Talk:Science

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The History of Science

Just because history of science is about science doesn’t mean it’s science itself.Science describes studying nature of the universe. 2601:600:C881:6C10:BC2B:559A:3F41:1961 (talk) 06:01, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

and how is that 41.80.117.28 (talk) 20:46, 26 December 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 24 October 2023

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Change definition of science to the pursuit, acquisition, dissemination, and application of novel knowledge.

Knowledgeandexpression (talk) 00:21, 24 October 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: proposed definition seems significantly worse, also makes no sense to define science solely on some piece on markets.financialcontent.com Cannolis (talk) 00:32, 24 October 2023 (UTC)

References

Image

There should be an image at the top of this page. It need not represent all of "science", because an image can't, but it can make the page look better. But take a look at the pages for Religion, or Philosophy, or Language. Can we pick a good image for this page? In my opinion something ancient would be best, because it demonstrates how science has existed for millennia, and it helps with a neutral point of view. What about, say, the Jantar Mantar, Jaipur? Language Boi (talk) 00:57, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Correction: the Jantar Mantar isn't really "ancient", but I still think it gives a better perspective than, say, an image of Galileo. Language Boi (talk) 01:02, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

why not CERN, a telescope, or some other instrument? The image should be recognizable, not a portrait or some obscure building. Artem.G (talk) 07:45, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Actually, I agree. The LHC is probably the best choice. Language Boi (talk) 21:19, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

Three main branches and literature science

The article says that there are three main branches: the natural sciences, the social sciences and the formal sciences. Where do the literature sciences https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literaturwissenschaft belong to? 2003:C5:8740:4F00:4D80:D5B8:EBF:82AB (talk) 15:50, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Anti-Science attitudes

"Anti-science attitudes seem to be often caused by fear of rejection in social groups. For instance, climate change is perceived as a threat by only 22% of Americans on the right side of the political spectrum, but by 85% on the left. That is, if someone on the left would not consider climate change as a threat, this person may face contempt and be rejected in that social group. In fact, people may rather deny a scientifically accepted fact than lose or jeopardize their social status."

it seems like the opposite example would fit better with this sentence? This seems to imply that the 'anti-science attitude' is seeing climate change as a threat. Sock-the-guy (talk) 22:27, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

How about simply "attitudes about science", because that's what the data is actually saying, is that such attitudes are socially informed. Remsense诉 22:33, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

I don't know that that makes sense, because the paragraph is from the article "antiscience". (unrelated, love the number theory userbox) Sock-the-guy (talk) 22:36, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure how you could say that support of something and rejection of something aren't related. Remsense诉 22:37, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

OH I thought you meant changing the entire paragraph. I see what you mean now.

Maybe something like:

"Attitudes towards scientific subjects seem to be often caused by fear of rejection in social groups. For instance, climate change is perceived as a threat by only 22% of Americans on the right side of the political spectrum, but by 85% on the left. That is, if someone on the left would not consider climate change as a threat, this person may face contempt and be rejected in that social group. In fact, people may rather deny a scientifically accepted fact than lose or jeopardize their social status." Sock-the-guy (talk) 22:39, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Also maybe 'desire for acceptance' or something similar instead of 'fear of rejection', not for any specific reason but I think it carries a more neutral tone? Sock-the-guy (talk) 22:43, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

It should reflect what the source says, as neutral point of view is not "no point of view": Cracking open the source, though there's no page cited in How minds change, here's a pertinent excerpt:

Humans aren’t just social animals; we are ultra-social animals. We are the kind of primate that survives by forming and maintaining groups. Much of our innate psychology is all about grouping up and then nurturing that group—working to curate cohesion. If the group survives, we survive. So a lot of our drives, our motivations, like shame, embarrassment, ostracism, and so on, have more to do with keeping the group strong than keeping any one member, including ourselves, healthy. In other words, we are willing to sacrifice ourselves and others for the group, if it comes to that.

"There are a lot of terms for this in modern psychology, political science, sociology, and so on—I prefer “tribal psychology,” but it’s also called “extreme partisanship,” “cultural cognition,” et cetera. Whatever the label, the latest evidence coming out of social science is clear: humans value being good members of their groups much more than they value being right, so much so that as long as the group satisfies those needs, we will choose to be wrong if it keeps us in good standing with our peers.

When I asked sociologist Brooke Harrington her thoughts on all this, she summed it up by saying, if there was an E=mc² of social science, it would be SD > PD, “social death is more frightening than physical death.”

So, while I think important claims like this could do with more rigorous sourcing than this, which is definitely anecdotal and narrative rather than wholly scientific itself—if this is the source we're writing from, "desire for acceptance" represents the text less well. More extreme versions of such tone problems can be considered editorializing, and even assigning undue weight to claims or WP:original research on Wikipedia. Remsense诉 22:58, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

You seem to know more than I do so I'm going to bow out of this discussion, I was just trying to point out something in the article that felt off to me. Sock-the-guy (talk) 23:03, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

I think you raised a good point! I was just giving my opinion, sorry if it came off a bit strong. Feel free to WP:BEBOLD and make your edit. Remsense诉 23:34, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

As this is an article of such a broad scope, I think it may be better to simply remove "current" stuff (such as the COVID and global warming controversies) and keep the article as timeless as possible. There are plenty of other articles with a more specific focus where those controversies can be explained. I would also remove the table with the opinions on global warming divided by political party: that's just a controversy specific to the US and it is irrelevant elsewhere. Cambalachero (talk) 14:00, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

I agree partly, perhaps with COVID, but I think climate change is likely WP:DUE. Remsense诉 14:08, 9 April 2024 (UTC)