Excerpt from Dr. Narendra Dabholkar’s Scientific Temper 2

Excerpt from Dr. Narendra Dabholkar’s Scientific Temper 2

English Translation – Dr. Vivek Monteiro

Now before going into details about what defines scientific temper, to explain in simple language, if one has to say in a single sentence, what is scientific temper, then this is it – “As much belief as there is evidence for”. This means that we use scientific temper ourselves to live our daily lives. For example, you want to go to Armori, you are posed with the question- ‘Where in Gadchiroli district is the village of Armori located, and how to reach there?’ So you ask someone ‘Tell me, I have to go to Armori and how do I get there?’. To which he replies-‘ You go thus, this way, you will reach Armori’. To which you ask, ‘How do you know?’, He replies- ‘Six months back I had a dream about going to Armori, and that’s how I reached there’. And then you asked the same question to another person, and he replies ‘ If you go thus, and thus you will reach Armori.’ And you ask him ‘How do you know?’ And he says “Two months back I was at the ST bus stand, and I overheard somebody telling his companion that this is the route by which he had gone to Armori. I am telling you what I remember now.” So you ask a third person what is the route to Armori and he tells you another way. And you ask him ‘How do you know? He replies  “ A month back, my friend went and returned from Armori by this route.” And then, when you ask a fourth person the way to Armori, he replies giving details of the entire route. And when you ask, this is fine, but how did you know that this is the route to reach Armori?, to which he replies “ I had some urgent work to do at Armori, and so four days back I went to and came back from Armori by this route.”

Now you tell me, for going to Armori, out of these four versions which one would you consider most believable and which one the least? You would least believe the man who had visited Armori in his dream six months back. The person who heard someone narrating to his friend the route at the bus stand would be more credible. You would have more faith in the person whose friend had actually visited Armori, as compared to the second, but still with some doubts. But the person who himself had visited Armori by a definite route, you would believe him the most. Which means “As much belief as there is evidence for”, this principle which we employ in our everyday practice, this is the core of the ‘Scientific attitude”.