[Pseudonym]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

Science is also becoming so complex that discoveries soon won't be made by individuals, but by groups. No one person is capable of being a generalist in a field, because there simply is too much data to first learn.

Doesn't every idea have to come first to an individual though? Or am I delving too far into philosophy and missing the larger point that collective efforts are necessary to coalesce larger bodies of knowledge to develop meaningful scientific relationships?

[andyt]

There's still lots of discussion whether human advances such as tool production/use or agriculture started at one source or several.

A story I read about wild macaques living on several islands being given cut up yams. At first only one female would wash the sand off in the ocean, but then the idea caught on, even on other islands that had no contact with the originator. I can't prove the veracity of this story, but it's nice to think about. Maybe we have a collective conscious as well as unconscious.

Oh, just to go off on a tangent - chimps in captivity were taught to use coins to trade for food. One night a researchers came back to the lab, turned on the lights, and there were the male chimps offering the females coins for sex. Maybe it's the oldest profession after all. (What was supposed to be the oldest profession if prostitution was the second oldest?)

[PostFactum]

Well if humans are too simple why we are not still understood, nowadays noone can be sure for 100% how works our body, brain, and mind. The big understanding begins from small. So maybe one day we will understand everything.

[Public_Domain]

[ShepherdsDog]

I'd have to agree...string theory, the multiverse and infinite dimesions are a tad difficult to wrap the ole grey matter around. The more we find out, the more questions we'll raise.

[Zipperfish]

GreenTiger GreenTiger:

The Penrose that you are talking about is that Roger Penrose
in Cambridge?

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

The guy is just offering an opinion. When they said "scientist" I thought that meant he'd have something to back it up. Godel basically proved this with his "Incompleteness Theorem" (in my mind the greatest feat of intelligence in the history of humankind). Godel proved that no [sufficiently complex] consistent rational algorithm (e.g. logic, mathematics) can completely describe a given system. There will always be truths which are unreachable by said system.

Indeed Shakespeare was (as usual) remarkably prescient when Hamlet said "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

Interestingly, Penrose proved that no artificial intelligence yet conceived, no matter how big and how fast, could prove Godel's Incompleteness Theorem.

Yes, Roger Penrose. Great mind.

[djakeydd]

Newsbot Newsbot:

Title: Humans too simple to understand universe: scientist
Category: Science
Posted By: Hyack
Date: 2010-06-18 00:53:58

Nuff said on that, that is precisely the case as to why ppl say they are atheist's They cannot possibly understand the God of the Holy Bible either, they cannot understand more than a sliver of who he is, so they give up. You cannot undertsand the mind of the infinite, when you are a piss ant mortal with a comparatively infinitesimally small finite mind.

[Guy_Fawkes]

It's not about understanding but about logical proof.

[BartSimpson]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

Science is also becoming so complex that discoveries soon won't be made by individuals, but by groups. No one person is capable of being a generalist in a field, because there simply is too much data to first learn.

New fields of science will be discovered by individuals who eschew the limitations of working with groups.

[QBall]

$1:

A top British scientist says we may never know all the secrets of the universe because, quite simply, we're just not smart enough.

This is a rather useless article. Since aliens haven't made their presence known to us it's up to humans to figure it out. Who else is going to do it? The dolphins?