Introduction and Consilience

Beyond the paradigm; getting more than your twenty cents worth.

Or

Possible answers to, alternative explanations for, and pertinent questions regarding some of science’s most vexing problems.

Introduction:

          Consilience

To truly know anything – to be able to visualize all its implications and apply it appropriately to new situations – requires knowing everything “anything” involves.  Essentially; impossible. But, it follows, the more we know about everything, the more we can learn. But again, the more we learn the harder it is to know everything. Which makes truly knowing anything harder.

With the explosive growth in information has come a tendency for scientists, as well as doctors, lawyers, economists, educators, and just about every other profession, to specialize in specific fields. It takes so long to learn the specialized knowledge for a given profession that there is not time to delve deeply into how your field is interconnected with other. Without the consilience that comes from being able to place specific facts within their overall web of interaction we run the risks of over simplifying, ignoring salient information, or heading down the wrong tract in search of further explanation.

The hypotheses that are presented in this document are consistent with known observations and the theory of relativity (as I understand it). They have not been experimentally proven.  It is my hope that they will provide a different way at looking at the problems and lead to new ways of investigating these issues by the present and future generation of scientists.

My credentials:

My academic career started as an engineering major at the University of Connecticut. After an intermission as an U.S. Navy Corpsman, I returned to UConn as a Geology major.  I transferred to Central Connecticut State University from which I received my BS and MS with educational certifications in biology, earth science, and general science.  My post Masters Degree advanced certificate (6th year science specialist) was part of the ISIS Program (Institute for Science Instruction & Study) at Southern Connecticut State University.

Presently a retired teacher; having spent a third of a century teaching primarily high school physical science, earth science, geology and astronomy. During those years, I found it imperative that before trying to teach a curriculum, I had to internalize the subject matter. So while I had a level of what would be considered expertise in geology and environmental science; I had to immerse myself into astronomy, atomic theory, basic chemistry, physics, climatology, oceanography, and electromagnetism. As a result, I am not a recognized expert in any one area of study, but I am a generalist with a basic background in a wide range of scientific fields. It seems to have been an education that has given me the ability to see a bigger picture; a wider perspective which experts may lack. This in turn may have allowed me to pull together bits and pieces of sometimes seemingly disparate information to create hypotheses representing a more accurate understanding of reality.  To be able to see what others have missed.