“Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts”?

Cargo cult science comprises practices that have the semblance of being scientific, but do not in fact follow the scientific method.[1] The term was first used by physicist Richard Feynman during his 1974 commencement address at the California Institute of Technology.

Cargo cults—a religious practice that has appeared in many traditional tribal societies in the wake of interaction with technologically advanced cultures—focus on obtaining the material wealth (the "cargo") of the advanced culture through magical means, by building mock aircraft landing strips and the like.

Feynman cautioned that to avoid becoming cargo cult scientists, researchers must avoid fooling themselves, be willing to question and doubt their own theories and their own results, and investigate possible flaws in a theory or an experiment.... "it's this type of integrity, this kind of care not to fool yourself, that is missing to a large extent in much of the research in cargo cult science."

Cool.

Should "know" be "knowing" in the following, BTW?

“We can't define anything precisely. If we attempt to, we get into that paralysis of thought that comes to philosophers… one saying to the other: you don't know what you are talking about!. The second one says: what do you mean by talking? What do you mean by you? What do you mean by know?”
―Richard Feynman

oristarA wrote:

Cool.

Should "know" be "knowing" in the following, BTW?

“We can't define anything precisely. If we attempt to, we get into that paralysis of thought that comes to philosophers… one saying to the other: you don't know what you are talking about!. The second one says: what do you mean by talking? What do you mean by you? What do you mean by know?”
―Richard Feynman

Feynman, bless his heart, was not an English major, so he's guilty of faulty parallelism here. He jumps from a gerund (talking), to a pronoun (you), to a verb or bare infinitive. There's no way to make the pronoun into a gerund, but it would have been better to use "knowing," yes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallelism_(grammar)

it would have been better to use "knowing," yes.

Feynman did not have a high opinion of scientists, as a class. Read what he has to say about "cargo cult science," for example. Such as:

Quote:

Cargo cult science comprises practices that have the semblance of being scientific, but do not in fact follow the scientific method.[1] The term was first used by physicist Richard Feynman during his 1974 commencement address at the California Institute of Technology.

Cargo cults—a religious practice that has appeared in many traditional tribal societies in the wake of interaction with technologically advanced cultures—focus on obtaining the material wealth (the "cargo") of the advanced culture through magical means, by building mock aircraft landing strips and the like.

Feynman cautioned that to avoid becoming cargo cult scientists, researchers must avoid fooling themselves, be willing to question and doubt their own theories and their own results, and investigate possible flaws in a theory or an experiment.... "it's this type of integrity, this kind of care not to fool yourself, that is missing to a large extent in much of the research in cargo cult science."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult_science

Kinda makes me think of good ole Max, know what I'm sayin?

Please don't believe that BS rhetoric about Feynman not having a high opinion of scientists. The cargo cult societies are not scientists. They are primitive, superstitious, blind believers in mysticism. If Feynman didn't have a high regard for scientists, then he wouldn't have had a high regard for science, and he wouldn't have dedicated his life to it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult

Feynman cautioned that to avoid becoming cargo cult scientists, researchers must avoid fooling themselves, be willing to question and doubt their own theories and their own results, and investigate possible flaws in a theory or an experiment.... "it's this type of integrity, this kind of care not to fool yourself, that is missing to a large extent in much of the research in cargo cult science."

1) Does “Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts” mean "“Science is the belief that experts are ignorant”?

We have many studies in teaching, for example, in which people make observations, make lists, do statistics, and so on, but these do not thereby become established science, established knowledge. They are merely an imitative form of science [...] The result of this pseudoscientific imitation is to produce experts, which many of you are. [But] you teachers, who are really teaching children at the bottom of the heap, can maybe doubt the experts. As a matter of fact, I can also define science another way: Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts.

When someone says, "Science teaches such and such," he is using the word incorrectly. Science doesn't teach anything; experience teaches it. If they say to you, "Science has shown such and such," you might ask, "How does science show it? How did the scientists find out? How? What? Where?"

It should not be "science has shown" but "this experiment, this effect, has shown." And you have as much right as anyone else, upon hearing about the experiments--but be patient and listen to all the evidence--to judge whether a sensible conclusion has been arrived at.

2) Does "it is difficult to get across a real feeling as to the beauty" mean "it is difficult to catch/enjoy a real feeling about the beauty"?

Does “Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts” mean "“Science is the belief that experts are ignorant”?

Feynman did not have a high opinion of scientists, as a class. Read what he has to say about "cargo cult science," for example. Such as:

Quote:

Cargo cult science comprises practices that have the semblance of being scientific, but do not in fact follow the scientific method.[1] The term was first used by physicist Richard Feynman during his 1974 commencement address at the California Institute of Technology.

Cargo cults—a religious practice that has appeared in many traditional tribal societies in the wake of interaction with technologically advanced cultures—focus on obtaining the material wealth (the "cargo") of the advanced culture through magical means, by building mock aircraft landing strips and the like.

Feynman cautioned that to avoid becoming cargo cult scientists, researchers must avoid fooling themselves, be willing to question and doubt their own theories and their own results, and investigate possible flaws in a theory or an experiment.... "it's this type of integrity, this kind of care not to fool yourself, that is missing to a large extent in much of the research in cargo cult science."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult_science

Kinda makes me think of good ole Max, know what I'm sayin?

The principle of science, the definition, almost, is the following: The test of all knowledge is experiment. Experiment is the sole judge of scientific “truth.” But what is the source of knowledge? Where do the laws that are to be tested come from? Experiment, itself, helps to produce these laws, in the sense that it gives us hints. But also needed is imagination to create from these hints the great generalizations—to guess at the wonderful, simple, but very strange patterns beneath them all, and then to experiment to check again whether we have made the right guess. This imagining process is so difficult that there is a division of labor in physics: there are theoretical physicists who imagine, deduce, and guess at new laws, but do not experiment; and then there are experimental physicists who experiment, imagine, deduce, and guess.

...

Now, what should we teach first? Should we teach the correct but unfamiliar law with its strange and difficult conceptual ideas, for example the theory of relativity, four-dimensional space-time, and so on? Or should we first teach the simple “constant-mass” law, which is only approximate, but does not involve such difficult ideas? The first is more exciting, more wonderful, and more fun, but the second is easier to get at first, and is a first step to a real understanding of the first idea. This point arises again and again in teaching physics. At different times we shall have to resolve it in different ways, but at each stage it is worth learning what is now known, how accurate it is, how it fits into everything else, and how it may be changed when we learn more.

“And then there’s the … kind of thing which you don’t understand. Meaning "I don’t believe it, it’s crazy, it’s the kind of thing I won’t accept.”

Eh. The other part well… this kind, I hope you’ll come along with me and you’ll have to accept it because it’s the way nature works. If you want to know the way nature works, we looked at it, carefully. That’s the way it works.

You don’t like it…, go somewhere else!

To another universe! Where the rules are simpler, philosophically more pleasing, more psychologically easy. I can’t help it! OK! If I’m going to tell you honestly what the world looks like to the… human beings who have struggled as hard as they can to understand it, I can only tell you what it looks like.

And I cannot make it any simpler, I’m not going to do this, I’m not going to simplify it, and I’m not going to fake it. I’m not going to tell you it’s something like a ball bearing inside a spring, it isn’t.

So I’m going to tell you what it really is like, and if you don’t like it, that’s too bad.

There is nothing here that I have said here about Physics that contradicts what Feynman said on the subject of mathematics or physics. You, on the other hand, pretty much called Fenyman's opinion "idiocy" on the Special Relativity thread.

(paraphrasing): Anyone who says he understands quantum mechanics doesn't understand it.