Feynman was admittedly not an average physicist. I noticed, in fact, that Nova had subtitled their documentary "The Greatest Genius Since Einstein?" Still, I think his attitudes were typical of many of those who do really good work in the physical (and biological) sciences.

In article <2dhbfn$c9v@pandora.sdsu.edu> dwahlgre@sunstroke.sdsu.edu (Dennis Wahlgren) writes:
> 'Truth' seems to be a word to be avoided. Science has the task of discovering
> empirical relationships. Remember, nothing is proven. We merely look for
> covariations in phenomena, and the important part is the reliability and
> validity of these relations. These latter two define 'truth.'

This is certainly a sophisticated point of view, guaranteed to win one points with philosophers of science. The only thing I wonder is... Why would anyone bother?

Well, it's a living, I guess. Beats working at the 7-11. But to the extent that psychologists actually have this attitude, it certainly explains why their ambitions for their research are so modest, as it seems to me.

Feynman certainly never thought of himself as merely looking for correlations between variables. He was driven by a compelling curiosity, a desire to find out what makes the world work. (I was struck in watching the Nova episode how often he referred to "the world" or "nature" as the subject of his interest, rather than merely physics.)

One of the reasons I so much liked Steven Rose's book The Making of Memory --- from Molecules to Mind was that his research, and that of many other neuropsychologists, seems driven by that same desire to understand --- how the mind works, in this case. But in many of the other areas of psychology there just don't seem to be scientists with this driving curiosity.

In article <grohol.756452323@alpha> grohol@alpha.acast.nova.edu (John Grohol) writes:
> Lee Lady writes:
>
> "NLP does not claim to be developing a scientific theory of psychology."
>
> Then why do you insist on cluttering up sci.psychology with NLP
> techniques and the like?
>
> Sci.psychology is for the purpose of discussing the science of
> psychology and psychological theory. If NLP has nothing to offer on this
> topic, then why post to this newsgroup??
>
> I wouldn't have even bothered to point this obvious discrepancy out, save
> for the fact I get tired of reading every decent psychology discussion
> turn into a debate on NLP techniques...

Here is somebody who talks a lot about being "scientific" and yet who is complaining because somebody is giving him the opportunity to learn something. Because the something in question is outside the Approved Curriculum, outside that little circle of things which has been marked off as all he is allowed to pay attention to.

Here is a person for whom being "scientific" consists not of extending his curiousity to the widest possible realm of investigation, but rather of making one's focus as narrow as possible.

And I can't keep myself from thinking that this attitude tends to characterize mediocre scientists, whose way of advancing their ideas and their theories is by doing their best to put down the ideas of others rather than by doing outstanding work themselves.

In article <97750@cup.portal.com> Elise-Swope@cup.portal.com writes:
> In numerous articles Lee_Lady has made some rather disparaging remarks about
> the science of psychology as a whole because of the failure of scientists
> and practitioners alike to embrace NLP.

This is certainly a revealing comment as to this person's attitude toward science. Here is someone for whom learning about NLP doesn't mean looking through a few books, seeing if there are any ideas or phenomena which one might be able to use (probably in transformed form) as starting points for scientific research.

Instead, here scientific ideas are seen as something to be "embraced," as if one were converting to a religion or entering into a monogamous relationship.

Contrast these attitudes with the story of Feynman and a friend spending a whole evening breaking spaghetti to try and figure out why the sticks always break into three pieces rather than two.

This same sort of intensive, all encompassing curiosity, and a drive to really understand how the mind works, is one of the striking characteristics of Richard Bandler. Abhorrent though much of his personal life has been (at least in the past) and much as one might deplore his tendancy to shoot from the hip and make statements for which he has little support of any kind (especially when standing in front of an appreciative seminar audience), it beats the hell out of me how any psychologist can claim to take himself seriously as a scientist and not want to find out at least a little about the remarkable ideas of Bandler and the various NLPers who have made more recent contributions to the development of NLP.

I believe that most people who know me consider me a fairly considerate person. But to me, the annoyance that I cause to a few people who don't want their illusions about science challenged is far outweighed by the potential good that can be done by letting psychologists know about the ideas of NLP and especially by facilitating the possibility of some serious academic research on NLP. That's precisely why I put so much effort into posting these articles in a sci group where they will be read critically and not in some alt group where most of the responses will say "Gee, man, that's really groovy. I believe it."