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Physicist's Guide to Skepticism
The laws of physics provide clear-cut principles defining what is possible - and not possible - in the physical world. This book examines and critiques many widely held pseudoscientific beliefs in light of these laws. Rather than treating supernatural claims on a case-by-case basis, Milton Rothman uses the general principles supplied by physics to show why they are, in fact, impossible.
Rothman divides the laws of physics into two classes: laws of permission and laws of denial. Laws of permission, such as Newton's laws of motion, generally do not allow precise predictions except in the simplest cases. Laws of denial, such as conservation of energy, permit very accurate conclusions about what cannot possibly occur.
He uses these concepts to examine and critique the possible existence of various paranormal phenomena, such as UFOs, telepathy, perpetual motion machines, poltergeists, etc. He also discusses a number of concepts traditional to science fiction: anti-gravity, faster-than-light travel, time travel, etc., which are shown to be impossible when subject to rigorous examination.
Written in a technically accurate yet entertaining style, this book will appeal to the non-specialist yet still present concepts of interest to both professional scientists and philosophers of science.
Rothman divides the laws of physics into two classes: laws of permission and laws of denial. Laws of permission, such as Newton's laws of motion, generally do not allow precise predictions except in the simplest cases. Laws of denial, such as conservation of energy, permit very accurate conclusions about what cannot possibly occur.
He uses these concepts to examine and critique the possible existence of various paranormal phenomena, such as UFOs, telepathy, perpetual motion machines, poltergeists, etc. He also discusses a number of concepts traditional to science fiction: anti-gravity, faster-than-light travel, time travel, etc., which are shown to be impossible when subject to rigorous examination.
Written in a technically accurate yet entertaining style, this book will appeal to the non-specialist yet still present concepts of interest to both professional scientists and philosophers of science.
- GenresSkepticismSciencePhysics
247 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 1988
60 people want to read
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October 4, 2021
This is a fairly old but still-great book explaining a little-appreciated power of science. Not only does science describe the things we can see, or put into museums, but science tells us that a broad class of phenomena are impossible. That is, there are some things that simply do not happen. This makes science more than just an exercise in logical induction.
Induction (i.e. empiricism) is a style of thinking whereby you may rule something out because you fail to observe it with many tries. For example, imagine you have a loaded coin that keeps coming up heads when you flip it. After you flip it a million times and get heads every time, you might conclude by induction that the next flip will again come up heads. But as David Hume pointed out in the 1700s, induction cannot by itself establish truth, but only what is very likely to be true. The next observation might produce a so-called black swan, something you never observed before and did not expect, i.e. a surprise.
In this book, Rothman goes beyond mere induction (which is pretty good in itself, for example all of evidence-based medicine rests on it). He shows how we have scientific theories that make impossibility predictions. These theories have been subjected to every practical test, and indeed for a theory to be tested it must make an impossibility claim. To falsify a theory we must construct a test that produces some outcome the theory rules out. One might argue that because we cannot test a theory an infinite number of times in an infinite number of ways, we are still relying on induction. No matter how many tests the theory passes, it might still be wrong. (And if the theory consistently fails some new test, it's back to the drawing board for a better theory, and we may be having another scientific revolution.) But if the theory passes zillions of tests and every variety of test we can construct, then at least then we would have a very strong probability claim. A theory that has been tested many times in many different ways and worked every time would seem to have a very low probability of being wrong. That is, the probability of another scientific revolution declines as a theory gets more and more established by further tests and being used by further new inventions and industries. But that leads to a different topic (Bayesian epistemology) that Rothman doesn't address.
Since reading this book I've realized that science proves a lot of things about our world, such as the fact that paranormal/supernatural phenomena like ESP, telekinesis, intercessory prayer, and so on, simply have no effect. For example, all of empirical science is based on controlled studies or controlled observations. A little thought will show that if paranormal phenomena are real, no study could be controlled. How could a scientist stop anyone in the world from messing up an experiment with ESP, telekinesis, or prayer? Since millions of experiments have been done, and billions of products have been manufactured with science (such as the computing device you are using to read my review), we can be confident either that paranormal phenomena either do not exist, or they manifest so rarely as to have left the vast world of science completely unbothered.
Intercessory prayer is equally ineffective. Medical researchers perform tens of thousands of controlled studies on new drugs, vaccines, and treatments every year. None of these studies have ever needed to control for prayer - it simply doesn't matter who might be praying for any person serving as a subject in any experiment. In contrast, statistical tools revealed a placebo effect, and scientists have to control for that. Therefore if prayer has any effect, it is far weaker than a placebo. Placebos themselves are not cures - for a treatment to qualify as effective, it must be significantly more effective than a placebo. That's what a controlled study is designed to demonstrate.
Many people seem to have the idea that science is great for the lab, the museum, the factory, or the hospital, but there is also this other mystical world of paranormal/supernatural stuff coexisting with it. Sorry, science takes it all. And if you like using a smartphone to look at Goodreads, you should be thankful that every supernatural claim is bunk. Because if supernatural stuff were true, there could be no controlled studies, and therefore no empirical science.
Induction (i.e. empiricism) is a style of thinking whereby you may rule something out because you fail to observe it with many tries. For example, imagine you have a loaded coin that keeps coming up heads when you flip it. After you flip it a million times and get heads every time, you might conclude by induction that the next flip will again come up heads. But as David Hume pointed out in the 1700s, induction cannot by itself establish truth, but only what is very likely to be true. The next observation might produce a so-called black swan, something you never observed before and did not expect, i.e. a surprise.
In this book, Rothman goes beyond mere induction (which is pretty good in itself, for example all of evidence-based medicine rests on it). He shows how we have scientific theories that make impossibility predictions. These theories have been subjected to every practical test, and indeed for a theory to be tested it must make an impossibility claim. To falsify a theory we must construct a test that produces some outcome the theory rules out. One might argue that because we cannot test a theory an infinite number of times in an infinite number of ways, we are still relying on induction. No matter how many tests the theory passes, it might still be wrong. (And if the theory consistently fails some new test, it's back to the drawing board for a better theory, and we may be having another scientific revolution.) But if the theory passes zillions of tests and every variety of test we can construct, then at least then we would have a very strong probability claim. A theory that has been tested many times in many different ways and worked every time would seem to have a very low probability of being wrong. That is, the probability of another scientific revolution declines as a theory gets more and more established by further tests and being used by further new inventions and industries. But that leads to a different topic (Bayesian epistemology) that Rothman doesn't address.
Since reading this book I've realized that science proves a lot of things about our world, such as the fact that paranormal/supernatural phenomena like ESP, telekinesis, intercessory prayer, and so on, simply have no effect. For example, all of empirical science is based on controlled studies or controlled observations. A little thought will show that if paranormal phenomena are real, no study could be controlled. How could a scientist stop anyone in the world from messing up an experiment with ESP, telekinesis, or prayer? Since millions of experiments have been done, and billions of products have been manufactured with science (such as the computing device you are using to read my review), we can be confident either that paranormal phenomena either do not exist, or they manifest so rarely as to have left the vast world of science completely unbothered.
Intercessory prayer is equally ineffective. Medical researchers perform tens of thousands of controlled studies on new drugs, vaccines, and treatments every year. None of these studies have ever needed to control for prayer - it simply doesn't matter who might be praying for any person serving as a subject in any experiment. In contrast, statistical tools revealed a placebo effect, and scientists have to control for that. Therefore if prayer has any effect, it is far weaker than a placebo. Placebos themselves are not cures - for a treatment to qualify as effective, it must be significantly more effective than a placebo. That's what a controlled study is designed to demonstrate.
Many people seem to have the idea that science is great for the lab, the museum, the factory, or the hospital, but there is also this other mystical world of paranormal/supernatural stuff coexisting with it. Sorry, science takes it all. And if you like using a smartphone to look at Goodreads, you should be thankful that every supernatural claim is bunk. Because if supernatural stuff were true, there could be no controlled studies, and therefore no empirical science.
Displaying 1 of 1 review