Waitin' on a bus

While on the bus riding home form work last night, I had a though about how people shift over a bit when someone sits beside you. No doubt some psychological study says this is because of some personal space bubble, which makes people uncomfortable. But what does that mean? Does it mean people always will shift over, or are just more likely too? Does that mean they simply can not help moving over?

Science can not handle free choice. In fact, it seems that the technical scientific term for human free choice is "error". All scientific experiments have some measurement error, which is from inadequate interments. But part is also "unexplained error". An "arbitary" (non-determined) choice would be unexplainable by mechanistic science theory, and would be in that category of unexplained error. Part of my fear is that social science erodes and explains away free will. Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" series is a story of a society in which social sciences (understood as a sort of mathematics) are so advanced that they can predict the future. As they are developed, predictions become more accurate and closer to predicting individual actions. Of course, if you could truly predict individual actions, then that action can not be the product of a free choice.

So to maintain free will, science must always be incomplete. Even if there was one law of social science that was consistent, that would mean we didn't have free will. Of course this is totally different then physical science. Take Peter Forsberg, who word on the street says might be signing with the Sens. Now even if Forsburg signs, and if he ever gets a solid shot on goal without his ankle or groin giving out, two things might happen. Social science tells us that being in a new environment degrades skills, he might miss the shot. On the other hand he might make it, and this doesn't prove the social science claim wrong. But physical science says that if he hits the puck with the stick, it should transfer forward momentum. If the puck, say, passed right through the stick (even one time), we would instantly see the claim of science as somehow incorrect.

So there has to be a major difference between social science and physical science. I think its free will. But what how does science deal with it? We just called it "error". An interesting characterisation of human choice.

R. Paul Besco