SCIENCE
Science itself might rightly be thought of as humanity’s greatest invention. Everything that wasn’t invented by accident—and many things that were—are products of science
Science doesn’t have all the answers and scientists are just as fallible as everyone else. But the Scientific Method is a rigorous methodology with a high burden of proof. The oversight provided by the Peer Review Process means that mistakes invariably get caught and corrected.
Don’t you wish we could say the same about our political and economic systems?
The Scientific Method
The Scientific Method seeks to prove or disprove a theory by testing if reality matches the theory’s predictions—not just once, but many times. It has a built-in feedback loop to continually iterate and improve the theory until its predictions are accurate. When scientists are ready to share their findings, they present them in a standardized format—a scientific paper—for review and publication. A paper will usually mention how certain the scientists are of their findings and suggest further experiments that they or other researchers might conduct.
The Peer Review Process
The Peer Review Process involves multiple experts in the same field evaluating the methods, results and analysis set out in the paper. These experts are expected to catch any mistakes before it enters the public record. Often there will be multiple papers on a subject, each with different theories and conclusions—perhaps each based on incomplete data. But the open sharing of ideas and data usually (eventually) leads towards a unified answer.
Scientific consensus arises when a lot of scientists reach the same conclusions based on evidence from a variety of sources.
Optimalism will use a decision-making process that takes the best features of science and then democratizes it:
Everyone is welcome to take part in researching problems and proposing solutions
Decisions will be based on large amounts of unbiased, verifiable real world data, as well as the most current models and the most accurate simulations possible
All methods, data and analysis will be made public and be subject to review by a diverse pool of experts
Proposed courses of action will include predictions and a plan to verify that the outcomes are as expected
When there is consensus among the experts and stakeholders, the public will be informed of the plan and given the opportunity to object or suggest an alternative
Otherwise, the public are encouraged to research things they care about, to make proposals and to vote directly on alternate courses of action, when more than one is scientifically reasonable
If a solution doesn’t turn out as expected, it will be adjusted or abandoned, as appropriate