SCIENTIFIC METHOD
The Inspiration
It is only December and I am already missing outdoor tennis. A while back I posted about precision and human mastery of manufacture at smaller and smaller scales. That post was titled “Five Nanometers”. The essence of the post concerned how the repeatability of making items on the smallest scale can simultaneously unlock our world at its largest scale. I can get excited about that. You will have to wait till the end to get why I mentioned tennis AGAIN.
The Setup
Each time we attempt to press the limits of human endeavor, the conflict between what humankind can achieve and the limits imposed by nature collide. In the prior post linked above, I briefly discussed the machining of the primary mirror of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). Some of the most inspiring images of the universe were taken by the HST. The HST is named for Edwin Hubble, an astronomer who applied the breakthrough observations of Henrietta Swan Leavitt to indirectly measure and characterize the world outside of the Milky Way galaxy. Hubble was an engaging man who became a public face of breakthroughs in astronomy. The year was 1929 and we were making breakthroughs and forging insights unimaginable in human history.
The HST will soon welcome a colleague in space and our knowledge and insights into our world will be transformed yet again.
The Details
It is always, in my opinion, worthwhile to have a timeline for perspective. The progression from “(1) I don’t know” to “(2) earth is the center” to “(3) sun is the center” to “(4) galaxy is the center” to “(5) universe is the center” is a wonderful trip. As always, most progress is recent as (1) held for two million years, (2) held for about 3500 years, (3) stood for about 300 years, (4) stood for about 50 years and (5) is crumbling after 20 years. Here is how we took the first couple of steps.
The Greeks and Egyptians were the first civilizations to broadly document their view of how things worked in the sky. Their ideas were named “geocentrism”. Their perspective was the Earth was at the center and the sun and other familiar objects were rotating around. This sort of theory evolved from our perspective (and the limitations of human eyes). These observations are from a Wikipedia article about the Geocentric model.
“First, from anywhere on Earth, the Sun appears to revolve around Earth once per day. While the Moon and the planets have their motions, they also appear to revolve around Earth about once per day. The stars appeared to be fixed on a celestial sphere rotating once each day about an axis through the geographic poles of Earth.
Second, Earth seems to be unmoving from the perspective of an earthbound observer; it feels solid, stable, and stationary.”1
Using their minds, astronomers and astrologers had begun the march of the scientific method by presenting a theory that fit their observations. Sometimes, it is the inability to make more observations that limits our ability to explain something. The lack of an instrument was the limiting factor to progress. The early scientists and the important philosophical explanations were all developed based on what we could see with the naked eye.
Despite its limitations, these theories had begun the march toward knowledge. The Greeks and Egyptians incorporated the theory that the Earth was a sphere, not a flat disk. Progress would come, but this view of the world would stand for about 15 centuries.
Almost all of this theorizing made enough sense relative to religious tradition. Almost every culture and civilization incorporated what they could see with their eyes into their religious texts. This is not controversial nor is it surprising. We have all heard the expression “I’m in 7th heaven”. I doubt it has any relevance to any of us. We now understand this to merely be the limitations of sight. The seven visible bodies that recurred and could be seen consistently were the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. They were positioned relative to how far away they “appeared”. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all reference the numbered heavens. Separate traditions did the same with different explanations. In 2 Corinthians 12:2-4, Paul is talking about someone in 3rd heaven! In the parlance of the day that might have meant Venus!
Beginning with Copernicus (1473-1543) in the 16th century the ground began to shift. With the religious texts of the three great monotheistic religions established, undermining our understanding would present challenges to the hierarchy of belief. Both Galileo and Kepler would further refine our view of the world. Their work, based upon the availability of lensed viewers (early telescopes) would upend the thinking of the time.
My favorite takeaway from this era illuminates (a joke) how we are always building stepping stones of knowledge. Once Copernicus realized the Sun was at the center and planets ringed outward, he was still left with a view that all of the rest of the stars revolved around us! It was merely perspective. Even Copernicus was strapped by how good his viewing instrument was. Copernicus is SIGNIFICANT though. He presents his ideas while still only having his eyeballs for evidence. His great leap is he uses that non-impulsive frontal lobe to contemplate where the truth may lie. The core theory must remain until a better explanation can emerge.
Since this era, which corresponds to the period when we finally established an accurate calendar, our work in understanding the world slipped into high gear! As a tribute to how difficult change can be, there was even a shift to ten heavens within religious circles once we realized there were planets beyond Saturn. We were now in the age of the telescope. A better set of glasses would allow us to begin learning at amazing speed.
Better telescopes have been the story ever since. A Dutch scientist Hans Lippershey patented the first telescope in 1608 with a 3X magnification. Galileo worked hard and by 1610 was magnifying at 30X but was now 4 feet long! Kepler in 1611 demonstrates a workable 25X magnification AND provides a wide field of vision! By 1656 Christian Huygens had built a 23’ long telescope that could magnify 150X. The devices were unwieldy and hardly usable on a windy night. The impracticality of these longer and longer tubes with glass lenses gave way to the use of mirrors instead. The race was on and Isaac Newton was in the game. These types of telescopes are called refractor telescopes.
I Don’t See It
So what is the point of all this? I am inspired that mankind has focused (no pun intended) on what can be made visible. This is the journey of all of the telescopes we think about including the HST. The HST is far from the largest telescope but because it is outside of the earth’s atmosphere it gets a clearer view. A 94” diameter mirror is nothing to sneeze at and it is an impressive achievement to get it up into space. The HST was a remarkable achievement but was plagued by problems, cost overruns, and near-failures. “Reaching for the stars” is hard and disappointment is part of the story. The machining of the primary mirror had a small error which led to blurry vision. Five additional trips by the Space Shuttle to install “corrective lenses” and other modifications were required to provide the images we are in awe of today. The HST will be honored as giving us a view of the heavens in the visible spectrum that may never be extended (at least in our lifetimes). The HST is about 45 feet long and 14 feet wide and is similar in size and weight to a school bus. The HST was launched in 1990 and has provided a wonderful and enlightening view of the universe.
We managed in the 19th and 20th centuries to understand that light beyond the visible spectrum had a lot to teach us. Next time we will continue learning about stuff even though we are stuck with these eyes of ours. Before you scoff and start questioning some inconvenient truths, don’t forget that being able to heat leftovers, treat tumors, take x-rays and all sorts of other cool things emerge if you loosen up and embrace new things. There are great things to “see” even though our human eyeballs are too primitive to notice. For those of you who have concluded I have ADHD, the oblique reference to tennis at the beginning has a point. The next big step past the HST is the size of a TENNIS COURT! We will pick up on that next. The wrapup tonight is what I wrote at the top as themes of today’s post. The more I post and the more I think about it, I think a pretty good way to live and manage your affairs is “(1) See something, (2) think about what you saw, (3) Go back and look again more carefully, and (4) ADJUST accordingly. This is a cycle like a rinse and a repeat. When I finish a session on the tennis court, I sometimes think about what I might try next time. What should I have done differently? I cannot think of a single example of something where it is best to stick with idea #1.
The great irony of all of this to me is the arrogance of man. To me, the only thing that has brought religion into conflict with science is the arrogance of man. The observation ALSO applies to those who proclaim they are being scientific. People who cling to something like evolution are ALSO off-base unless they cheerfully embrace that in science, all ideas and theories are questioned and improved continuously. It is the intransigence of a worldview that presents the largest problem.
Because science NEVER states something is the TRUTH but instead DESIRES that others with more knowledge and inspiration will come next and challenge it makes the method largely foolproof. It even cheerfully cordons off the things we do not know. Religion, at times, creates a dilemma and conflict. Rather than being philosophical, I would imagine that the great monotheistic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) would have been better off not claiming a “never changing truth” about such stories as 7th heaven.
It took science a long time, but once we realized we just needed a different pair of eyeglasses to see with, all of this came tumbling down. Whether a scientist or a religious scholar, be cautious when someone claims to share the unvarnished and unchanging truth. This sort of thinking will always end badly. The same is true of pundits who engage with “Newton was the greatest”. The truth is Newton provided some inspiration at a moment in time and did his best with the information he could surmise. This is what makes living today the best time ever. The progression of an idea and its underlying understanding is inspiring. Placing the synthesis of an idea relative to the steps that led us there on a staircase is great. It is not that the Egyptians got it all wrong. Rather the staircase starts with their inspirations to explain the night sky. There are many great steps in between. Celebrate the journey and never install a door at an arbitrary step to preclude climbing higher. The only thing that will risk our future is nostalgia, and an end to the progress of learning more. That makes my head hurt. Here’s a song about the stars.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geocentric_model
During the depth of the pandemic, that first spring, I was looking for a group project we could all do from home to help stay connected. We were studying astronomy at the time during distance learning. Long story short, here is what we came up with: “Shining Star.” https://youtu.be/tItbFZ2_IjY