DOES THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD EXIST?

Is there a scientific method?  This is the question that James Blachowicz asks in their New York Times article.

In these pages, we have been questioning the scientific method.  For background, see SCIENTIFIC METHOD and THE TOOL WE CALL DRAWING.

Blachowicz proceeds to differentiate between the definition of a word and the experience of the word.  They compare the literal meaning with what is the actual observable reality.  Think of the difference between the definition of “green” and the observable reality of something that is green.

They then extends the analogy between the actual meaning of a word and actual scientific observations.  Another way to say this is, the definition of a word is analogus to a scientific prediction.

So whether we are operating in the world of language or the world of science, Blachowicz offers that the process is the same.

There is no difference in:
-literary definition / observation and
-scientific prediction / observation.
These are the same process.  They involve the same cultural mechanisms.

And we can expand the analogy to drawing.  A drawing is the same as a definition and a prediction.  The real world observation is what matters.

So with these similiarities, Blachowicz asks:

“If scientific method is only one form of a general method employed in all human inquiry, how is it that the results of science are more reliable than what is provided by these other forms?”

How indeed.   All of these constructs, be they drawing, language, or science, are simply means of human inquiry.

With these similarities, then the question becomes, how did science gain the upper hand in our society?  The answer is that science has quantifiable, repeatable results.  Science has a very appealing “quantified precision.”

Yet Blachowicz states that just because science has quantified precision does not mean that it is a superior method of thinking.

That hits it on the head.  The scientific method is not a superior method of thinking.  We’re all running around confident that simply because it is quantifiable, then it is better.  And that simply is not the case.

A drawing, a poem, is quite possibly superior to any scientific prediction.