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When Calculation Replaces Comprehension: The Limits of a Data-Driven Science

We live in an age intoxicated by numbers. Big Data, AI and quantum computing promise to make science faster, sharper and more objective than ever. We count, model, predict, optimise. On paper, it looks like the triumph of reason. And yet, beneath the glow of dashboards and equations, a quieter question lingers: do numbers alone bring us closer to reality — or just to ever more elegant shadows of it? To understand why data-driven science holds such power today, we must look beyond technology—and return to an older, deeper fascination with mathematics itself. From Pythagoras and Thales to Planck and Einstein, the history of science is also the history of our fascination with mathematics — its beauty, its power, and its blind spot s. Mathematics in Science: The Beauty and the Blind Spots Humans are deeply drawn to structure, and few structures feel as comforting and beautiful as mathematics. There's a quiet thrill in following a complex proof to its clean conclusion, in...

Big Data Satire: When Scientists take their SUV for Grocery Shopping

Some things are so big, they can only exist to cover up something else. In the ’90s and early 2000s, it was cars: SUVs that never saw an off-road trail, tanks on four wheels, needed just to roll to the grocery store. Today, it’s data: Big Data. Massive datasets, proudly paraded like a shiny status symbol. Who needs theory, careful thinking, or painstaking research when you have Big Data? The numbers “speak for themselves,” or so the legend goes. How convenient: Science as a self-service buffet where you dump numbers into a machine and out comes Truth. Meanwhile, pesky questions like “Where did these data come from?” or “What do they actually not tell us?” can be politely ignored. When Size Is Everything Big Data is the academic equivalent of the 90ies “Look at my enormous car!” But Big Data is not the Rolls-Royce, it's the SUV among research practices: The more terabytes, the more prestige. Small datasets are like compact cars—cute but embarrassingly outdated. And anyone still ...

Why Modern Research Feels Meaningless: From Thales to Today — The Historical Foundations of Science

Research once began with curiosity—the deep urge to ask why and explore the unknown. Today, much of science feels disconnected from its purpose, shaped instead by predefined project frameworks, funding priorities, and standardized methods. This shift risks creating research without meaning. From the ancient origins of scientific thinking in philosophers like Thales, Socrates, and Aristotle, to modern concerns about how the academic system and funding pressures influence research quality, we explore what happened to science. By understanding the forgotten roots of inquiry and recognizing the dangers of excessive standardization in academia, we can begin rethinking research today—restoring the lost spirit of science and ensuring that inquiry once again drives discovery. This article is not just a critique. It is a call to remember what science once was—and what it still could be. Because when we lose the spirit of inquiry, we lose more than methods or funding: We could lose the very mean...

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