Scientific Temper and Education: A Framework for Discussion

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I have often wondered why a scientist, in India, is most reluctant to talk or write something about general matters especially in the newspaper or media. So I was very happy to see the critical comments of Rahul Siddharthan (1) (IMSc, Chennai), about the article of Sarukkai (a philosopher at NIAS, Bengaluru) (2), on “March for Science” held on Aug.9, 17. I was wondering whether I should intervene in the debate as I had disagreements with both of them.  But I was reluctant to write.

 

There were more responses (3) from Sarukkai and Pathak, a sociologist from JNU, Delhi, Again I hesitated.to respond. Then Surendran (4), a sociologist from TISS in Mumbai, criticized both of them in a detailed way for their skepticism of and bias against, science. She claimed that sociology is also a science and some sociologists had also marched with the scientists. Then came a sociologist of science, Thomas (5) from Jesus & Mary college, Delhi, who criticized Surendran saying, her functional approach to sociology is not correct. Thomas claimed further that social scientists need not follow the scientific method, but can still claim to be scientists! With everyone except the last demolished, was there anything left to write or comment about?  I began to see why scientists do not write. Before they move to the keyboard the opposition seems to have demolished each other. Finally I thought I would write anyway, maybe in a more inclusive way, as the subject of scientific temper, in my view, is an extremely important one for education of younger minds.

 

The main complaint against scientists by all the respondents, was “the claim that studying science reduces superstition and increases scientific temper is not correct. One has just to look at the personal lives and institutions of scientists; with a lot of superstition, casteism, sexism and other undesirable qualities” I think this is true. It is because, scientific temper is a psychological attitude which is not influenced by doing routine science, but requires change in one’s values and moral / ethical frameworks. In India, this is still largely decided by family and society. This has been noted by many persons, both scientists and non-scientists. Most of them agree that values and wisdom are outside natural science. Ethical framework decides largely our attitudes and behaviours. Still Siddharthan has a point. The sheer scale of the change in life and environment, due to science and technology, in the last 60 years has reduced the sanctity of superstitions. People do not worry about travelling south on Thursdays, as much, now as earlier. I do not know about bathing with clothes on after an eclipse as some newspaper recommended recently!

 

To continue the discussion it may be useful to look at the science / non science divide from a broader perspective, the world view of an individual. World view is a collection of memory, knowledge, attitudes, values, vision and so forth; and is what guides and determines a person’s thoughts and actions. We can start with I, at the centre of my world. As we move towards the outside, the world view has unreal dreams and imaginations, tastes and likings, many of them, uncommunicable. Then come arts, humanities, then social sciences and then on to natural sciences like physics, chemistry on the outermost circle (or sphere). For the present discussion we will call the world view up to and including the social sciences as inner world and beyond that up to and including the natural sciences as outer world. (6)

 

The outer world is the objective or impersonal world, common to all human beings (us) which existed before my birth, holds me in it now and will continue to exist after my death. Though what happens after my death has no reality for me, I can visualize now, a world that may exist even in my absence. It is the world of physics and other natural sciences. Emotion or feeling does not enter into the impersonal description of the outside world. Logic and scientific method (repeatability, falsifiability) are necessary. This world has a universal time and history. It is accessible to every individual through his or her perceptions.   Science is related to outer world and decides our knowledge of it, its laws and evolution. Here the word science refers to natural science. The social sciences belong to the inner world.

 

Human attitudes and Social sciences

The distinction between natural and social science is very important.  As the philosopher from UC Berkley in U.S.A., John. R. Searle  puts it (7) “  The distinction, rough as it is, between the so called `natural’ sciences and the `social’ sciences is based on a more fundamental distinction in ontology (essence of things), between those features of the world that exist independently of human attitudes, like force, mass, gravitational attraction and photosynthesis, on the one hand, and on the other, those whose existence depends on human attitudes like money, property, marriage and government. There is a distinction, to put it in very simple terms, between those features of the world that are observer – independent and those that are observer – dependent. Natural sciences like physics, chemistry and biology are about features of nature that exist regardless of what we think, and social sciences like economics,  political science and sociology are about features of the world, that are what they are, because we think, that is what they are. ”   The observer dependence that Searle talks about is different from the observer dependence in natural sciences especially in quantum mechanics. Searle is referring to the dependence on concepts and ideas expressed by the culture, society and state.

 

Observational Uncertainties

One can have further gradations in the social sciences depending on the nature of subjective involvement, as measured by the uncertainties in observations. The large uncertainties make individual observations meaningless. We have to have large number of observations and use statistical methods for drawing conclusions. Smaller the sample larger is the uncertainty as we can see in the predictions of economics.

 

The details of many of the above processes, like construction of outside world, are subjects of study in themselves, especially in philosophy. In these disciplines many different theories can coexist (peacefully or otherwise). I quietly accept statements like “there is nothing natural about natural science”. How we agree on reality is still not unanimously agreed upon in philosophy, though most of us have worked out (hopefully) our own way of deciding what is real.

 

Differences in the Working of Inner and Outer Worlds

Inner world includes humanities, arts and social sciences and all other areas outside natural science.  Though this world is not part of science, the scientific method, i.e. logic and reasoning, plays an essential role here also. However repeatability and falsifiability do not exist; as controlled experiments are not generally possible and where possible have large errors or dispersions. Sometimes the word `Soft sciences’ is used to describe these areas.  Statistical methods are crucial for their study. To achieve objectivity in the study of these subjects is not easy. Detachment plays an essential role though perfect detachment is not possible.  Values and ethics are human attitudes.  They are part of the inner world. This is why we say that, (Natural) Science and technology do not bring wisdom. Science is value neutral. If one wishes to change the value system, that one is born into, how does one decide on a new system of values?

 

Albert Einstein has said (8) “Those convictions which are necessary and determinant for our conduct and judgments cannot be found solely along this solid scientific way.  Knowledge of ‘what is’ does not open the door directly to ‘what should be’……, the goal of our human aspirations.  Fundamental ends and valuations…. come into being not through demonstrations but through revelations, through the medium of powerful personalities. One must not attempt to justify them, but rather to sense their nature simply and clearly”. One makes a personal choice, consciously or unconsciously.

 

In the inner world, as we move closer to the centre,   heart, rather than the head, is the decider.  Love, compassion, kindness, elation, ecstasy play big role in decisions. In outer world elation at the time of creation has to be followed by verification.  Soft sciences do not have such an easy way out. There is  the difficult problem of  `empirical validity’.  In the absence of experimental or mathematical proof, validity is by personal satisfaction. One example is ‘Music Appreciation’. Here personal satisfaction is a key factor, though opinions of other experts may also play a role. Personal satisfaction is accompanied by elation or happy feeling and decides our choice of good music. Elation at the highest level is the feeling of unity of ourselves and the universal self. This is of course going beyond positivism and materialism into metaphysics and theism or humanism.

 

In these areas, one has to live with uncertainty and try to validate conclusions to the extent soft sciences permit you. The acceptance of authority in the real world, however, does not seem to be based on validity alone. It is a mixture of charisma, social importance and the power wielded by the promoter of the idea, among other things. Hence use of logic, touch with reality and scientific method to the extent possible, is absolutely necessary to tell us if the ‘emperor has no clothes’; that is to see the reality without being blinded by wrong public opinion. This is specially true, in India, where godmen of all types abound.

 

This discussion has a special importance for education, which should provide guidance for personal ethical choices. Scientific temper involves looking at a problem, considering the various options, and deciding what to do. Science teaching, in natural sciences, all over the world, is largely a transmission of skills and accepted ideas. It is not good at presenting alternatives to choose from and raising discussions. It is the social sciences, which help in making suitable choices and cultivating scientific temper. The diminishing role of social sciences in the total curriculum of a science student, at present, leaves them ill equipped to handle ethical issues and decide or write about them in newspapers and media. The inclusion of scientific temper in the curriculum of every student is essential for meaningful education.

   

References

1. Siddharthan, R., The Wire, 12 August 2017.
2. Sarukkai, S., The Hindu, 10 August 2017.
3. Sarukkai, S., The Wire, 14 August 2017;
Pathak, A., Indian Express, 12 August 2017.
4. Surendran, A., The Wire, 21 August 2017.
5. Thomas, R., The Wire, 23 August 2017.
6. The terms ‘world 1’ and ‘world 2’ are used by Popper, K. (1974/2002). The Unended Quest, Routledge classics, London, in somewhat different contexts.
7. Searle, J. R., The New York Review, 28 February 2002, pp. 33–36; see also his book The Mind.
8. Einstein, A., Out of My Later Years, Philosophical Library, N.Y., 1950, pp. 21–23.

 

Natarajan Panchapakesan formerly taught Physics at Delhi University

This article was originally published in Current Science, and appears here with permission from the author and the journal.

Climate change: act before it is too late

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In a recent paper published in the journal BioScience, William Ripple and colleagues examine the progress made by humans in tackling various environmental challenges over the last 25 years. For this, the authors look at the global trends for several key environmental metrics like the available per capita freshwater resources, total forest cover, abundance of vertebrate species, etc.

Summarily, they find that the state of the environment is scary and is steadily getting worse. To quote the authors “we have unleashed a mass extinction event, the sixth in roughly 540 million years, wherein many current life forms could be annihilated or at least committed to extinction by the end of this century.” The authors also prescribe a large number of actions that need to be undertaken urgently to ameliorate the current situation.

There is no dearth of papers calling attention to the fragile state of global environment. What makes the present paper different is the fact that more than 15,000 scientists from 184 countries of the world have formally expressed support for the content of this paper. This makes it perhaps the biggest formal endorsement of a scientific article by the scientific community. Given the significance of climate change for every human being on the planet, this is a much needed step. However, for any improvement in the present state-of-affairs, the entire society needs to act together. As the authors point out “Sustainability transitions come about in diverse ways, and all require civil-society pressure and evidence-based advocacy, political leadership, and a solid understanding of policy instruments, markets, and other drivers.”

 

Sutirth Dey is an Associate Professor of Biology at Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Pune.

Science, Scientists, and Society: Renewing the Dialogue

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Over the past century, there have been many points of intersection between organized science, governmental policies and patronage, and societal benefits and concerns. In India, these linkages achieved prominence largely after independence. In India, as in the west, the initial engagement of science, polity and society was marked by optimism, enthusiasm, and a belief that science would enable and empower governments to address various national problems, thereby enhancing the quality of life of the citizenry. In more recent decades, the euphoria has subsided, in part as science and society have both undergone rapid, far-reaching changes. The darker side of even the well-meaning application of at least some scientific technologies has also become more apparent, with greater appreciation of the longer-term detrimental effects of many scientific fixes to problems in areas ranging from food security to energy to disease. Another change is that scientific research has, on the whole, become more expensive, leading to a greater societal expectation of accountability. Moreover, with rapid technical specialization within science, science and scientists are increasingly being seen to be self-referential and out of touch with societal needs and aspirations. One unfortunate outcome of these changes has been a burgeoning anti-science feeling in a subset of society, most dramatically so in the USA, but also, to a lesser degree, in India.

 

Thus, it is imperative to have greater clarity on issues like what expectation do society and government have from science and scientists and vice versa. This is essentially what has been referred to as the ‘social contract of science’. In order to achieve this clarity, at least three major issues need to be acknowledged and addressed. First, what are the differences between how scientists, other academics, and society view the nature and role of science? Second, how have changes in how science is practised, evaluated and encouraged, and changes within society,  affected the perceptions about the social contract of science? Third, how can communication between scientists and society be enhanced, to generate better mutual understanding, so crucial to any rethinking of the social contract of science. We shall briefly outline some of our views on all three issues.

 

One big difference in how scientists and society view science is in the relative importance given to its utilitarian aspects. To many basic scientists, science is primarily a quest for understanding. To much of society, the purpose of science is to solve practical problems of daily life. The former think of science, primarily in terms of brilliant conceptualizations explaining the mysteries of the universe. The latter primarily think of science as providing vaccines, cures for diseases, better crops, novel energy sources, satellites and varied civilian or military technologies. In the minds of most members of society, and governments, science and technology are Siamese twins, conjoint forever. Yet, for many scientists, technology is a very useful tool, but not to be conflated with science. Consequently, many scientists do not conceive of the primary role of science as being the solving of practical problems. That is seen as a secondary by-product, arising from the utilization of understanding gleaned from basic research. Bridging these two positions are applied science researchers and engineers, much more attuned to actual problem solving with direct and immediate relevance to societal and governmental concerns. One shortcoming in Indian science, we believe, has been the dual expectation of basic and applied research from the same set of scientists. This cannot lead to outstanding basic or applied science, since the training, mind-set, and approach of really good basic and applied scientists actually need to be somewhat different. The problem is that without a good foundation in basic science, it is difficult for a nation to actually do really good innovative applied science.

 

Another huge difference in how society and scientists view science pertains to the nature of scientific ideas as provisional knowledge. Society expects certainty: scientists are perceived to be dealing in factual truths about the world, not conceptualizations that work in some contexts, but not in others, or that may be overturned by new discoveries. Hence, legitimate disagreements and debates within science often drive disillusionment in society, with despair that scientists cannot even agree among themselves. The key difference here is that, in politics and many aspects of daily social life, confident certainty is seen as a virtue; in science, such levels of certainty would suggest intellectual arrogance. A simple example makes this clear – if a doctor was to say “I cannot really figure out what is causing your symptoms”, we, as organismal biologists, would empathize and say “yes, its hard enough to understand the basic biology of a fruitfly, let alone humans”; most non-scientists would conclude that the doctor was incompetent.

 

Within academia, too, there are differences between how scientists and others view science. A large proportion of scientists and their acolytes within society, fall into the ‘scientism’ fallacy of believing that scientific methods of analysis and understanding are superior to others. It is also quite common among academicians of social science and humanities, and their acolytes, to dismiss science as being ‘just one of many narratives’. Clearly, such dismissively patronizing attitudes will not foster dialogue that could potentially lead to mutual intellectual enrichment. We are particularly pained by this, because, in our fields of evolution, ecology and behaviour, we routinely face problems shared by the so-called ‘hard sciences’ as well as the ‘social sciences’. Evolutionary biologists, like historians, have to deal with contingency and lack of replication, but the approaches developed to deal with these problems are very different in the two disciplines. Similarly, ecologists and behavioural biologists invest great effort in trying to understand social behaviour and organization, as do sociologists and psychologists, but in very different ways. There are great, unutilized, opportunities here for mutually enriching dialogue.

 

To turn to the second issue, a major aspect of change over the past few decades has been the ascendancy of what we call the ‘corporate culture’, propagated by the business management weltanschauung. This is a problem for science and also for society at large. The relevant aspects of the corporate culture can be described as the beliefs that (i) every product/service can be conceptualized as a commercial commodity; (ii) specialized knowledge of a product/service is not necessary for its successful marketing; (iii) quality can be assessed via quantitative metrics; and (iv) short-term measures of success are the only important metric for evaluation. Overall, this culture has had extremely deleterious societal effects by commercializing three important professions – education, healthcare and journalism – whose practitioners traditionally viewed their role as having a strong ‘service to society’ component. The results of applying the above four beliefs to these professions are seen every day, and we will not belabour the point. This same corporate culture is also damaging science by adversely impacting how scientific research is presented, projected and evaluated. More importantly, this corporatization of science has contributed greatly to the self-referential nature of science, with scientists increasingly choosing to work on problems likely to garner rewards in a system valuing hype and advertising more than solid science. This only exacerbates the disconnect between science and society, causing further erosion of mutual trust.

 

On the third issue, of communication between science and society, there are actually three aspects that need consideration. The first is the communication of scientific advances to society. This aspect of science communication has improved nationally and globally in the past ten to fifteen years, though there is still a way to go. The second aspect, where we feel scientists have not done a good job thus far, is the communication of our view of the scientific ethos to society. By giving a clearer picture of how we view science, and why, and its significance even for the utilitarian side of science, we would foster more nuanced societal expectations from science, and also contribute to the fostering of a ‘scientific temper’ on the twin foundations of skepticism and rationality. The third issue, which in India needs urgent attention, is the role of the scientific establishment as a mediator and interlocutor between government and society on policy issues that have major scientific dimensions and also raise societal concerns. Such issues could range from genetically modified crops to nuclear power plants. The government-society interaction on such issues is typically highly politicized and often very emotional. What is typically missing though, is a balanced and apolitical set of scientific inputs that make the debate more meaningful. This is where, ideally, the scientific establishment needs to be more active, in order to serve as a reasonably respected and impartial interlocutor, representing a community trusted by both government and society, to present a critical appraisal of the scientific aspects of policy in order to facilitate a meaningful cost-benefit analysis, in both economic and socio-political terms. This is a role played successfully by scientific academies and other scientific bodies in many western countries, and one that is as yet not embraced to the required degree by such bodies in India. Again, a certain level of trust is necessary for such an interlocutory role to be successful, and the first requirement for trust is dialogue and mutual understanding.

 

In this context, we are very gratified that the Indian Academy of Sciences has recently announced a new initiative towards promoting meaningful dialogue between scientists and society. The idea is to have an open-ended and sustained dialogue amongst science practitioners, science policy makers, science administrators and educators, and society at large, so that all stake-holders can engage on issues pertaining to the practice, teaching and management of science, as well as, all aspects of the science-society interface. The hope is that this will give rise to a more inclusive and acceptable vision of the place of science in society, polity, and culture. This initiative is centred around a new academic journal, Dialogue: Science, Scientists, and Society , which is accompanied by a more informal, though moderated, web-discussion platform called Confluence. The journal will also serve as an umbrella for organizing public meetings to promote discussion and debate leading to a better mutual understanding between scientists and society. Two such events have recently been conducted in Bengaluru and Delhi. It is our privilege to be associated with this effort and we hope that it will truly result in a meaningful re-imagining of the social contract of science.

 

This article originally appeared as a guest editorial in Current Science and has been republished with the journal’s permission.

Mewa Singh is a Distinguished professor at the University of Mysore and is Chief Editor, Dialogue: Science, Scientists, and Society. 

Amitabh Joshi is a professor at the Evolutionary and Organismal Biology Unit, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bengaluru  and the Editor of Publications, Indian Academy of Sciences.

 

A March by Scientists

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When the mainstream media is busy covering politics, politicians, and the economy, leaving very little time for useful yet “uneventful” and little-understood topics like science and scientists, events in the last few months leading up to the “March for Science” has taken a bit of space in our collective imagination. We have read news and criticism on the “March for Science”. While the event was mainly symbolic, it has brought to the open an important topic and counter-narrative by social scientists and philosophers warranting a healthy discussion.

 

The intent behind the “March for Science” event was a genuine one. Equally legitimate were the demand to increase the budget for science and developing a society with scientific temper and science-based educational curricula. However, it’s time that we, the scientists in India, articulate good reasons, and there are plenty, what science can do for the society in bringing democracy to the forefront and why the freedom of inquiry must be preserved. This should be in line with what Vannevar Bush, an inventor and science administrator in the USA, submitted in his report, “Science, The Endless Frontier” to the US President Franklin D. Roosevelt in July 1945. While doing so, it is important to stay contemporary on the challenges and what science can do in providing solutions for the specific problems that our nation faces. For example, we need to state, and with metrics, on how increasing the investment in primary healthcare will reduce the nation’s long-term financial burden by curbing infant mortality, reduce the nation’s burden on deadly diseases like heart diseases, cancer, obesity and diabetes and how an increased investment in science will move the innovation quotient of the nation upward leading to more employment and wealth creation. Above all, we need to state why the nation must invest more in high quality basic science and cite examples from our own past on how investment in basic science had led to long-term value creation. The letter to the Primer Minister, sent as a pretext to the event, although factual and genuine, lacked all these. The good news is that we have plenty of reasons on why a knowledge-based society driven by empirical evidence from all disciplines can alleviate most problems that our nation faces today. The onus is on us, the scientists, to provide evidence and with metrics that science can indeed help India achieve her rightful place in the 21st century. Especially important is to mention how science will bring the practice of democracy to the front, will provide equal opportunity to all and aid citizens with tools to bring the miscreants to justice. While doing so, it is important to assure the nation that the practice of science will follow the highest standard of propriety and spell out the specifics on the transparent checks and balances that need to be in place to stop wrong doings and misuse of the nation’s resources. This is precisely what is missing is our current narrative. While making those promises, it is important that we take accountability seriously while making promises to the nation, remain true to ourselves and come back to the nation every 5 years on what is achieved against what we had set out to do.

 

The scientists need to understand and appreciate the fact that it will take an eclectic effort to solve many of the problems in our society. The society may become sanguine about science but the scientists realize that the pursuit of truth through empirical evidence is not restricted to natural sciences alone. Scientists need to get out of the myopic view on what constitutes the truth. Each scientist has, a personal history, religious inclinations, desire for recognition, cultural barrier and fear of failure. On most societal issues, the view of a scientist is colored as much as by evidence, observation and experimentation as it is by one’s cultural and religious beliefs and inclinations. Therefore, it is difficult to separate a scientist, the person, from the culture in which the scientist grows up and imbibes the work ethics during the period of training and the practice of the art. One may argue that a scientist does not interpret the data based on his/her religious and cultural beliefs and to a large extent it’s true. While doing so, it is important to note that there may be no clash of thoughts while formulating a specific hypothesis or designing an individual experiment, but on larger societal issues, the case is different. Take the example of “believing in god”. There is nothing, not in science, that can explain the presence of god with empirical evidence but many scientists believe in god defying solid evidence based on millions of years of evolution and natural selection. The same scientists visit temples, mosques and churches, pray and follow religious practices. Therefore, it’s not true that all scientists believe in evidence when it comes to their own personal choice and on larger issues outside of their narrow sphere of experimentation and hypotheses building. Hence, stating that all scientists follow logic and evidence on all accounts will be wrong.

 

Although there is no official survey in our country, a closer look to our society suggests that scientists are as religious and/or ritualistic as people from other works of life. In fact, a 2009 Pew survey in the USA suggested that more than half of the scientists believe in god or a higher power. This brings us to the question; does it make a religious scientist a non-scientist? No, it does not. Frankly, one’s religious and cultural beliefs should not even mater. The real question that we need to answer is whether it is possible to remain true to one’s religious and cultural beliefs and still be fiercely independent in postulating and deriving rigorous conclusions based on empirical evidence?

 

Therefore, it is time that we scientists climb down from the moral high ground and end the notion that only natural sciences practice empirical evidence-based learning. In fact, social scientists have already provided with methodology and framework to solve many of the societal problems outlined above. It will be good if our scientists broaden their horizon of the pursuit of knowledge, embrace disciplines outside of their own, including some of the suggestions provided by the social scientists, and learn to question the answers that they usually get at the end of experimentation and observation. Giving a strong message and teaming up with intellectuals and academics from all other disciplines will make a strong case on why the nation needs to support the pursuit of knowledge. This will narrow the chasm between science and other disciplines and make a strong appeal to our political class on the importance of science in nation building.

 

Binay Panda is at Ganit Labs, Bengaluru.

Black holes are simpler than forests and science has its limits

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Albert Einstein said that the ‘most incomprehensible thing about the Universe is that it is comprehensible’. He was right to be astonished. Human brains evolved to be adaptable, but our underlying neural architecture has barely changed since our ancestors roamed the savannah and coped with the challenges that life on it presented. It’s surely remarkable that these brains have allowed us to make sense of the quantum and the cosmos, notions far removed from the ‘commonsense’, everyday world in which we evolved.

But I think science will hit the buffers at some point. There are two reasons why this might happen. The optimistic one is that we clean up and codify certain areas (such as atomic physics) to the point that there’s no more to say. A second, more worrying possibility is that we’ll reach the limits of what our brains can grasp. There might be concepts, crucial to a full understanding of physical reality, that we aren’t aware of, any more than a monkey comprehends Darwinism or meteorology. Some insights might have to await a post-human intelligence.

Scientific knowledge is actually surprisingly ‘patchy’ – and the deepest mysteries often lie close by. Today, we can convincingly interpret measurements that reveal two black holes crashing together more than a billion light years from Earth. Meanwhile, we’ve made little progress in treating the common cold, despite great leaps forward in epidemiology. The fact that we can be confident of arcane and remote cosmic phenomena, and flummoxed by everyday things, isn’t really as paradoxical as it looks. Astronomy is far simpler than the biological and human sciences. Black holes, although they seem exotic to us, are among the uncomplicated entities in nature. They can be described exactly by simple equations.

So how do we define complexity? The question of how far science can go partly depends on the answer. Something made of only a few atoms can’t be very complicated. Big things need not be complicated either. Despite its vastness, a star is fairly simple – its core is so hot that complex molecules get torn apart and no chemicals can exist, so what’s left is basically an amorphous gas of atomic nuclei and electrons. Alternatively, consider a salt crystal, made up of sodium and chlorine atoms, packed together over and over again to make a repeating cubical lattice. If you take a big crystal and chop it up, there’s little change in structure until it breaks down to the scale of single atoms. Even if it’s huge, a block of salt couldn’t be called complex.

Atoms and astronomical phenomena – the very small and the very large – can be quite basic. It’s everything in between that gets tricky. Most complex of all are living things. An animal has internal structure on every scale, from the proteins in single cells right up to limbs and major organs. It doesn’t exist if it is chopped up, the way a salt crystal continues to exist when it is sliced and diced. It dies.

Scientific understanding is sometimes envisaged as a hierarchy, ordered like the floors of a building. Those dealing with more complex systems are higher up, while the simpler ones go down below. Mathematics is in the basement, followed by particle physics, then the rest of physics, then chemistry, then biology, then botany and zoology, and finally the behavioural and social sciences (with the economists, no doubt, claiming the penthouse).

‘Ordering’ the sciences is uncontroversial, but it’s questionable whether the ‘ground-floor sciences’ – particle physics, in particular – are really deeper or more all-embracing than the others. In one sense, they clearly are. As the physicist Steven Weinberg explains in Dreams of a Final Theory (1992), all the explanatory arrows point downward. If, like a stubborn toddler, you keep asking ‘Why, why, why?’, you end up at the particle level. Scientists are nearly all reductionists in Weinberg’s sense. They feel confident that everything, however complex, is a solution to Schrödinger’s equation – the basic equation that governs how a system behaves, according to quantum theory.

But a reductionist explanation isn’t always the best or most useful one. ‘More is different,’ as the physicist Philip Anderson said. Everything, no matter how intricate – tropical forests, hurricanes, human societies – is made of atoms, and obeys the laws of quantum physics. But even if those equations could be solved for immense aggregates of atoms, they wouldn’t offer the enlightenment that scientists seek.

Macroscopic systems that contain huge numbers of particles manifest ‘emergent’ properties that are best understood in terms of new, irreducible concepts appropriate to the level of the system. Valency, gastrulation (when cells begin to differentiate in embryonic development), imprinting, and natural selection are all examples. Even a phenomenon as unmysterious as the flow of water in pipes or rivers is better understood in terms of viscosity and turbulence, rather than atom-by-atom interactions. Specialists in fluid mechanics don’t care that water is made up of H2O molecules; they can understand how waves break and what makes a stream turn choppy only because they envisage liquid as a continuum.

New concepts are particularly crucial to our understanding of really complicated things – for instance, migrating birds or human brains. The brain is an assemblage of cells; a painting is an assemblage of chemical pigment. But what’s important and interesting is how the pattern and structure appears as we go up the layers, what can be called emergent complexity.

So reductionism is true in a sense. But it’s seldom true in a useful sense. Only about 1 per cent of scientists are particle physicists or cosmologists. The other 99 per cent work on ‘higher’ levels of the hierarchy. They’re held up by the complexity of their subject, not by any deficiencies in our understanding of subnuclear physics.

In reality, then, the analogy between science and a building is really quite a poor one. A building’s structure is imperilled by weak foundations. By contrast, the ‘higher-level’ sciences dealing with complex systems aren’t vulnerable to an insecure base. Each layer of science has its own distinct explanations. Phenomena with different levels of complexity must be understood in terms of different, irreducible concepts.

We can expect huge advances on three frontiers: the very small, the very large, and the very complex. Nonetheless – and I’m sticking my neck out here – my hunch is there’s a limit to what we can understand. Efforts to understand very complex systems, such as our own brains, might well be the first to hit such limits. Perhaps complex aggregates of atoms, whether brains or electronic machines, can never know all there is to know about themselves. And we might encounter another barrier if we try to follow Weinberg’s arrows further down: if this leads to the kind of multi-dimensional geometry that string theorists envisage. Physicists might never understand the bedrock nature of space and time because the mathematics is just too hard.

My claim that there are limits to human understanding has been challenged by David Deutsch, a distinguished theoretical physicist who pioneered the concept of ‘quantum computing’. In his provocative and excellent book The Beginning of Infinity (2011), he says that any process is computable, in principle. That’s true. However, being able to compute something is not the same as having an insightful comprehension of it. The beautiful fractal pattern known as the Mandelbrot set is described by an algorithm that can be written in a few lines. Its shape can be plotted even by a modest-powered computer:

Mandelbrot set. Courtesy Wikipedia.

But no human who was just given the algorithm can visualise this immensely complicated pattern in the same sense that they can visualise a square or a circle.

The chess-champion Garry Kasparov argues in Deep Thinking (2017) that ‘human plus machine’ is more powerful than either alone. Perhaps it’s by exploiting the strengthening symbiosis between the two that new discoveries will be made. For example, it will become progressively more advantageous to use computer simulations rather than run experiments in drug development and material science. Whether the machines will eventually surpass us to a qualitative degree – and even themselves become conscious – is a live controversy.

Abstract thinking by biological brains has underpinned the emergence of all culture and science. But this activity, spanning tens of millennia at most, will probably be a brief precursor to the more powerful intellects of the post-human era – evolved not by Darwinian selection but via ‘intelligent design’. Whether the long-range future lies with organic post-humans or with electronic super-intelligent machines is a matter for debate. But we would be unduly anthropocentric to believe that a full understanding of physical reality is within humanity’s grasp, and that no enigmas will remain to challenge our remote descendants.Aeon counter – do not remove

 

This article was originally published at Aeon and has been republished under Creative Commons.

Martin Rees is a fellow of Trinity College and emeritus professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge. He is the Astronomer Royal and a foreign associate of the US National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is the author of more than 500 research papers and eight books.

Public lectures by Prof. Jerry Coyne

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Prof Jerry Coyne, author of the bestselling science books: Why Evolution Is True and Faith Vs. Fact: Why Science and Religion are Incompatible, is visiting India from 16th December 2017 to 4th January 2018 to give a series of lectures covering a range of topics – Science, Evolution, Rationality, Free-will etc.

Prof Coyne’s talks are arranged in IISER Mohali, IISER Pune, JNCASR Bangalore, Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore, IISER Thiruvananthapuram and INSA, Delhi.

Talks in Pune and Delhi will be webcast live.

Visit here for more details

India's S&T visions: the missing participants

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Source: Pixabay. CC0 Creative Commons.

Science and Technology (S&T) are crucial for the progress of any country. Therefore, every country needs to have a vision about what S&T milestones it wishes to reach within a given time-frame. India is no different, and various committees, over the years, have spent substantial time and effort to produce S&T vision documents for the country. However, whose visions are they and who are they meant to serve? In an attempt to engage with these issues, in a recent article published in Current Science, Pankaj Sekhsaria and Naveen Thayyil of IIT-Delhi examine the various S&T vision documents produced in India.

The picture that emerges in their article is dismaying, but hardly surprising. As a representative example, describing the Technology Vision 2035 (TV-2035), the authors point out:

“The vision is mainly created by the techno-scientific bureaucracy. Of the 24 names listed as key contributors, only a couple are from outside the formal S&T architecture of the country. The rest are all serving scientists or bureaucrats in institutions like Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), various Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) laboratories and the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), former bureaucrats/administrators like former secretaries to the government or former heads of some important S&T establishments. Citizens and the peoplescape that TV-2035 claims to include, appear missing in vision creation and in visioning. If at all they are present, they are present primarily as recipients of the vision, like the one for agriculture explicitly indicates. The agency of citizens and of ‘other’ knowledge systems is conspicuous by its absence, raising concerns about the ability of S&T establishments to conduct such consultative and representative visioning processes even when they are claiming to do so.”

Given the lack of representation of the various stakeholders in the process of formulating these visions, the authors then proceed to ask how thoroughly are these visions examined by the scientific community of India. Considering the pages of Current Science as a representative sample, the authors’ conclusion is: hardly. In their own words:

“Visioning processes in India appear to be characterized by a distinct inability to come up with visions that have wider resonances than what is considered appropriate by the top brass of the techno-scientific establishment. And even this is marked by virtually no debate, discussion and critique from the rest of the S&T community, leave alone from other sections of the society. The processes are dominated by these miniscule (albeit powerful) spaces not only for a S&T vision, but also for visions for a collective future. S&T processes no doubt have an important space, but they can only be one among other key components. If various actors have to come together for formulating visions and suitable S&T trajectories, then the current institutional set up needs to be modified to perform such important tasks.”

The authors do acknowledge that individual scientists have espoused their visions about S&T policies. Thus, their critique is primarily about the lack of engagement of the scientific community with broad-scope vision documents like TV-2035.

This article raises several interesting questions that merit some thoughts.

  1. It is one thing to say that “the current institutional set up needs to be modified”, but quite another to actually come up with a list of those modifications. Thus, we need prescriptions here, and those prescriptions themselves need to be closely examined and debated.
  2. If we take the issue of examining such vision documents as a collective, then again, how can it be made sure that such examinations do happen? A journal like Current Science or Dialogue and a forum like Confluence can provide a formal and an informal platform respectively for examining such issues. But would that be sufficient, or do we need something else to make sure that public debates about such policy documents become a way of life?
  3. Finally, there needs to be an understanding and monitoring of how each vision statement is followed up, whether consecutive vision statements make a continuum, and a sense of how far or near are we to the previously envisioned statement(s). In other words, nurturing a vision to (at least a partial) reality must also be a job for the entire society. Otherwise, these statements would remain discrete feedback-less uni-directionally communicated texts, with little relevance for the society that they are meant to serve.

The above questions are certainly not trivial to resolve. They would require coordinated efforts from various sections of the academic, administrative, social and political establishments as well as everyone who has a stake in S&T progress of this country. By raising them on this platform, we hope to initiate a constructive discussion among these parties.

 

Sutirth Dey is an Associate Professor of Biology at Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Pune.

How the Evil Eclipse turns food to poison and other stories

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On August 7, 2017, lunar eclipse was visible in several parts of South-East Asia, Africa, Europe, and Australia.  In India, it was visible from 10:55 pm to 11:51 pm. I started receiving calls from my relatives who advised, “Do not cook or eat food during the eclipse. If food is uncovered during eclipse, throw it out.”

Hundreds of thousands of people in India do not partake of food or water during eclipse and take bath with cold water later. Even during my pregnancy, I was warned not to step outside or touch anything during eclipse as it could lead to deformations in the fetus. These beliefs can be detrimental as some pregnant woman do not eat food or even choose not to deliver during lunar or solar eclipse. Renowned spiritual leader Sathguru Vasudev explains the “logic” of these practices in his blog:

“The cycles of the moon have an impact on the human system, physically, psychologically and energy wise. Certain things happen in the planet where anything that has moved away from its natural condition will deteriorate very fast. That is why there is a change in the way cooked food is before and after the eclipse. What was nourishing food turns into poison, it is better to keep the stomach empty at this time”.

When the tales of Evil Eclipse were spread by not just by religious leaders but also national dailies, scientists from the Astronomical Society of India were outraged and wrote to the Financial Express to retract the anti-science article and publish “the science behind eclipses, how they are beautiful natural events that everyone can enjoy, and bust certain myths concerning eclipses” to which the national daily acceded.

 

Traditional Knowledge versus science

A lot of Hindu Mythology and traditional knowledge is pushed as science these days. According to Hindu mythology, Rahu – a demigod seeking immortality drank Amrit, or divine nectar. However, the Sun and Moon Gods warned Lord Vishnu who then decapitated him for his transgression. Disembodied Rahu, immortalised after drinking nectar, seeks revenge on Sun and Moon by swallowing them once in a while. But as he is disembodied, they fall back out again. That’s how you get an eclipse! And rays from the Sun during eclipse are considered bad omen as they are reflections of Rahu. Also, there are supposedly increased levels of bacteria and germs in the food and environment during eclipse as the Sun’s rays are blocked.

Although all traditional knowledge shouldn’t be dismissed as pseudoscience, it should be backed by scientific evidence to be construed as a fact. For e.g. Tu Youyou, one of the recipients of the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2015 for the discovery of artemesin (anti-malarial drug), was inspired by ancient Chinese medicine. However, stating that Indians had mastery over transplantation and plastic surgery thousands of years ago because of elephant-headed Hindu God Ganesh in our mythology, would probably be taking it too far!.

 

Spread of pseudoscience

Beliefs in pseudoscience usually arise due to insufficient communication between masses and scientists. Most explanations or counters for the myths are present in journals which are difficult to access or in a language which is difficult to understand and interpret by the non-specialists who end up believing popular spiritual leaders or political agents.

Kudos to the scientists of Astronomical Society of India who spoke up to dispel such stories. It is time scientists speak up before these become ‘scientific facts’ in textbooks and newspapers. As one scientist put it, ‘If scientists do not speak up for science, who else will?’

 

Surat Saravanan has a PhD from Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai and is currently, a freelance science editor and writer.