this post was submitted on 03 Apr 2025
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Science Memes

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Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.

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If you are here asking: "Is this a science meme?"

Probably, yes. We use the Dawkins definition of meme: a replicating idea, not just an image macro with a fact on it. A good post here doesn't need to teach you something. It needs to make you ask something: who, what, where, when, and especially why or how.

Science isn't a filing cabinet of facts, it's a conversation. For example, a photo of an eel or other localized wildlife counts because most people never see one, and wonder is the first step of inquiry. A car meme counts if it makes you curious about what's under the bonnet. If you want to talk about something you noticed in the world, chances are someone else wants to talk about it too.

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shrimp colour drama (mander.xyz)
submitted 1 year ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[–] ArsonButCute@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I disagree that it's pointless. I think it may be beneficial to humanity (eventually) to establish whether or not there is an objective reality which we all experience.

[–] Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (3 children)

i agree, but that's a job for neuroscience, quantum mechanics, and psychology; not a pack of dorks on the fediverse.

[–] ArsonButCute@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

But I want to contribute to humanity in a meaningful way!

-me, a dork on the Fediverse nearly incapable of contributing to humanity in a meaninful way

[–] JuxtaposedJaguar@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

Hey now, you could be the person to force manufacturers to add a new type of warning label to random products!

[–] Sedathems@mander.xyz 4 points 1 year ago

it's more in the philosophy ballpark, which shapes the interpretration of methodology and the consequences, in my humble opinion.

[–] Zacryon@feddit.org 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But what if the dorks on the fediverse are scientists?

[–] Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

then by all means

[–] pcalau12i@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

There is no way to "establish whether or not there is an objective reality." It's a philosophical position. You either take the reality which we observe and study as part of the material sciences to be objective reality, or you don't believe it's objective reality and think it is all sort of invented in the "mind" somehow. Either position you take, you cannot prove or disprove either one, because even if you take the latter position, no evidence I present to you could change your mind because to be presented evidence would only mean for that evidence to appear in the mind, and thus wouldn't prove anything. The best argument we can make is just taking the reality we observe as indeed reality is just philosophically simpler, but that also requires you to philosophically value simplicity, which you cannot prove what philosophical principles we should value with science either.