TL;DR – Scientific investigation is not simply finding patterns and generalizing from them. Sometime ago I met someone who had high standards for what truth is. “Science cannot give any real truth!” “Science uses induction, which is not logically sound.” “All that scientists do is find patterns and generalize them to a rule.” I guess …
TL;DR – There may be infinitely many parallel worlds but there is nothing to be detected. A friend of mine is really into science fiction. “Did you know that there are infinite parallel worlds?” “And that there are infinitely many you and me, each a little bit different?” “And one day we will be able …
TL;DR – Subjective experiences, like consciousness, are outside of what can be experimentally tested. I was at a bar, tired from a long day, when a person started pestering me with questions: “Doesn’t the brain process electrical signals, which is ultimately explained by quantum physics?” “Doesn’t quantum physics say that things happen only because we …
TL;DR – Statistics can only study correlations between populations and are blind to the effect on individuals. Since I moved to the United States of America, I have met people with very strong views about religion and science. One would say: “the bible says the world was created 10,000 years ago.” Another would say: “science …
TL;DR – Events with low probability happen all the time, even ones with probability zero. When I was in high school, a friend of mine vehemently told me: “Me with him? It’s more likely that donkeys start raining. It’s more likely that hell freezes over. It’s more likely that I enter a convent and never …
TL;DR – Statistics applies to populations, not individuals. There is no such thing as the probability of one individual having some characteristic. I remember talking to a friend of mine a long time ago. “I wonder what will I do when I grow up?” “What are the chances that I become a doctor?” “What are …