Pod Insights Stuff You Should Know The Stuff You Should Know Doin’ Science Playlist: Things We Believed Before the Scientific Method About this episode It’s easy to think of people in the distant past as kinda dumb for believing things like that mice could spontaneously generate from old grain. But if you look a little deeper, you’ll find there was a sensibility to the odd beliefs that came before science.
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Transcript 11,820 words · 7 speakers
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0:45 Josh Clark? He'd also tell you about how Capital One cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs. Yep, even on weekends. It's pretty much all he talks about, in a good way. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See capitalone.com/bankguy. Capital One, N A, Member FDIC.
1:03 Speaker 02 Hey, folks. Owning a home means one thing. Something's gonna break. AC, plumbing, fridge, and it's never convenient or cheap. That's where American Home Shield comes in. An AHS home warranty can help protect your wallet from pricey breakdowns on even your oldest appliances and systems. And if they can't repair the covered item, they'll replace it. So check out American Home Shield and get 20% off any plan at ahs.com/sysk and see promo details. See ahs.com/contracts for coverage details, including service fees, limitations, and exclusions. American Home Shield. Don't worry, be warranty. Hey, everybody. Chuck here, continuing our journey down the science trail.
1:47 Speaker 02 Here we are with, I believe, episode seven on the list. How the Scientific Method Works.
1:54 Speaker 02 Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from howstuffworks.com.
2:04 Josh Clark? Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant.
2:08 Speaker 02 There's Jerry.
2:10 Josh Clark? Stuff you should know.
2:11 Speaker 02 Why are you grinning?
2:12 Josh Clark? It's been a while, man.
2:13 Speaker 02 I know.
2:14 Josh Clark? It's funny, like, those words come pouring out of my mouth and it's cool.
2:18 Speaker 02 You wake up in the middle of the night saying that and Yumi, like, slugs you in the face.
2:21 Josh Clark? Right. She's like, "Go back to sleep." She has to dry my brow.
2:25 Speaker 02 Yes, we pre-recorded some for December, as we like to do, to take a little time off at the end of the year and not explain things for a few weeks in our real lives.
2:35 Josh Clark? It's nice.
2:36 Speaker 02 Like, people ask me things like, uh...
2:38 Josh Clark? What happened to that stick of butter?
2:40 Speaker 02 Yeah, I don't know. Don't ask!
2:41 Josh Clark? Don't even ask me.
2:42 Speaker 02 I could tell you.
2:43 Josh Clark? Yeah.
2:44 Speaker 02 But I'm not gonna.
2:45 Josh Clark? Exactly.
2:45 Speaker 02 That's how it goes in my house. Find your own butter. December was Find Your Own Butter Month.
2:51 Josh Clark? Yeah. That's a good, that's, that's a good one.
2:54 Speaker 02 That should be a t-shirt for us. Stuff you should know. Find your own butter.
2:57 Josh Clark? Or December is Find Your Own Butter Month.
2:59 Speaker 02 Yeah, that's right.
3:00 Josh Clark? Maybe a stick of butter with some garland on it?
3:03 Speaker 02 Yeah.
3:03 Josh Clark? I like that.
3:04 Speaker 02 So, uh, it's good to see you again, man. Good to be back in here.
3:07 Josh Clark? Yeah, it is nice to be back, isn't it?
3:08 Speaker 02 As much as the break was great, I'm happy to be explaining things again.
3:12 Josh Clark? Well, that's good, because if we got in here and you're like, "I can't do this. I can't do it again."
3:16 Speaker 02 We'd be in trouble.
3:17 Josh Clark? Yeah.
3:17 Speaker 02 Yeah.
3:17 Josh Clark? So I'm, I'm glad we're all feeling good. Jerry, you feeling good? Jerry's got two thumbs up and a big goofy smile.
3:24 Speaker 02 Two of her three thumbs.
3:25 Josh Clark? She looks like Bob from that, uh, male enhancement pill ad.
3:30 Speaker 02 Oh, is he the guy, the old man that's like, super buff?
3:33 Josh Clark? I wouldn't call him old. He was middle-aged. He looked like, um, kind of a Bob Dobbs typey dude. I think that's kinda who he was modeled after.
3:40 Speaker 02 Is he the guy that's super muscly now? I'm thinking of someone different, I think.
3:44 Josh Clark? You're thinking of Jack LaLanne?
3:45 Speaker 02 No, no, no, no. Just, there's some ad, there's some old man that looks like really creepy, cause from the neck down...
3:50 Josh Clark? Cause he's super, like, buff?
3:51 Speaker 02 He just looks like a 25-year-old.
3:53 Josh Clark? No, remember there was like, a, a male enhancement pill, and I'm making air quotes here?
3:57 Speaker 02 For erectile dysfunction.
3:59 Josh Clark? Oh, well, there go the air quotes. But yes, uh, and it was like, in the early 2000s, I think?
4:05 Speaker 02 Uh-huh.
4:05 Josh Clark? Maybe late 90s, but I think early 2000s. And these ads were everywhere and there was Bob and like all these great things happened to him because he started taking this pill. I can't remember the name of the pill, but the company like got into a lot of trouble because it was basically like a subscription service. And like you gave him your credit card and you got this free trial, but then they started sending it to you and it was like next to impossible to cut off service.
4:30 Speaker 02 Interesting.
4:31 Josh Clark? They were like, no, we want your mailness to be enhanced.
4:34 Speaker 02 So.
4:36 Josh Clark? You, you've seen these ads.
4:37 Speaker 02 Yeah, I was gonna start asking questions, but why, why bother?
4:40 Josh Clark? I will, I will YouTube, I will find it on YouTube.
4:43 Speaker 02 I'll be like, oh, Bob.
4:45 Josh Clark? Yeah, you will. You'll go, oh, and we'll have to come back in and record an insert.
4:49 Speaker 02 Right. The guy that's on the back of all those pill bottles in my bathroom.
4:53 Josh Clark? So Chuck.
4:54 Speaker 02 Yes.
4:55 Josh Clark? I don't even remember how we got, oh yeah, Jerry did that. That was Jerry's fault, but um, you remember we did the enlightenment episode?
5:02 Speaker 02 Yeah.
5:03 Josh Clark? Okay. We talked a lot about how there's this kind of um, tug of war over the human psyche.
5:13 Speaker 02 Sure.
5:14 Josh Clark? Between rationalism and mysticism, I guess you could, you could put it.
5:17 Speaker 02 Yeah.
5:19 Josh Clark? Well, I feel like we're, we're talking today about the scientific method.
5:22 Speaker 02 Yeah, great idea, by the way.
5:23 Josh Clark? Thank you very much.
5:24 Speaker 02 Kudos.
5:24 Josh Clark? It's been a long time coming.
5:26 Speaker 02 Yeah.
5:27 Josh Clark? Because I realized like, I, I, I don't understand it as fully as, I don't understand science. I understand the scientific method because it's pretty cut and dry and it's beautiful and elegant and simple, but then you just take this thing and it, it came out of the birth of rationalism.
5:42 Speaker 02 Yeah.
5:42 Josh Clark? And when you place it into the world and make it function, there's a lot of implications.
5:48 Speaker 02 Yeah.
5:48 Josh Clark? Is it being used properly? Is it being used responsibly? Like, are we putting what constitutes faith into that, you know, like it just raises all this other stuff? And it made me realize like, I, I don't understand science as much as I want to. So researching this, it was awesome.
6:03 Speaker 02 Yeah, and this is a cool episode, I think, because not only are we going to talk about the scientific method, but we're going to talk about just science, like what is science in general and some of the rock stars along the way who really, you know, laid out the path. Remarkably, in like many, many years ago.
6:22 Josh Clark? Right.
6:22 Speaker 02 Like coming up with these amazing discoveries that still like hold. You know, you can like hold their feet to the fire for a lot of this stuff.
6:29 Josh Clark? Yeah, because if you come upon a universal truth.
6:33 Speaker 02 Yeah.
6:34 Josh Clark? You know, it is what it is. Like you got to be the person who discovered it because you know, you saw it. You realized it a certain way, but ultimately it was there already.
6:43 Speaker 02 Yeah, like Newton. I mean, we'll talk about all this stuff, but it's not like now we're like, oh, Newton. Most of what he said was wrong, but that's understandable because it was a long time ago. Like his stuff holds up.
6:53 Josh Clark? Yeah.
6:53 Speaker 02 Really, really well.
6:54 Josh Clark? I was wondering if he on his deathbed was just like, oh, man, I contributed so much to humanity. It's mind boggling.
7:02 Speaker 02 But I couldn't enhance my malehood.
7:05 Josh Clark? Well, Bob hadn't come along yet. So Chuck, let's, let's just quit stalling and talk about science. Like, what is science?
7:12 Speaker 02 Well, I hate the, the old elementary school defined as, but it's a pretty good place to start here. To get a base definition of science.
7:21 Josh Clark? Yeah, old William Harris did a great job with this.
7:24 Speaker 02 Yes, William Harris did a great job on this.
7:25 Josh Clark? Yeah, he did.
7:26 Speaker 02 Uh, "Science, the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experimentation."
7:34 Josh Clark? Boom, end of podcast.
7:36 Speaker 02 Uh, so the first part of that is, science is practical. And it is, you know, they make a good, he makes, uh, Bill Harris makes a great point in here. It's not just stuff you do in a lab and it's not just for scientists. It is all about being hands-on and active and it's all about discovery and asking questions about. I mean, that's how everything is ultimately solved is by someone looking at something and having a question about it.
8:02 Josh Clark? Exactly. And then the scientific method comes in when you say, and this is how you properly get to that answer.
8:09 Speaker 02 Exactly.
8:10 Josh Clark? Um, and he makes another good point too, that the, the idea that there is a method, a scientific method makes it seem like it's, it's secreted away among the, the fraternity of scientists and like you said, any, anybody can use it. It's just kind of part of being a curious human is.
8:28 Speaker 02 It's not even, anyone can use it. Everyone does use it.
8:31 Josh Clark? Nice.
8:31 Speaker 02 You just might not even know that you're using it. Like if you, I mean, one of the examples they use later is if like your car overheats.
8:38 Josh Clark? Right.
8:38 Speaker 02 When you figure it out why and fix it, that's the scientific method.
8:42 Josh Clark? Right.
8:43 Speaker 02 Playing out.
8:43 Josh Clark? Exactly. Based on reasoning. Yeah, okay.
8:47 Speaker 02 And deduction and induction.
8:49 Josh Clark? Right.
8:49 Speaker 02 Man, there's so much to talk about.
8:51 Josh Clark? Okay, so let's, let's talk about that definition that you had. So, the first part is, is that science is, it's a practical activity. So, science is practical, right?
9:00 Speaker 02 Yeah.
9:01 Josh Clark? It's, it's this, um, the basis of the whole thing is discovery, right? You see something, you see birds in flight, and you say, where are those birds going? And if you just went and laid down on the ground and went to sleep after that, then you're not, you're not carrying out science. But if you went, I'm gonna find out where those birds are going, and you follow them, and you start taking notes, that's, that is the basis of science, is discovery.
9:27 Speaker 02 Yeah, and that's the observational part as well. Sometimes you're using a microscope or a telescope, sometimes you're using your eyeballs, but no matter what your tool is, uh, you're gonna be watching something and recording, uh, what's called data or data, depending on, I don't know, what kind of person you are.
9:46 Josh Clark? Yeah.
9:47 Speaker 02 What do you say? I think I say both.
9:50 Josh Clark? I think I say data.
9:52 Speaker 02 Data?
9:52 Josh Clark? Yeah. I don't think I've, I don't think I say data.
9:55 Speaker 02 Okay.
9:55 Josh Clark? Data, I say data.
9:57 Speaker 02 Data?
9:57 Josh Clark? Yeah.
9:57 Speaker 02 All right, we'll go with data.
9:59 Josh Clark? You say both?
10:00 Speaker 02 I feel like it just comes out of my mouth one way or the other, and I don't really think about it.
10:03 Josh Clark? I think that's like being ambidextrous.
10:05 Speaker 02 Yeah?
10:05 Josh Clark? Yeah.
10:06 Speaker 02 I'm a data datist?
10:07 Josh Clark? Yeah.
10:08 Speaker 02 Uh, so, once you are observing, uh, this data, well, there are a couple of kinds. There's quantitative data, uh, which are numbers, like, you know, if your body temperature is 98.6, although I think that's changed slightly now, hasn't it?
10:23 Josh Clark? Yeah. Yeah, there, it used to be like, if you were a human being, your body temperature's 98.6, and then you realize, like, no, there's a little more variation than that.
10:31 Speaker 02 Yeah, but any kind of just, uh, numerical representation is quantitative, uh, whereas qualitative is, uh, behavioral, like, I'm gonna watch that bird, um, eat and poop for the next week.
10:45 Josh Clark? Right, or, what happens if, uh, what will the slug do if I put a bunch of salt on it? You know?
10:51 Speaker 02 Don't do that.
10:52 Josh Clark? No, you really should not do that.
10:53 Speaker 02 No, that's awful.
10:54 Josh Clark? But the reaction of the slug is gathering qualitative data. And depending on who you talk to, there isn't qualitative data in science, that it should all just be quantitative, because, yeah, because...
11:08 Josh Clark? Quantitative data is reproducible. Qualitative data is, it's not necessarily reproducible. You can observe the same phenomenon, but you're not necessarily controlling it.
11:20 Speaker 02 Okay, I guess I get that, but I agree with Bill here in that they are both, they go hand in hand.
11:25 Josh Clark? Yeah.
11:26 Speaker 02 And neither one is more important than the other. You need to have both.
11:28 Josh Clark? Well, a lot of people do, and we'll talk more about it later, because without the idea that qualitative data is acceptable and scientific, you don't have the social sciences, like they don't exist.
11:39 Speaker 02 Yeah, that's a good point.
11:40 Josh Clark? You know, but yes, we have quantitative data and qualitative data. I agree with you. They're both useful.
11:47 Speaker 02 Okay.
11:49 Speaker 02 It is an intellectual pursuit, so you can make observations on data all day long, but until you bring reason, in this case inductive reasoning, which is deriving a generalization based on your observations, then it's just data sitting there on a piece of paper, like it's supposed to lead you somewhere.
12:08 Josh Clark? Right, exactly. And so we should talk about inductive and deductive reasoning. And depending, again, it's really weird. One of the things I came across is that there's not a universal agreement on how science is carried out.
12:22 Speaker 02 Sure.
12:22 Josh Clark? Like, I saw some places where there was like, there's no place for inductive reasoning in science. Then other places are saying, well, you have to have science using inductive reasoning. Everybody seems to agree that deductive reasoning is the basis of science.
12:37 Speaker 02 Right.
12:37 Josh Clark? But that you also have to have inductive. So deductive is basically taking a big, broad generalization.
12:43 Speaker 02 Yeah.
12:44 Josh Clark? And saying that it applies to something.
12:48 Speaker 02 Specific, more specific.
12:49 Josh Clark? Yes.
12:49 Speaker 02 Yeah.
12:50 Josh Clark? Inductive is the opposite, where you say, I've noticed these different data points.
12:56 Speaker 02 Yeah.
12:56 Josh Clark? And that means that this broad generalization is true.
13:02 Speaker 02 Right.
13:02 Josh Clark? So you go from specific, small observations to a broad generalization. And the reason that a lot of people say, well, inductive reasoning doesn't have any place in science, is because You're saying those birds over there are all brown. Therefore, all birds of that type are brown. Even though I haven't seen every single bird of that type in the world.
13:24 Speaker 02 Right.
13:24 Josh Clark? I'm saying that all those birds are brown. And a lot of people say, there's no place for that in science.
13:29 Speaker 02 Well, if you want to go out and prove that, then that's your business, you know? You can't just say that and be like, and I'm done.
13:36 Josh Clark? Right, exactly.
13:37 Speaker 02 I guess you could, but you wouldn't be much of a scientist.
13:39 Josh Clark? Right, but you can use it to formulate hypotheses.
13:44 Speaker 02 Sure.
13:44 Josh Clark? Right, so you can say, I've generated all these data points. I'm going to put them together and see if this broad generalization is true.
13:51 Speaker 02 Right. Okay.
13:52 Josh Clark? So there is a place for inductive reasoning in science. But everybody says deductive reasoning is the basis of science.
13:59 Speaker 02 Well, Bill Harris does, he offers a great example for inductive reasoning with Edwin Hubble of the Hubble Telescope. He was looking through the Hooker Telescope, which at the time at California's Mount Wilson.
14:15 Josh Clark? Is that the one from Rebel Without a Cause?
14:17 Speaker 02 No, that's Griffith Park Observatory. Which has been redesigned and is really cool now.
14:25 Josh Clark? Is it?
14:26 Speaker 02 Yeah, I mean, it was kind of cool before, but it was definitely like, sort of the space museum that time forgot.
14:32 Josh Clark? Oh, really?
14:33 Speaker 02 So they've updated it.
14:34 Josh Clark? I'll bet that was cool, though, in its own way.
14:36 Speaker 02 Yeah, it was neat. I used to live near there, so it was kind of.
14:38 Josh Clark? But that's like, the famous one, at least in the movies.
14:41 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's where they have the big knife fight.
14:43 Josh Clark? Yeah.
14:43 Speaker 02 And there's this James Dean statue there, too.
14:45 Josh Clark? Oh, I didn't know.
14:46 Speaker 02 Like a bust. So, yes, Edwin Hubble, he's at Mountain Wilson, and he's looking through the Hooker Telescope, which was the biggest one. And at the time, everyone said, the Milky Way galaxy is it. That's what we've got going on.
14:59 Josh Clark? Yeah, did you know this?
15:01 Speaker 02 Uh, yeah, I knew that.
15:02 Josh Clark? Because we're talking 1919.
15:04 Speaker 02 Yeah, not that long ago.
15:05 Josh Clark? Did not realize this.
15:06 Speaker 02 And he started looking through this telescope and said, you know what? These nebula. That everyone says are part of our galaxy look to me like they're beyond our galaxy. And not only that, they look like they're moving away from us. So he made this, through inductive reasoning, made this observation that, you know what, I think there are many, many galaxies out there. And not only that, I think they are expanding.
15:30 Josh Clark? Yeah.
15:30 Speaker 02 And through technological advancement with telescopes over the years, scientists, you know, it proved to be true.
15:37 Josh Clark? Yeah, pretty cool. So this is a really good example of him saying, like, I've made some observations. And now I'm going to say this broad generalization.
15:46 Speaker 02 Yeah.
15:47 Josh Clark? Right? So these, these galaxies appear to be moving away from another. So the whole universe.
15:53 Speaker 02 Yeah.
15:54 Josh Clark? Is expanding, right? That's inductive reasoning.
15:57 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's a pretty brave thing, especially back then, because you're really putting your reputation at stake.
16:03 Josh Clark? It really is.
16:04 Speaker 02 You know?
16:04 Josh Clark? So what Hubble was, what Hubble did was what we've come to see as science. He made some observations. He came up with a hypothesis. And then it was tested later on. It's not, you don't necessarily, as a scientist, you're a part of a larger collective of scientists.
16:23 Speaker 02 Yes.
16:23 Josh Clark? Right? And every scientist needs one another. It's why there's journals and conferences and things like that to share information, right?
16:31 Speaker 02 And to party.
16:32 Josh Clark? Right, and to party. And Hubble came up with his own observations. And rather than just experimenting and experimenting and experimenting himself, which I'm sure he continued to do.
16:42 Speaker 02 Sure.
16:42 Josh Clark? He created this basis of work that he probably realized was going to survive him.
16:47 Speaker 02 Yeah, yeah.
16:48 Josh Clark? Right? And then later on, scientists came down the road and they tested his hypothesis. And they found it was correct. And so his hypothesis became a theory. It eventually became part of the basis of the Big Bang Theory, that the universe started as a huge explosion. And it's expanding still because we're, because it exploded at one point, right?
17:10 Speaker 02 Yeah.
17:11 Josh Clark? And they, they did that by carrying out other tests.
17:14 Speaker 02 Or experiments.
17:16 Josh Clark? Exactly.
17:17 Speaker 02 Yeah.
17:17 Josh Clark? So this is how science works. Like some guy back in. 1919, makes some observations in California. In 1925, he proposes this big, broad generalization.
17:28 Speaker 02 Yeah.
17:28 Josh Clark? And over the next, like, ensuing half a century, more and more scientists all around the world start testing his hypothesis and find it to be true, so it becomes a theory.
17:38 Speaker 02 Yeah. Well, well, let's finish up here with science.
17:42 Josh Clark? Okay.
17:43 Speaker 02 The last part of the definition is that it's systematic and it's methodical and it requires testing and experiments. And it requires those experiments and tests to be repeated and verified. And it is, it's a system, it's a way of working things out. It's a way of working.
18:03 Josh Clark? Yeah.
18:04 Speaker 02 And that is the scientific method, basically.
18:05 Josh Clark? Yeah.
18:06 Speaker 02 You have your idea, you pose a question, you theorize or you put a hypothesis out there, and then you go about trying to either prove it or disprove it.
18:15 Josh Clark? Yeah, exactly. And then the way that you go about proving or disproving it, that's the scientific method.
18:20 Speaker 02 That's right.
18:21 Josh Clark? Everything else is just scientific inquiry. The way you go about, the standardized way of going about scientific inquiry is the scientific method. And we, friend, will talk about the scientific method right after this.
18:42 Speaker 03 First thought is like, wow, how are we going to do all this?
18:44 Josh Clark? Hey, this is Josh and Chuck from Stuff You Should Know.
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19:03 Speaker 03 It was going to rival anything that was already built. And that takes quite a bit of people and different teams to all be on the same page.
19:11 Josh Clark? That includes field services manager Drexel Jones. His team made sure it all came together and held up on game day.
19:17 Speaker 04 Through what Alan's whole crew designed, we connected the event visitors to the world.
19:23 Speaker 02 And after years of hard work and collaboration, it was opening night.
19:26 Speaker 04 To actually see the whole stadium light up and data's flowing is a beautiful thing.
19:31 Speaker 03 What the fans experience is incredible. It gave me a lot of pride.
19:34 Josh Clark? AT&T, connecting fans to what they love.
19:38 Speaker 05 Connecting changes everything. AT&T.
19:44 Speaker 02 You know, you're never done decorating your home. You know what I mean?
19:47 Josh Clark? Sure.
19:47 Speaker 02 Yeah, because it's a process. There's always something you could do, or buy, or update. The only question is, what's next? For us, our animals just wear out our rugs so quickly. It's usually a new rug.
19:58 Josh Clark? Well, Chuck, whether you need a rug, or whatever is next for you, you can go to Wayfair. It's the smart place to get it.
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21:40 Speaker 02 All right, you brought up a point I think we should go ahead and just get right to, my friend.
21:45 Josh Clark? Let's do it.
21:45 Speaker 02 Hypotheses and theories.
21:48 Josh Clark? That's tough to say together.
21:50 Speaker 02 I know.
21:50 Josh Clark? You did it, though.
21:51 Speaker 02 One thing that really chafes my hide is when you hear poo-pooers of whatever scientific theory say, "Well, it's just a theory."
22:00 Josh Clark? Yeah.
22:01 Speaker 02 And where was this thing that you found that poo-pooed that? Do you remember what website that was? No?
22:09 Josh Clark? No. Although I do want to give a shout out now that you mention it to Explorables.
22:14 Speaker 02 Yeah.
22:14 Josh Clark? It's like an online university, basically, of free courses. And there is one on scientific reasoning that is just amazing. It's like a huge rabbit hole. You go down, you start clicking on the embedded links, and you end up like, understanding all sorts of stuff. So, go check that one out.
22:32 Speaker 02 If you like understanding stuff.
22:33 Josh Clark? Right.
22:34 Speaker 02 So, that's one of the things that bugged me if someone says it's just a theory. And this does a great job of kind of throwing that out the window. Because it's basically mixing up the two definitions of theory.
22:46 Josh Clark? Yeah, there's like a colloquial definition that people use every day that doesn't really have much to do with the scientific use of it.
22:52 Speaker 02 Yeah, like I got a theory that Jerry, in her one-hour bathroom breaks every day, is really playing Words With Friends in the lobby.
23:03 Josh Clark? I think your theory's correct.
23:04 Speaker 02 So, that's a theory in the colloquial meaning.
23:08 Josh Clark? Right.
23:09 Speaker 02 As far as science goes, a theory is not just something you postulate, saying, "This may or may not be true." A theory is beyond the hypothesis, and it's something that is strongly supported in many different ways. And there's all kinds of evidence to support something that eventually becomes a theory.
23:27 Josh Clark? Right. So, what you... your theory about Jerry's bathroom breaks?
23:31 Speaker 02 Yeah.
23:32 Josh Clark? In the scientific world would be a hypothesis. What?
23:36 Speaker 02 Fact?
23:36 Josh Clark? Yeah. Well, it'd be a scientific law.
23:39 Speaker 02 Yeah.
23:39 Josh Clark? But it ultimately would begin as a hypothesis, a hunch, based on intuition, based on data you've collected, observations, that kind of stuff.
23:49 Speaker 02 Yeah.
23:49 Josh Clark? Where like, you know, you've seen that Jerry goes to the bathroom for like, an hour to stretch.
23:54 Speaker 02 Yeah.
23:55 Josh Clark? Frequently, when she comes back, she's finishing up a game of Words with Friends.
24:01 Speaker 02 Sure.
24:01 Josh Clark? You've heard that she's been spotted in the lobby during these times.
24:05 Speaker 02 Yeah.
24:05 Josh Clark? So your hypothesis is that while she is gone for these hour-long bathroom breaks, she's actually down in the lobby playing Words with Friends, right?
24:13 Speaker 02 Yeah, based on knowledge, observation, and logic.
24:16 Josh Clark? Right. So let's say that you decided to set up an experiment, and you experimented, and you went, and you found Jerry playing Words with Friends.
24:23 Speaker 02 Yeah.
24:23 Josh Clark? Five different times. And you told me about it.
24:27 Speaker 02 Right.
24:27 Josh Clark? And I was like, "I'm gonna run that same experiment, exactly the way you did."
24:30 Speaker 02 Yeah.
24:31 Josh Clark? Right? I would test that same hypothesis. If I found the same results to be true, then what you would have come up with, your hypothesis, would move to basically a theory.
24:41 Speaker 02 Yeah.
24:41 Josh Clark? That is this widely accepted thing, this explanation, that Jerry is not actually in the bathroom, she's downstairs playing with friends. It'd be the Jerry Bathroom Break Theory.
24:53 Speaker 02 That's right.
24:54 Josh Clark? And then, if it turns out that you find that Jerry, spending an hour a day, pretending to be in the bathroom, but actually being downstairs playing Words with Friends.
25:06 Speaker 02 Yeah.
25:07 Josh Clark? If the universe couldn't exist without her doing that every day.
25:11 Speaker 02 Yeah.
25:11 Josh Clark? You would have a scientific law.
25:14 Speaker 02 That's right.
25:15 Josh Clark? Yeah. I think that was a good example you came up with.
25:18 Speaker 02 Well, that's a great example, as it turns out. Uh, I guess the point here is, when you hear someone say, in an argument, "Well, that's just a theory, just punch 'em in the head, and then tell 'em what we just said about the bathroom breaks."
25:32 Josh Clark? Yeah.
25:33 Speaker 02 And they'll say, "Who's Jerry?"
25:34 Josh Clark? Or just cue up that whole bit, and stand outside of their window, wearing a trench coat and holding a boombox over your head, with this smug look on your face.
25:45 Speaker 02 Uh, alright, so should we go back in the old wayback machine a little bit, and just talk a little bit about how the scientific method came to be?
25:52 Josh Clark? Yes.
26:01 Josh Clark? Man, this thing, where do you run this on these days?
26:05 Speaker 02 What do you mean?
26:06 Josh Clark? It's just straight kerosene? The fumes in here are killing me.
26:10 Speaker 02 Sorry about that. I'm trying to go green, you know?
26:12 Josh Clark? Kerosene is not green.
26:15 Speaker 02 Diesel, maybe?
26:17 Josh Clark? I'm choking.
26:18 Speaker 02 Biodiesel, how about that?
26:19 Josh Clark? Okay.
26:20 Speaker 02 The Wayback Machine will run on french fry grease.
26:22 Josh Clark? That would be fine.
26:23 Speaker 02 Alright, I'll get to work on that.
26:24 Josh Clark? I could handle those fumes.
26:26 Speaker 02 So, you teased us with the Renaissance, and the reason the Renaissance was so awesome and necessary was because of something else we've talked about, which was the Dark Ages. When...
26:37 Josh Clark? Which, remember, that's a rationalist's disparaging term for this era.
26:42 Speaker 02 That's right. But I think sort of rightfully so. Because, right before the Dark Ages, until about a century after, there was not much advancement at all in the realm of scientific advancement.
26:56 Josh Clark? No, it's true. That's hard to argue with that. And the reason why is, again, science wasn't really born yet, and there is a huge struggle between rationalism and mysticism. And ultimately, we're living in the age of rationalism now.
27:10 Speaker 02 Yeah, and we should point out, too, that this was mainly in Europe. Over in the Islamic world, as I think we had a listener mail point out, there were a lot of advancements being made.
27:20 Josh Clark? Right.
27:21 Speaker 02 Just sort of flying under the European radar at the time, because some say the Catholic Church kind of kept science under its thumb for a while.
27:30 Josh Clark? Yeah. Well, it was a pretty big threat.
27:32 Speaker 02 Yeah. And said, you know, "You can't do this stuff. You can't experiment like this, and don't ask these questions."
27:37 Josh Clark? Right.
27:38 Speaker 02 "'Cause here are your answers."
27:40 Josh Clark? Yeah.
27:41 Speaker 02 But eventually, the Renaissance came about in the 12th century, and people woke up and saw some of the work in the Islamic world and said, "You know what? Maybe let's start reading up on Aristotle and Ptolemy and Euclid once again."
27:53 Josh Clark? Yeah, they're like, "We forgot about these guys."
27:56 Speaker 02 Yeah, I mean, it literally kind of vanished for a while.
27:58 Josh Clark? It did, from the West.
27:59 Speaker 02 Yes.
28:00 Josh Clark? Fortunately, it was still around, you know, in its home places. But yes, in the West, they were lost. The Roman stuff was almost entirely lost because it was being suppressed by the locals.
28:11 Speaker 02 And I think the Greek knowledge was completely vanished.
28:14 Josh Clark? Yes, somehow, somehow they got, there was some, um, we got another listener mail after the Enlightenment one. They said that it was a, an Islamic scholar who was the one who translated Aristotle.
28:27 Speaker 02 Oh, right.
28:27 Josh Clark? Into Latin or something like that. And that without this guy, like, the West wouldn't have had much to start with. Because that's where that birth of rationalism came from, was this rediscovery of Greek and Roman classical thought.
28:41 Speaker 02 Yeah.
28:42 Josh Clark? And this was the basis of scientific inquiry, of rationalism, of saying like, okay, there's, there's set rules to things. And we need to discover these rules and how the, the principles of how the universe works. Like, there has to be principles, and we need to find this in a rational, methodical way.
28:57 Speaker 02 Yeah.
28:57 Josh Clark? And right out of the gate, Europe said, oh, okay, well, whatever you say is right then, Aristotle.
29:03 Speaker 02 Right.
29:04 Josh Clark? We're used to just believing everything without questioning it.
29:06 Speaker 02 Yeah.
29:07 Josh Clark? And luckily, Albert Magnus, I think, is who it was.
29:10 Speaker 02 Albertus?
29:11 Josh Clark? Was it Albertus Magnus or Roger Bacon who said, no, it was Bacon. Roger Bacon, who just has this great name, Rog Bacon.
29:19 Speaker 02 The Bacon Brothers?
29:20 Josh Clark? Yeah.
29:20 Speaker 02 Francis and Roger?
29:22 Josh Clark? Right.
29:22 Speaker 02 Well, they weren't brothers, though.
29:23 Josh Clark? But were they related at all?
29:25 Speaker 02 You know, I looked that up, and I don't think people know either way. I don't think there's any proof, but a lot of people think because of their names and the way things went back then, that they may very well have been related.
29:36 Josh Clark? And I mean, they were separated by 300 or so years.
29:40 Speaker 02 Although Roger was a, was a monk, so he would not have had children. So if they were related.
29:45 Josh Clark? It's an excellent point.
29:46 Speaker 02 It wasn't necessarily through his line.
29:48 Josh Clark? Gotcha.
29:49 Speaker 02 You know?
29:49 Josh Clark? Yeah. It could have been a nephew or something.
29:52 Speaker 02 Yeah. Or his brother Kevin might have had the line that matched.
29:56 Josh Clark? So Roger was the one who said, everybody stop. Just because Aristotle wrote something doesn't mean it's fact, especially when we find contradictions to it.
30:06 Speaker 02 Yeah.
30:07 Josh Clark? It doesn't, Aristotle's not automatically right. And this was a huge advancement.
30:10 Speaker 02 Yeah, and Albertus Magnus was the one, I believe, who said. You know, this thing called revealed truth, which is basically God says this instead of a truth found by experimenting.
30:24 Josh Clark? Right.
30:24 Speaker 02 Is maybe we should experiment instead and not take this revealed truth as the truth.
30:29 Josh Clark? Right, and we mentioned in the Enlightenment episode as well about scholasticism, about using scientific inquiry to explain theology.
30:38 Speaker 02 Right.
30:39 Josh Clark? Which was, you know, you're still working from a theological standpoint.
30:43 Speaker 02 Right.
30:43 Josh Clark? But you're starting to use scientific inquiry and the, the idea that you shouldn't just accept things as truth, that was again, a huge, huge breakthrough.
30:53 Speaker 02 Yeah. Francis Bacon, the other Bacon brother.
30:56 Josh Clark? He's one of the heroes of this story.
30:58 Speaker 02 Yeah, he was an attorney and philosopher and.
31:01 Josh Clark? And possibly Shakespeare.
31:02 Speaker 02 Oh, really?
31:04 Josh Clark? Uh huh.
31:04 Speaker 02 I never heard that.
31:05 Josh Clark? Oh, yeah.
31:06 Speaker 02 Interesting. So what do you mean, like wrote those under the pseudonym?
31:11 Josh Clark? Yeah.
31:11 Speaker 02 Huh. And the Shakespeare sister was the other theory too, right? That it was a woman?
31:16 Josh Clark? I've heard that, yeah.
31:17 Speaker 02 And she couldn't like, you know, women couldn't be the playwright, so her dumb brother William.
31:23 Josh Clark? That's a good. Was it her brother?
31:26 Speaker 02 I think that was one of the theories.
31:27 Josh Clark? Huh. This is a good Smith song, too.
31:29 Speaker 02 Uh, Shakespeare's sister, was that the name of it?
31:33 Josh Clark? Yeah.
31:34 Speaker 02 Wasn't it a band too? I think it was.
31:37 Josh Clark? Was it?
31:37 Speaker 02 Maybe. Uh, so anyway, he was a philosopher and a lawyer and he said, you know what? The Baconian method basically became the scientific method.
31:49 Josh Clark? Yeah.
31:50 Speaker 02 He was the first dude who really said, this is how, the steps that you should take to investigate science.
31:57 Josh Clark? Right. There has to be a framework and the whole point of this, that we take this so for granted now because it's so intuitively and on its face.
32:08 Josh Clark? Right.
32:09 Speaker 02 Yeah.
32:10 Josh Clark? As far as scientific inquiry goes, but this is an enormous breakthrough to say, you follow this step, these steps, this framework. And if everybody who carries out science follows the same framework, then science will be universal and interchangeable. And anyone in the world, and not just now, but anytime.
32:30 Speaker 02 Yeah.
32:30 Josh Clark? Will be able to carry out the same experiment. And will be able to verify or disprove it.
32:37 Speaker 02 Yeah.
32:38 Josh Clark? And that is amazing that that happened. That's why Francis Bacon is one of the heroes of the story. And he didn't come up with this entirely on his own, but he was the one who said, this is what we're gonna do. I'm gonna give it a name. I'm going to spell it out. And from now on, you can call me the dad of the scientific method.
32:58 Speaker 02 Yeah, and that's why Newton was such a rock star because he so rigorously stuck to the scientific method. That all these centuries later, his, you know, his systems of laws are, they have stood the test of time.
33:10 Josh Clark? Yeah.
33:11 Speaker 02 And I think it's a good point to bring up too, that the collaboration of scientists is really the hallmark of advancement and moving forward.
33:23 Josh Clark? Right.
33:23 Speaker 02 It's not working in a vacuum. It's sharing your ideas and working with one another. And the whole little sidebar here on cell theory, I thought was pretty cool. Which was when science quit, or not quit, but started looking at small things instead of looking at the universe around them and at the stars.
33:41 Josh Clark? Right.
33:42 Speaker 02 And said basically, you know, through the advancement of lens grinding, Antonio van Leeuwenhoek specifically, a Dutch tradesman, was pretty good at making simple microscopes. And all of a sudden contemporaries like Robert Hooke said, you know what? Let's start looking at tiny things.
34:00 Josh Clark? Right.
34:00 Speaker 02 Because therein might lie the answer to many, many things.
34:03 Josh Clark? Yeah.
34:03 Speaker 02 And they were right.
34:04 Josh Clark? Robert Hooke found cork, or he discovered cells by looking at cork.
34:09 Speaker 02 Yeah.
34:10 Josh Clark? Through an early microscope. So in this story, science is hastened by technological advancement. Lens grinding.
34:18 Speaker 02 Yeah.
34:18 Josh Clark? To make microscopes. And then this new technology is used to further science, right?
34:23 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's like mutual inspiration between Leeuwenhoek and Hooke. Leeuwenhoek.
34:29 Josh Clark? Yeah, it was neat. Because Hooke heard about Leeuwenhoek's.
34:33 Josh Clark? Microscopes.
34:34 Speaker 02 Yeah.
34:35 Josh Clark? Got his hands on one, or a microscope, looked at them, like cork, and said, "Oh, there's such a thing as cells."
34:41 Speaker 02 Right.
34:41 Josh Clark? Levenhoek said, "Oh, that's pretty neat. Let me try." And he said, "Oh, there's such a thing as, quote, 'little animals,'"
34:48 Speaker 02 Right.
34:48 Josh Clark? "Which we call protozoan bacteria."
34:50 Speaker 02 Yeah.
34:50 Josh Clark? And one of the Royal Societies, after Levenhoek presented his findings, turned back to Hook and said, "Hey, Hook, we know you're pretty handy with a microscope."
34:59 Speaker 02 Yeah.
35:00 Josh Clark? He confirmed Levenhoek's findings.
35:02 Speaker 02 Are there little animals?
35:03 Josh Clark? Hook said, "There are indeed. I can see them with my microscope."
35:07 Speaker 02 That's right. And that inspired a German botanist named Matthias Schleiden to look at a lot of plants. And he was the first guy to say, "You know what? Plants are composed of cells." And he was having dinner one night with his zoologist buddy.
35:23 Josh Clark? Yeah, and this is about 100 years later.
35:25 Speaker 02 Yeah, Theodore Schwan, and said, "You know what, dude? Order the wine and order the steak. Trust me, because this place is fantastic. And also, plants are made of cells. Don't tell anyone." And he went, "You know what, dude? I have been investigating animals with microscopes, and they're made of cells too."
35:46 Josh Clark? And so they figured out, at this dinner.
35:48 Speaker 02 Yeah.
35:48 Josh Clark? That everything is made of cells. All living things are made of cells.
35:52 Speaker 02 Boom.
35:52 Josh Clark? Okay, so this is huge. This is a big advancement, right?
35:55 Speaker 02 Yeah.
35:55 Josh Clark? That we're hitting upon right now.
35:57 Speaker 02 Huge.
35:58 Josh Clark? But it laid the further foundation, right?
36:01 Speaker 02 Yes.
36:01 Josh Clark? So, initial scientific inquiry led to further scientific inquiry and further scientific conclusions and generalizations.
36:09 Speaker 02 Yep.
36:09 Josh Clark? All living things are made of cells. And then it was extrapolated elsewhere, right?
36:14 Speaker 02 Yeah, like 20 years later, Rudolf Virchow said, "You know what? Not only is everything made of living cells, but they all come from pre-existing cells," which was a huge deal at the time, because people believed in spontaneous generation.
36:29 Josh Clark? Yeah.
36:30 Speaker 02 At the time.
36:30 Josh Clark? Like if you left some wheat seed in a sweaty shirt, it would spawn mice, I think, was one of them.
36:38 Speaker 02 Gross.
36:38 Josh Clark? There's a lot of weird ones. Press basil between some bricks and you'll get a scorpion. Was one like they were really out there.
36:46 Speaker 02 Yeah, well, the one that is well, not true, but the one that you could actually see was rotten meat would eventually spawn maggots.
36:54 Josh Clark? Right. How did they possibly get there?
36:56 Speaker 02 Yeah, spontaneous generation.
36:58 Josh Clark? But that's the obvious explanation. And if you think about it, they're working from Occam's razor. And Occam's razor says the simplest explanation is usually the the right one.
37:07 Speaker 02 Yeah.
37:08 Josh Clark? All all other things given. Well, the thing is, is spontaneous generation has never been shown to be possible.
37:14 Speaker 02 Right.
37:14 Josh Clark? We got the cell thing over here. Let's investigate that.
37:18 Speaker 02 Yeah.
37:18 Josh Clark? So this, what was the guy's name? Virchow?
37:22 Speaker 02 Yes.
37:22 Josh Clark? He's saying, OK, well, wait a minute. I've got this the cell theory I'm working on. It's been around for a couple of decades.
37:28 Speaker 02 Cell hypothesis, probably.
37:29 Josh Clark? Cell hypothesis at the nice catch.
37:32 Speaker 02 Don't feel bad, though, because this article that you sent said that scientists today like still like confuse those terms.
37:38 Josh Clark? Yeah.
37:39 Speaker 02 Just colloquially.
37:40 Josh Clark? And the the House of Works article makes a good point in saying that science and everything that has to do with it is in the scientific method is very fluid.
37:48 Speaker 02 Yeah.
37:48 Josh Clark? And open to interpretation and experimentation.
37:51 Speaker 02 Yeah.
37:52 Josh Clark? Obviously. But so he says, OK, this cell hypothesis, this is a pretty good explanation for what we now call spontaneous generation. He didn't do anything about it. He just put it out there.
38:05 Speaker 02 Yeah.
38:06 Josh Clark? And then along comes Louis Pasteur, who does do something about it. He figures out a great experiment to try to disprove spontaneous generation.
38:15 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's pretty simple, too. He basically took a broth,
38:21 Speaker 02 put equal amounts in two different beakers. One had a straight neck and one had an S shaped neck. He boiled it just to make sure everything in it was killed.
38:30 Josh Clark? Yeah.
38:30 Speaker 02 And then just let it sit there in the same conditions, open to the to the world and or open to the room like it wasn't corked, in other words. And he noticed that the one with the straight neck eventually became cloudy and discolored, uh, meaning there was some junk growing in there.
38:47 Josh Clark? Yeah.
38:47 Speaker 02 And the one in the S-shaped neck did not do anything. It remained the same.
38:52 Josh Clark? Right.
38:52 Speaker 02 So that led him to think, what?
38:54 Josh Clark? Well, he thought that germs, that there was such thing as germs, which Levenhoek and Hook had already shown.
39:01 Speaker 02 Yeah.
39:01 Josh Clark? Um, and that if, that in the S-shaped flask, they had gotten trapped in the neck.
39:07 Speaker 02 Mm-hmm.
39:08 Josh Clark? In this, the open neck, they had been able to just enter unobstructed.
39:12 Speaker 02 Right.
39:13 Josh Clark? And had, uh, generated there. The reason that the S-shaped flask was still sterile was because there is no such thing as spontaneous generation. If there were, then no S-shaped neck would impede anything like that.
39:26 Speaker 02 And boom, there you have it.
39:28 Josh Clark? So he disproved that spontaneous generation is a thing, right?
39:34 Speaker 02 That's right. Through sci- the scientific method.
39:36 Josh Clark? Exactly. Here's the leap that a lot of people make, scientists included, that really is a great disservice to science. He didn't prove cell theory.
39:46 Speaker 02 Right.
39:47 Josh Clark? What he did was take that cell hypothesis and present some really persuasive evidence that it's probably right.
39:57 Speaker 02 Yeah, but like this article you sent points out, disproving something is just as important as proving something.
40:02 Josh Clark? So here's the thing. That's the most you can hope for with science is disproving.
40:06 Speaker 02 Sure.
40:07 Josh Clark? With science, unless you're talking about math, with science, there's no such thing as proof. A theory, even a law, a universal law, still has the potential for being undermined by one single experiment, one single observation.
40:20 Speaker 02 Right.
40:21 Josh Clark? And therefore, there is no real ultimate proof in science. There's just theories and support for theories.
40:28 Speaker 02 Right.
40:29 Josh Clark? And then ultimately, laws aim further and further support for laws.
40:33 Speaker 02 Right.
40:34 Josh Clark? Right? But they're not proven. What science does ultimately is disprove things or lend support for existing theories or existing interpretations of why things happen the way they do.
40:47 Speaker 02 Yeah.
40:48 Josh Clark? And that's what Pasteur did. So if you look at that experiment, he disproved spontaneous generation, but he lent support to the cell theory. And probably with his experiment, it went from the cell hypothesis to the cell theory.
41:00 Speaker 02 Right.
41:00 Josh Clark? Because it was just so persuasive. And that's what a theory is. It means that a lot of people out there who are reasonable say, This explanation is probably the right one.
41:11 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's predictive. If you do it over and over, you're probably going to get the same result.
41:15 Josh Clark? Right. But that's not to say that pastures showed that if you do this a million and one times.
41:21 Speaker 02 Right.
41:22 Josh Clark? That the S-shaped flask won't turn cloudy.
41:25 Speaker 02 Yeah.
41:26 Josh Clark? He didn't prove that. You can't prove that, which is, again, science can disprove and lens support can't prove.
41:33 Speaker 02 Very good point. So, right after this message break, we're going to get into the actual steps of the scientific method.
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43:46 Speaker 02 All right, dude. I guess at long last, we're there. Like you mentioned before, the scientific method is fluid. And it's not like when you get your science degree, they hand you a little laminated card, like the Miranda rights that cops carry, that list out all the different steps you have to take. But generally...
44:07 Josh Clark? Oh, maybe.
44:08 Speaker 02 Yeah?
44:09 Josh Clark? I would... We should carry those around. We should make little wallet cards of the scientific method just to carry. With the Stuff You Should Know logo on it.
44:16 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah.
44:17 Josh Clark? We'll make a million bucks.
44:18 Speaker 02 We could brand them and sell them.
44:19 Josh Clark? Yeah.
44:21 Speaker 02 Generally speaking, though, it follows these steps. The first thing you do, like we mentioned earlier, is you observe something, you ask a question. Next, like Darwin was known, I think when we did our podcast on him, he would spend like a week on three square feet of ground on his property.
44:39 Josh Clark? It was like even longer than that, remember?
44:41 Speaker 02 Yeah, it was, wasn't it?
44:42 Josh Clark? He said that he wasn't going to mow his lawn for like three years because he wanted to see what happened.
44:48 Speaker 02 Yeah, so he's the ultimate in qualitative data of just observing, writing things down, and asking questions. And the reason you ask your question is so you can narrow something down. Like, I think the example they use in here is on Galapagos, like the beaks of... What bird was it?
45:06 Josh Clark? The finches?
45:07 Speaker 02 Yeah, the finch bird. He noticed a bunch of different beaks. So he finally posed a question, like, you know, "I think these beaks are different for a very specific reason, and I aim to find out why."
45:17 Josh Clark? Yes. He said, "What caused the diversification of finches on Galapagos?"
45:22 Speaker 02 Ooh.
45:24 Speaker 02 You should have done that with an accent.
45:26 Josh Clark? Well, yeah, he would have had a British accent, huh?
45:28 Speaker 02 Yeah.
45:28 Josh Clark? Huh.
45:29 Speaker 02 Unless he was pretending to be someone else.
45:31 Josh Clark? I always think of him as like, um, sounding like Hemingway or something.
45:35 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah?
45:35 Josh Clark? Yeah.
45:35 Speaker 02 Drunk and violent?
45:36 Josh Clark? Kinda. But he wasn't. He was like the opposite of that.
45:40 Speaker 02 Yeah, well, I saw the, the movie, uh, saw a picture of his voice as, uh, the dude that played him, who I can't remember right now.
45:49 Josh Clark? Ed Norton.
45:50 Speaker 02 No.
45:52 Speaker 02 I finally saw Birdman, though. Did you see that? Yeah?
45:55 Josh Clark? Yeah.
45:56 Speaker 02 Great movie.
45:57 Josh Clark? Um, I disagree.
45:59 Speaker 02 Oh, you didn't like it?
45:59 Josh Clark? No.
46:00 Speaker 02 What? Wow. That surprises me. Um, we'll get into that off the air. So, uh, sorry, you just threw me with that.
46:12 Josh Clark? Make an observation?
46:13 Speaker 02 Yes.
46:13 Josh Clark? He's on Galapagos and he's like, what the heck's with all these different finches?
46:16 Speaker 02 Right.
46:17 Josh Clark? It's one small island. Why would there be different species of finch?
46:20 Speaker 02 So ask the question.
46:21 Josh Clark? And, and why are they all seeming to survive and coexist so well? What's, what make, yeah, then he leads to the question, what's making all of these species of finches so diverse?
46:33 Speaker 02 Right, or Bill Harris uses, uh, a pretty good example that's something everyone can understand. Like, what car body shape is the best for air resistance? Like, one that's shaped like a box, or one that's shaped like aerodynamic like a bird?
46:47 Josh Clark? Right.
46:47 Speaker 02 And he carries that out, and the next step, uh, you formulate your hypothesis, uh, based on your, you know, foreknowledge and maybe observations, like, so you know what? I think that a car shaped like a bird is probably more aerodynamic than one shaped like a box.
47:03 Josh Clark? Yeah, if you're thinking, if you're the type of person who's sitting around asking questions about aerodynamics, you probably already have some sort of sense that a box is less aerodynamic than a bird.
47:13 Speaker 02 That's right.
47:14 Josh Clark? Boxes rarely fly, unless they're carried by one of those delightful Amazon delivery drones.
47:21 Speaker 02 They don't have those yet, right? They're not gonna do that, are they?
47:24 Josh Clark? There's like a pizza delivery drone service.
47:28 Speaker 02 Oh, man.
47:28 Josh Clark? I think, where you have, no, is it pizza or grilled cheese? In New York, and you go stand on an X after you order and it like comes and drops it.
47:37 Speaker 02 That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard.
47:38 Josh Clark? Yeah?
47:39 Speaker 02 And I can't wait to do it.
47:40 Josh Clark? I'll bet they're making a lot of money.
47:43 Speaker 02 That's pretty funny. Um, yet we can't get food to the homeless somehow.
47:46 Josh Clark? Exactly.
47:47 Speaker 02 We can drop a grilled cheese on someone's head.
47:49 Josh Clark? Right. They're like, you homeless guy, get off of that X.
47:51 Speaker 02 Yeah, exactly. Um, alright, so your hypothesis, I don't think we ever mentioned, is typically represented as an if-then statement.
48:00 Josh Clark? Yeah, if you're doing good science, it is.
48:02 Speaker 02 Yeah, like if the car's profile, uh... Well, the example he uses, if the body's profile related to the amount of air it produces, uh, which is the more general statement.
48:15 Josh Clark? Yeah, that's like based on a theory.
48:17 Speaker 02 Yeah, and it's gonna get more specific, then the car design like the body of a bird will be more aerodynamic than one like a box.
48:24 Josh Clark? So that's inductive reasoning, starting with a broad statement and going to something narrow.
48:29 Speaker 02 And it's if-then at the same time.
48:31 Josh Clark? Yeah, and now you have a test. You have a question that can be answered. You can figure out a way to answer it.
48:37 Speaker 02 Yeah, and he points out too, this is, uh, pretty important, that, uh, your hypothesis, if it's formulated correctly, means it is testable and it's falsifiable.
48:46 Josh Clark? Which are often one in the same.
48:48 Speaker 02 True.
48:49 Josh Clark? You know?
48:49 Speaker 02 Yeah.
48:50 Josh Clark? And that's, again, we go to the people who say that their soft sciences aren't real science, they're pseudoscience, because a lot of the data that they come up with, a lot of the hypotheses they come up with, aren't falsifiable, they're not testable.
49:06 Speaker 02 Right.
49:07 Josh Clark? It's a thing, it's an issue.
49:09 Speaker 02 It's a thing. Uh, so next up in the steps, uh, you're gonna experiment, and when you experiment, you can't just go in there willy-nilly and do whatever you want. Um, you have to set up specific conditions, uh, and they must be controlled. That's the key.
49:24 Josh Clark? And you wanna, everything that's supposed to be identical, needs to be identical. So, basically you have two variables at least. You have an independent variable.
49:33 Speaker 02 Yes.
49:33 Josh Clark? And you have a dependent variable. And if you're talking about car shape... That is the independent variable in this study.
49:41 Speaker 02 Yeah, that's the one that's manipulated.
49:43 Josh Clark? Exactly. It's the one you're controlling. The independent variable is the one you, the researcher, is controlling. So in this case, you're controlling the shape of the car.
49:52 Speaker 02 Right.
49:52 Josh Clark? You have yourself a bird-shaped car and you have yourself a box-shaped car. So the shape of the car changed because you made it change. Now, when you blast a bunch of air over it during your experiment, what you're measuring is the dependent variable. So you're measuring what happens based on the change that you made.
50:12 Speaker 02 That's right. And you want to study one single variable at a time, basically.
50:17 Josh Clark? Yeah, don't get fancy. Just do good science, step by step, methodical.
50:22 Speaker 02 You also have to have your control group in any experiment, an experimental group. And the controlled group is what's gonna allow you to compare the test results to that baseline measurement.
50:35 Josh Clark? Yeah.
50:35 Speaker 02 And you need that baseline measurement.
50:37 Josh Clark? So like, Pasteur.
50:38 Speaker 02 It's not just like chance, basically.
50:40 Josh Clark? Exactly. Like if Pasteur had just done the S-shaped neck and nothing happened.
50:44 Speaker 02 Right.
50:45 Josh Clark? He wouldn't have necessarily been able to say that he was right, even though he was right. He needed that control, which was the open flask.
50:53 Speaker 02 Right. Or with the cars, you need two cars, like you said, one bird-shaped and one box-shaped.
50:59 Josh Clark? Right. Or then maybe, in this case, since the bird shape and the box shape both show up in the hypothesis, you'd need a third, like, egg-shaped one or something like that.
51:07 Speaker 02 Ooh, I bet that would be pretty streamlined.
51:10 Josh Clark? Yeah.
51:10 Speaker 02 Yeah?
51:10 Josh Clark? Yeah.
51:11 Speaker 02 But the key, though, is all of those variables have to be, all the other variables have to be the same. Like, you have to have them, they have to be the same weight, they have to be painted the same. The tires, everything, the windows. One can't have an antenna and the other not. They've all, they gotta be identical, other than the one variable.
51:30 Josh Clark? Right. The independent variable, that you're, that's the one you want different. Everything else you want the same.
51:35 Speaker 02 That's right.
51:35 Josh Clark? Or else it's possible that, oh, well, this one had bigger tires, so that actually made it more aerodynamic.
51:41 Speaker 02 Yeah, and you're just doing yourself a favor by doing all that stuff.
51:44 Josh Clark? Yeah.
51:44 Speaker 02 You know, you wanna rule out everything else but that one variable.
51:47 Josh Clark? Yep.
51:48 Speaker 02 After that, you want to analyze your data, so you can draw your conclusion. And sometimes it's kind of straightforward and easy, sometimes it takes a lot of work and a lot of various tools to draw it out.
52:04 Josh Clark? Yeah, so let's say you're just blasting a car in a wind tunnel.
52:07 Speaker 02 Yeah.
52:08 Josh Clark? You're measuring the wind resistance using certain awesome instruments and that kind of stuff, and you're taking that data, and then afterward, you're going to analyze, you're going to compare the data that you gathered from the bird-shaped car, the box-shaped car, and then the control, the egg-shaped car.
52:24 Speaker 02 Right.
52:25 Josh Clark? You're going to compare them, and you're going to say, "Well, the wind resistance was less for the bird-shaped car than the box-shaped car, which means that my hypothesis was correct."
52:36 Speaker 02 Right, and here are all the data points, whereas Louis Pasteur could just say, "Look at the beakers!"
52:41 Josh Clark? Exactly. Don't be an idiot.
52:43 Speaker 02 Yeah.
52:44 Josh Clark? I'm a scientist.
52:45 Speaker 02 That one's got gross stuff, you can see it.
52:47 Josh Clark? Right, but the other thing about science too, Chuck, ideally, is let's say that egg-shaped one turned out, the control group, turned out to have better wind resistance than anything. Well, just by virtue of carrying out this experiment correctly, you would have stumbled upon an even better aerodynamic design.
53:07 Speaker 02 That's right.
53:08 Josh Clark? And you would have come up with that little egg-shaped Mercedes SUV.
53:11 Speaker 02 Yeah.
53:12 Josh Clark? That was so huge, like 10 years ago.
53:14 Speaker 02 The Mercedes Egg.
53:15 Josh Clark? Right.
53:16 Speaker 02 Coming to a store near you.
53:17 Josh Clark? So, that's a big, big part of the scientific method, is carrying out an experiment, controlling the variables, analyzing the data, and then there's a step that he missed that is very rarely part of a scientific method list.
53:36 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah.
53:37 Josh Clark? That is to share your data.
53:39 Speaker 02 Oh, sure.
53:40 Josh Clark? And this is a huge problem with science right now.
53:42 Speaker 02 Yeah, that article you sent was really eye-opening. "Scientific Research Has Changed the World, Now It Needs to Change Itself."
53:48 Josh Clark? It's an Economist article, it's up on the internet.
53:51 Speaker 02 Yeah, it was kind of scary that... It's, I mean, here's some of the data he points out is one rule of thumb among biotech venture capitalists is about half, 50% of published research can't even be replicated. And a biotech firm Amgen found that they could reproduce only six of their 53 landmark studies in cancer research.
54:14 Josh Clark? Right.
54:14 Speaker 02 So you can't repeat these things. It's like, everyone's fighting for dollars and fame, maybe not fame, but
54:21 Josh Clark? Some are.
54:22 Speaker 02 Career advancement.
54:23 Josh Clark? Sure.
54:24 Speaker 02 Such that they're kind of not doing that final step any longer.
54:27 Josh Clark? No, and it's not necessarily just them. It's the other scientists aren't going back and saying, "Well, let me see if your results are reproducible." People are just taking it on faith.
54:39 Speaker 02 Right.
54:39 Josh Clark? We need another Roger Bacon to come along and be like, "Dude, we can't just blindly accept that one person carried out this one study"
54:46 Speaker 02 Yeah.
54:46 Josh Clark? And then just go do clinical trials on it without anybody reproducing it to see if the, the results can be verified independently.
54:55 Speaker 02 Yeah, because, and this is a good time to mention bias. There is such a thing as bias, and it still happens. A scientist is usually out to prove something or disprove something.
55:08 Josh Clark? Right.
55:08 Speaker 02 That they want a, a specific result. Like, even if you're super open-minded, you're probably hoping to disprove or prove something, one way or the other, and your confirmation bias might, you know, even if you don't think you're doing it, you might nudge out some results that don't support your hypothesis.
55:27 Josh Clark? Right.
55:28 Speaker 02 And so you won't make it into that awesome journal.
55:30 Josh Clark? Yep.
55:32 Speaker 02 Which, this author points out that journals need to start putting in what he calls uninteresting results in experiments.
55:42 Josh Clark? Right, or
55:42 Speaker 02 Like, the stuff that's not sexy.
55:44 Josh Clark? Right, or studies that failed to show that their hypothesis was correct.
55:49 Speaker 02 Yeah, stuff that's disproved.
55:50 Josh Clark? Those things still need to, well, not even disproved, well, yeah, I guess it is disproved, but yes, like, the guy set out to say, like, that a red balloon uses less helium than a silver balloon.
56:02 Speaker 02 Right.
56:03 Josh Clark? And it turns out that, no, they Use the same amount of helium. Well, if that study gets published and put out there into the scientific literature on helium and balloons.
56:12 Speaker 02 Yeah.
56:13 Josh Clark? Then it's going to prevent some other scientists down the road from wasting time, money, and helium, which, as you'll remember, is an increasingly needed commodity.
56:21 Speaker 02 Sure.
56:22 Josh Clark? Um, by carrying out the same experiment.
56:25 Speaker 02 Yeah.
56:25 Josh Clark? So whether, whether the results are positive or negative or what, the, the study's meant to be shared. And that's the point of the scientific method is to, to reduce bias.
56:34 Speaker 02 Right.
56:35 Josh Clark? If you follow it all the way through ideally and do all of the steps, including share your research, whether it's happy or sad, then science benefits, the world benefits. And by not doing that, the world does not benefit.
56:48 Speaker 02 Yeah, he points out that, uh, these days only 14% of published papers are quote unquote negative results. And it used to be like 30% or more. Um, and he says, cause it's, a lot of it has to do with this sort of, uh, you know, getting in these journals and you're the rock star scientist and this study is super sexy.
57:10 Josh Clark? Right.
57:11 Speaker 02 Like if they kind of quit going that route and made it what it should be, then, uh, research dollars would be better spent and, uh, people could, you know, he said the peer reviewed thing isn't even all it's cracked up to be anymore.
57:22 Josh Clark? I know that he mentions a study from a medical journal that gave a bunch of peer reviewers, some stuff with deliberate errors inserted into the research, into the studies. And even when they were told that they were being tested to find this, they still missed a lot of it.
57:38 Speaker 02 Yeah.
57:39 Josh Clark? So, yeah, the science needs to kind of reevaluate the way it's carrying out science. It's not science, the problem isn't science itself. The problem isn't the scientific method, it's the way that it's being used or not followed through. And a lot of it has to do with academia and the people funding science.
57:55 Speaker 02 Yeah, and he said, you know, these days there's up 7 million researchers. And back in the day, even in like the 1950s, there were like a few thousand maybe.
58:04 Josh Clark? Right.
58:04 Speaker 02 So there's just a lot of career competition, he calls it careerism. And, uh, so you fake a result or two, or you just nudge out some results that don't support your hypothesis.
58:14 Josh Clark? Yeah.
58:15 Speaker 02 You want the bigger paycheck or the fame or notoriety and all of a sudden, science is not science.
58:21 Josh Clark? Yeah.
58:22 Speaker 02 You know, it's pseudoscience.
58:25 Josh Clark? Exactly. And speaking of pseudoscience, I think we've reached the point where we should talk about the limitations of the scientific method, because it does have its limits, right?
58:36 Speaker 02 Yeah.
58:36 Josh Clark? Like, the way that the scientific method is set up, especially if you go through, if you include falsification, which most scientists now say is a thing.
58:45 Speaker 02 Sure.
58:45 Josh Clark? Like falsifiability of your hypothesis means that you have a real scientific hypothesis there.
58:51 Speaker 02 Yeah.
58:52 Josh Clark? If it can be disproven by some observation or some measurement or whatever, then it's falsifiable. And if it's not falsifiable, then it's not really science. So the thing is, for something to be falsifiable, and it was actually a philosopher that came up with the concept of falsification, a guy named Karl Popper in the 1930s.
59:11 Speaker 02 Yeah.
59:11 Josh Clark? And he was the one that said, like, you have to be able to falsify something for it to be disproven or supported.
59:19 Speaker 02 Right.
59:19 Josh Clark? And if not, then it's pseudoscience.
59:21 Speaker 02 Right.
59:21 Josh Clark? Well, part and parcel of that is that what you're saying has to be able to be detected empirically. There's some way that has to, the presence of it has to be measured or inferred.
59:33 Speaker 02 Right.
59:33 Josh Clark? And so, a lot of people say, well, then, with the scientific method, it reaches the limits of its current usefulness when it tries to explain the supernatural.
59:43 Speaker 02 Right.
59:44 Josh Clark? When somebody says, like...
59:46 Speaker 02 Ghosts are real.
59:47 Josh Clark? Exactly. You can't prove that. Well, you also can't disprove it either.
59:51 Speaker 02 Right.
59:51 Josh Clark? Right? And so, if you are a scientist who says, because the scientific method can't prove or disprove the existence of ghosts or God.
1:00:03 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:00:04 Josh Clark? There is no such thing as ghosts or God, you're making a leap of faith just as much as the same person who says, "Science can't prove or disprove the existence of ghosts or God, therefore, gods and ghosts are real."
1:00:17 Speaker 02 Right.
1:00:17 Josh Clark? They're both leaps of faith. And that really, the most scientific approach to the existence of the supernatural, whether it is ghost or God. Is that we simply don't know and that we cannot know scientifically. And but that doesn't mean that it does exist or doesn't exist.
1:00:34 Speaker 02 Right.
1:00:34 Josh Clark? And that saying that science shows that it does or doesn't exist is by by definition, the opposite of what science shows.
1:00:41 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:00:41 Josh Clark? Science shows neither. It's not capable of showing or showing that something doesn't exist.
1:00:48 Speaker 02 Yeah, that's a good point. Uh, the other place where science can get corrupted is when it blurs the lines or when people blur the lines between uh, moral judgments and science uh, value judgments. Like you can study global warming, you can study cause and effect, you can report data. But when you make that second leap to say, and this is a scientist, I mean, someone can come along and say global warming is bad, shouldn't drive your SUV. That's fine, but a scientist can't do a study and say that because that's uh, that's a value judgment and that's where science can get corrupted pretty much.
1:01:27 Josh Clark? Right.
1:01:27 Speaker 02 You can, you can study global warming and results till the cows come home, but you can't assert that if you use this light bulb, you're a bad person.
1:01:36 Josh Clark? Right, or um, ocean acidification is bad. It's not good for humans, but if you're a jellyfish, it's awesome.
1:01:43 Speaker 02 Right.
1:01:44 Josh Clark? You know, so yes, and again, you made a great point. It's not science, it's people using science to make value judgments.
1:01:52 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:01:52 Josh Clark? So it ultimately, the scientific method, although it does have its limitations in that it needs empirical data.
1:01:59 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:02:00 Josh Clark? Uh, to prove or disprove something. It, it, it's not, it's not flawed. That's not a flaw, that's a limitation.
1:02:07 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:02:08 Josh Clark? And it's, it's when it's misused, then it's results become flawed or skewed. And that's the people doing it, man, not science.
1:02:16 Speaker 02 That's right.
1:02:17 Josh Clark? It's pretty interesting stuff.
1:02:18 Speaker 02 Yeah, man, this is a good one.
1:02:20 Josh Clark? I thought so too, man.
1:02:21 Speaker 02 Way to start out with a bang.
1:02:23 Josh Clark? Boom.
1:02:23 Speaker 02 It's all downhill from here.
1:02:26 Josh Clark? Uh, if you want to know more about the scientific method, uh, check out that article on The Economist, check out Explorables, uh, and then of course, check out the scientific method in the search bar at howstuffworks.com. And since I said that, it's time for listener mail.
1:02:43 Speaker 02 That's right, but quickly, before listener mail, we get asked by listeners all the time, "What can we do, since you have a free podcast, we can't pay for it, what can we do to help you guys?"
1:02:54 Josh Clark? Yeah.
1:02:55 Speaker 02 And one thing you can do that we would appreciate is go to iTunes and leave a rating and a review for us.
1:03:02 Josh Clark? Yeah.
1:03:02 Speaker 02 That makes a big, big difference in keeping us up there in the rankings, which means more people find stuff you should know. After they listen to Serial, they'll just say, "Well, geez, there's other podcasts in the world."
1:03:14 Josh Clark? What is this podcast?
1:03:17 Speaker 02 So, ratings and reviews really help us out, and it doesn't cost you anything but a few minutes. Be honest, we're not saying, "Go leave us some great review," but go leave us a great review.
1:03:28 Josh Clark? You said it.
1:03:29 Speaker 02 And tell one person about stuff you should know, we would appreciate that, too. Turn somebody on to the show, and that's it. That's our version of a pledge drive.
1:03:38 Josh Clark? Wow. We do that, what, once every three years now?
1:03:42 Speaker 02 Not very obnoxious.
1:03:43 Josh Clark? And it lasts 40 seconds.
1:03:45 Speaker 02 All right, so on to listener mail. This is from my sister-in-law, actually.
1:03:49 Josh Clark? Oh, yeah? This is nepotism?
1:03:50 Speaker 02 Yeah, Jenny Bryant. She
1:03:53 Josh Clark? Makes sense.
1:03:54 Speaker 02 Mentioned in the homeschool episode, homeschooled her kids for a little while, and she sort of corrected me. "Love the homeschooling episode, guys. One very big trend these days in the homeschooling community is what Abby, my niece, does, which is hybrid homeschooling. So, two to three days a week, she is at school, and then the rest of the time she's at home."
1:04:16 Josh Clark? She's a plant.
1:04:17 Speaker 02 She's not a plant. The rest of the time, she's at home. So, she says it's a great option with curriculum provided, and new topics taught at school, and then worked out at home. Many of these schools are credited making getting into college, including Ivy League schools, hassle-free.
1:04:33 Josh Clark? Nice.
1:04:33 Speaker 02 And Abby's school has sports teams, homecoming. Abby's actually an excellent volleyball player.
1:04:38 Josh Clark? Yeah.
1:04:39 Speaker 02 Beta club, newspaper staff, all the good stuff. "The flexibility is great for families, and we are huge fans of how the hybrid approach prepares students for college by allowing them time outside of class to manage their work and life schedules." So that's from Jenny.
1:04:54 Josh Clark? Nice, thanks Jenny.
1:04:55 Speaker 02 It was actually via text.
1:04:56 Josh Clark? Oh, really?
1:04:57 Speaker 02 Our first listener mail via text.
1:04:59 Josh Clark? How did you print that out? Did you retype it and print it?
1:05:02 Speaker 02 No, dude. Are you serious?
1:05:05 Josh Clark? You can print from texts?
1:05:06 Speaker 02 No, you just copy pasted it to an email.
1:05:09 Josh Clark? Oh, oh, yeah, yeah. Forgot about that method.
1:05:12 Speaker 02 How in the world did you print a text?
1:05:14 Josh Clark? Did you do that with your thoughts? I have a niece who is excellent at volleyball, too.
1:05:19 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah? How old is she?
1:05:20 Josh Clark? Yeah, we should get them together. Phew, I don't know, 10, 11, 12?
1:05:23 Speaker 02 Okay.
1:05:23 Josh Clark? Something like that?
1:05:24 Speaker 02 Abby just turned 13, so they're...
1:05:26 Josh Clark? Oh, maybe they face off against one another.
1:05:28 Speaker 02 Yeah. Is she in Atlanta?
1:05:30 Josh Clark? Yeah, she's up in Canton.
1:05:31 Speaker 02 You never know.
1:05:32 Josh Clark? Where is Abby?
1:05:34 Speaker 02 She's in Roswell, but they, I think with volleyball, they kind of have, play all over the state.
1:05:38 Josh Clark? Wouldn't that be bizarre if they play each other?
1:05:40 Speaker 02 Yeah, we'll just see each other at a match one day on opposite sides of the court with our arms folded.
1:05:44 Josh Clark? Yeah. Uh, what else?
1:05:47 Speaker 02 I got nothing else.
1:05:48 Josh Clark? Well, like Chuck said, go leave us a review. And if you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at SYSK Podcast. You can join us on facebook.com/stuffyoushouldknow. You can email us. Do we still do that?
1:06:04 Speaker 02 Yeah, you can't text me.
1:06:05 Josh Clark? At [email protected] . And as always, join us at our home on the web, stuffyoushouldknow.com.
1:06:17 Speaker 00 For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstuffworks.com.
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