What is the point of the disconnected assertions? Earlier civilizations had calendars long before the Dark and Middle Ages, during which time there was very little science or progress of any kind, while much was lost. What rational thought occurred was in spite of the dominant mysticism of the Church and other prevailing superstitions. There was no science to denigrate. The Church does not do science. It's not complicated.

"Science in the Middle Ages"
https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...
Link to
http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/20...

Bill Nye is a dupe. I used to watch him collapse 55-gallon drums on local tv in Seattle 30 years ago to entertain the late-night crowd.

Ohm's law is not the basis of electrical engineering. It pertains only to resistance, not explaining other components and phenomena. Even all resistance is not linear -- as in the now omnipresent semiconductors to which Ohm's law does not physically apply except in the mathematical use of piecewise linear approximations across the range of physical nonlinearity.

For the all the common use of Ohm's law in circuit analysis for the very wide range of materials with linear resistivity to extreme precision and range, it isn't the "basis" of "everything" in electrical engineering. Speaking loosely on behalf of something so common and important is one thing, but it's misleading to those who don't know -- there are people who have been led to think that Ohm's law is the fundamental law of electricity, with no idea of the enormous importance, scope and impact of the real physical basis: the experiments, theories and equations of Maxwell and Faraday.

That's funny. I'd have to revisit my studies on semi and super conductors...uh, no.

Hmmm. Interesting. Thanks...

I have "delved into the history of science". Easter has nothing to do with science. "Introducing" science in support of religion is not science. It is no better than creationism. Science was done in spite of religious beliefs.

There is no place for faith. It is not a means to knowledge. After faith is accepted it is too late to stop the force it causes. See Ayn Rand's "Faith and Force".

Yes. The manager at my first job used to say there's an exception to every rule, except for Ohm's Law. That one always works.

The basic electrical equation? I made the mistake of studying engineering, I guess. LOL

That's hate speech. (sarcasm)

Of course the church burned people. There's a place for science and a place for faith. Any man is certainly capable of having both. It's when the application of force gets integrated in when the screaming, bleeding and running starts...

If you delve into the history of science and read about the development of astronomy, you will find that the problem of Easter - coordinating the lunar and solar calendars - was an impetus. Before he became Pope Sylvester II, Gerbert of Aurillac introduced the astrolabe into Europe from Muslim scholars in Spain. There is much more, and it goes far deeper than the introductory essay in For the New Intellectual.

Newton's laws and Maxwell's equations are not "half truths". They are a system of principles relating known gravitational or electromagnetic phenomenon, objects, forces and motions under known circumstances within the relevant context of the subject matter. All knowledge is "limited" to what it is about. Lack of an impossible omniscience does not imply that what we do know is "half truths". We know what we know, about the facts we know about, not an infinity of everything at once or nothing. Clear, contextual knowledge limited to what it is does not mean "half truths". Without truth there couldn't even be a concept of "half truth".

Explanation is relational, integrating a body of knowledge with what is already objectively understood and known to be true, not an impossible infinite regress of causes of causes of causes of ... to a mystical ultimate. Rational understanding is objective, contextual, and finite, not either wrapping your consciousness around reality in an infinite mystic insight or the false alternative of skepticism.

Truth is a correspondence between statements and facts; it does not preclude improvement through expanded knowledge. Knowledge of what is true is a contextual absolute -- it is absolutely true in the context of what you know about to the degree of precision validated, which is part of the known context. Knowing what is true does not cut off questions about why, the search for the limits of the context, correction of errors, or argument about new discoveries; it makes them all possible. Without truth there is no basis for rational argument at all. Without truth you know nothing and can make no progress. Science is not a progression of exploded fallacies muddling in "half truths". Leave the Pragmatists to their own subjectivism and skepticism as they blindly wander through whatever they claim "works" at the moment as their sorry excuse for knowledge.

Those who fear "the Truth", as if it were dogma by nature, with no understanding of what truth and contextual knowledge are, or the basis for particular instances of knowledge, can have no rational understanding and therefore fear certainty of anything. Knowledge is understanding of facts through our conceptual faculty, it is awareness of reality, not a Kantian "model" in parallel with it -- which is the contemporary common form of skepticism and subjectivism as the false alternative to mysticism. Those who think in "models", fearing certainty of objective knowledge as awareness of reality, become rationalistic dogmatists or hopeless fragmented skeptics, or both, with no means of knowing as they trap themselves inside their own minds.

Relating to gravity a pratfall could be examined as to cause and effect. As a side note Professor I. Cory was hilarious when I watched him on Johnny Carson. It made me think of some of my favorites as a boy .....Buddy Hackett was something else and from the old black and whites films WC Fields
, Marx Bros and Jonathan Winters and a young Bob Newhart .

Newton's laws and Maxwell's equations are known to be incomplete. In addition, they are behavioral in nature rather than existential so while they describe what things do they do not describe what things are. they are behavioral models that have known limitations and boundaries beyond which they loose their power to predict outcomes.. As such they are, at best, half truths. The same can be said of special and general relativity and quantum mechanics. The problem is that stating that a scientific theory reflects "truth" tends to cut off argument. That is exactly what the AGW proponents recognize and why their arguments are successful. No one wants to challenge the "Truth". Scientific advancement consists of improving our models. this means that we must recognize that there is room for improvement. Truth is absolute and needs no improvement.

We just did: Newton's laws and Maxwell's equations.

Since I wasn't in competition as a stand up I doubt if he'd give a crap. Those few of us who are old enough to appreciate comedy without blatant obscenity can weep for the passing of Hope, Cory, Skelton and the generation that could make you laugh until your sides ached.

Can you cite an example of a scientific truth?

Truth is a logical and philosophical concept, not theology. It means correspondence between a statement and the facts. The notion that truth "evolves" is Pragmatism, with it's "truth is what works" and "what is true today may not be tomorrow".

The context of our knowledge expands and we learn more. Learning more with new discoveries does not invalidate the facts and principles we already knew unless a genuine mistake is uncovered. Electrodynamics did not invalidate Newton's mechanics. Newton's laws are just as true today as they were when he formulated them about the same facts of nature.

Science is objective, neither a mystical insight with assumed infinite precision nor a succession of exploded fallacies. Theology and Pragmatist philosophy are a false alternative.

If you allow the notion that "Truth" can evolve with improved understanding then I agree. However, the general understanding of "truth" is that it is inviolable, eternal, and unchanging. In this sense "truth" is a theological rather than a scientific concept. If that is the way the word is used then it has no place in science.

"Hello ... I cringe at calling you buy your "name", since I like to pretend to be a gentleman,"

Don't trouble yourself over it; it's a real-life nickname I've carried since the mid 1980s. My wife calls me Animal.

Your comments are thought-provoking and well taken.

Hello ... I cringe at calling you buy your "name", since I like to pretend to be a gentleman,

I think that you might be a little too rigid. I think that most people knowledgeable about him would agree that Michael Faraday was one the best scientists of all time. He had not gone to school to earn a "degree". Still, he was one of the most influential scientists of all time.

I think that you have to agree that science, by definition, is the search about the facts of reality (or existence). It is the exponential growth of knowledge that imposed specialization. It is continuously necessary to know more and more to be able to advance a scientific field. Knowledge is required basis for advancement into new knowledge. And given the infinity of "things" and "phenomena" in that reality, "sky is the limit". Hence, bigger and bigger teams of scientists needed to make a new discovery. And discoveries get to be incrementally smaller and smaller.

Also, I do not think it right to exclude, say, a chemist from an intelligent, knowledgeable and productive discussion of climate. I can think of innumerable combinations of scientific fields where productive insights can be gained from inputs from different scientific "branches". In fact, "interfaces" among those "branches" are often the most fertile grounds for advancement.

Also, there are plenty of, is it ignorami? ;-), with fancy degrees from even fancier schools, just as there are many very knowledgeable people without any degrees. Isn't it very difficult to ascertain how much of what someone knows?

One last comment. Techne is Greek for art. I will quote Leslie Groves (who knows who said it before him?): "Engineering is ART OF THINGS THAT WORK." I find that definition simply beautiful. Engineers need knowledge from a number of scientific fields to do their thing. To design a new model they go to the most recent prior model that worked (most of the time). Then they have to gamble. No way you can test for 40 years a model that is expected to function ("work") 40 years. Takes guts.

Just my comments on the theme.

Stay well.
Sincerely,
Maritimus

I worded that poorly. Science is a discipline, yes; more to the point it is a system for examining facts and observations to come up with explanations for how those facts came to be and how the systems behind them work. For example: It is an observed fact that allele frequencies in populations change over time. The theory of evolution is an explanation of the factors that cause allele frequencies in populations to change, including the various factors that influence the rate and manner of those changes; differential reproductive success, random mutation, and so on.

But it is correct, if someone refers to person A as a "scientist," to object that this statement is inconclusive; the obvious reply is "what kind of scientist?"

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... and Professor Irwin Corey, the real WFA, might have sued for plagiarism had he not passed away recently. :-]