Re: Postmodernism and Truth (was Re: virus: Simulacrum)

J. McVean (jmcvean@acs.ucalgary.ca)
Thu, 23 May 96 10:39:29 MDT


Bill Godby wrote:
> They are paradigms not objective standards. These standards and truths are
> only as good as the tools created to measure them, and the data they measure
> is still interpreted via humans. Objectivity in science is a fallacy.

Perhaps absolute objectivity is impossible but I think one can
get pretty damn close. It depends on what type of science you are
discussing. I can see how objectivity in anthropology might be
pretty scarce but at the other extreme, the study of physics is
pretty objective nowadays. When you are measuring the mass of an
electron, even if you have a vested interest in finding out it is
4.3, if your results tell you it's 9.11E-31 it's pretty hard to
distort that so long as your method is well documented (as it
must be). Even if you lie, someone else will try your experiment
an you will be found out.

Not to say that physics doesn't ponderously hold on to old
theories sometimes, but it does move to closer and closer
approximations of the real world.

Jason