>>11647496The problem with his definition is not only the under-determinedness of the word "science".
If I try to gain knowledge from reading out the remains of a coffee mug, or look into a glass ball, then this, in an equally valid way, is pursuit of truth. I'm pursuing truth in a retarded way. The pursuit lies in the practitioner. And having fixed the method, it can be refined to be as rigorous as one can get.
The scientific method (which for some reason doesn't even make it into Elons definition) has a track record of leading to innovation - we can say we have a cell phone today that we wouldn't have without science. But this empirical reflection on the success of the method is just an observation and doesn't tie to truth.
What we may observe is that Science, is, among other things, a pursuit that was very helpful for humans in many regards. And reading out the coffee mug is a useless regards. But usefulness is not truth and to project that we're steadily approximating a true aspect of the material notions we are investigating is already taking a realist philosophical position, a bias.
Sure, what one may of course do is taking a Rick & Morty stance that knowledge can just mean the capacity of making more and more reliable predictions about more and more things - i.e. reducing the world to the material and really just giving up any notion of truth that can't be captured by our method.
