[Pen-l] The Science Arrow of Time

[raghu <mraghu01@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Thu, May 28, 2009 at 2:23 PM, Jim Devine <jdevine03@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> By the way, science does not always advance. It sometimes gets stuck
> in cul-de-sacs or even goes backward (where "backward" is defined
> later, with the benefit of hindsight) or gets involved in building
> nukes and the like. Science can be corrupted, as in the pharmaceutical
> industry or financial engineering.


I'd like to challenge you on this one. There do exist scientific
disciplines that ALWAYS advance. Mathematics, for instance. Our body
of knowledge of mathematics today is strictly greater than it was
yesterday and so on.

Or to give a more prosaic example: Moore's Law. CPUs become faster and
smaller over time. At some point, this trend may plateau out. But
there is no going back. Once we have learnt how to make smaller and
faster chips, there is no reason ever to go back to old technologies.
The new chips are better in a very specific sense: they can do
everything the old chips can and more..

Indeed science is the only domain of human activity I can think of, of
which this is true. But it makes it a bit tricky to counter the
"eternal progress" narrative.
-raghu.


--
Jesus loves you ... everyone else thinks you're an idiot.
_______________________________________________
pen-l mailing list
pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l