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RichardKennaway comments on Rationality Quotes: March 2011 - Less Wrong
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Bruce Gregory "Inventing Reality: Physics as Language" pp.186-187.
It might be more accurate to substitute "rules" for "procedures".
Unfortunately in Medicine at least, there seems to be a substantial degree of sloppiness in applying the rules, particularly in the use of metastudies.
I'm having trouble thinking of even a single decade in which all or even most scientists have agreed on what procedures should be followed in theory testing (let alone throughout the history of science). Can you?
That depends on the distance you view them from. Look at any two things closely enough, and you will see differences. Look at them from far enough away, and they will seem identical.
One major difference in evidential standards I can think of is the use of statistics. No-one collects statistics on how often an unsupported body will fall. I doubt the early chemists, at the stage when they didn't really know what substances they were working with, would have benefitted from statistical analyses of their results. Instead, they worked to find experiments that produced the same result every single time. In other areas, especially psychology, people gather statistics that are sometimes completely meaningless.
That's the only substantial variation I have thought of so far. What counterexamples are you thinking of?
Unfortunately that seems to be changing.
Do you have specific examples in mind?
The whole "science is settled" debacle in climate change? I'm not going to take a position on it, but it certainly seems to have become about that particular theory rather than the scientific method.
I don't see what you mean. Is there some specific evidence you have regarding the breakdown of scientific principles in the context of climatology?
I don't have any specific evidence--but even "scientific" debate on the topic, between scientists, tends to largely ignore the merits of the science and become a political affair a la Green Vs. Blue, centered entirely on whether or not the participants accept the prevailing theory.
I wasn't under the impression that climate science journals had degraded to that level - could you elaborate on what convinced you of this?
I've not read the science journals, and so cannot comment on them. I'm referring to informal debate (as in blogs and so forth) by climate scientists.
I don't think informal discussions are a good barometer for the health of a scientific field.
I'm not really referring to the health of the scientific field, per se. For all I know, there are plenty of brilliantly scintillating papers being published in climate journals, that would dazzle me with their astounding respect for methodology. Some anecdotal evidence leads me to believe that this is not, in fact, the case, but it is not of sufficient strength that I would make that claim. The area in which discussion of climate science seems devoid of actual science is in the realm where climate science is meant to inform governmental policy, which, of course, has obvious pressures for politicization of the science in either direction.
There is plenty of evidence.
Someone released a bunch of code, data and emails from the East Anglica CRU which showed that they had attempted to hide data from the british equivalent of a FOIA request, that their data processing code was of very questionable quality, that they had attempted to and were at least marginally successful at suborning the process of getting papers peer reviewed in several journals.
The whole issue is rather murky with both sides slinging a lot of mud, but it's clear that what most of us consider "good science" was not being done.
That's the email hacking case? I don't believe that constitutes good evidence of bad behavior on the part of the scientists involved - most of the allegations were invented by taking bits of the emails out of context.
Scientists in general do not agree on all the same theories, but that doesn't mean that some theories aren't so well supported that nearly all scientists accept them. Anthropogenic climate change is not as well supported as the atomic theory of chemistry, but it's sufficiently well evidenced that there's no reason why it should continue to be controversial among people acquainted with the data. It's in no way a failing of the scientific method if scientists are able to reach strong consensuses.
As another poster mentioned the Anthroprogenic Climate Change debate. There is still debate about it, and the more light that is shown into the data, data gathering and processing methods of the primary investigators the more questions there are. Other statisticians and researchers have had to use FOIA (and the British equivalent) to get "raw" data and other information from researchers. If you won't release your raw data, and you won't release methods for processing that data then you really can't agree on anything, now can you?
So-called Alternative and Complementary "Medicine" being taken seriously by journals and organisations who should know better. And this is when the good studies show very, very little real effect these frauds. Especially things like Acupuncture and (for things like pneumonia and cancer) chiropractic care (I will note that spinal adjustments can be very valuable for some spinal problems).
Meaning stuff like this: http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=9912 (note that one of the main complaints of the author of that post is not that Chinese Medicine calls stuff by different (and humorous) names, but rather how it classifies and recommends treatment. This is a MAJOR point).
I also know people who've worked inside NASA and other labs and I know how much worldview and localized politics have influenced what got funded, and what was done with the funding. Not enough of the story to recount with any accuracy, but enough to know that there was a hand on the scales as it were.
I have a Popperish view of science, and I'm perfectly willing to accept that humans have some influence on temperature, I'm willing to buy that chemicals compounded by nature have greater effectiveness (or equal effectiveness with few undesirable effects) than chemicals compounded in a laboratory, but science is never settled, and if you want to hide your work you really don't deserve benefit of the doubt.
Because the parent mostly comes off as a crank, I'll link to an intelligent person making similar arguments: Eric S. Raymond has a series of blog posts on the AGW controversy; the crunchiest posts in my opinion are here, here, here, and maybe here.
I would give this five votes up if I could.