Favorite teacher

Tags

history, lay teachers, math, nuns, postaday2012, science

Recall one of the best teachers you’ve had.

May 24, 2012

Favorite Teacher

Woodcut of Socrates

At my elementary school, Our Lady of Mount Carmel, we had a mix of nuns and lay teachers. The nuns were all old school, they were exceptional disciplinarians, I don’t remember learning much beyond praying, singing and obedience. The lay teachers were the ones who encouraged and taught me my history, science and math. One stands out and that is Ms.Muroe. She taught science and I remember that she was teaching us evolution and the way she explained it launched me into the library because she had piqued my intellectual curiosity and I wanted more; more knowledge. I actually minored in Anthropology later on at NYU because that spark that she lit had never died out.

How do we battle bad science?

Tags

postaday2011, science

I believe that there isn’t any such thing as bad science, only bad scientists. Science is about numbers, calculations, equations and theories. The foundation of good science is the absence of ego and an agenda. Science is objective therefore it cannot be bad only the person practicing science can be good or bad. A good scientist follows where the science leads, whereas a bad scientist leads the science where he or she want it to be, thereby manipulating it.

The only way that I can think of, to battle bad science is to continue to have all scientists do what they do best, continuously test and re-test all theories. That is another basis of science, a good theory will survive repeat testing under all conditions. Bad theories can’t withstand rigorous testing, a good scientist would be fine with that because that is the whole point of science, not really the results themselves, but how well the theory holds up to testing.

Eventually, good solid theories and experiments will always win out, it might just take longer than usual because of the distractions of those scientists attempting to influence the numbers and equations in their favor or to prove their theory.