What is science?

[MarcusA]

All the information in science is filtered by our senses is all I know.

[billy rubin]

all of reality is filtered by your senses, marcus.

unless your thoughts are part of reality

[Asmodean]

Yes. In fact, that information is converted into human-relatable types through the very same senses. (As in: the theory is written by humans) Those can fail, of course, which is why we seek to agree on certain concepts. For example, how do you know that what you see as blue, I also see as blue? Well, you can rely on numbers. If "everyone" says "blue," while one person says "yellow," you may want to err on the side of blue. Or you can do a spectrum analysis, convert the colour into numbers, representing wavelengths, then see if it has sufficiently short waves to constitute something within the blue spectrum.

Whatever the case, it may be just as well to go for a "lesser" investigation most of the time. After all, you don't always need the perfect model of reality - just good enough for the purpose will do. To put it thusly; if all you want is to design a car, then Newtonian mechanics will get you there and probably quicker than the more precise/comprehensive theories. Or, in reference to the above example, if something being blue or not doesn't really matter to something else, then we may just agree that that there *point* is blue, while this here *point* is not and leave it at that.

The issue then is only what happens when you are proven wrong. My approach is to change my model of reality accordingly. Is the sky demonstrably green? Then green it is - until an even better model shows up.

[billy rubin]

yes. to the navajo the sky is green, i believe.