10 Scientific Ideas That Scientists Wish You Would Stop Misusing

1. Proof

Physicist Sean Carroll says:

I would say that “proof” is the most widely misunderstood concept in all of science. It has a technical definition (a logical demonstration that certain conclusions follow from certain assumptions) that is strongly at odds with how it is used in casual conversation, which is closer to simply “strong evidence for something.” There is a mismatch between how scientists talk and what people hear because scientists tend to have the stronger definition in mind. And by that definition, science never proves anything! So when we are asked “What is your proof that we evolved from other species?” or “Can you really prove that climate change is caused by human activity?” we tend to hem and haw rather than simply saying “Of course we can.” The fact that science never really proves anything, but simply creates more and more reliable and comprehensive theories of the world that nevertheless are always subject to update and improvement, is one of the key aspects of why science is so successful.

2. Theory
Astrophysicist Dave Goldberg has a theory about the word theory:

Members of the general public (along with people with an ideological axe to grind) hear the word “theory” and equate it with “idea” or “supposition.” We know better. Scientific theories are entire systems of testable ideas which are potentially refutable either by the evidence at hand or an experiment that somebody could perform. The best theories (in which I include special relativity, quantum mechanics, and evolution) have withstood a hundred years or more of challenges, either from people who want to prove themselves smarter than Einstein, or from people who don’t like metaphysical challenges to their world view. Finally, theories are malleable, but not infinitely so. Theories can be found to be incomplete or wrong in some particular detail without the entire edifice being torn down. Evolution has, itself, adapted a lot over the years, but not so much that it wouldn’t still be recognize it. The problem with the phrase “just a theory,” is that it implies a real scientific theory is a small thing, and it isn’t.

3. Quantum Uncertainty and Quantum Weirdness

Goldberg adds that there’s another idea that has been misinterpreted even more perniciously than “theory.” It’s when people appropriate concepts from physics for new agey or spiritual purposes:

This misconception is an exploitation of quantum mechanics by a certain breed spiritualists and self-helpers, and epitomized by the abomination, What the Bleep Do We Know? Quantum mechanics, famously, has measurement at its core. An observer measuring position or momentum or energy causes the “wavefunction to collapse,” non-deterministically. (Indeed, I did one of my first columns on “How smart do you need to collapse a wavefunction?”) But just because the universe isn’t deterministic doesn’t mean that you are the one controlling it. It is remarkable (and frankly, alarming) the degree to which quantum uncertainty and quantum weirdness get inextricably bound up in certain circles with the idea of a soul, or humans controlling the universe, or some other pseudoscience. In the end, we are made of quantum particles (protons, neutrons, electrons) and are part of the quantum universe. That is cool, of course, but only in the sense that all of physics is cool.

4. Learned vs. Innate

Evolutionary biologist Marlene Zuk says:

One of my favorite is the idea of behavior being “learned vs. innate” or any of the other nature-nurture versions of this. The first question I often get when I talk about a behavior is whether it’s “genetic” or not, which is a misunderstanding because ALL traits, all the time, are the result of input from the genes and input from the environment. Only a difference between traits, and not the trait itself, can be genetic or learned — like if you have identical twins reared in different environments and they do something different (like speak different languages), then that difference is learned. But speaking French or Italian or whatever isn’t totally learned in and of itself, because obviously one has to have a certain genetic background to be able to speak at all.

5. Natural

Synthetic biologist Terry Johnson is really, really tired of people misunderstanding what this word means:

“Natural” is a word that has been used in so many contexts with so many different meanings that it’s become almost impossible to parse. Its most basic usage, to distinguish phenomena that exist only because of humankind from phenomena that don’t, presumes that humans are somehow separate from nature, and our works are un- or non-natural when compared to, say, beavers or honeybees. When speaking of food, “natural” is even slipperier. It has different meanings in different countries, and in the US, the FDA has given up on a meaningful definition of natural food (largely in favor of “organic”, another nebulous term). In Canada, I could market corn as “natural” if I avoid adding or subtracting various things before selling it, but the corn itself is the result of thousands of years of selection by humans, from a plant that wouldn’t exist without human intervention.

6. Gene

Johnson has an even bigger concern about how the word gene gets used, however:

It took 25 scientists two contentious days to come up with: “a locatable region of genomic sequence, corresponding to a unit of inheritance, which is associated with regulatory regions, transcribed regions and/or other functional sequence regions.” Meaning that a gene is a discrete bit of DNA that we can point to and say, “that makes something, or regulates the making of something”. The definition has a lot of wiggle room by design; it wasn’t long ago that we thought that most of our DNA didn’t do anything at all. We called it “junk DNA”, but we’re discovering that much of that junk has purposes that weren’t immediately obvious. Typically “gene” is misused most when followed by “for”. There’s two problems with this. We all have genes for hemoglobin, but we don’t all have sickle cell anemia. Different people have different versions of the hemoglobin gene, called alleles. There are hemoglobin alleles which are associated with sickle cell diseases, and others that aren’t. So, a gene refers to a family of alleles, and only a few members of that family, if any, are associated with diseases or disorders. The gene isn’t bad – trust me, you won’t live long without hemoglobin – though the particular version of hemoglobin that you have could be problematic. I worry most about the popularization of the idea that when a genetic variation is correlated with something, it is the “gene for” that something. The language suggests that “this gene causes heart disease”, when the reality is usually, “people that have this allele seem to have a slightly higher incidence of heart disease, but we don’t know why, and maybe there are compensating advantages to this allele that we didn’t notice because we weren’t looking for them”.

7. Statistically Significant

Mathematician Jordan Ellenberg wants to set the record straight about this idea:

“Statistically significant” is one of those phrases scientists would love to have a chance to take back and rename. “Significant” suggests importance; but the test of statistical significance, developed by the British statistician R.A. Fisher, doesn’t measure the importance or size of an effect; only whether we are able to distinguish it, using our keenest statistical tools, from zero. “Statistically noticeable” or “Statistically discernible” would be much better. 8. Survival of the Fittest

Paleoecologist Jacquelyn Gill says that people misunderstand some of the basic tenets of evolutionary theory:

Topping my list would be “survival of the fittest.” First, these are not actually Darwin’s own words, and secondly, people have a misconception about what “fittest” means. Relatedly, there’s major confusion about evolution in general, including the persistent idea that evolution is progressive and directional (or even deliberate on the part of organisms; people don’t get the idea of natural selection), or that all traits must be adaptive (sexual selection is a thing! And so are random mutations!).

Fittest does not mean strongest, or smartest. It simply means an organism that fits best into its environment, which could mean anything from “smallest” or “squishiest” to “most poisonous” or “best able to live without water for weeks at a time.” Plus, creatures don’t always evolve in a way that we can explain as adaptations. Their evolutionary path may have more to do with random mutations, or traits that other members of their species find attractive.
9. Geologic Timescales

Gill, whose work centers on Pleistocene environments that existed over 15,000 years ago, says that she’s also dismayed by how little people seem to understand the Earth’s timescales:

One issue I often run into is that the public lacks an understanding of geologic timescales. Anything prehistoric gets compressed in peoples’s minds, and folks think that 20,000 years ago we had drastically different species (nope), or even dinosaurs (nope nope nope). It doesn’t help that those little tubes of plastic toy dinosaurs often include cave people or mammoths.

10. Organic

Entomologist Gwen Pearson says that there’s a constellation of terms that “travel together” with the word “organic,” such as “chemical-free,” and “natural.” And she’s tired of seeing how profoundly people misunderstand them:

I’m less upset about the way that they are technically incorrect food is all organic, because it contains carbon,etc. the way they are used to dismiss and minimize real differences in food and product production. Things can be natural and “organic”, but still quite dangerous. Things can be “synthetic” and manufactured, but safe. And sometimes better choices. If you are taking insulin, odds are it’s from GMO bacteria. And it’s saving lives.

http://io9.com/10-scientific-ideas-that-scientists-wish-you-would-stop-1591309822

11 – ‘Nearly infinite”.

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Spiny Norman said:

11 – ‘Nearly infinite”.

I disagree. Anything which has a greater than 50% probability of being infinite is “nearly infinite”.

1. Proof

Theologians, lawyers, mathematicians and scientists all have a radically different idea of what “proof” is. Mixing up the different concepts is the problem.

2. Theory

see “proof”.

3. Quantum Uncertainty and Quantum Weirdness

What causes the wavefunction to collapse? Until physicists find a definitive answer to that one they can’t really complain about how the general public in general and science fiction in particular misuses “quantum weirdness”.

4. Learned vs. Innate

Yes. The old “nature vs nurture” argument almost always leads to the answer “both”.But on the other hand, saying “both” can be a cheat using ambiguity as a cover for ignorance.

5. Natural

Just two comments here. One is that the word “Nature” has to be well understood as it’s been the title of a scientific magazine for more than 140 years. Two is that “natural” entered the advertising literature through the advertising of sugar – they really had no choice in the matter as the anti-sugar advertising lobby had been viciously attacking sugar as unhealthy – but the anti-sugar lobby couldn’t argue that sugar was unnatural.

6. Gene

The word “gene” isn’t the problem. It’[s the word “causes” in the sentence “This gene causes heart disease” that is the problem.

7. Statistically Significant

Yes, needs qualification, like “3 sigma” or suchlike. Though xkcd disagrees.

8. Survival of the Fittest

Social Darwinism is one of the worst possible evils.

9. Geologic Timescales

Large numbers are a problem for some people, I don’t know why. So many people fail to distinguish between 200 thousand and 200 million. More people would understand if metric prefixes were used kiloyear vs megayear, so why not start using it?

10. Organic

For me, “organic” is just a synonym for “grossly impure”.

If you wear a lab coat you must be a scientist

mollwollfumble said:

Spiny Norman said:

11 – ‘Nearly infinite”.

I disagree. Anything which has a greater than 50% probability of being infinite is “nearly infinite”.

Wouldn’t “Likely Infinite” be more accurate?

To me, the phrase “Nearly Infinite” means the value is not actually infinite, but may as well be. (IE: the total number of grains of sand on every beach on the planet)

mollwollfumble said:

Spiny Norman said:

11 – ‘Nearly infinite”.

I disagree. Anything which has a greater than 50% probability of being infinite is “nearly infinite”.

Not using any standard English language definition of the words – things that are not infinite are finite, by definition.

For me, this is one of the key problems with science communication (or a lot of lay science discussion), people feel that it’s ok to use terms outside of the context of their understood definition.

6. Gene

The word “gene” isn’t the problem. It’[s the word “causes” in the sentence “This gene causes heart disease” that is the problem.

This bit is interesting as haven’t some women had double mastectomies when told they have a gene that dramatically? increases your chances of getting breast cancer. Are they preempting something that may never happen even if their mother and grandmother did get it

Carmen_Sandiego said:

mollwollfumble said:

Spiny Norman said:

11 – ‘Nearly infinite”.

I disagree. Anything which has a greater than 50% probability of being infinite is “nearly infinite”.

Wouldn’t “Likely Infinite” be more accurate?

To me, the phrase “Nearly Infinite” means the value is not actually infinite, but may as well be. (IE: the total number of grains of sand on every beach on the planet)

To me, the use of the phrase ‘nearly infinite’ is simply lazy. What’s wrong with saying “the total number of grains of sand on every beach on the planet is very large”

From a human perspective I suppose something that is nearly infinite may as well be infinite as it makes little difference to us a species.

>but not so much that it wouldn’t still be recognize it

Hmm.

Cymek said:

From a human perspective I suppose something that is nearly infinite may as well be infinite as it makes little difference to us a species.

that’s not true are all… infinity is a very well defined and understood concept

10. Organic

For me, “organic” is just a synonym for “grossly impure”.

I always thought it was used to flog off fruit and vegetables grown without the use of any form of pesticide and using manure,compost, animal poo and not the fertilisers used in large scale farming. Its more expensive as it’s labour intensive and a percentage gets eaten by insects

mollwollfumble said:

10. Organic

For me, “organic” is just a synonym for “grossly impure”.

How so?

>Anything which has a greater than 50% probability of being infinite is “nearly infinite”.

Um, no. Anything that has a greater than 50% probability of being infinite is still either finite or infinite. If you throw a loaded coin (which you know comes ups heads more than 50% of the time) you’re not going to call “nearly heads!”

diddly-squat said:

Cymek said:

From a human perspective I suppose something that is nearly infinite may as well be infinite as it makes little difference to us a species.

that’s not true are all… infinity is a very well defined and understood concept

Yes but lets says like someone said the number of grains of sand on every planet in the universe is nearly infinite if it was infinite would it make any difference to our lives.

Cymek said:

diddly-squat said:

Cymek said:

From a human perspective I suppose something that is nearly infinite may as well be infinite as it makes little difference to us a species.

that’s not true are all… infinity is a very well defined and understood concept

Yes but lets says like someone said the number of grains of sand on every planet in the universe is nearly infinite if it was infinite would it make any difference to our lives.

how about we change the name of the colour red, to green… now there are two colours that have exactly the same name but are completely different things… imagine the confusion that would create.

the same is true of the word infinite, we can’t just change the definition to mean something else simply because it’s difficult to grasp or ‘visualize’.

diddly-squat said:

Cymek said:

diddly-squat said:

that’s not true are all… infinity is a very well defined and understood concept

Yes but lets says like someone said the number of grains of sand on every planet in the universe is nearly infinite if it was infinite would it make any difference to our lives.

how about we change the name of the colour red, to green… now there are two colours that have exactly the same name but are completely different things… imagine the confusion that would create.

the same is true of the word infinite, we can’t just change the definition to mean something else simply because it’s difficult to grasp or ‘visualize’.

What is infinite besides the size of the universe

Cymek said:

What is infinite besides the size of the universe

If the universe is infinite in size (and looks much like our visible part of it, everywhere) then there are infinite numbers of all the kinds of things we can see in it.

If the universe was finite what would this edge look like, would it just be an uncrossable barrier giving off no form of radiation.

Cymek said:

If the universe was finite what would this edge look like, would it just be an uncrossable barrier giving off no form of radiation.

Most finite models don’t have any edge. If you start travelling in a “straight line” from one point you’ll eventually return to it, as on the surface of the earth.

“Your theory of a donut-shaped universe is intriguing, Homer. I may have to steal it.” ―Stephen Hawking

Cymek said:

diddly-squat said:

Cymek said:

Yes but lets says like someone said the number of grains of sand on every planet in the universe is nearly infinite if it was infinite would it make any difference to our lives.

how about we change the name of the colour red, to green… now there are two colours that have exactly the same name but are completely different things… imagine the confusion that would create.

the same is true of the word infinite, we can’t just change the definition to mean something else simply because it’s difficult to grasp or ‘visualize’.

What is infinite besides the size of the universe

infinity

diddly-squat said:

Cymek said:

diddly-squat said:

how about we change the name of the colour red, to green… now there are two colours that have exactly the same name but are completely different things… imagine the confusion that would create.

the same is true of the word infinite, we can’t just change the definition to mean something else simply because it’s difficult to grasp or ‘visualize’.

What is infinite besides the size of the universe

infinity

I’ll just add that the whole idea of limits in mathematics would not exist without infinity; and limits is what underpins calculus. Infinity is also really important to other branches of mathematics such as:

• complex number theory
• set theory
• topology
• fractals

I agree that we shouldn’t use “almost infinite” to mean very big, even if BC thinks it’s OK.

I know he’s a professor of astrophysics and everything, but I think all those TV shows have made him lazy in this respect.

OTOH, I think it is quite OK to talk about something being effectively infinite if we can’t tell the difference between very big and infinite.

So the Universe is effectively infinite, so far as our best measurements to date are concerned.

A surface that is very close to flat has effectively infinite radius (but’s radius is not close to infinity).

For a short focal length camera, anything more than about 3 m away is effectively at infinity.

No, no, no, no, no. You cannot qualify infinity (or even effectively qualify it).

The Rev Dodgson said:

I agree that we shouldn’t use “almost infinite” to mean very big, even if BC thinks it’s OK.

I know he’s a professor of astrophysics and everything, but I think all those TV shows have made him lazy in this respect.

Hold on, are you suggesting that B.C is a professor of astrophysics?

:)

sibeen said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

I agree that we shouldn’t use “almost infinite” to mean very big, even if BC thinks it’s OK.

I know he’s a professor of astrophysics and everything, but I think all those TV shows have made him lazy in this respect.

Hold on, are you suggesting that B.C is a professor of astrophysics?

:)

He was heavily involved in discussions with NASA.

sibeen said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

I agree that we shouldn’t use “almost infinite” to mean very big, even if BC thinks it’s OK.

I know he’s a professor of astrophysics and everything, but I think all those TV shows have made him lazy in this respect.

Hold on, are you suggesting that B.C is a professor of astrophysics?

:)

Ack! Don’t mention his name!

B.C. was often accused of “playing the space card”, but that was his job as a space activist and tireless campaigner against spacial prejudice.

>8. Survival of the Fittest
>>Social Darwinism is one of the worst possible evils.

What would be required for such ideas, in practice, to be applied or/and propagate and replicate and do evil, to any scale to warrant the warning “worse possible evils”?

Bubblecar said:

B.C. was often accused of “playing the space card”, but that was his job as a space activist and tireless campaigner against spacial prejudice.

And somewhere on the interwebs a lurker’s head explodes