Over the last week we have witnessed an interesting (of course convoluted and heated) debate in X between two heavy weights of social media and influence. The 800++ pound “gorilla” owner, executive chairman, and CTO of X Corp, Elon Musk, against Vice-President and Chief AI Scientist at Meta, Yann LeCun.

The theme? Science and the scientific method.

It all started after Musk posted:

Join xAI if you believe in our mission of understanding the universe, which requires maximally rigorous pursuit of the truth, without regard to popularity or political correctness.”

To which LeCun answered:

Interestingly, the conversation evolved toward a more “objective” question. ((Btw, to follow this kind on conversation in Elon Musk’s X is nearly mission impossible?). Let me cherry pick:

YLC: I’m a scientist, not a business or product person.
EM: What “science” have you done in the past 5 years?
YLC: Over 80 technical papers published since January 2022. What about you?

BasedJeffBezzoS: Guys we’re all on the same based AI team stop infighting 😭

YLC: Well, if it’s not published, it’s definitely not science.
EM: This is one of the dumbest things anyone has ever said 🤣🤣
YLC: You don’t seem to understand how research works.

To qualify as Science…

LeCun’s definition of science sparked a backlash. What is science?

As LeCun explains, scientists follow, or should follow, the scientific method of testing hypotheses using observation and experimentation. However, scientific methodology has not been systematically analyzed using large-scale data and scientific methods themselves.

This is exactly the question Alexander Krauss¹ addressed in a recent paper published (yes, published 🙂 ) in PNAS Nexus, on April 2024². The abstract clearly summarizes the question and the proposed answer:

Scientific, medical, and technological knowledge has transformed our world, but we still poorly understand the nature of scientific methodology. Science textbooks, science dictionaries, and science institutions often state that scientists follow, and should follow, the universal scientific method of testing hypotheses using observation and experimentation. Yet, scientific methodology has not been systematically analyzed using large-scale data and scientific methods themselves as it is viewed as not easily amenable to scientific study. Using data on all major discoveries across science including all Nobel Prize and major non-Nobel Prize discoveries, we can address the question of the extent to which “the scientific method” is actually applied in making science’s groundbreaking research and whether we need to expand this central concept of science. This study reveals that 25% of all discoveries since 1900 did not apply the common scientific method (all three features)—with 6% of discoveries using no observation, 23% using no experimentation, and 17% not testing a hypothesis. Empirical evidence thus challenges the common view of the scientific method. Adhering to it as a guiding principle would constrain us in developing many new scientific ideas and breakthroughs. Instead, assessing all major discoveries, we identify here a general, common feature that the method of science can be reduced to: making all major discoveries has required using sophisticated methods and instruments of science. These include statistical methods, particle accelerators, and X-ray methods. Such methods extend our mind and generally make observing, experimenting, and testing hypotheses in science possible, doing so in new ways and ensure their replicability. This provides a new perspective to the scientific method—embedded in our sophisticated methods and instruments—and suggests that we need to reform and extend the way we view the scientific method and discovery process.

So, is Science “a method”? Yes, but the method² —and fundamentally the tools (technology)— is only a means to augment our cognitive and sensory abilities, to extend our mind.

____________________

(1) Alexander Krauss is publishing interesting research using data about scientific discovery / production.

(2) Krauss, Alexander. ‘Redefining the Scientific Method: As the Use of Sophisticated Scientific Methods That Extend Our Mind’. PNAS Nexus 3, no. 4 (1 April 2024): pgae112. https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae112.