Scientific and mathematical inaccuracies, misconceptions and errors that get under your skin

[Quaxar]

People that use the concept of scientific theories as scientific facts and laws. to disprove other theories facts and laws.

when thats all it is just a theory and any mad man with a tin foil hat can make up a theory it doesn't mean its right. until proven right

Perhaps you should look at the posts in this topic who's nitpick is people like you who don't actually understand the concept of scientific theories as opposed to regular theories. Gravity is a scientific theory, so trying to say that something like that is "just a theory" to marginalize it is only a display of ignorance.

Actually buddy, its the 'Law of Gravity'. Its been proven, there are ways to actually calculate gravity from mass. Its a law. Theories are, in essence, explanations of why something happens, but are not proven. There may be evidence, but its not proven. Im a Psych major (Yes, currently studying, but im doing my own research already), and very rarely, VERY rarely is something ever proven.

So yes, the guy is right when he talks about people using theories to prove or disprove something. He is not correct because you cant just make up a theory, there has to be some type of evidence to back it up. This aint philosophy.

Theories are there to be tested and discussed rationally, not to be used to forward your own biases. When something is proven it becomes a law. Believe me, I deal with theories on a daily basis, everything I come up with from research is a theory (Psychology is that way), and we use the exact same scientific method.

Nice try, but Gravity is in fact both [http://thehappyscientist.com/science-experiment/gravity-theory-or-law]. We don't dispute that it exists, or that we can model it with some degree of accuracy, but we don't know the "why" of gravity. We have some pretty good ideas, but that's about it.

Oh, thanks, you just helped my point. Nice try though.

"While the law lets us calculate quite a bit about what happens, notice that it does not tell us anything about why it happens. That is what theories are for. In the language of science, the word "theory" is used to describe an explanation of why and how things happen. For gravity, we use Einstein's Theory of General Relativity to explain why things fall."

So yeah, mis-info that would of been gladly accepted if you did it in a better tone, but now, thanks, you added fuel to my fire.

The irony of you attacking my tone while using "Actually, buddy" in your own post is fun.

The fact remains that a scientific theory is measured and tested. For example, we have tested Einsteins Theory of General Relativity via clocks, and is actually quite necessary in calculating the position of GPS units, among other things.

Yeah, I used that because he was trying to force a veryyyyy incorrect opinion on someone is bad, me making a small mistake of gravity being a law (which it is, as you have shown), is different.

Scientific theory has some type of evidence behind it. As some type of scientist, you NEVER EVER EVER accept a theory as true, you accept it as a possible truth. You always keep your mind open to other truths, or you become bias.

So, lets use the highly discussed theory of evolution. This is an example, not a debate. I will not discuss it past the terminology we are using. The theory of evolution has some type of evidence behind it, but it is not proven, so it is theory, and could be COMPLETELY wrong. That's not saying it is, but it has the chance to be. Now, look at creationism. If you actually believe that the theory of evolution is proven, you will dispute the fact that creationism is a theory of the origin of species, to. This is because of written history of the bible (which precedes most books, and has much evidence behind its validity (not reliability)), as well as other evidence which is not relevant here. These are two highly debated THEORIES. Neither of them are true, neither of them are false, unless proven. Once its proven, it will become a law.

So, dont treat theories as true. Treat them as possible truths.

EDIT: Let me add, that neither of us were in the right treating others like that, so I will accept that. Lets try to kill that.

Alright, I didn't want to do this but as my captcha says... zero tolerance. At least in this thread.

You partly confuse the general concept of a theory with the scientific meaning of theory. The "Laws of Gravity", "Laws of Thermodynamics" etc are still theories if it comes down to it, very well-proven ones that have so far been standing for decades and as such can be regarded as a working concept but it is still regarded a theory in scientific terms.
A scientific theory, as you rightly say, has evidence behind it and can be regarded as a truth but only until you find one single thing that clashes with the theory. Such is Gravity, should we happen to come across a single little spot on earth where things fall upwards and it would be scientifically sound it wouldn't matter a second if it was called a law, it would still be an old theory in need of reinterpretation.

Sometimes I feel like we should, just as an experiment, rename the theory of evolution to law of evolution and see how that influences the media.
The theory of evolution is not "highly discussed", it is as much discussed in a scientific manner as most other working models; though I could give you discussed in the media because they generally speaking haven't got much of a clue on most things.
Evolution has as much evidence behind it as is needed to make it a working model. It could be completely wrong, but so could gravity... you yourself say that one never accepts a theory as absolute.

On the topic of creationism:
Accepting the bible as evidence on the basis of being an old book would be a completely flawed logic. The Greek's mythological scriptures are much older but you don't see many people running around discussing Greek Creationism vs. Evolution. There is a plethora of religious creation stories, most of which involve one or more deities that existed before the existence of any existence and created something as complex as the universe and life in it which would mean they'd need to be even more complex than the thing they create which in turn would lead someone to think about how they came into existence.
Now, you could either explain this by infinitely ascending orders of mythical beings all creating less complex gods OR you can look at the <url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ockham%27s_razor>very-unlikely but still more likely than that theory of formation of amino acids and other carbon compounds, then constantly increasing in complexity in small steps over millenia until finally reaching the first multi-cell organisms.

This is why the Theory of Creationism can never be regarded as a scientific theory and should in fact not even be a legal sequence of words. Hell, even the Vatican accepts the Theory of Evolution over Creationism, if that's not convincing enough I don't know what is.

So, don't treat (scientific) theories as true but as the most likely and currently accepted view of how things work, so far not invalidated by elaborate and countless experiments and other theories. But please don't treat (scientific) laws as absolute truths either.

 

[Thedutchjelle]

Being a Biomedical sciences student the thing that grinds me the most are insane "diet" claims by nutritionists. Gillian McKeith with her "eat loads of green plants, the chlorophyll in the plants will oxygenate your blood through photosynthesis ". >< My brother, though not stupid, sometimes falls for the tricks, but then I have to explain to him why he's wrong and he usually trusts me.

I saw a commercial about a special shampoo (I think it was Panthene) with "special keratin amino acid ! ". Oh Really ? And what exactly IS a "special keratin Amino Acid ?". IT IS A PROTEIN DAMNED, NOT AN AMINO ACID !

A poster on the escapist told me about a cream for the face that was "reinforced with Deoxyribonucleic Acid ". Because slapping DNA on your skin will repair that DNA. Now we can live for ever, fuck you, telomeres ! Do you want to have wings ? Here, just put on some bird wing DNA on your shoulders !

What astonishes me is that they're allowed to lie like that.

And that Homeopathic lady posted earlier was simply amazing. Mentioning Einstein makes your claims 75% smarter.

Biomedical Sciences here to ;D 3rd year in my Bachelor now.

I believe I a similair advertisement to the one you mentioned. Some cream that was supposed to stop the aging by repairing the damage in the DNA. I facepalmed so hard I now write with the back of my head.

Lot of good points already raised on the first page of the thread. Basically, all bio-errors that everbody with a decent education shouldn't make bug me badly. I can forgive people not knowing a certain enzyme fucks with a certain substrate. But thinking Chihuahua's (those dogs)were made by crossing a rat and a small dog..

Also people who say "it tastes like chemicals" "this has chemicals in it" etc. EVERYTHING is a chemical. Water is. Oxygen is. Plastic is. All have chemical properties.

 

[Emperor Nat]

Regardless, let's not argue about that, because we'll likely get nowhere.

I don't... I... are you allowed to say that on the internet? I thought we were meant to shout insults and start a petty squabble that derails the entire thread. I mean... what do you do in this situation? Am I to question your sexuality and make crude remarks about your mother? Or... no, that doesn't seem right...

OT: In all seriousness, some of these posts are annoying to say the least.

I guess my only two are the whole "We only use 10% of our brains" thing, and claims that science disproves religion. The two are, as noted, different fields. The fact that you can explain how my body works, the composition of it all and how we as a species came into being does not preclude divine intervention in same.

Generally I see this as physics or biology. But hey, if you were an omnipotent, omniscient being... would you not make a clear set of rules by which things can run? I mean, that's sorta how programming works. You try to set everything up so that there's always a script ready to account for what the player is doing.

And now, obligatory comedy skit.

Angel 1: "Hey, these humans are building a telescope. It can see pretty far."
Angel 2: "What's the problem?"
Angel 1: "Our skybox is kinda crappy at the moment. A few little dots, that's all."
Angel 2: "Uh... humans like flowers, right? Copy-paste something in there."

 

[katsabas]

The fact that people actually promote the use of grapefruit juice in order to boost the effectiveness of medicine, including Viagra. What's even more disturbing is that shit like that gets published.

 

[Veylon]

Intergalactic, as it's used in fiction. It often gets dragged in when humanity's ten ships are shooting at ten ships from another species that lives a dozen light years down the road over the one system that's in between our homeworld and theirs. OMG! Intergalactic warfare!

This kind of exaggeration is like describing a schoolyard scuffle as a global crisis. Galaxies have billions of stars each. Inter- means there's more than one of these monstrosities involved. The scale of a conflict that could be accurately described as intergalactic would be so vast in time, scope, and resources that it's nigh impossible to imagine. Worlds would be seared or shattered, billions killed, fleets massacred, and that would just be the small moment-to-moment news.

 

[DJjaffacake]

The idea that all radiation will a)give you cancer, or b)turn you into some sort of mutant is pretty retarded. Ionising radiation, which is UV, X-rays, Gamma rays, Beta radiation and Alpha radiation can cause cancer (notice the emphasis on can). Of those, UV and X-rays are only likely to cause cancer if you're coming into contact with them a lot, and Alpha is only really an issue if you ingest it. Light is a form of radiation for fuck's sake, no one gets cancer from exposure to light.

 

[Maxy]

"Human beings only use 10% of their brains."

This one really bugs the crap out of me. I usually hear it said by 'experts' on late night tv who are trying to sell books to expand our memory or unlock our psychic potential or some such rubbish.

Human beings don't only use 10% of our brains, we only use 10% of our brains at any one time. The parts of our brains that are active while we are for instance, reading a book, are inactive or less active when we are listening to someone talk, singing a song, playing jump rope, etc.

The plus side to that one is that you can always look smugly at whoever says it to you and say, "Well, maybe you do."

On a slightly more serious note, I thought the truth behind that little factoid was that only 10% (or less) of our brain cells are neurons?

Neither are actually true. While our entire brain is never concurrently active we switch between modes while doing things so frequently that its hard to pin down a "%" active at any given moment, and as far as I know a maximum has not been determined. I'm know it is above 10% however. The myth started as most do with a off hand comment later taken out of context.

dunno about how much of your brain is active at any one time, but from vague recollections of what one of my neuro lectures was telling me they are beginning to think that it MAY be closer to 50/50? the other half being glial/support cells ie astrocytes, oligodendrocytes, microglia <- this ones technically not a glial cell. another fun (maybe...) fact, your cerebellum contains approximately the same number of neurons as the brain (this was also another little bomb our lecturer dropped)

 

[Rodrigo Girao]

When it comes to bad science, nothing infuriates me more than those ridiculous studies that try to pin health benefits to genital mutilation aka circumcision. Their methodology is always wrong, and they twist the numbers to get whatever result they want; they never mention its destructive side effects, well known since ancient times; and they never touch the ethical problem of performing an irreversible body modification on people who have not consented to it.