Science is Subjective
I said it. Subjective.
I’ll tell you why. Let’s first examine the scientific method, as it is called. Here’s a chart I duplicated from Wikipedia:
Who performs each one of these steps? Did they adhere to the doctrine? Who delivered the report of their findings to me? Did that person present the information accurately? I’ll get to these questions, but notice the human element.
Let’s also make sure we have our terms down. Oxford Dictionary offers these definitions of interest:
Subjective-— Based on or influenced by personal feelings, tastes, or opinions.
Objective — Not influenced by personal feelings or opinions in considering and representing facts.
Okay, we have the lay of the land, and even if you don’t agree with the opening assertion yet, we can hopefully agree on the meanings of the words being used in the assertion.
Now let’s dig deeper into the scientific method. The scientist starts out with a question they want to answer. Is it even the right question? Doesn’t matter. They are a human, and they want this question answered. It’s a human feeling they are experiencing. That of curiosity, or hunger for more information. Maybe even desire for validation, in some cases. They may jump through hoops to sanitize their own emotion in pursuit of pure objectivity, but they cannot completely remove their own feelings about the goals they want to accomplish.
The next piece is research. A human being with feelings, biases, and emotions begins to gather information, much of which may be drawn from other human beings with feelings, biases, and emotions. Some of their research may be quite original, but even that research is still based on their own personal reasoning. From these previous two steps, they develop a hypothesis. By it’s very nature, a hypothesis is subjective. A claim is being made. And everyone agrees that a hypothesis untested has little worth. Which brings us to testing.
This is where it gets really interesting. Consider for a moment the double-blind test. Or even the triple-blind test. Why multiple layers? Because humans who have personal emotions, feelings, biases and preconceived notions can taint the test, right? But how many layers (or in some methodologies, how high-quality of blinding) does it take to achieve objectivity? The answer of course is that it cannot be done. You might potentially be able to reduce subjectivity, but you cannot remove it. You may be able to even out the subjectivity, spreading it between multiple humans, but it is still there. It is impossible to remove. In fact, this doesn’t just apply to science, it applies to all disciplines. Everything is subjective.
The next piece is the power of the observer. Consider the delayed choice quantum eraser experiment. If you’re not familiar, the summary is that nature behaves drastically differently when being observed by a human. Funny how quantum physics and particularly quantum superposition messes with everything we were taught about science being black and white, and yet we are often still being told that scientific research presents only binary outcomes.
At this point you may think I’m crazy, because it may sound like I am proposing there is no true reality. No way to say, “This is how the universe operates.” This would be true. I am a bit crazy. And there is no true reality. There is no one way in which the universe operates. Perhaps you would counter with this reasonable argument: “I know that a human who fell to the ground from 30,000 foot in the air without a parachute would die. That is something I know, about how the universe works.” But you would only pose such an argument if you had never heard of Vesna Vulović, who survived that very thing in 1972.
As someone who works in the technology field, I apply the scientific method to my work with regularity. You might ask why, since I seem to be criticizing it. That’s the thing, I’m not criticizing it. I’m simply saying it’s subjective, and not objective, as we have been conditioned to believe.
The next step in the scientific method is to analyze data. How many times have you heard the phrase, “Studies suggest that…” This is because many studies are dealing with percentages. The FDA may give approval for a drug based on a low percentage of study participants experiencing adverse reactions. This only further proves the subjective nature of science. If you are the patient who actually had the adverse symptom, you probably aren’t going to be celebrating the approval of the drug, because you’re feeling pretty lousy.
But the most damning part of this process of all perhaps, is the reporting of conclusions. In a best case scenario, the consumer of the information will receive the data first hand. In this case, the consumer will decide if they trust the work of the scientist. How will they measure this? Perhaps the consumer is also a scientist, and has come to trust the source scientist. But how does the consumer know if the source didn’t just have a bad day? What if they just aren’t living up to their normal standard of excellence? If the consumer is not a scientist with expertise in the subject matter, how can they trust the source without knowledge of the subject matter? By evaluating the scientist’s education credentials perhaps? Maybe they might be convinced if the source was educated at Harvard. But Harvard is an establishment that once supported eugenics as a scientifically sound idea, which of course is not a scientifically nor ethically sound idea. And every major university has its dirty laundry and cognitive dissonances both in the past and in the present. Perhaps the consumer uses some other data point to evaluate the legitimacy of the source. And yet, it remains impossible for the consumer of the data to verify the outcome of someone else’s study without being the one who performed the study. Quite often though, the information will be received through corporate news pipelines. Don’t get me started. No matter how much they claim not to be biased, it is pretty much impossible for a billion-dollar capitalist entity to not present information with bias, if for no other reason than that their business model thrives off alarmism. Who decides if this corporate information pipeline is telling the truth? The consumer, who often knows nothing about science and is thousands of miles away from the source of a scientific study. They often have a love/hate relationship with information pipelines, but most often settle on one to trust that fits their worldview. Lastly, what of the person who performed the study themselves? Can they trust their own results, since they performed the study? That’s up to them. Science is subjective, remember?
The reason the chart showing the scientific method goes in circles, is because the scientific method is not about proving something is true, it’s about posing a plausible theory based on the information currently available.
In the medical field, the scientific method has existed in parallel with some very absurd practices, like bloodletting, X-raying unborn babies, and eugenics. What dogmas are we accepting from the scientific community today that future generations may laugh at or shake their head at in disbelief?
What worth does science have? Whatever worth you want it to have. I find it useful to me for solving some — not all — problems. But remember that most so-called science being presented to you by external entities, is not your science. You may decide to trust the source, and there is nothing wrong with that. But to make the statement that the source is definitely right “because science doesn’t lie”, is where I disagree. Humans lie — whether intentionally or not — and science is practiced by humans, which is why science is subjective. Not worthless. Just subjective. There is not one conclusion, one law, one binary outcome that is forever and universally definitive. There is just…….you.
