April 28, 2007

Uncertainty

Werner Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle is one of the fundamental truths of science. When two variables depend on each other directly - the measurement of one influences the action of the other. This holds in particle theory with momentum and direction - wave functions have been calculated to provide the limits under the terms of measurement. We also grasp the concept of error and include a measurement of error based on calculation. While some events do happen outside the error bars, these are 'rare' and often signal incorrect measurement - a device or an operator was not working/thinking properly. Error can be made at any point in a process - accomodations can control small errors unless they are a portion of absolute function - like an O-ring on a shuttle.

Error has a compounding effect over time. When order incorporates error and builds it into a system, then that error can influence other codependent systems. Systems thinking is important, because we rely on systems to get things done. Back-up systems provide means for support when the primary systems go down - nature uses this built-in redundency to shift gears for optimal operations under a myriad of changable environmental conditions.

It appears that most of our highly trained specialists are not capable of being generalists. This will allow for a thought revolution on a different scale as people uncommoditize our lives and apply learning in one field of endeavor to applications in a completely different fields of endeavor. As i see the science toys of chem grad school 25 years ago being marketed as mainstream electronic gadgets of today, i wonder if the ability to use these toys for applicable utility can be developed. To test this hypothesis, i will play science camp network as a game theory game, with a scoring system and activities that vette all the scientific information available in my habitat today.

This summer i will be running science camps outdoors for children of all ages, at the Umpqua Discovery Center in Reedsport and the Douglas County Museum of Science and Natural Science in Roseburg. Our focus will start with the Umpqua River system, and our quest will be to organize the information into a form where what is done can be checked. Anomalies that fall out from different eyes will be explained in terms of the expertise available from people who know the field. I believe current data collection methods incorrectly self-correct out anomalous data in the field, when true collections of numbers without regard to the measurement would allow this data to be rejected mathematcally at a desk. This would increase the uncertainty and open the range - since many anomalies are real and should not be ignored.

This research directed learning approach will listen to the earth generating numbers - and teach us how to measure. What we do here can be duplicated in form and applied in different function to the specifics of the land in other areas. Lots of people measure different things - sifting through bias to look and see what is really there is important for making good land management decisions. The scoring system will reward good data handling and proper protocol use. With lots of photo points.

Natural Resources come from the earth and people are natural resources in themselves. Rather than wait, ONRRI, as a cooperative institute will develop partnership - focus our attention from the grass root level - and question what we know. Personally, i hope to find where internal errors were built into the assumptions of prior generations of well meaning, but misinformed scientists. Science should not be an elite profession, but rather a common approach to life. Redile is a means for anybody to look deeper into themselves.

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