A Time for a New Way to Science!

I am troubled by the management of our natural resources, especially in the aquatic environment that is so familiar to me. To deal with the compounding problems that the aquatic communities face with the pressures of humanity there needs to be a shift in how we approach these problems.

In our normal sciences, this includes aquatic sciences, we have invented instruments and methods to create vast amounts of data on the natural world. We have now entered this data into our newest instrument, the computer, creating new statistics quicker, making the results of science statistically viable quicker. It creates scenarios to ponder …and sets direction for further science with more theories to be solved.

In fisheries and water science we have created formulas to estimate fish populations, we have create instruments to measure water quality and flow, and we have created data bases on both to create charts and graphs to represent statistics.

We then speculate on the data and then make decisions to say our results are not complete and need more study or we speculate on the meaning and make decisions on what to do with the data. For example, we create a fish regulation to protect a certain size or single species of fish, or we set a standard regulation based on certain water quality parameters. But are we moving to actions to solve fishery and water quality problems beyond description of the current knowledge?

We have been taught by scientists from the text written by the experts or the professors who have written them because of their scientific expertise. This specialization has led to even more specialization. For example, in the past the text book had become a basis tool of an institution of expertise for decades. Now the computer and its data driven storage now have driven results into on-line specialized scientific journals with limited access. We now have this knowledge all in one place and just like the encyclopedia of yesterday the information becomes antiquated. Yet the expert can retrieve it and create more scientific data. The world of actual observation of the natural world has become second-tier science.

Science makes great strides and grows only when someone “thinks out of the box.” Yet this philosophical statement of problem solving has now become a cliché,’ where its importance in solving the problems of the world is even more important today. Ecology is the field that forces thinking in a three dimensional-like world where biology, chemistry, and physics collide to make the world function. The paradigm of single expertise in a single science is not enough. A new paradigm is here for us to accept. Will it be accepted in time as a tool to solve major problems?

In my field of aquatic ecology, the time to act is here. The principle of restoration needs to be applied to our declining fisheries AND our declining water quality… they are in separatable. Solutions are there … We just need to bring them into management of our aquatic resources.