week 1 post 5

cargo cult science

This article was a bit humorous. There were several different topicsthat Feynman touched on but all with one central theme or idea: thingsare not always what they seem and that we need to take a scientificapproach to things in order to not fool ourselves. The people of theSouth Seas who tried to replicate something in order to get planescarrying goods to land again, obviously did not take a scientificapproach to things. One person probably suggested that if they re-created the scene of when the planes landed the first time then surelythey would return again. This must of sounded like a great idea toeveryone else so they all went along with it and trully believed thatthis theory had to be right without even testing it or putting it upagainst other ideas.

Our society has a tendency to do that as well. We hear something from,lets say, a psychic and without much question, we believe that there isprobably some truth in it. We allow ourselves to be fooled bysomething we dont understand. Or we allow people who seem to be quiteknowledgable stop us from questioning certain things. After readingthis article i feel like maybe its time to stop taking people's wordfor it and start finding things out on my own.