Hasty science – Harmonia Philosophica

Science: This beautiful whore! [From the Reproducibility crisis to Epstein connections]

Photo by **Spiros Kakos** from **Pexels**

In Greece (and many other countries) there is a saying: After going to the doctor, always go to a second one to get a second opinion! This public wisdom has been so much embedded in our everyday life that we do not even consider it as something special. And yet, this simple but highly intuitive advice hides something much more sinister than we would like to admit…

But let’s take things from the beginning.

In the times of ancient Greeks, science and religion were not even separated. Both fields of thinking existed harmoniously together and helped wise people to their common goal: reach the truth. This common path continued up to the era of Galileo (whose case was largely overstated and wrongly attributed by all – read the relevant articles in Harmonia Philosophica), when for reasons altogether irrelevant to the essence of science or religion philosophy science was separated from religion.

And then the downfall started…

Science started being an independent realm of human endeavor and this resulted in the infamous “war” with religion. A war based on false premises and fed by the hate of the new intellectual order against the old one (read the “Enlightenment was not light” article in Harmonia Philosophica). It was about that time that another factor came in to fuel the fire even more: MONEY.

The result of the corrupting effect of money in science can easily be seen today by anyone even remotely connected to science. If you are not, let me draw you a picture: You are a scientist. You are funded to conduct research but only as long as you produce results. And results mean publications. So you need to publish, but this is not enough on its own. You need to publish more and more quickly before the other publish first! In that way you will get more money from funds and then you will publish more and then… Well, you get the meaning.

All this has resulted in a gruesome comedy of tragic proportions: We are everyday bombarded with new “scientific news” (the most important of which are debunked or analyzed philosophically here in Harmonia Philosophica every four days) which often contradict each other or which are so immature which should never see the light of publication. Newton used to keep volumes unpublished for decades before he was sure that the quality was good enough and today we see minions of science to publish new papers every a month or so.

This ridiculous situation would be funny if it wasn’t serious as well. In this parade of publications we also see medical publications about what we should eat (coffee, wine, etc), what we should not eat (coffee, wine, etc), what we should do in order not to die, what we should not do, what medicine will save us from death (even though not even clinical trials have started and they usually never do – you see, only the initial publication is usually enough to ‘prove’ that you do research) et cetera. Doctors are also of course taking part in the party (why wouldn’t they anyway? they are Scientists!). So medical companies pay their bills and give them bonus trips, they suggest to you the medicine they are paid to suggest, they may even promote some surgeries to write a paper! (remember, always get a second opinion)

Meet the Reproducibility Crisis!

At some point the problem mentioned above started to become so huge that even scientists took notice (remember, true science has a serious lag to notice obvious things). This is what is now known as the Reproducibility Crisis in science. And when we say science we mean Science! As a whole. As it turns out, the eagerness to publish resulted in scientists faking results. According to a 2016 poll of 1,500 scientists reported that 70% of them had failed to reproduce at least one other scientist’s experiment (50% had failed to reproduce one of their own experiments). In 2009, 2% of scientists admitted to falsifying studies at least once and 14% admitted to personally knowing someone who did. Misconducts were reported more frequently by medical researchers than others. (source)

That article you read about not having to drink coffee because you will get cancer? Forget it! Or perhaps not! Actually that is the problem now: We cannot know what is false and what is right! As long as there was money to fund the research, then the research would yield a result! How can you trust anything today when it is known that about 70% of scientists cannot replicate the experiments of others?

And yet the money is still flowing in…

The problem is so big that you can easily find articles pinpointing the problem – focusing also mainly in the medicine related research. (source) (source) (source) Karl Popper, the 20th century’s pre-eminent philospher of science, said that science without a testable hypothesis really isn’t science at all, but rather a “pseudoscience.” Much of today’s so-called science, which relies on scary projections without tests to back them up, fits this description. (source)

And yet the money is still flowing in…

Meet Epstein!

The billionaire who served time for a sexual offense involving a minor and then, afterwards, jailed for being accused of running a worldwide ring of pedophiles. Yes, so? What about him? Well, it turns out that Epstein was in love with… science! As it turns out he was a patron of many well known scientists! Scientists who took Epstein’s money or associated with the financier even after he was jailed for soliciting an underage girl for prostitution. Some of them issued apologies, some failed to comment. (source) Would this sound as a surprise? Not to those who have been looking at the path science has taken for the last centuries or so…

One of the science institutes which took money from Epstein includes the famous MIT Media Lab. There has been a huge uproar for this, which resulted in the Media Lab issuing statements and promising to give the equal amount of money it had received to the victims of Epstein. Are they really sorry? Hard to distinguish the truth behind the statements made under public outrage. One of the founders of MIT Media Lab – Nicholas Negroponte – provided an answer though: In an event he said quite simply and honestly that he suggested that the Lab took the money from Epstein and that he would do it again! “Take the money!” he added emphatically. “Take it!” he repeated. (source)

Many people might object here. It is some scientists who are not moral. It is some scientists who are not good and ethical. Not science. But they would be wrong! It is exactly science which is inherently immoral today!

Science is supposed to be morally neutral [1] [2]. Today we believe that knowledge is intrinsically good [1]. But it is exactly this ethical neutrality which leads to unethical paths! It is exactly this certainty of goodness which leads to everything bad modern civilization has experienced. This is what Rousseau tried to point out in the first place – knowing what is good has nothing to do with being good.

“Take it!” said Negroponte.

And so he did. And so other will keep on doing…

And that beauty which was once science, will turn into an beautiful old whore… Looking at us with a promising look and a tear in her eyes. And as the Polar Star of Lovecraft, she has forgotten what message she has to give us. Except that she has a message to convey…

Bibliography

Paul RootWolpe, Reasons Scientists Avoid Thinking about Ethics, Cell journal, Volume 125, Issue 6, 13 June 2006, Pages 1023-1025, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2006.06.001
Ma-Kellams C, Blascovich J, “Does ‘Science’ Make You Moral? The Effects of Priming Science on Moral Judgments and Behavior”, 2013, PLoS ONE 8(3): e57989, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0057989.

Against stupidity: A lost cause [On the irrationality of terror for a ‘nuclear’ war]

Harmonia Philosophica has for a long time fought against stupidity at all levels. The recent cries of terror from scientists regarding the gruesome effects of a nuclear war are yet another example of sheer stupidity which once more needs to be dealt with if we want to keep our sanity within this insane world.

Due to recent tensions between India and Pakistan, two nuclear powers, the Internet was swarmed with grave warnings of how the planet would be destroyed and the climate would be affected to such an extent that the planet would essentially be inhabitable in a matter of years.

Reading from a ScienceAlert article: “For that reason, climate scientists have modelled how an exchange of nuclear weapons between the two countries – what is technically called a limited regional nuclear war – might affect the world. Though the explosions would be local, the ramifications would be global, that research concluded. The ozone layer could be crippled and Earth’s climate may cool for years, triggering crop and fishery losses that would result in what the researchers called a “global nuclear famine” (source)

Now let’s get real and start to dismantle everything this statement of terror tries to tell us: According to the article, a war between two countries possessing about 140-150 nuclear weapons (both) would result in the destruction of the ozone layer and would create global famine. Really?

Or better: REALLY?!?

Harmonia Philosophica has reminded people over and over again of a “small” little fact that the “global thermonuclear war” we are all so anxious of happening has ALREADY happened. Check out the article “Global Thermonuclear War: It has ALREADY happened! (tip: it was called “testing”)”.

In summary: During the Cold War all the superpowers (and the lesser powers) detonated about 2,400 (that is TWO THOUSAND FOUR HUNDRED) nuclear weapons on the surface of the Earth, in the sea, below the surface of the Earth or (that’s even better) on the upper levels of the atmosphere. (so as to make sure that the ozone layer is destroyed).

The result?

NOTHING.

Or so we are told… According to the most widespread ‘theory’ the ozone layer which was destroyed about the time those nuclear tests ended was not because of these nuclear tests but because of you (yes, YOU!) who owned a refrigerator with chemicals which were ‘bad for the ozone’. Yes, your refrigerator is more powerful than 2,400 nuclear bombs detonated on the planet… And now we believe that theory because… why would the government lie to us? Right?

I am not a conspiracy lover, but this goes well beyond being a conspiracy. It is more at the borders of ridiculousness.

But even after 2,400 nuclear bombs there was no global famine. No global disaster. (or it there? could the widespread increase of cancer be attributed to this or did the ancient people also died like flies because of that disease? Let’s see what the official medicine has to say about that; yet, that medicine which until recently claimed that smoking is not bad for your health and which now swears that cell phones are OK and affect not your brain)
Science has reached to a point of being a global religion. And religion, in its bad version, always needs terror to impose itself on people. This terror is what we see everyday in the news when ‘scientists’ (as if this attribute alone means anything) warn us about how we are all going to die if we don’t stop using straws while at the same time they accept grants from companies potentially making those straws. And this terror has the same foundations as all other types of terror used in the past to control people: Stupidity.
One must be really stupid to claim that world disaster will strike Earth is India and Pakistan will go to war.

Because as I said above: The nuclear bombs matter not.
It is your refrigerator you must be concerned about…

Can’t wait! Must have Nobel now!

The ones who discovered Higgs Boson (OK, except some nasty Indian who had the nerve to interfere with the glorious western white race Nobel Prize process) were awarded the Nobel Prize. (1)

There you go. A “discovery” based on one experiment alone – and what an elusive discovery that is! – is made the basis for awards and nominations.

The billions of CERN demand immediate justification.

Who can wait 10, 20 or even 50 years to confirm the importance of the “discovery” as it happens in other Nobel prizes? (see here for example) Fast food science is on the way! And a coke along with some french fries please!

Hasty science & embryonic tissue…

The living tissue inside an animal has been regressed back into an embryonic state for the first time, Spanish researchers say. They believe it could lead to new ways of repairing the body, for example after a heart attack.

However, the study published in the journal Nature, showed the technique led to tumours forming in mice.

Stem cell experts said it was a “cool” study, but would need to be much more controlled before leading to therapies. (1)

Hasty science… In the old days great minds waited for years before they publish (see Newton). They wanted to “make sure” or “make perfect” whatever they wrote. There was no “rush” then… Some great geniouses back then even refrained from publishing at all or even burned their works because they thought they were… “imperfect” (!) (see Ovidius)

Now …

Well, now let’s publish and we will think later…