The Truth about Science...

This started as a simple response to a friends blog, however the response elaborated into my own post.
Objectivity is a tenant of science like legs are the foundations of a table. However, any firm believers in such objectivity may be sadly dismayed to find that objectivity better resembles the tablecloth rather than the foundation. Jack Webb's character on Dragnet was infamous for saying just the facts ma'am. (On a brief side note, this phrase is incorrect. The actual phrase was All we know are the facts ma'am). You may have also heard the popular phrase "the facts speak for themself".

Research is conducted to find the facts of a situation. However, those facts are sought to prove or disprove a hypothesis. When we make an argument for a case, our arguments contain a premise and conclusion. So what if a underlying premise is difficult to deduce? For instance, the statement "We are causing global warming" contains a underlying premise: the rate of increase in global warming is increasing, the increase is unhealthy, and we are the cause.

I still believe it is important to do extensive research in your suppositions and science is the best model we have of pursuing knowledge- but it is simply a tool that's at the mercy of its wielder. Scientist are still attempting to prove their own hypothesis. (not saying that in itself is not a bad thing; as human factors expert Jeff Atwood points out in his blog, research without a purpose is pointless). Therefore, unless you read the raw data, your simply getting a experts point of view. While good scientist recognize that they have an innate bias and factor that into their tests, this added value is lost on the reader if they lack a understanding of the data and statistics used to analyze the data. Since the average person is often unaware of complex arithmetic equations used in research, they are forced to trust the deductions of the experts. But, the experts don't always know what they are talking about (read the book "the experts speak" if you doubt this).

So to summarize, we should be aware that often we are getting someone's interpretation of the facts. These interpretations themselves carry their own baggage. This is unavoidable, since everything we do is colored with emotional overtones. Basically we can't strip the impact that emotions play in our decisions, choices, and beliefs. However, that's a topic for a different time...