The difference between science and non-science

[Senior] Since the term "science" was born, "non-science" and "pseudoscience" have been born just like their twin brothers. The struggle of the "three brothers" has never stopped. In the long river of history, too many changes have taken place-whether it is ideological understanding or production technology-which makes people wander between "science", "non-science" and "pseudoscience". Perhaps no one can tell the difference between these three lies, because many once irrefutable truths have later become superstitions despised by everyone (of course, there are also many whimsy that were originally thought, but now they have become scientific truths, and there are countless examples). Up to now, no one can thoroughly analyze their similarities and differences, and announce to the world that their conclusions are eternal truths, because truth and fallacy, like science and pseudoscience, are constantly developing and transforming each other.

According to the above inference, no one can clearly explain the similarities and differences between science, non-science and pseudoscience, so my article seems unnecessary. But I think if my article can arouse people's thinking and discussion and contribute a little to people's understanding of the nature of science, then this article is still meaningful, which is why I write.

Below, I will first introduce the meaning and characteristics of science, supplemented by some examples, so that everyone can have a more rational understanding of the term science, and then I will give some non-scientific examples to summarize the characteristics of non-science. For pseudoscience, so do we. At the end of the article, I will comprehensively discuss the similarities and differences among science, non-science and pseudoscience.

Firstly, the definition of science is introduced. Let's look at a passage first: "... if science is the witness of human climbing the peak of civilization, then scientists are the thorny explorers in the mysterious kingdom of science." Marx once compared the entrance of science to the entrance of hell, and put forward such requirements for scientists: all hesitation must be eradicated here; Any cowardice will not help here. Throughout the ages, generation after generation of scientists, with the courage of scientific exploration, perseverance and dedication, have searched for crystal-clear hatching stones on the beach of the sea of truth in Wang Yang, revealing the mystery of the whole universe to mankind ... "[1]. This sentence describes an important feature of science, that is, exploring nature and truth. No matter Newton's three laws, Einstein's theory of relativity or simple Coulomb's law, they are all the results of human exploration of nature, and these theories, which have been tested and precipitated by history-whether summarized through experimental observation or subjective reasoning-have not been overthrown so far. People regard the truth discovered by these noble people (at least for now) as "science". I think this is the most primitive definition of science. Of course, as you can see, it is not complete.

With the development of science, people have doubts about the original scientific definition. This suspicion is mainly because people find that many original "sciences" can be baptized and scrutinized in a short time, but they can't stand the test of a longer time. Newton's law, for example, was originally regarded as the originator of science, but Einstein brought the whole physics into a new darkness, which made Newton's "science" fall apart and become an outdated product that is very "incomplete, even junior high school students can see flaws" (in fact, this statement is biased, and Newtonian mechanics still has its value, especially for dealing with macro problems. )。 This kind of thing not only happens in the field of physics, but also has many similar events in various disciplines, which makes people have to redefine science.

Gradually, people pay less attention to scientific results, because it is impossible to judge whether a thing is scientific or not from the results. Today is considered to be correct, and with the passage of time, its mistakes and loopholes may be found. On the contrary, what is considered wrong today may be verified by experiments in the future. So what is the core of science? People began to turn to the uniqueness of the research process, and perhaps it is more appropriate to define science by studying the characteristics of natural processes.

What are the characteristics of the process of "studying nature"

One of the characteristics of science is "respecting logical reasoning", which can be said to be the fundamental difference between science and superstition. Throughout the science handed down now, there are strict logical reasoning, namely: (1) First, the basic hypothesis is set as an unprovable axiom. (2) All conclusions need strict mathematical deduction (because mathematics is the most emphasis on logic, and science often uses mathematical tools to arm itself to conform to strict logic as much as possible), and many conclusions are far from the basic assumptions. Let's take general relativity as an example. There are two basic assumptions: (1) generalized covariant principle, that is, a given physical law satisfies covariant relation in any inertial system and non-inertial system. (2) Equivalence principle, that is, gravity and inertia force are equivalent in local area. According to the first article, Einstein turned to strict mathematics-Lorentz transformation-and analyzed many physical processes in different reference frames, and got the conclusion that "scale shrinks and rises"; Based on the second basic assumption, the equation of the short-distance line of light motion is derived, and the conclusions such as "light bending" are deduced by synthesizing these conclusions. However, every step is strictly logical. If you read the book of General Relativity, you can see that there are almost no flaws here, which completely conforms to people's thinking (although some problems are difficult to understand).

Of course, strict logic is not enough. As will be mentioned later, there are many pseudosciences that are also good in logic, but why can't they be called science? This is because it does not have the second characteristic of science-respect for facts.

Any act of exploring the mysteries of nature is based on facts. Without the test of facts, even the most theoretical research cannot exist. Although limited by technical conditions, many advanced theories can't be verified and judged by existing experimental methods, they can only be regarded as "scientific conclusions" if they are tested by correct experimental phenomena (the "experiment" here is generalized, not necessarily using instruments, but observing natural phenomena, etc.). Einstein's general theory of relativity is difficult, but it is precisely because of three important phenomena: gravitational redshift, precession speed of mercury and deflection of light that this theory is deeply rooted in people's hearts and is considered as "one of the greatest scientific theories in the 20th century". Another example is quantum mechanics. For those who study physics and mathematics, the thinking mode of quantum mechanics is grotesque, and the Schrodinger equation compared with the classical Hamilton equation is also extremely subjective. However, using the theory of quantum mechanics, we can explain many once "weird" phenomena, such as superconductivity and atomic spectral line splitting, which are the results of successful experiments of quantum mechanics, so this theory has been widely spread in various fields and become a veritable "scientific conclusion". Countless scientific theories and discoveries in history are basically supported by objective phenomena. It is precisely because of this that many theories are pulled down from the altar of science with the standard of "seeing is believing" because they are "invisible" in essence. One more thing, this "fact" must be repeatable and can't "happen only once", otherwise you can't convince others of your theory.

In addition, science can predict unobserved phenomena. Quantum mechanics predicts the Josephson effect, and quantum optics predicts the formation of quantum beats, all of which are good evidence. I don't need to repeat this point.

The above three points are the modern definition of science, which is better than the original one. He will not judge whether it belongs to the "scientific category" because of the correctness of the conclusion itself, but will define it according to the characteristics of the research process. Of course, we must admit that this definition also has limitations, especially for the second feature of "respecting facts". As we all know, actually "not seeing" does not mean that the theory is unscientific. As mentioned earlier, not seeing now does not mean never seeing it, which is also the limitation of defining a science in this way. Everything is limited and it is impossible to "generalize". We don't need to delve into this limitation, because the side effects of limitation are insignificant compared with the benefits of this definition. We should believe that there may be a better definition of "science" in the future, which can better eliminate the side effects (but the side effects cannot be completely eliminated, which is the basic principle of dialectics).

Perhaps it is because of this definition that the twin brothers of "science" began to appear-that is, pseudoscience and non-science.

Let's discuss non-science first. According to logic, if the basic characteristics of a process do not conform to either of the two characteristics of science, then the process is unscientific. In order to let everyone have a perceptual understanding first, I will give two examples.

Let's look at a passage: "The existence of existence contains three meanings: first, there is existence in the universe, including existence recognized by human beings and existence not recognized by human beings; Second, the existence of specific time coordinates and spatial positions, such as Zhang San in the office; Third, what exists in a certain existence is the existence that belongs to existence. For example, there is a river in China called the Yangtze River. As far as human cognition is concerned, the two basic conditions for judging existence are process and self-presentation; At the same time, there must be a process for the existence of something, and it can present itself (the same is true for things), which shows that the two basic conditions for the existence of things are process and self-presentation. Therefore, existence is our general expression of the process of existence and self-expression. As far as the unity of the process of existence and self-expression is concerned, existence is undifferentiated existence, existence is "existence" and only "existence"; If there is no process and no self-presentation, there is no existence, or "nothing". The carrier of process and self-expression is existence, so everything can be called existence. The difference between different beings lies in the process and self-expression, such as people, the earth, the sun and so on. The stipulation of existence should be analyzed from the stipulation of process and the stipulation of self-presentation. " [2]

This is an important exposition of a famous "folk scientist" in his article on general relativity. His theory calls itself "five-dimensional space-time theory". He thinks Einstein's theory is wrong and his theory is correct. Looking at his works, we can easily see the following characteristics: (1) He discussed physical problems from a theoretical point of view, but he didn't have a fundamental assumption and logical deduction. He just said a lot of philosophical terms and ideas out of context. (2) His exposition is completely philosophical and has nothing to do with any physical way of thinking. (3) His theory is only a hypothesis, without any experimental verification.

From the above two points, we can sum up some characteristics of non-science: non-science generally does not have its own assumptions and logical reasoning, and it is often confused with the knowledge of many different disciplines, and then some conclusions that do not conform to strict logic are drawn to confuse the audience. In particular, non-scientific people generally don't respect facts, that is to say, the basics of non-science are purely subjective guesses, and people who engage in non-science don't want to turn to the test of facts. This kind of speculation is different from philosophical speculation. Philosophical speculation is born by summing up the objective world, while unscientific speculation is just an activity of stealing philosophical thinking results.

Of course, there is another important feature of non-science, which may not be reflected in the quotation, that is, non-science can not predict phenomena in general. Non-scientific people always try to explain the world with some theories that they think are novel, but the result can only stay in explaining phenomena and can't predict anything new. For example, the book On Existence and Time talks about how to explain the original phenomenon, but says nothing about the predictability of this theory. Science should be able to predict natural phenomena. If it does not have this function, then this science may not be called a real science, at least it is not a complete science.

It says non-science, so what is pseudoscience? As the name implies, "false" is false, but this "false" is not a general "false", but a kind of "false", that is, the theoretical or experimental results are packaged by some means to make them conform to the three characteristics of science and make people believe. For example, the "water to oil" experiment, which once swept the country, is a typical representative of pseudoscience. The essence of pseudoscience is unscientific, but what is worse is that it has to disguise itself.

For pseudoscience, we need to be especially vigilant, because its fundamental purpose is deception, which is different from non-science. People who engage in non-science may be described as ignorant, but we can tolerate and educate them with the view of "those who don't know don't blame" and let them embark on the road of science; But for those who engage in pseudoscience, we have to pay in hell, because their motives are clear, that is, to use some means to achieve their ulterior motives, or the pursuit of money, or the desire for fame and fortune, and so on. For non-scientific theories, we can easily see through them, but for pseudoscience, it is precisely because of its gorgeous packaging that it is more difficult for us to understand and crack. What's more, we will be deceived by non-science for life.

Of course, we should also consider science in an all-round way, that is, we can't take everything we oppose as true, it's all pseudoscience. For example, there are many so-called "fake guards" now. Although their behavior has certain benefits, it also stifles many genius ideas. We should oppose pseudoscience with a scientific attitude, not selfish.