What is science in all of this?

Science consists entirely of theories - tentative, fluid proposals based on people's best bets for how the world works. It is because they are not set in stone that these ideas have a chance of being nudged closer and closer toward describing reality, or discarded in favor of something better.

The problem is that the dynamic view of science doesn't come across strongly enough in the classroom. For reasons of expediency, scientific theories are presented as done deals. Little appreciation is conveyed for the intellectual struggle that went into interpreting the data or examining the assumptions - always open to question - that lurk behind the experiments. Lost from most explications is the exhilarating possibility that a theory that seems undeniable today could be overturned tomorrow.

Among the other fundamentals of science is the doctrine of uniformity, that the physical laws are the same now as they were in the past. And this is closely related to another unprovable assumption, “Occam's razor.” Given two explanations for a phenomenon, the simpler one is more likely to be true. Viewed this way, science may seem like just another religion - based on things one chooses to believe because they seem deep down to be true. Yet it is more. Science ultimately is a method of inquiry building toward understanding.

We must be mindful of the dangers that come when a scientist mistakes a theory for eternal truth, shoring up flimsy hypotheses by contorting the data. Equally dangerous is when a scientist attempts to make things happen with the data rather than rigorously exploring the evidence in the proper manner – by interrogating it. Good science may be two scientists attempting to prove the other incorrect. Good science is recognizing the sources of bias and attempting to find rational and logical evidence to support or refute a hypothesis. Above all it is testing with rigor and recognizing the limits of one’s data.

Science is, foremost, a method of interrogating reality - proposing hypotheses that seem true and then testing them; trying, almost perversely, to negate them, and elevating only the handful that survive to the status of a theory. In making sense of the world, one is always free to start from different assumptions. But part of a good education is learning what you are trading off in the bargain.

Follow this case study after you have completed your research on Angkor Wat and see if you can accept this as science - it is rigorous testing of questions? Is it based on evidence or supposition? What is this? Is it science of pseudoscience?