Malcolm and Forum:
The book is full of good quotes, including the one you cite.
If one reads the whole essay (<8 pp), I think the larger context might
help--so Feynman can, so to speak, speak for himself. I, for what it's
worth, would not interpret the quote in the way you suspect, but would be
interested in your counterpoints to those assumptions. Reading the last 36
pages or so should clarify a lot, and the entire 248 pages is not all that
bad.
I'm interested in how others interpret the quote. I'm interested in how
others define ecology, and how they would describe a theory of ecology. I'm
not trying to make a point, only to open discussion on the topic and maybe
learn something.
WT
"The suspension of judgment is the highest exercise in intellectual
discipline." --Raymond M. Gilmore
"Quotation is a serviceable substitute for wit."
- Oscar Wilde
"Can man live by aphorism alone?" --Wayne Tyson
----- Original Message -----
From: "malcolm McCallum" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, August 29, 2009 8:07 AM
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Science Ecology Theory
I'm not really sure what the point of your post is.
Are you trying to say that deductions from science are simply conjecture?
Are you trying to relate that there can always be an exception?
Are you trying to say its all trite?
I looked up the book on Amazon, and I found a much more interesting quote:
-You can know the name of that bird in all the languages of the
world, ....., you'll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird.
You'll only know about humans in different places, and what they call
the bird.
On Sat, Aug 29, 2009 at 1:11 AM, Wayne Tyson<[email protected]> wrote:
Honorable Forum:
If students learn nothing else, skepticism, especially about themselves
and authority, is a pretty good start.
From: What Do You Care What Other People Think? (concluding essay, "The
Value of Science") by Richard Feynman, p. 245
"The scientist has a lot of experience with ignorance and doubt and
uncertainty, and this experience is of very great importance, I think.
When a scientist doesn't know the answer to a problem, he is ignorant.
When he has a hunch as to what the result is, he is uncertain. And when
he is pretty darn sure what the result is going to be, he is still in
some doubt. We have found it of paramount importance that in order to
progress we must recognize our ignorance and leave room for doubt.
Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of
certainty-some most unsure, some nearly sure, but none absolutely
certain."
I think this book, especially from around page 212, is a particularly
useful bit of thinking by a great mind wrought from an ordinary human who
took some extraordinary leaps. The entire book is well worth reading, but
this essay (p. 240-248) in particular should be required reading for
every student of science--and for that matter, everybody.
It's not that genius is rare, it is that it is abused. Don't let this
happen.
WT
--
Malcolm L. McCallum
Associate Professor of Biology
Managing Editor,
Herpetological Conservation and Biology
Texas A&M University-Texarkana
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