Just Joshin' #105 (Science)
1 Family Photo:
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The Discovery is a science museum in Reno. We celebrated Lawrence's birthday with a visit.
The museum's biggest exhibit is a model of the Truckee River watershed and the water cycle, complete with "clouds" cut from stacks of pringles-shaped platforms towering 3-stories above the atrium. The clouds create an irregular jungle gym for "climbers of all ages".
Lawrence loved the clouds—undeterred by their height—dragging me up and down the tiny crawlspaces they created. Calvin loved the river exhibit—chasing plastic balls through the ebbs and flows of the river's curves. The science museum was a lot of fun.
I hope Calvin and Lawrence love science as they grow up.
I didn't love science as a kid—I liked math. I was good at math. I was good at taking a number, running it through the algorithm I was given, getting the number I was supposed to get on the other end. When you get the number your supposed to get on the other end, they say you're good at math.
Science wasn't like that. Science would start with some question: Does a metal ball fall faster than a paper ball? Does dropping a pendulum from different heights change how long it takes to swing back and forth? Does more ice make a drink colder? Does wrapping a thermometer in a blanket heat it up?
Yes?
We'd do some experiment and I'd find out I was wrong—I was almost always wrong—I thought that meant I was bad at science.
But science isn't about being right or wrong. Science is about guessing, then comparing those guesses with observations. I wasn't wrong, my guesses were wrong—and first guesses don't matter much in science. It matters that you keep guessing, that you refine your guesses as you increase your observations.
Everything we "know" is underpinned by sets of interconnected guesses. I had to appreciate that before I could love science.
A scientific mind is led by curiosity and wonder, fortified by resilience in the face of uncertainty, doubt, and incomplete guesses.
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I hope Calvin and Lawrence love science as they grow up. I want to teach them to think like scientists. But I can't love it for them. They'll have to do that on their own.
Like water, they each have to follow their own path.
1 Dad Joke:
Rivers
Why did the river go to school?
To increase his current knowledge and deepen his understanding!
*image by Dad[AI]Base
Highlights:
Science
I should have loved biology by James Somers
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In biology class, biology wasn’t presented as a quest for the secrets of life. The textbooks wrung out the questing. We were nowhere acquainted with real biologists, the real questions they had, the real experiments they did to answer them. We were just given their conclusions.
David Deutsch: Knowledge Creation and The Human Race, Part 2
Everything is a theory-laden guess.
I’m teaching this to my six-year-old because I want him to have a solid foundation, and he now understands intuitively that, “Yeah, everything is a guess.” So every time we get to something and he asks why, I say, “Let’s start making some guesses.”
The Scientific Virtues by Slime Mold Time Mold
This is wrong. Science education should begin with the scientific virtues.
Teaching someone painting techniques without teaching them composition will lead to lifeless paintings. Giving business advice to someone who lacks civic duty will lead to parasitic companies. Teaching generals strategy without teaching them honor gets you warlords. So teaching someone the methods of science without teaching them the virtues will lead to dull, pointless projects. Virtue is the key to happy, creative, important, meaningful research.
The scientific virtues are:
- Stupidity
- Arrogance
The Art of Doing Science and Engineering by Richard W. Hamming
In science, if you know what you are doing, you should not be doing it.
In engineering, if you do not know what you are doing, you should not be doing it.
iamJoshKnox Highlight:
Naming vs Knowing - Screenshot essay reflection on Richard Feynman and being a parent.
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Josh Knox
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