8/26/2015

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT
John Godfrey Saxe's ( 18161887) version of the famous
Indian legend
On Science

It was six men of Indostan

To learning much inclined,
Who went to see the Elephant
(Though all of them were blind),
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind.

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT

The First approach'd the Elephant,

And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side,
At once began to bawl:
"God bless me! but the Elephant

The Second, feeling of the tusk,

Cried, -"Ho! what have we here
So very round and smooth and sharp?
To me 'tis mighty clear
This wonder of an Elephant

The Third approached the animal,

And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands,
Thus boldly up and spake:
"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant
Is very like a

Is very like a

wall

Is very like a

spear

!"

snake

!"

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

8/26/2015

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT

The Fourth reached out his eager

hand,
And felt about the knee.
"What most this wondrous beast is
like
Is mighty plain," quoth he,
"'Tis clear enough the Elephant

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the

ear,
Said: "E'en the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most;
Deny the fact who can,
This marvel of an Elephant

The Sixth no sooner had begun

About the beast to grope,
Then, seizing on the swinging tail
That fell within his scope,
"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant

Is very like a

tree

Is very like a
!

fan

Is very like a

!"

rope

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

THE BLIND MEN AND THE

ELEPHANT

And so these men of Indostan

Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind
_men_elephant.html

MORAL.
So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

http://www.noogenesis.com/pineapple/blind_men_elephant.html

Outline
I.

The visitors from Twilo (Leon Lederman)

II.

Tools for Knowing / Epistemological Icons (Joe Redish)

II.

Diagnostic Features of Science (Edward Wilson)

Objectives

Explain in what ways the Visitors from Twilo story can

serve as a metaphor for the way we approach puzzles in
the sciences

Explain E.O. Wilsons five diagnostic features of science

that distinguishes it from other ways of knowing.

Give examples of situations where Joe Redishs Tools for

Thinking are useful

8/26/2015

Activity 1

Imagine an intelligent race of beings from the planet

Twilo.

Visitors from Twilo:

(Source: Leon
Lederman, the God
Particle)

they cant see objects with a sharp juxtaposition

of black and white

they cant see objects with a sharp juxtaposition

of black and white

They look more or less like us, they talk like us, they
do everything like humans - except for one thing

A contingent from Twilo comes to Earth on a

goodwill mission

http://alumnus.caltech.edu/~kantner/zebras/pictures.html
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/glenn/news/AF/2007/April07_FIRSTBuckeye_prt.htm

http://www.seoclerks.com/youtube/18886/send-10k-3k-promotional-high-quality-visitors-to-your-blog-website-landing-page-or

8/26/2015

We take them to see one of the most popular

cultural events on the planet:
See IF, first 30 seconds, then 4:40
onward

http://www.seoclerks.com/youtube/18886/send-10k-3k-promotional-high-quality-visitors-to-your-blog-website-landing-page-or

We, of course, don't know that they can't see the

black-and-white soccer ball. So they sit there
watching the match with polite but confused looks
on their faces.

www.ballooninaboxusa.com/
sports.htm,http://athletics.vassar.edu/soccer/wpics/soccer.jpgwww.news.harvard.edu/gazette/ 2002/09.26/08soccer.htmlhttp://www.tamucc.edu/images/soccer.jpg

www.ballooninaboxusa.com/
sports.htm,http://athletics.vassar.edu/soccer/wpics/soccer.jpgwww.news.harvard.edu/gazette/ 2002/09.26/08soccer.htmlhttp://www.tamucc.edu/images/soccer.jpg

We, of course, don't know that they can't see the

black-and-white soccer ball. So they sit there
watching the match with polite but confused looks
on their faces.

We, of course, don't know that they can't see the

black-and-white soccer ball. So they sit there
watching the match with polite but confused looks
on their faces.

As far as the Twiloans are concerned, a bunch of

short-pantsed people are running up and down the
field kicking their legs pointlessly in the air, banging
into each other, and falling down.

As far as the Twiloans are concerned, a bunch of

short-pantsed people are running up and down the
field kicking their legs pointlessly in the air, banging
into each other, and falling down.
At times an official blows a whistle, a player runs to
the sideline, stands there, and extends both his arms
over his head while the other players watch him.

http://www.seoclerks.com/youtube/18886/send-10k-3k-promotional-high-quality-visitors-to-your-blog-website-landing-page-or

http://www.seoclerks.com/youtube/18886/send-10k-3k-promotional-high-quality-visitors-to-your-blog-website-landing-page-or

http://www.seoclerks.com/youtube/18886/send-10k-3k-promotional-high-quality-visitors-to-your-blog-website-landing-page-or

8/26/2015

We, of course, don't know that they can't see the

black-and-white soccer ball. So they sit there
watching the match with polite but confused looks
on their faces.
As far as the Twiloans are concerned, a bunch of
short-pantsed people are running up and down the
field kicking their legs pointlessly in the air, banging
into each other, and falling down.

Some use classification techniques:

The Twiloans spend about fifteen minutes being
totally mystified. Then, to pass the time, they attempt
to understand the game.

- Clothing  2 teams
- Player movements  geographical territories
- Different players display different motions

At times an official blows a whistle, a player runs to

the sideline, stands there, and extends both his arms
over his head while the other players watch him.

- Named various positions

Once in a great while the goalie inexplicably falls to

the ground, a great cheer goes up, and one point is
awarded to the opposite team.

- More work  tables, scores, complicated rules

Missing

- Charts, tables, etc  great discovery: Symmetry

Missing:

Young Pipsqueak Twiloan: "Let's postulate the

existence of an invisible ball.

-Whats the essence

of the game?

8/26/2015

How did the YPT come up with the idea?

See IF 4:57
Young Pipsqueak Twiloan: Let's postulate the
existence of an invisible ball.
Elders: Say what?

Objective 1: Explain in what ways the Visitors

from Twilo story can serve as a metaphor for
the way we approach puzzles in the sciences
1)

Diagnostic Features
of Science

8/26/2015

Science, to put its warrant as concisely as possible, is the

organized systematic enterprise that gathers knowledge
about the world and condenses the knowledge into
testable laws and principles. The diagnostic features of
science that distinguish it from pseudoscience are first,
repeatability: Second, economy: Third, mensuration:
,... Fourth, heuristics: ... Fifth and finally, consilience:

Science, to put its warrant as concisely as possible, is the

organized systematic enterprise that gathers knowledge
about the world and condenses the knowledge into
testable laws and principles. The diagnostic features of
science that distinguish it from pseudoscience are first,
repeatability: Second, economy: Third, mensuration:
,... Fourth, heuristics: ... Fifth and finally, consilience:
Astronomy, biomedicine and physiological psychology
possess all these criteria. Astrology, ufology, creation
science and Christian Science, sadly, possess none. And it
should not go unnoticed that the true natural sciences
lock together in theory and evidence to form the
ineradicable technical base of modern civilization. The
pseudosciences satisfy personal psychological needs, but
lack the ideas or the means to contribute to the technical
base.

Diagnostic Features of Science

Repeatability

Part 2 Objectives

Explain the E.O. Wilsons five diagnostic features

of science that distinguishes it from other ways
of knowing.

The diagnostic features of science that distinguish it

from other ways of knowing

Repeatability
Economy
Mensuration
Heuristics
Consilience

The same phenomenon is sought again and

again, preferably by independent
investigation, and the interpretation given to
it is confirmed or discarded by means of
novel analysis and experimentation.

E.O. Wilson, Consilience (New York: Knopf, 1998).

8/26/2015

Repeatability

Economy

Scientists attempt to abstract the information

into the form that is both simplest and most
pleasing-the combination called elegancewhile yielding the largest amount of information
with the least amount of effort.

Economy

Economy

Economy

Bakit ka nalate?

Economy

Ockhams Razor / Law of Parsimony:

William of Ockham
( 1288-1349)

Entia non sunt multiplicanda sine necessitate.

Everything should be made as simple as

possible, but not simple (Albert Einstein as
paraphrased by Roger Sessions)

Entities are not to be multiplied beyond

necessities.

Source: http://folk.uio.no/klaush/ockham.htm

8/26/2015

Economy

It can scarcely be denied that the supreme

goal of all theory is to make the irreducible
basic elements as simple and as few as
possible without having to surrender the
adequate representation of a single datum of
experience (Albert Einstein, 1933 Herbert
Spencer Lecture, Oxford University)

Economy

In every field of inquiry, it is true that all things

should be made as simple as possible but no
simpler. (And for every problem that is muddled
by over-complexity, a dozen are muddled by
over-simplifying.
(Sydney Harris, 1964 newspaper column)

8/26/2015

Example
Science and Measurement

Example: Consider process of observation with

human senses, it really creates a mental model
of the real world, as macroscopic approximation
to the microscopically comprised real world.
Therefore absolute reliance on perceived fact
are subject to error induced by crudeness of
model.

Mensuration

If something can be properly measured using

universally accepted scales: generalizations
about it are rendered unambiguous.

Are the horizontal lines parallel or do they slope?

Heuristics
The best science stimulates further discovery, often
in unpredictable new directions, and the new
knowledge provides an additional test of the original
principles that led to the discovery.

Source:http://www.optillusions.com/02.html

10

8/26/2015

Consilience

The explanations of physical phenomena most likely

to survive are those that can be connected and
proved consistent with one another.

Tools for knowing / epistemological icons

Talk to a seatmate to make

sure that you can: Explain
E.O.Wilsons five diagnostic
features of science that
distinguishes it from other
ways of knowing.

Joe Redish

Choosing a channel on cat TV

Cat observing a small
piece of the world
restricted by a
window frame.

choosing a channel on cat TV

=
choosing a limited set of phenomena to be
studied

Source:http://umdberg.pbworks.com/w/page/49797017/Readings%20Physics%20131

11

8/26/2015

Shopping for ideas

When starting a new
subject it often helps
to consider
-experiences
-prior knowledge
to give our new ideas a
basis in things we are
comfortable with.

Choosing foothold ideas

A lot of science relies on a small
number of core ideas or principles - ideas that we believe we can
count on in a wide variety of
circumstances .
We introduce the metaphor of a
foothold for our idea as one we
choose to accept as true, at least
for the time being, as a way to
proceed.

Seeking coherence (building a safety

net)
The crossword puzzle (or
Sudoku) focuses on the fact
that it is the consistency of
the crossing information
that tells us we have the
right choice.
The safety net icon focuses
on that fact that coherence
-- links to other things we
know -- is one of the best
ways that we can check our
thinking.

Playing the implications game

A critical part of learning
to be a scientist is
learning to work out
what the implications are
of any bit of knowledge
we have or principle we
choose.
Following the
implications of our
foothold ideas and
principles is a critical
process of science.

Sense Making

Science is not just

accumulating facts
but putting them
together in a
coherent way.

In a sense it's like

trying to make
sense of the picture
at the right. At first
glance it looks like a
lot of random
spots. But if you
look at it for a while
you might see a
picture emerge.

Sense Making
Hint: It's an
animal.

12

8/26/2015

Sense Making
Does this new
orientation
help?

Does this new

orientation
help?

Sense Making
Creating a
coherent
whole

Sense Making

Refining Intuition

Sense Making
Often seeing
the dog is
more
important
than
memorizing
each of the
independent
spots

Impossible Illusion

(Lyell-Mller illusion)
You cannot always
trust your first
intuition and that we
often have to check
our expectations via
measurement.

13

8/26/2015

Impossible Roof Illusion

Multiple Representations
Different ways of
representing the same
physical system often
help us understand the
nature of the system.
memory. Second,. As a
result, the use of multiple
representations can be
effective in building links
between different
aspects of the situation.

Different representations associate more

naturally with different features of the data /
situation we are trying to describe

Dangerous Bends
Some of the representations we use in
physics include
words
equations
tables of numbers
graphs
specialized diagrams.

Quick answers are

dangerous "one-step
thinking" something
that might at first
look obvious is not
necessarily right.

The first principle is that you must not fool

yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.
Richard P. Feynman

14