Chapter 16 - Conclusion
The concluding chapter to 'A Habit of Lies' argues that false reporting in science is commonplace and endemic. Such instances are not rare accidents or oversights but are deliberate, politcal acts designed to establish control. It argues that such behaviour will continue until the responsibilities of scientists, institutions and journals is made clearer in the form of published codes of practice.
16.1 Conclusions
16.2 What Should be done about the Cytoskeletal Model?
16.3 Authoritarianism in Science
16.4 Playing God in Science
16.5 Perhaps the Wave Model is Wrong?
16.6 Scientific Responsibility, Meaning and Subtext
16.7 Wish List
16.8 Closure
16.1 Conclusions
Evolutionary theory has it that communication is always exploited by deception. Communicators and deceivers then engage in an arms race as ever more sophisticated ways of detecting deceit are countered by improved deceptive tricks. More than any other species, humans deceive, all cultures containing deceit and responses to it, if only the self-defeating, self-deception of denial. Deceit in science is as common as in any other culture, possibly more given that the prevalent response is denial.
The types of scientific misrepresentation used seem to depend on the position of the deceiver in the social hierarchy. Responses to deception are equally variable and likewise depend on social position, with the deceptions characteristic of juniors being severely frowned upon, while those of seniors are condoned and legitimated by the organisations they control. Disregard of alternative views and suppression of dissent are examples of the condoned deceits that are unavailable to juniors but recurrent among senior figures. The exclusion of the wave model is best viewed as such a condoned deceit; manifestly a falsehood, it is nonetheless institutionalised as part of the field and endorsed by the organisations involved.
Two sets of issues arise from this situation. The first concerns the area of cell biology to which the wave model applies, the second the general practices of science, its philosophy, history, psychology, sociology, rules, values and administration. These issues were examined in the preceding chapters but the basic points should be reiterated. By critically rationalist criteria, the wave model is the best representation of the dynamic behaviour of cell surfaces yet presented. It is the only concept yet advanced that has a foundation in fundamental theory, it is refuted by no data, enjoys much supportive evidence and violates no general principle that could legitimately justify its dismissal.
The lipid flow model and other variants of the membrane flow model are wrong. Their axioms have been stated adequately, their predictions can be assessed fairly well and tests show them to be incompatible with observation. In any case, there never were any good grounds for proposing the flow model, which seemed an unlikely guess on general grounds.
The cytoskeletal model presents a different and much more troubling situation. It is not simply that anything resembling cytoskeletal fishermen could have been safely dismissed at the outset, it is worse than that. The authors of these ideas seem to shrink from anything remotely resembling an actual, testable mechanism. Yes, the cytoskeleton, made from the cell's muscle proteins, provides the primary engine of particle movement but that alone is a shallow insight and hardly a more testable mechanism than suggesting angelic hands as the motive force.
In terms of mechanism, the model's advocates offer a strange mixture of indifference to evidence, vagueness and uncommunicativeness. The model itself changes depending on the work in which it is described, or the observations needing to be explained. Once fudges have been added to get around contradictory data and postulates reformed to suit the exigencies of the moment, there is nothing left but vacuity. The resulting lack of clarity means it is simply impossible to derive any prediction, let alone one that might be susceptible to contradiction. Moreover, advocates of the cytoskeletal model combine their extremely vague ideas with very authoritarian social attitudes, so much so that, no matter what the evidence, belief has become compulsory. Their model is propagated in ways that are more usually associated with spiritual mythology than scientific theory. None of this advances science but it does seem to serve by protecting the reputations of the model's advocates and immunizing their ideas against contradiction.
This book described two mutually incompatible concepts wearing the name "the cytoskeletal model;" one of which is teleological, the other ridiculous. Two is one too many but the literature offers still more variations. Many workers view the cytoskeleton as a railway track with molecular trains running along it. For at least one other it is a "Darwinian machine." Space will not be given to describing these ideas, or the faults in them. Suffice it to say, they are neither the cytoskeletal model, as originally conceived, nor a significant improvement on it.
At its irreducible core, the cytoskeletal model says simply that "muscle type proteins" produce movement and force in non-muscle, as well as muscle, cells. Further, all these ideas seem to abandon any role for the membrane. The first sentence is hardly a penetrating analysis, the second is a poor judgement, but the author knows no other, unambiguous statement that could be added. The motile proteins of non-muscle cells certainly evolved into the actin and myosin of muscle and the evolvability criterion indicates that their modes of action will be similar. Like the proteins themselves, one mechanism should show signs of evolving from the other. However, the cytoskeletal models ignore the evolvability criterion and postulate activities for the cytoskeletal proteins wildly different from their behaviour in muscle. Still, braced with one immunising truss or another, attached to ever more improbable properties for its constituent parts, the cytoskeleton can "explain" anything. But the explanations have more in common with an article of religious faith or a political creed, than with scientific thought.
Comparing the cytoskeletal model with experiment is like holding water in a sieve, one simply cannot do it. To make sense of this idea one must shift one's perception and stop thinking of it as a scientific theory, viewing it instead as an ideology. Suddenly everything about it becomes clearer. In this role, its vagueness, its changeability and its unfalsifiability are no longer weaknesses, they have become strengths, serving to protect the elite whose interests this ideology encapsulates.
Not only do its properties and weaknesses become comprehensible but the role the flow model has played can now be seen in a new light. The Soviet newspaper Pravda, was noted for the lies and propaganda it published in support of communist ideology. However, sometimes, with party backing, it would publish dissent in the form of straw man articles. These presented arguments that they disagreed with the party line but were so obviously flawed they were no threat to it. The practice enabled the newspaper to pose as an organ of debate. More rational dissent, of course, was censored and could only be found in samizdat, the Russian underground press. The membrane flow model seems to have been an example of such officially sanctioned dissent in science. Always seen as absurd, the flow model placed the cytoskeletal ideology in no danger of losing a debate. The wave model is a different animal; the cytoskeletal ideology could not survive a contest with it, and its advocates would hazard their reputations and power if they took part in such a debate. Wherever possible, it is censored.
The cytoskeleton, as an organelle, is clearly a reality but, given the evidence reported in chapter 7, it is irrational and dogmatic to claim the ideas linked to it are established. The cytoskeleton has become transformed into a faith, as if its only role were to take upon itself whatever properties may be presently required by its champions. Yesterday the cytoskeleton pulls organelles around the cell, today it flows, tomorrow it is a network of railway lines with brownian trains running along it. Anything to explain the latest observation. The cytoskeletal model is, in Popper's phrase, a "self-annealing myth," or, as Flew (1975) said, it has suffered "death by a thousand qualifications." The field has a plethora of observations but evaluation consists merely of inventing ever more improbable new properties for the cytoskeleton. Busyness is preeminent over systematic analysis.
At one time, the cytoskeletal model might have been defended as a working hypothesis to be narrowed down as results came along. However, it has not been successfully modified and any such useful role is well behind it. The problem today is not how to adapt it but how to get rid of it. Misquoting Dorothy Parker, this model should not be tossed lightly aside, rather it should be thrown with great force. Others will claim to see continuing merit in it but they should state its axioms with sufficient clarity for testable predictions to be derived. They should provide four strands of information :-
- What the cytoskeletal model actually is. There are at least two, in fact several, different versions of it. Workers should either agree on what they are proposing or, if they disagree, present their separate proposals under different names. In all cases postulates should be stated clearly.
- Evidence or argument compelling belief in the cytoskeletal model(s), what some might call the smoking-gun observation. This means the core observations that can be explained by the favoured version of the cytoskeletal model but cannot be explained by other means. In other words, positive evidence for any metaphysical postulates. These critical observations seem absent.
- A response to the apparent disproofs of the cytoskeletal model. The now classic observations of lipids capping; the more recent observations by Theriot of particles moving much faster than the underlying cytoskeleton; the apparent conflict between cytoskeletal accumulations beneath patches taking 5-20 minutes, while particles begin to move within seconds of contacting the membrane. How these data (and the rest quoted in section 6.3) can be accommodated in the chosen version of the cytoskeletal model.
- Lastly, and this links in with number 2 above, the observations that negate the wave model.
Such explanations should be given by anyone claiming to be engaged in a critically rationalist, scientific debate. Readers of "A Habit of Lies" might like to read such information and certainly this book should conform with Protagoras' ideal, by laying out the arguments for and against the different models for comparison. These strands of information should be listed here but the author is unable to do so. Those who might provide that data evidently feel their arguments are too weak to be hazarded in debate or, possibly, have such elevated positions they do not notice the questions. The names and professional addresses of some workers who may be able to contribute are attached in appendix 1. Do ask them; if you receive a reply, please send a copy for collation and possible inclusion in any future editions of "A Habit of Lies".
The cytoskeletal model has survived, not as a result of rational debate, but because its advocates and inventors are gatekeepers. Despite the evidence, they teach this notion as if it were established fact. It has become a cognitive norm and scientific innovation deviating from it is not valued. The arguments against it are plain but treated as silly and childish. Clear, relevant questions are patronised and dismissed. The intended subtextual reading seems to be that the questioner is ignorant or foolish; a more sensible subtextual reading is that those questioned have no sensible reply to offer. Still, power can override reason and advocates of the wave model now work in other fields or not in science. They have lost their careers, grants or laboratories. Not only have its supporters been sanctioned, the wave model itself has been excluded from society like an Amish teenager, shunned for marrying outside the faith. Discussions of capping, whose direct and primary aim is to decide which model is correct, take place as if the wave model never existed. Reviews are written as if it were never proposed. These are exclusion, techniques of the type used by authoritarian regimes against dissenters. Still, the wave model is right and should not be so treated.
An alternative theory has been suppressed, despite possessing good evidential support, being advocated by well-qualified scientists and being founded on fundamental principles. Its exclusion shows how gatekeepers defend cognitive norms, which has nothing to do with logic or Merton's principles. The wave model was never some bizarre idea lacking evidence or argument, though even if it were, simply refusing to give reasons for dismissing it would still be unprofessional. Moreover, these men have access to the literature in which to articulate their opinions. Ignoring the wave model is not merely the exercise of academic freedom, or a pursuit of those experiments and theories that interest them. Its omission is a rhetoric act, in every way as deliberate and calculated as its inclusion would be, in every way as false as political propaganda that uses the same tactics. Rational scientific debate includes an obligation to report truthfully and a freedom to pursue individual interests in no way removes that duty.
However, workers in this field do not report truthfully. Even verbally or in letters, rather than acknowledging the real scientific issues involved, they simply choose other rhetoric tricks. One such tactic recurs, there is a strong tendency, explicitly or implicitly, to defer to "the field as a whole". Sheetz, for example remarks that the wave model has not been taken all that seriously. The passive tense, in response to requests for his own reasoning, implicitly cites the field as authority. There is, of course, no entity such as the field as a whole, it comprises only a few elite scientists, of whom he is one, that has formed a consensual view. The fact that he, like other members of his clique, is unwilling to disclose his reasoning, leaves behind it a strong suspicion that their group judgement is based largely on vested interests. This elite is the "field as a whole," and its members cannot defer to themselves as some higher authority. "The field as a whole," is an iron curtain phrase that serves to evade proper explanation.
Dialogue is always controlled but in scientific debate, power is abused when the control is such as to exclude competing viewpoints. This debate has indeed been so controlled and for senior, distinguished scientists to so behave suggests that they believe themselves immune from any response. Purposeful scientific debate requires a balance between freedom of expression, on the one hand, and control aimed at maintaining direction and purpose, on the other. A proper balance may be a matter of judgement but the capping field has displayed only totalitarian one-sidedness, which is no balance at all. This field has moved completely beyond scientific rationality and entered the realm of authoritarian control.
"(Scientists) have enjoyed acting the mysterious stranger, the powerful voice without emotion, the expert and the God." (Bronowski (1951))One of the greatest scientist-communicators of the post-war period, Jacob Bronowski is most remembered for the BBC TV series The Ascent of Man, the title deliberately contradicting that of Darwin's book The Descent of Man. To the immense but ephemeral impact of the TV programme was added the lesser but more lasting influence of a book of the same name (Bronowski (1973)), which reached out through time and space to persuade Pratkanis and Aronson (1991).
Bronowski was a man who thought deeply about the nature of things, a scientist, a philosopher, and also a Jew. For such a man, who lived through that period of history, prejudice and bigotry were aspects of life bound to cause him pause but he found science to offer a more constructive influence. He was struck by Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, the law stating that nothing can ever be measured with absolute precision. In engineering parlance, there is a certain tolerance in measurements. He liked the word tolerance for its social as well as engineering meaning and chose it to recast Heisenberg's principle into one of his own, a Principle of Tolerance, whose application he extended into the social domain. To Bronowski, tolerance of differences of opinion or nature among people was as important and necessary as tolerance in engineering.
Certainty, he said, was the prerogative of God and men claiming certitude place themselves in the role of God. Bronowski knew that men cannot actually take the position of a God but they can arrogate to themselves the trappings of God-like omniscience and certainty - they can act the God, or Play God in words the author once considered as a title for this work. The phrase Playing God, as generally used, means making arbitrary decisions. In science such behaviour is unacceptable and effectively elevates the individual concerned above the scientific process itself. Only by recognising human uncertainties can we see ourselves, other people and other ideas for what they are. For progress, we actually need diversity and dissent and only by tolerating differences can that be achieved.
For Bronowski, the Jew, there could be only one place to demonstrate the evils of intolerance. Outside Auschwitz, near the gas chambers of that awful place, there is a shallow pond into which the ashes of its victims were discharged. The mud of this pond is formed, quite literally, from the bodies of those who died and were incinerated there. Bronowski waded into the pond, reached down into the mud and scooped up a handful. He allowed the ashes, even of his own family, to filter through his fingers and fall back into the mud from whence he had drawn them. "I beseech you," he said, "from the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be wrong." The quote is from Cromwell, from Bronowski the words were a prayer for tolerance to which it behooves us to listen.
Allied wartime propaganda depicted Germans as evil and the discovery of camps like Auschwitz offered powerful support to the prejudices generated by that portrayal. Following the war, much psychological research was conducted, aimed at delineating those facets of the German character leading to their persecution of Jews, gypsies, the mentally ill and anyone else seen as an obstacle to Hitler. The work, much of it carried out by Jewish scientists, indicated that this evil was not a product of the German character at all, it was a product of the human character. There is not the slightest doubt that, subjected to the same environment of paranoia, prejudicial propaganda and official coercion, every race and nation on earth would have acted as the Germans did.
At today's distance in time, thoughtful people do not think the German people more evil than others. Evil and good do not divide mankind into good races and bad races, or even into good and bad people. Good and evil, right and wrong, truth and falsity, divide all men through their souls. This simple fact has serious implications. The triumph of good cannot be ensured by killing bad men (or Jews, or black men, or Germans, or Catholics or Protestants) and then populating the world with the good survivors; thoughtful people do not believe that. Neither can the triumph of right be ensured by appointing a "good" man to an important post and then saying to him "you now have the power, do what is right!" Far too many thoughtful people propose such solutions and they are wrong. Hitler was just one of the dictators to take power this way.
It is always tempting to "resolve" important and controversial matters of public concern by appointing a "good" man on terms that well-nigh annoint him with the mantle of Godhood. In science, despite the conflict with well known and established logical principles, God playing and God making are endemic practices. Scientific gatekeepers are routinely appointed on terms that virtually invite them to conceal their processes, and that is wrong. How scientific beliefs are formed is vital to knowing their reliability, which is why in science, as in government or law, codes of practice matter and why checks and balances are necessary.
The reader might criticise "A Habit of Lies", it is hoped he will, after this author can be wrong, like anyone else. It is possible that the wave model itself is in error. It is possible, though exceedingly unlikely, that the cytoskeleton really does work like a little conveyor belt under the membrane. However, this book levels no charge of error against the establishment, it is other charges that matter. Even if cell waves were irrelevant, even if cytoskeletal flow were proved right tomorrow, the charges surrounding intolerance would stand. The legal profession, with a much longer history than science, has established the principle that it is not enough that justice be done, justice must be seen to be done. Just so, and in science it is not enough that true solutions are found, knowledge claims should be seen to be correct. It is not enough that a scientist himself knows, or believes he knows, the reasoning that leads to his truth. His arguments must be available to all, especially to those who might disagree. Scientists must face the discipline of counter-argument. As John Stuart Mill put it (in On Liberty)
assuming that the true opinion abides in the mind, but abides as a prejudice, a belief independent of, and proof against, argument - this is not the way in which truth ought to be held by a rational being. This is not knowing the truth. Truth, thus held, is but one superstition the more, accidentally clinging to the words which enunciate a truth. ..... Even in natural philosophy, there is always some other explanation available of the same facts; some geocentric theory instead of heliocentric, some phlogiston instead of oxygen; and it has to be shown why that other theory cannot be the true one: and until this is shown, and until we know how it is shown, we do not understand the grounds of our opinions.A century before Popper, Mill, a non-scientist, understood the need to address alternatives, yet even today professional scientists still ignore it. For progress, science depends upon innovation, which in its turn depends upon diversity of opinion existing and being permitted. Then, and only then, can the ideal of Protagoras, Aristotle and so many others be fulfilled, the ideal of conflicting opinions being laid down side by side so that onlookers can compare one to the other on their merits.
Whether surf-riding is right or wrong, this book is the one place where, so far as possible, these conflicting opinions are laid down side by side. This author may not know all the arguments and has doubtless made a bad job of presenting the case for the other side, after all, that case is not admitted. But from all the mountains of paper the field has generated, some things are entirely unacceptable: the secrecy surrounding reasoning, the God-like certainty with which the establishment present their conclusions as authenticated fact, the indifference to enquiry and complaint and the ostrich-like apathy of the scientific institutions. It is extremely probable that the establishment are wrong but, though their error is palpable, that is no crime. Charges of incompetence, falsity, prejudice, censoriousness, propaganda and intolerance, of generally displaying "A Habit of Lies", are less easy to dismiss. The crucial accusation is that of falsity. If the omissions were to be justified rationally; if possibilities were described as historically they are; if the missing debate were to be finally embraced, this could rebut criticism. However, it is no longer believable that this will happen, or that a worthwhile rebuttal really exists.
The concept of subtext (section 13.5) explains how a statement can be literally true, yet misleading. It has serious implications for ideas such as truth and responsibility. A description can be literally true but so worded as to cause the reader to interpolate false conclusions. Many people, government officers for example, become very adept at such deception. They become economical with the truth, fail to mention inconvenient facts or encourage convenient misapprehensions in others. In the capping field, the omission of the wave model from discussion creates for those who know of it, the interpolated but false conclusion that it has been eliminated. Others, who do not already know of the wave model, derive the conclusion that only two models have ever been proposed. All workers draw false conclusions, though they do so in slightly different ways. Most of the falsehoods they read in derive from the subtext of the articles, and is amplified by its repetition into the teeth of requests for explanation.
There also seems to be much subtextual meaning in the correspondence received from the scientists themselves. The letter from Maddox, quoted in section 10.5, did attempt to address the questions raised but was very unsuccessful. None of the others reply at all, at least not in the text of their letters. The real message is relegated to subtext, to be inferred by anyone so disposed. The reader is invited to go back to these letters, either in the body of "A Habit of Lies", or its internet appendix and consider the subtextual interpretation he would place upon them. "I do not intend to cooperate in this dialogue," is a polite way of phrasing it. "Don't bother me with all this silliness!" is less polite but still accurate.
It seems that these workers are very antagonistic towards the wave model and would prefer to be rid of it. A rational way to gain that objective would be to show it that it is rubbish and giving a killing rebuttal of it. However, they are not capable of doing so and instead, the tactic chosen is to ignore it, which places their claim about the wave model's inadequacy in subtext. One is reminded of Pinker's (1994) comments, when he explained that the convoluted phrasing of contracts arises from the underlying antagonism between the parties and is designed to avoid the subtextual content of plain speech. In its ideals scientific debate does not involve hostility but, in practice, it is an inescapable fact that science, like law, is adversarial.
It is important to recognise adversarialism as a fact of scientific life, a fact which leaves hardly more reason to expect cooperation in scientific communication than is seen in litigation. It is damaging to adopt administrative procedures that are based on an idealised fantasy of rational debate, rather than the practical reality of adversarial conflict. (Here the MRC's "trust" in the integrity of the scientific community might come under scrutiny.) The law has other responses to this problem besides the convoluted prose of contracts, and one of the simplest is the creation of a general but explicit duty to communicate. In law, witnesses are obliged to answer questions, while lawyers are prohibited from concealing relevant information, even if they believe the other side may benefit from it. For the same reason, there should be a professional duty to communicate in science.
Scientific papers should not leave important subtextual messages to be inferred by readers. Journals do not need to be as unreadable as contracts, leaving some subtextual traces is inevitable and normally quite harmless. It is when the contentious meaning, implications or reasoning of a paper is in subtext, especially if it is at odds with the article's literal meaning, that fraud becomes a possibility and a duty exists to clarify the situation. If a scientist is unwilling to take a leaf out of the lawyers book and put his arguments in plain text, the presumption must be that he has no evidence to justify his claims.
This situation also places a duty at the door of journals. The principle of "daylight and fairplay" espoused by Toulmin (1972), or the due process of a courtroom, are the same as the declaration made by the European Convention on Human Rights, "The public has the right to be properly informed". It is not good enough that some anonymous referee can be found to give a private nod. Scientific papers should be actually true, not merely in some literalist translation of its words but also in the natural subtextual interpretations that will be placed upon it. If a published paper is materially misleading, the journal's duty is plain, it should correct the offending paper.
Here also the ethics of terminology and the nature of meaningful dialogue is relevant. During communication there is a duty to respect the conventional meanings of words, or to explicitly define them if ambiguity might arise. There is also a duty to ask and address real questions and deliver straight answers. For a formalised statement of the meanings of the italicised terms the reader is referred to Jardine (1991).
"A Habit of Lies" has two, perhaps three, main jobs, the most important of which is to make the case for the wave model, to serve as its advocate. This author cannot be objective enough to know how well it succeeds but feedback is welcome, many improvements have been wrought from the comments of others, including those who disagree. If the reader has persisted to this point, it is hoped he will feel a substantial case has been made, have some sympathy for it, and want to see, or offer, a rebuttal. The second major role of "A Habit of Lies" is to present a perspective on the scientific process which is under- represented in writings on scientific philosophy. It is a broadly social perspective, previously championed by social scientists, but one that may gain some weight from this example. It is the perspective of seeing scientific theories, not just as approximations to reality, but also as societal constructs subject to all the deviations from rationality to which this leads. Thus, "A Habit of Lies" might contribute to the philosophy and sociology of science. Finally, it is hoped the work may serve as a precedent and offer some help to other scientists who find themselves in a similar predicament.
You, the reader, may or may not agree with those objectives and views will vary as to how well they are achieved. Should you disagree with its aims or arguments, you are urged to articulate that disagreement and point out the particulars in which the work fails. If you sympathise and would like to do a little to help, here's how. What follows is a list of ways other people could help to improve matters. It is a list of things the author feels are needed in "A Habit of Lies" but which are absent for one reason or another. Other contributions may occur to you, please make any suggestions that come to mind.
- Replies from advocates of the cytoskeletal model, as indicated in section 16.2. If you feel able to put the case for the cytoskeletal models, or even the flow model, please take up your pen.
Some photographs. The photographs of waves presented in "A Habit of Lies" are copyright either to the authors of the original papers or the journals in which they were published. These can be legally used in fair comment criticism but it would be nice to have others with copyright. Should a reader have similar pictures they can offer with copyright, it would be nice to hear from them.
Codes of practice. It is very difficult to establish what institutions believe their ethical standards should be. Accordingly, "A Habit of Lies" needs exemplars of how institutions claim they expect their staff to behave, particularly any code that carefully addresses and defines scientific malpractice or falsehood. If you know an institutional code on this, no matter whether staff work on capping, the document would exemplify expected norms.
Finally, bearing in mind that chapter 7 is the pivotal chapter in this work, any suggestions the reader can offer to make its argument more compelling will be welcomed. For example, there are rumours of amoeboid eukaryotic cells swimming without contact with a substrate. This is an observation best interpreted using waves and a section on it should have been included. The author believes such reports and observations exist but searches have uncovered no papers on the subject. If you know of any, please let me have the references.
At times, people have a duty to bear witness to what they have seen and experienced, to give their testimony. "A Habit of Lies" is both a testament from the author and a reflection of the strength of his feelings. It is hoped the weight of those convictions have not clouded the argument being presented.
Every book must end and some things will always be left out. It would have been good to review social aspects of science more fully as there is a shortage of down to earth work. Purely academic reports tend to lose their message in the detail and often seem too distant in time, or concept, from modern science to greatly influence perceptions in the laboratory. Many other images of science are purely celebratory, being drawn from the rose-tinted memoirs of successful but retired gatekeepers. Less committed examinations, by people with direct experience of scientific practice, are rare but much needed. Such a study would take "A Habit of Lies" yet further into psychology, sociology, sociobiology, political science and the history and philosophy of science. One could easily double its length while only scratching the surface. In particular, a search of cognitive psychology and anthropology for links between social hierarchy, perception and learning, and a discussion of the sociology of conflict, would have been highly relevant. In a personal testament one must draw a line and, if ever written, this will be elsewhere.
In this electronic age, there is no reason for a book to be a static document. Two previous versions of this one, entitled "Cap That!" and numbered 1.0 and 1.1, were distributed to people and institutions concerned. This edition is completely rewritten and numbered version 2.0 but it is the first with the new title "A Habit of Lies". The facts and arguments remain much the same, though both the presentation and the author's knowledge have developed. Further changes are likely as events unfold.
Capping has been an influential field and concern must be expressed not just with the money it spends but also its wider effects. There will, I suspect, be some attempt to sideline capping and particle movement as topics but relevant studies will go on, if only because cell motility is too important an area to close down. To minimise the impact of false ideas, it is hoped that "A Habit of Lies" will be read by practising scientists, who will become reticent about allowing their own fields to be guided by opinions and "conclusions" from this area. It is hoped, especially, that the book will be read by students, both in cell biology and other fields. To them it delivers a general message - lecturers and textbooks on science teach positive facts about the world, a style of teaching that can produce a false impression of knowledge. Books and lecturers are not to be blamed, their positive style abbreviates things, enabling more to be taught. Even so, all the facts and theories you learn arise as the apex of a pyramid of negation, just one of which, assigned wrongly, renders the positive facts worthless. Indeed, an erroneous dogma can be worse than worthless and mislead the learner into following mistaken directions. It is, therefore, instructive to look into some of the negatives underlying learning.
Students of cell biology today are taught about the cytoskeleton and how it does everything, apart from cook breakfast. Most are taught about capping and particle movement, and probably that the cytoskeleton does it, that is a positive fact. The message of "A Habit of Lies" is that in this they have been taught a false dogma, something worse than nothing at all. The "negation" of the wave model is one of the negatives to look into. Students, and all readers, are reminded that they can contribute to the pyramid of negation that should be cell biology. If you have the opportunity, ask about the reasoning underlying the negation of the wave model. Ask your teachers or anyone else who seems suitable. There is a gap here, anything you learn may help fill it and contribute to science. If you receive a rationalist reply, let it be known and reported. "A Habit of Lies" is not fixed in tablets of stone, nor can it be. It is a document with one large piece missing, the reply, the rebuttal, from those claiming to know better. Its completion requires the rejoinder to the wave model.
There is my truth, now tell me yours. (Nietzsche)
© Copyright John A Hewitt.
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Last Modified 23 October 2005