BSC 106 Man and His Environment

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BSC 106 Man and His Environment

• Spring 2009
• Joseph E. Harvey

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Course Outline

• The Philosophy of Science
• Basic Ecology
• The Theory of Evolution
• Human Evolution
• Cultural and Social Evolution
• Sociobiology
• Food Production and human hunger
• Human Impacts
• Atmosphere
• Water Resources
• Terrestrial Systems
• Biological Resources

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My Educational Philosophy
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Memorization and Critical thinking

• One cannot create something from nothing we must
  have blocks to build with.
• Have conversations in your mind to have something
  worth saying
• Challenge your own ideas
• Why do I believe this?
• How do I know this?
• Am I certain?
• Is there any chance I may be wrong?
• Do I know it well enough to explain it?

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Modern schooling versus classical schooling

• When will I ever use this information? The
  fools refrain
• Example The Greek flute player
• The essence of an educated person one who
  cultivates knowledge not directly necessary for
  survival.
• Modern trade schools how to make the perfect
  servant

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The Seven Liberal Arts

• The Quadrivium

• The Trivium

• Artithmetic
• The Study of number
• Geometry
• Number in space
• Music
• Number in time
• Astronomy
• Number in space and time

• Grammer
• The study of words
• Rhetoric
• Using language effectively
• Logic the bridge
• The study of good reasoning

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How to do Well

• Gaping electric jaws
• Writing makes the exact man
• To be interesting, be interested
• Hope is not a strategy
• Practice taking a test to study for taking a test
• In short, by yourself some notecards

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Philosophy
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The Branches of Philosophy

• Metaphysics
• The nature of being and the world Cosmology and
  Ontology
• Epistemology
• The nature and scope of knowledge
• Ethics
• The moral philosophy. The study of how persons
  should act or if such questions are answerable
• Politics
• The study of government and the relationship of
  individuals and communities to the state
• Aesthetics
• The study of beauty, art, enjoyment,
  sensory-emotional values, etch.
• Logic
• The study of patterns of thinking that lead from
  true premises to true conclusions.

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Epistemology

• In classical thought, two spheres intersect to
  describe what we know
• The sphere of Truth
• The sphere of Belief
• Knowledge lies in between
• How do we acquire knowledge?
• How do we know what we know?

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Internalism and Externalism

• Rene Descartes (1596 1650), an internalist
• Senses are the only means for learning of the
  outside world
• Senses are fallible and limited in scope
• Ergo, knowledge acquired through senses is
  fallible
• To arrive at infallible knowledge, we must
  question all involving the senses
• This leaves us with only one infallible truth,
  Cogito ergo sum.

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The Goal Axiom

• Axiom
• a proposition that is not susceptible of proof or
  disproof its truth is assumed to be self-evident
• Descartess Method
• To arrive at axial truth, he employs a method
  called hyperbolical/metaphysical doubt, sometimes
  also referred to as methodological skepticism he
  rejects any ideas that can be doubted, and then
  reestablishes them in order to acquire a firm
  foundation for genuine knowledge

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Empiricisma form of externalism

• The branch of the philosophy of knowledge which
  deals with knowledge gained through experience.
  Essentially, that gained through
  experimentation.
• Indicates that man begins as a, tabula rasa,
  learning everything from experience. Denies the
  validity of innate ideas.
• Plato argued against the tabula rasa with the
  idea of anamnesis.
• Empiricists of note Aristotle, Locke, Hume

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Rationalisma form of internalism

• Any view appealing to reason as a source of
  knowledge or justification. Lacy, A.R. 1996
• A system where the criterion of truth is not
  sensory, but rather intellectual and deductive.
• The introduction of mathematical methods to
  natural philosophy a byproduct of the
  Renaissance.
• Rationalists of note Socrates, Descartes,
  Leibnitz, Kant

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A Mutually Exclusive Dichotomy?

• The balance of both views
• Imagination and the spark

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The Scientific Method
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What distinguishes Scientific Philosophy?

• Scientific Empiricism attitude that beliefs are
  to be accepted and acted upon only if they first
  have been confirmed by actual experience we
  should only trust what we experience personally
• defines the limits of scientific knowledge (i.e.
  our ability to perceive physical phenomena)
• subject to change with changes in technology

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• Philosophy has always investigated qualities.
  Science distinguishes itself by investigates
  quantities as well.
• This philosophy became most formally established
  in the 16th and 17th centuries through the
  writings of Francis Bacon and others

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The Scientific Method

• Observation
• From surrounding generates a testable hypothesis
• Hypothesis
• Possible explanations of the phenomena in
  question
• Must be testable
• Must generate predications
• Testing
• Analysis
• evaluation of the information acquired from the
  experiment in terms of the hypothesis
• Synthesis
• results of the experiment are compared with
  existing scientific knowledge on the subject
• implications of the results are explained
• Publication
• Analysis and synthesis are subjected to review by
  knowledgeable scientists
• if acceptable, are published in a scientific
  journal

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Testing and Experimentation

• Experiment A controlled manipulation of a
  physical phenomenon
• They are designed to test predictions of a
  specific hypothesis
• Not all experiments are of equal value
• Objectivity of tests
• Number of samples used (more is better)

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Testing is about Control

• Experimental Groups

• Variables

• Experimental Group
• Treatment or condition being studied
• Control Group
• No treatment

• Independent Variable
• Manipulated by researcher treatment or condition
  under investigation
• Dependent Variable
• Response that is measures
• Controlled Variables
• All other factors kept the same for all groups in
  the study

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Hypotheses, Theories, and Laws

• Hypothesis A limited statement regarding cause
  and effect in specific situations.
• It refers to our state of knowledge before
  experimental work has been performed and even
  before new phenomena have been predicted
• Theory or Law It represents an hypothesis (or a
  group of related hypotheses), which has been
  confirmed through repeated experimental tests.

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Laws A model of the Universe

• Accepted theories and laws become part of our
  understanding of the universe and become the
  basis for investigating less well known areas of
  knowledge
• New discoveries are first assumed to fit into the
  existing theoretical framework.
• Laws are questioned only after repeated
  experimental tests of a new phenomenon cannot be
  accommodated.
• Reevaluations of accepted laws have
  revolutionized the world
• Example Relativity, the understanding of the
  origin of all energy.

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Problems with Science
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Scientific Fallacy Bacons Idols of the Mind

• Idols of the Tribe This is humans' tendency to
  perceive more order and regularity in systems
  than truly exists, and is due to people following
  their preconceived ideas about things.
• Idols of the Cave This is due to individuals'
  personal weaknesses in reasoning due to
  particular personalities, likes and dislikes.
• Idols of the Marketplace This is due to
  confusions in the use of language and taking some
  words in science to have a different meaning than
  their common usage.
• Idols of the Theatre This is due to using
  philosophical systems which have incorporated
  mistaken methods. Here Bacon is referring to the
  influence of major philosophers (Aristotle) and
  major religions on science.

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Science doesnt answer all questions

• The Domain of Religion

• The Domain of Science

• Who?
• Why?

• When?
• How?

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• Example Ascertaining the meaning of a play.
• Example The man who mistook his wife for a hat.

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Are we all Scientists?

• Science deals with quantities and measurable
  phenomena. Ergo, it cannot prove the absence of
  something.
• Logic is only as reliable as the knowledge of its
  foundation
• Example The sun moving around the earth.
• Science is often changing its perspectives due to
  new discoveries.
• Example Quantum physics. Light it behaves as a
  wave and particle. It move the same speed
  despite direction of measurement.
• The definition of a scientist a man who knew
  nothing until there was nothing left to know.
• The half life of bad ideas
• Man is a rational animal secondarily to his
  emotional side

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Finis