| Message | Hi George,
This is just a quick note to thank you for the shout-out to my book (Being Wrong) in your blog post on scientific error - and to thank you, as well, for your thoughtful commentary on Jonah Lehrer's recent New Yorker article. I read that piece with a distinct if muted discomfort, and you did a nice job of articulating some of the reasons for that feeling.
I actually think the question of whether it's possible to refine the scientific method (such as it is) is an interesting and legitimate one - but first you have to understand what that method is and isn't, and his piece didn't seem to me to reflect such an understanding. Nor, as you point out, did it distinguish between the physical and social sciences. Off the top of my head, I can think of a half-dozen reasons why social science might be susceptible to "losing its truth" - some intriguing and some damning, but none of them damning *of the scientific method.* Weirdly, the piece itself felt insufficiently scientific to me (a good scientist would have understood what hypothesis this evidence really tests), and indeed teetered uncomfortably close to the kind of anti-science skepticism that pervades today's culture - not Lehrer's goal, I'm sure, but still.
Anyway, my $0.02. I appreciated yours. And I appreciated the perfectionist comment as well. Try being a perfectionist while writing a book about being wrong: trust me, the mind boggles.
Happy holidays, and all the best --
Kathryn Schulz |