The end of science

[Phovos]

It's possible that we'll reach the edge in some forms of science, but all science? As long as there's someone smart enough to carry it on, I think it'll survive as long as we do.

[acousticbox]

I'm not well versed in the scientific field and the following statement could be perceived as dumb and a bit uneducated. When I saw the movie Lucy and how she began to determine that humans created a framework in which it limited the scope of perception they had on the world as an intriguing thought process. Mathematizing everything around us could only bring us so far. Again, I know I drew this from a really crappy sci-fi flick, but just the romantic idea that there is some inconceivable way of perceiving the world around us gets me wondering.

[Universalism]

When only considering the evolution of scientific knowledge in and of itself, I would say that it has no bound. Everything I have seen in life implies to me that life is a continual and unending process, from day-to-day sights and activities to the fact that the universe is constantly expanding. New things are always bound to happen, and subsequently they shall be discovered.

Of course, in reality there are many more complicated factors to consider. For example, the relation of growth in scientific knowledge with human evolution. It is possible that we could reach a point when we had discovered everything we possibly could in our current evolutionary state, and we would have to transcend into a new one to be able to comprehend anything higher.

Additionally, scientific discoveries have consequences, both intended and unintended. These are difficult for humanity to grapple with. While I am an optimist and I hope everything will work out, it is possible that humanity could annihilate itself with the consequences of its own knowledge if its ethical and spiritual maturity does not develop at a sufficient rate in relation to its scientific maturity.

[Lady Littlepaws]

Lilith Galaxy

I think we will come to realize that science and many of it's glorious inventions it has brought us has actually brought a lot of harm too. I think we will, if we aren't eliminated before then either at our own hand or natures, evolve to realize that life is more than having an iphone. Science I feel, has already reached it's peak, and is beginning it's decline. A clear example of this is the mass amount of people who are rejecting many of modern medicine's practices. There are a great deal of folks who are going back to natural remedies and treatments. People don't want the latest scientific cleaning formula, they want lemon and vinegar. Things like vaccines that were once hailed will eventually be phased out from lack of willing participants and new research that will eventually conclude they cause mutation and hinder our evolution. As will most pharmaceutical drugs. Science can only be as perfect as the human who is utilizing it. People are realizing that science, as great as it is, is not better than nature. Science will never know what it knows. It will never be able to really do what it can do. At one point formula was the latest and greatest in science, far better than breastmilk. But that too, we are realizing is wrong, and we are shying away from "science" from GMOs and chemicals, and preservatives. People don't really want "the latest and greatest" science can offer, they want the farthest thing from it. I think people are starting to look at science as a monster that was once seemingly great, and has now gone out of control to threaten every aspect of our lives. If science is too reach a peak, then this is definitely it, and I would expect to see a fall of the scientific community in the coming years.

We haven't even discovered teleportation, perfected gene therapy or engineered spacecrafts for trans-dimensional travel but you claim that we've already reached our limits?

Humans are inherently curious creatures that are driven towards progressing and exploring, despite the risks they're faced with - do you think our ancestors kept tucked away in their caves all day, munching on beetles instead of going out and contesting with predators for bigger, meatier prey?

I don't know about you, but I don't really want to reach my 80s and still be living with curved TVs, XBox kinects and gimicky "3D" goggles.

[Incuboss]

At some point, technology will become so advanced that human life will no longer have an expiration date. We will either have invented and understood a way to control nano-bots into our own bloodstreams that will continuously renew our life expectancy, keeping us alive for almost infinitely times more than how long we live today. If stemcell research gets passed and we get the okay to begin to use that for regenerative growth research, we may be that much closer to "immortality" if you will. We will be able to rebuild our bodies from traumatizing damage, such as limb loss, cancer, loss of functionality in some organs. Some people also believe that we may have our own legacy, our minds and souls, if you will, implanted into bodies pre-determined to last forever. Such as cybernetic bodies, robots, even uploaded into computer mainframes. Automated intelligence is one way that we could, persay, beat the trials of time. But on that same note, others would argue this is no longer humanity, as we have shed our bodies and replaced them with machines. I'm on the side of regeneration, and maybe less painful nano-bots. However, I don't see it happening even in the next millennium.

[Bubblehead0987654321]

I don't think science will ever be done. There is still much more to be discovered, are aliens true, what other planets are out there, what are ALL the creatures in the ocean and on earth, and much more. If we were to run out, someone would still be able to revise theories. For example, someone may find another species related to us back then that we could have evolved from, we may have closer DNA to other animals then we think. I mean, scientists have actually proven the big bang theory wrong, what else can they do? Only time, the people, the technology, and wherever that path leads, we will know.

[PUSS KING]

Not going to happen in a long, long time.

In my field, microbiology, you often hear statements such as 'the Type 3 Secretion System is expressed in about half of all bacteria". Except, it's not all bacteria. Humans have cultured less than one percent of bacterial species. The T3SS, a structure considered ubiquitous for all intents and purposes, has only been demonstrated in around a two-hundredth of bacterial species. Even in our tiny sample we're constantly amazed by the variety: magnetosomes, electricity-metabolising species, extremophiles. There is yet mountains of new information we never even dreamed of out there.

And it takes DECADES to fully research these things sometimes. The TAT (Twin-Arginine Translocation) secretion pathway is a pretty exciting find in microbiology and was discovered near my own labs. It was discovered eleven years ago. So far, we have a vague idea of what it might do, that it changes size and that it's ludicrously energetically inefficient. Everything else: it's assembly, it's molecular kinetics, it's transcription, pathways in involves, how it detects substrates and why it even exists if it's so costly* remain mistifying to us after a decade.

And that's just one tiny, tiny subtopic of one area of one subject. Science will never truly 'run out'.


*a similar structure in most animals uses around 8ATP per substrate secreted. TAT uses the proton motive force which ultimately requires about 12,000ATP to power one secretion.

[Slutty_Eddie]

Amarok Anernerk

I have a question for you all. Do you think science might have a peak? That sooner or later in our history discovery and invention could peter out?

Well, it might, but it will change for the better.

Love it or hate it, Alchemy is not what pop culture thinks it is. It's proto-chemistry. It had a lot of weird ideas, and it never achieved any of it's main goals, but it brought gun powder and a whole lot of other cool things into being. The division between organic and inorganic chemistry is a direct link to Alchemy, which one of it's missions was to find the Elixir of Life, a substance that you can remove from a living thing to make it dead, and put it into a non-living thing to make it alive.

It never achieved it's goals, but look how far it got us. Likewise, things we are looking for now, like the universal model, might never exist, but the search might lead us to new things.