Allegro Music College Alice and Deb Dialogue Script

1- Go back to the 3.1.b The skeptic’s challenge at the beginning of this unit and read again the dialogue between Alice and Deb.

2- Imagine Deb and Alice meet again. Imagine, both have read/learn the same information you have read in this unit.

3- Create a new dialogue between them about what they (you) have learned. Each of them has to participate in the dialog for at least five times with something else than a yes/no answer) and the dialogue should incorporate concepts covered in this unit such as empiricism, realism, falsificationism, paradigm, etc…

Our starting point is the desire to arbitrate the following dispute that arises when Alice,
who has been reading A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking, is trying to explain
the exciting things she has learned about the Big Bang and the history of the universe to
her friend Deb.
Alice:
. . . and so one second after the Big Bang the temperature of the
universe was about ten thousand million degrees, which is about the
same as the temperature in the middle of the explosion of a nuclear
bomb.
Deb:
Do you really buy all that stuff? Don’t you think it’s a bit far-fetched?
Alice:
Of course I believe it, and I don’t think it is any more far-fetched than
the fact that this table we are sitting at is almost all empty space and
that it is made of atoms so tiny that millions of them could fit on the end
of a pin.
Deb:
Exactly, it is just as far-fetched and you are just gullible for believing it.
Alice:
But that is what science tells us.
Deb:
‘Science’ doesn’t tell us anything; scientists, people like you or me, tell
us things and like all people they tell us what is in their interest to tell
us.
Alice:
What do you mean?
Deb:
Isn’t it obvious? A used-car dealer will tell you that a car is a lovely little
runner with one previous owner because they want you to buy the car,
priests tell you that you must come to church so you can go to heaven,
because otherwise they would be out of a job, and scientists tell us all
that nonsense so we will be amazed at how clever they are and keep
spending taxpayers’ money on their research grants.
Alice:
Now you are just being cynical; First, I don’t think everybody lies or
make up stories to get what they want. I don’t, do you? Not everyone is
out for themselves you know. And second, I do personally experience
technological advances everyday, that are the result of scientific
discovery.
Deb:
And you are just being naïve; anyway, even supposing that scientists
really believe their theories, can’t you see that science is just the
modern religion?
Alice:
What do you mean?
Deb:
Well, if you were living five hundred years ago you would believe in
angels and saints and the Garden of Eden; science has just replaced
religion as the dominant belief system of the West. If you were living in
a tribe in the jungle somewhere you would believe in whatever creation
myths the elders of the tribe passed down to you, but you happen to be
living here and now, so you believe what the experts in our tribe, who
happen to be the scientists, tell us.
Alice:
You can’t compare religious dogma and myth with science.
Deb:
Why not?
Alice:
Because scientists develop and test their beliefs according to proper
methods rather than just accepting what they are told.
Deb:
Well you are right that they claim to have a method that ensures their
theories are accurate but I don’t believe it myself, otherwise they would
all come to the same conclusions and we know that scientists are
always arguing with each other, like about whether salt or sugar is
really bad for you.
Alice:
Scientific arguments have more to do with interpretation of the data,
and interpretation of the data could be unfortunately subjective to many
aspects, regional, cultural, backgrounds, etc.. And it takes time for
theories to be proven but they will find out eventually.
Deb:
Your faith is astounding – and you claim that science and religion are
totally different. They are both as you just said very subjective. The
scientific method is a myth put about by scientists who want us to
believe their claims. Look at all the drugs that have been tested by
scientific methods and pronounced safe only to be withdrawn a few
years later when people find out how dangerous they are.
Alice:
Yes but what about all the successful drugs and the other amazing
things science has done.
Deb:
Trial and error, that’s the only scientific method there is, it’s as simple
as that. The rest is just propaganda.
Alice:
Trial and error. I can’t believe you really said that; scientific theories,
like the Big Bang theory, are proved by many experiments and
observations, by many people working in different fields of science.
That is why we ought to believe them and that is what makes them
different from creation myths and religious beliefs.
Deb:
So you say but how can experiments and observations prove a
theory to be true?
Alice:
I suppose I don’t really know. But if experiments and observations
agree with the theory, how can you say the theory is not true?
Deb:
We need to keep learning and talking about this. It is very interesting.
In this dialogue, one of the characters challenges the other to explain why her beliefs,
which are based on what she has been told by scientists, are any better supported than
belief in angels and devils or the spirits and witchcraft of animistic religions.
Of course, there are lots of things that each of us believe that we cannot justify directly
our-selves; for example, I believe that large doses of arsenic are toxic to humans, but I
have never even seen any arsenic as far as I am aware, and I have certainly never
tested its effects.
We all believe all kinds of things to be the case because we rely upon what others,
experts in the subject) tell us directly or indirectly.
This is method of gaining knowledge is called: by Authority.
This method can be very biased and sometimes leads to grave error, however it is
indispensable to living our daily lives.
We simply must accept a large amount of information on the basis of authority, if
for no other reason than we often do not have the time or the expertise to check it
out firsthand.
Most of us believe that the Earth revolves around the Sun, that we as human beings
evolved from animals that were more like apes, that water is made of twice as much
hydrogen as oxygen, that diseases are often caused by viruses and other tiny
organisms, and so on. If we believe these things it is because the experts in our tribe
(the scientists) tell us them; in that way, the causes of our beliefs are of much the same
kind as those of someone who believes what the local witch-doctor tells them about,
say, the cause of disease being the witchcraft of another person.
We like to think that there is a difference between our beliefs and belief in witchcraft
nonetheless; if there isn’t then why do we spend so much money on modern drugs and
treatments when a few sacrifices or spells would do just as well?