The techniques of the scientific method are universally valid; they're not contingent on a specific culture. If civilization was wiped today and we had to start from scratch, we would discover the same methods to ascertain natural laws and apply them to our purposes.
When we find an alien culture, I expect they will follow the same rules to find out what works and what is real (if they're advanced enough to use science).
The techniques of the scientific method are universally valid; they're not contingent on a specific culture. If civilization was wiped today and we had to start from scratch, we would discover the same methods to ascertain natural laws and apply them to our purposes.
Different scientific communities have different methods. The scientific method as practiced by physicists isn't the same method we use in computer systems research and it isn't the same method they use in medical research. And this isn't because these different fields have different deviatio...
I'm afraid I haven't properly designed the Muggles Studies course I introduced at my local Harry Potter fan club. Last Sunday we finally had our second class (after wasted months of insistence and delays), and I introduced some very basic descriptions of common biases, while of course emphasizing the need to detect them in ourselves before trying to detect them in other people. At some point, which I didn't completely notice, the discussion changed from an explanation of the attribution bias into a series of multicultural examples in favor of moral relativity. I honestly don't know how that happened, but as more and more attendants voiced their comments, I started to fear someone would irreversibly damage the lessons I was trying to teach. They basically stopped short of calling the scientific method a cultural construct, at which point I'm sure I would have snapped. I don't know what to make of this. Some part of me tries to encourage me and make me put more effort into showing these people the need for more reductionism in their worldview, but another part of me just wants to give them up as hopeless postmodernists. What should I do?