on physiological climate had so little in common that in moving between the two groups, one might have crossed an ocean. That;s an interesting quote. You can see this quote in your Study Guide as well if you wanted to go back and look at it.

Well, what Snow is referring to is this qualitative, quantitative nature of the human mind. He went on to relate the development of science to the quantitative thinkers. Its interesting that this same idea has appeared recently in the notion of the right and left brain, which has become so popular in psychological theories. It appears from studies of the brain and the way it works that human intelligence is organized in two very different ways. The right side of the brain is intuitive, artistic and abstract and qualitative. While the left side of the brain is logical, concrete, mathematical and quantitative.

Now, normally, the two halves of the brain are connected. But in rare cases that connection is broken. When this happens, the effect on the perception of people that they test is very strange. Now, current theory suggest that in most of us one side of the brain or the other dominates the way in which we view the world. This is similar to handedness, although its not necessarily that right handed people are left brained or vice versa. But even though most of us are right handed, we still use our other hand to various degrees. Some of us are barely functional with our less dominant hand and others are fully ambidextrous. Same is true for left handers. So it seems that in thinking, just like in handedness, some people appear to be more ambidextrous with the brain than others. Interestingly enough, its often the case that scientific genius is accompanied by this cognitive ambidexterity. Einstein, for example, was well known for his mathematical left brain physics, but he was also well known for his right-brained humanitarianism and political wisdom. It has recently been suggested in a book that just came out this year that people not only differ in IQ or intelligence quotient, but also in EQ or emotional quotient.

We wont explore this psychological theory any further at this point, but we will note a couple of relative points regarding science and the study of this course. First of all, most scientists tend to be predominantly left brained. That is, the mathematical, rational side. And many would say that science is a left brained activity. Now for the most part this is true, although one could argue that many of the most major advances in scientific thinking will come about as a result of an individual who, like Einstein, was able to function with both hemispheres of the brain. Einstein was well known for his intuitive approach to science. Many of his theories originated with an intuition which he later worked with the left side of his brain to turn into a mathematical form.

OK. The second thing is now, and this is where the conflict comes in. Students who study physical science in classes like this one are more likely to be right brained dominant. That is, the artistic, intuitive, linguistic type. This course is designed along the left brain lines. We wont, well need to see how the two things integrate, and well need to see how the quantitative aspect of science work. But you will never be required to do the calculations of the type that one would find in a more traditional science course. In this section well examine three important ideals of science. Simplicity, appeal and universality. Although these are not written rules there are certain characteristics of scientific theories which stand out. Looking back on the development of scientific ideas, we see that good scientific theories, those which have withstood the test of time fit these criteria. In the 20th century, especially, during the development of quantum theory, for example, a theory was rejected once because it was not beautiful enough. The first of these is parsimony. Parsimony means stingy or frugal. We would like our scientific theories and ideas to be the simplest ones which are consistent with the facts.

One of the earliest statements of this principle of parsimony was in Ptolemy's book, "The Almagest, " published in the second century A. D. It promoted a geocentric world view and stood as the accepted authority on astronomy for 1500 years. In spite of being incorrect and not being not very accurate, mostly because it was the best and the easiest method to calculate the motions of the planets and stars. So, this is not something new in the 20th century. This is throughout the history of thoughts. We've always preferred a certain preference for simplicity. Think about it. There's something very elegant about simplicity, whether its in art, music, poetry or science. Parsimony asserts a preference for the simple over the complex whenever possible. A parsimonious explanation is the simplest explanation which is consistent with the facts.

Another way to say this is, if one is faced with more than one explanation which adequately explains or describes something, choose the simplest. All other things being equal, in the absence of any other criteria, the simplest explanation is the truest. Truest, of course, means the fewest contradictions. This statement of parsimony is often called Ockham's Razor. This is named after William of Ockham, a medieval philosopher who said it, and I think it is very elegant language. He said, "What can be done with fewer assumptions is done in vain with more. " This is called Ockham's Razor, as I mentioned before. Why do you suppose its called a razor? What's the word, razor, got to do with things here. Something you can think about.

Other scientists have said it, I have two more quotes here that express the idea of parsimony in similar words, but I like the elegance of the way these guys say things. Newton said it this way, "Nature does nothing n vain, and more is in vain when less will serve. Isn't that nice? Einstein said it very eloquently too. Einstein simply said, "Everything should be made as simple as possible but no simpler. Don"t get confused for simplicity can be misleading.

Most nonscientists would not agree that science is a process of simplification. In fact it often seems that science does just the opposite. We don't really make things more complicated, we just use a vocabulary which is very specialized. We do it because w want to make sure that were talking about the same thing when we communicate with others. Not necessarily the things that we study are difficult or even esoteric. Its not necessarily true that our models are simple, they are just the simplest possible. Don't get those confused. Simplest possible simply means that it may still be complex, but its no more complex than it needs to be. We have a clearer picture now of what we mean by reductionism, which is one of your dictionary words. Reductionism is a sort of a modeling process by which we remove those things which are not essential to the model. In other words, we try to make the model as parsimony as is possible by reducing it to its most simple form.

OK. The third thing here is appeal. Good science does more than just explain the observed facts. It also has aesthetic appeal. Aesthetics, a field of philosophy for the ancient Greeks, considers the concepts of beauty, truth, quality, elegance and symmetry. One view asserts that there is a nonobjective quality, that's with a capital Q, that affects us regardless of whether or not we can define it, and toward which we are drawn as if by some mysterious force. For an excellent dialog on this subject, we very much recommend a book called, The Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig. Despite the strange title, this book is a treasure trove of understanding about the role of aesthetics in our world views. Though for us it will have to stand as an axiom that in genera given the choice, all else being equal, we would prefer to believe that beauty is more appealing than ugliness. Admittedly, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but its arguable that people anywhere prefer what they consider to be beautiful, all else being equal.

Beauty is allied with truth, even in science. And don't get me wrong, again. This is not just to say that one would prefer an elegant and beautiful theory on the basis of elegance alone. All other things being equal, two models of equal simplicity, both explaining the facts equally well, well take the pretty one. Why we should have this preference for beauty really isn't clear, but its clear that it seems that's something deeply rooted in our humanity, and sometimes leads us into trouble in science just as it does in life. You know, even if science could be used to describe feelings or emotions, its doubtful that such a study would add anything and it would, like Einstein said, be useless. I'm referring to a quote by Einstein that said, "It may be possible to describe everything in scientific terms, but it would be useless."

Now, think about this for a minute. A piece of music might be described as a series of vibrations or a particular set of nerve impulses. Its unlikely that looking at magnetic patterns stored on a cassette tape will bring the same emotional responses as listening to the music. Such a description will in no way move the listener n the same way that listening to the music will. Other things like love, fear and hunger and so forth, might be eventually described as purely chemical interactions or as nerve impulses. But wouldn't we rather think of them as more than that? Doesn't our humanity demand that we still have emotional reactions which cannot be described to be predicted and manipulated? That's the purpose that art and poetry serves. Its not the realm of science.

In this program we tried to set the stage for our journey into the nature of physical science throughout the next 28 programs. We've tried to dispel the myth that science is merely a dull and lifeless collection of facts and replace it with the idea that science is an exciting and lively process by which we learn the nature of the physical universe. We've tried to show you that science is a human activity which uses the same talents and skills as other human endeavors, involving creativity, insight, intuition, and imagination. In science we see formalized learning which is not really very different from learning in general. And we try to reduce the physical world to the simplest possible concepts and elegant models which contain the fewest contradictions and which encompass the widest possible variety of circumstances in all of space and time. Pretty big charge, don't you think?

Well, now its time for what I like to call a challenge de jour. In challenge de jour I want you, at this time to use the Study Guide and Outline in the text and synthesize an account of your thoughts on one of the following: If you need help with the concept of synthesis, start with the dictionary and look up some of these things. Well, I guess that's it for today. I hope you have a better idea now about what we mean by physical science and what physical science is. Next time well look at the role of consciousness and perception and try to relate it to science.

Well, that's it, time's run out on this program. See you next time.

When it comes to science, get physical.

[Silico: Good bye, get physical.]

OK, that was a good job, you seemed to be a little nervous at first, but you did really well.

Music

The End