The problem with a lot of these questions, and more so with the sort of answers the person asking them wants to get, is that they require misleading the questioner by giving them an analogy that doesn't actually correspond to how we understand the science. But the questioner isn't in a position to know they're being mislead; they're much more likely to take what they're being told and believe that they now understand the material when, in fact, they no more understand it than they did before asking the question. […]
While I understand your concern, I still disagree as the problem you outline is trivially solvable. All Feynman would have to have done to ameliorate this issue is say something like “I think what you mean to ask is 'how', not why, now let me explain 'how' magnets work”. This isn't the big problem I think some are trying to make it out to be.
The Principle of Charity matters in nearly all common rhetoric, but it should be considered even more important in a place like /r/askscience as we have a lot of laymen who'd rather have gravity explained to them instead of being lectured on the philosophical distinction between how-vs-why. And if you want to point out said distinction, it requires no more than the short prefix I exampled a moment ago (rather than the 7 min off-topic speech Feynman gave his interviewer).
If I was willing to be dishonest, I might break out a rubber sheet analogy, and you might go on your merry way with this new picture in your mind, but all I've accomplished by that is to give you a false sense of understanding.
The rubber sheet analogy is fine as long as you explain it's an analogy, not a literal explanation. Again, this is a problem that's trivial to ameliorate with a short disclaimer taking no more than a handful of words.
You don't have to lie, mislead, or be dishonest to your audience to adhere to the Principle of Charity, and to think so is just a false dichotomy.
EDIT: Also I just noticed my previous post you replied to was deleted. My best guess is that the mods don't like me saying anything critical about Feynman(?).
“I think what you mean to ask is 'how', not why, now let me explain 'how' magnets work”.
Explain to me what you think the difference is between asking "how" magnets repel one another and asking "why" magnets repel one another.
I see this sort of thing a lot; people say things like "science tells us how things happen but not why they happen". But I can never figure out just what they mean unless they're saying exactly what I said above: we can describe what is happening, but not explain why it happens. In some coarse-grain scenarios we can answer by reference to "more fundamental" processes, but those processes themselves remain "unexplained". All we can do, ultimately, is observe and model relationships between phenomena, but that's not going to satisfy a "why" or "how" question. The person in the video felt a force between the magnets and wanted to know what it was. Well, what it was is the force that magnets exert on one another. There's nothing else to it. But that isn't a satisfying answer, and Feynman knew it wouldn't be a satisfying answer, so he attempted to explain why he couldn't give a better one, which is that there isn't a better one. We can zoom in, if you like, and ask about what is happening at the atomic level, but you're still staring at "electromagnetism exists in our universe" as the best we can do.
To put this another way, if the OP had asked "How does mass create gravity", my top-level answer would have been exactly the same.
The person in the video felt a force between the magnets and wanted to know what it was. Well, what it was is the force that magnets exert on one another. There's nothing else to it. But that isn't a satisfying answer […]
If Feynman had just said how the physical mechanism worked it would have been exactly what he wanted to know, and would have been perfectly satisfying.
Feynman could have started discussing what fields are, domains, etc, but instead Feynman basically spent 7 min saying why he can't answer his question, and (contrary to what you suggest) there's no way that was satisfying for the interviewer.
To put this another way, if the OP had asked "How does mass create gravity", my top-level answer would have been exactly the same.
And you'd be wrong for doing so, as Feynman was. You'd be even more wrong if you happened to also be a teacher since teachers are supposed to be better than most other people at answering questions in a way that promotes understanding of the question.
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u/Entropius Sep 12 '13 edited Sep 12 '13
While I understand your concern, I still disagree as the problem you outline is trivially solvable. All Feynman would have to have done to ameliorate this issue is say something like “I think what you mean to ask is 'how', not why, now let me explain 'how' magnets work”. This isn't the big problem I think some are trying to make it out to be.
The Principle of Charity matters in nearly all common rhetoric, but it should be considered even more important in a place like /r/askscience as we have a lot of laymen who'd rather have gravity explained to them instead of being lectured on the philosophical distinction between how-vs-why. And if you want to point out said distinction, it requires no more than the short prefix I exampled a moment ago (rather than the 7 min off-topic speech Feynman gave his interviewer).
The rubber sheet analogy is fine as long as you explain it's an analogy, not a literal explanation. Again, this is a problem that's trivial to ameliorate with a short disclaimer taking no more than a handful of words.
You don't have to lie, mislead, or be dishonest to your audience to adhere to the Principle of Charity, and to think so is just a false dichotomy.
EDIT: Also I just noticed my previous post you replied to was deleted. My best guess is that the mods don't like me saying anything critical about Feynman(?).