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Week 1
The one topic from the last class that I have been thinking a lot about has been the discussion on the objectivity (or lack thereof) of science. At first I was very opposed to the discussion that we were having about how subjective science really is. I was thinking specifically of certain tests, for instance an NMR test. In one of these tests I would interpret the results the same way any other chemist in the world would. I felt that in our class discussion we were talking about science in too broad of terms, because I still believe that there are many fields in science that are truly objective. Then this weekend my views were even further played with by a New Yorker article that I was reading for another Biology class. The article, The Truth Wears Off, talks in part about publication bias and the selective reporting of results. This made me think that maybe in science really isn't the objective field that I have always thought it to be. Even after much thought I can't come to a comfortable conclusion. I am not comfortable with thinking of science as a subjective field, but I now am realizing that maybe there are certain parts of science that are subjective. Even after coming to this conclusion I still argue that this can't be a generalization because there are many parts of science that are truly objective, and that will always be objective.