>>11838404That's the problem, heritability is used to describe very specific things. Same with phrenology, and they have very very nice applications with limited ranges. Ie. Teaching kids basic genetics and checking for birth defects
From my perspective you are exemplifying the exact reason scientists are so manic about getting everyone on the same page. The data that was made has been looked at by the contemporaries of the time and then discarded due to them not being good data. But even now you feel a "protectiveness" for phrenology that will push people to say it's still relavent.
Except I made that whole story up. Because a real scientist trying to discover why this reaction was changing with lunar cycles in this obscure alchemy text would be fucking stumped. The alchemist didn't gather the data right for anyone to make the conclusion I gave. So it would remain an "unsolved" question. The answer is so specific and nuanced that we can't rederive the original experiment. Meaning we can't know why the moon matters. We can make new studies, and meta analysis, and they disproved a lot of early heritability and phrenology. Which is why neither is used now.
Don't get me wrong, I love ancient science stuff. The things alchemists did were amazing. A hobby of mine is collecting old stories about people "discovering magic". Like the Smith who made a blade that never dulled because the edge was carbon nanotubes. Or the iron pillar of dehli. Or radioactive minerals that let people "curse" others. I am also a champion of the idea that anyone can be a scientist. Insight can come from almost anywhere, and you could find a hidden gem in this data. A paper describing a chemical doing a weird thing from the 1800's? I'd be down to investigate.
If you are actually interested in learning if "heritability is the black pill" you should know what that means before changing your whole world view. It's a feather of evidence being used to justify a heavy worldview.
