All I have to do is to forget what pomo really is, believe pz's authority, and be a post-modernist, I guess.ianfc wrote:Rehabilitated post-modernism I guess http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/ ... ent-689225
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PZ Myers
10 September 2013 at 9:11 pm (UTC -5)
OK, guys, you really need some help here. For example:
heat albumin to 100 degrees centigrade in a solution of phosphate buffered saline with beta mercaptoethanol at 1 atmosphere, it’s non-covalent bonds will dissociate.
That’s true. That’s a fact. Proteins have measurable, quantifiable properties. There are some wacky postmodernists out there who’ll try to argue with that, but most won’t. Instead, they’ll ask you,
What does it mean? What is the context? What is the purpose of dissociating non-covalent bonds in that molecule? What is the framework of knowledge in which that fits?
Most scientists are comfortable with the distinction between data and information (I think). You’ve plopped out a datum. Fine. Now explain why.
I get this all the time with students. You can give them a recipe to follow out of a lab cookbook, and they can follow it and it works fine, most of the time. When it doesn’t, they’re lost, because they don’t understand the mechanism, the theory, the whole big background of solutes and solvents, dissociation constants, the interactions between salts and pH and temperature, that whole massive edifice of scientific knowledge behind your simple statement that you take completely for granted.
That’s postmodernism. Wake up and notice all your assumptions.
If you’re a good scientist, you’re practicing postmodernism all the time
I'm sure that he knows this subject every bit as well as he understands power dynamics in society.
Was mindless gibberish his goal, or just what an ignorant fool does when he pretends to understand when he's clueless?
Anyway, I can't really fault him in this, driveling irrelevancy appears to suit him well.