this post was submitted on 20 Jun 2024
546 points (82.8% liked)

Science Memes

11081 readers
2608 users here now

Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.

Rules

  1. Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
  2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
  3. No spam.
  4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.

This is a science community. We use the Dawkins definition of meme.

Research Committee

Other Mander Communities

Science and Research

Biology and Life Sciences

Physical Sciences

Humanities and Social Sciences

Practical and Applied Sciences

Memes

Miscellaneous

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
546
Science is more like a conversation. (mander.xyz)
submitted 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
105 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 124 points 5 months ago (3 children)

Scientific method is the best tool we have to achieve "pure objectivity and truth", but it's not perfect. The primary point of failure being application of it by extremely subjective creatures.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 5 months ago (3 children)

I know right? It baffles me how transphobes use "science" to be transphobic, like Sir/Ma'am, where in the chromosomes is it written "woman" or "man" or any of the stereotypes attached to those words. We made that shit up, we looked at what was there and then added meaning to it that wasn't there. We interpreted the data according to our current age's biases. Sure those wiggly things usually determine the parts you're born with, but where in those parts is it written that women are soft and belong in the kitchen?

If you were to do some unethical science you can even add/block hormones that go into the fetus during its development for it to develop bits that it wouldn't normally. Hell, you can do that well after birth and new features will develop because human bodies are rather "customisable"

sorry rant over, I don't often get to talk about this from this perspective because getting into the intricacies of subjectivity of science in regards to how human beings and our languages are flawed is a bit too advanced for the average bigot

[–] [email protected] 12 points 5 months ago

Or if you want a shorter version, "circle the part of the chromosome where it says men hold the door open for women". There are obviously differences between what's written in genes and the billion little social rules surrounding gender. It makes sense to have different terms to differentiate biology from social rules, and "sex" and "gender" can do that just fine.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago (2 children)

A person's sex is science, but their gender is a social construct. I sometimes wonder if trans people would even be a thing if there were no socially defined gender roles (or assumed gendered language) and people could just be who they are. I suspect there would not be as there wouldn't be anything to be "trans" from.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 5 months ago (1 children)

A person's sex is science, but their gender is a social construct.

Even sex is not the black and white dichotomy most people make it out to be. The way we define and dictate someone's sex isn't reproducible for everyone. The intersex population is larger than what most people assume, and can vary in ways that defy the way we normally evaluate sex. It can range from someone having different chromosomal pairings, to having a varied arrangement of secondary sexual organs.

Anyone saying that someone's sex is scientifically dependent on "x" is either ignorant, or academically dishonest.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

arguably science itself has been constructed in a social context ie a social construct

[–] [email protected] 7 points 5 months ago (1 children)

It is definitely limited by the cultural understanding of linguistical norms. Because the language we utilize in the methodology predates it, the language itself can limit most people's conceptual understanding of whatever topic you are utilizing the methodology on.

Accurate communication is hard.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

yes thank you leto ii

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Trans people would still be a thing without socially defined gender roles. Even without gender, my sex was still wrong - my brain still told me, in times like trying to get comfortable to fall asleep, that my boobs weren't supposed to be there.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Mm, that's a good point - being uncomfortable in your own skin isn't a problem that would go away.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Even if we were beings of implacable logic, there would also be the issue that we aren't omniscient. We are never going to reach the full truth of everything because we aren't going to be able to gather all the data.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

We can't be sure of that. Maybe we will constantly be approaching the truth and never reach it. Or maybe we will just figure out every rule governing the quantum physics and extrapolate all the macro physics. Who knows.
Maybe there are meta physics responsible for creating our physics. Like, laws governing the creation of universes with different physics in each of them. Maybe it's meta physics all the way down...

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago (1 children)

The general laws of physics, sure, I have no solid reason to think they'll be forever out of reach (only doubt), but in order to determine if there was intelligent life (even moreso civilizations) in galaxies that have already stranded away from our field of vision, we would need to have immense luck for physics to allow us to cheat the limits we know about today.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago

Again, we can't even begin to speculate on what we'll know in 1000 or 10,000 years because it's so far beyond our current understanding. Practical time travel might be discovered. Or maybe we'll learn how to extrapolate the path of any number of particles all the way back to the Big Bang and effectively learn all of the past.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Extremely subjective creatures, many of which believe they're always right (including many "scientists").

But yeah, you're right, the reality is somewhere between the two extremes of the meme. Although we might also want to have a conversation about what "pure objectivity and truth" means.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago (1 children)

We like putting things into boxes. It simplifies things. It's easier to put things into objective boxes in math and physics, but the further from those you get, more subjective these boxes become. Biology is almost entirely subjective, we just draw a line in the sand where it suits our needs (at the time) the best.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago

Absolutely, and a big part of being a good scientist is acknowledging that subjectivity (and well as the degree of uncertainty in all our knowledge). In social science, subjectivity is baked in... there's no way to avoid it, no matter how hard you try.

That's not to say subjectivity means science can't do anything useful in these areas. Most of the problems with subjectivity come from pretending something is objective when it's not.