re science and methodology was homeopathy tradition in article c l ws jn unx sas com sasghm theseus unx sas com gary merrill writes in article apr cs rochester edu fulk cs rochester edu mark fulk writes flights of fancy and other irrational approaches are common the crucial thing is not to sit around just having fantasies they aren t of any use unless they make you do some experiments simple example warren jelinek noticed an extremely heavy band on a dna electrophoresis gel of human alu fragments he got very excited but why do you characterize this as a flight of fancy or a fantasy while i am unfamiliar with the scientific context here it appears obvious that his speculation for lack of a better or more neutral word was at least in significant part a consequence of his knowledge of and acceptance of current theory coupled with his observations it would appear that something quite rational was going on as he attempted to fit his observation into that theory or to tailor the theory to cover the observation whether a scientific idea comes while one is staring out the window or dreaming or having a fantasy or watching an apple fall newton or sitting in a bath archimedes it is ultimately the result of a lot of intense scientific thinking done beforehand letting one s mind roam freely and giving rein to one s intuition can be a useful way of coming up with new ideas but only when one has done a lot of rational analysis of the problem first scientific intuition is not something one is born with it is something that one learns maybe we don t understand completely how it is learned but training in systematic scientific thinking is certainly one of the key elements in developing it informal exploration is also often an important element in finding new scientific ideas one thinks for instance of darwin s naturalistic studies in the galapagos islands which led him to the ideas for the theory of evolution this is why i am offended by a definition of science that emphasizes empirical verification and does not recognize thinking and informal exploration as important scientific work i agree that mere speculation does not deserve to be called science i also think that mere empirical studies not directed by good scientific thinking are at best a very poor kind of science in article qk linnl im u cs utexas edu turpin cs utexas edu russell turpin writes i think that lee lady and i are talking at cross purposes lady seems concerned with the contrast between great science that makes big advances in our knowledge and mediocre science that makes smaller steps in most of this thread i have been concerned with the difference between what is science and what is not i don t think that science should be defined in a way that some of the activities that lead to really important science namely thinking and informal exploration are not recognized as scientific work in the arguments between behaviorists and cognitivists psychology seems less like a science than a collection of competing religious sects lady uhunix uhcc hawaii edu lady uhunix bitnet
