[sweetjazz]

eF, I think you are on to something here. I think that when we pursue something intellectually, we should be asking a question (and then openly seeking an answer) -- not looking to prove a particular answer is right for a specific question.

At the same time, we have to use our judgment in which ideas we consider and how much of our energy to exert on considering various possibilities. It would be foolish to spend time checking whether the sky is really blue because of the conventional physics explanation (which takes some time to understand) or whether physics really predicts that it is green but there's a giant sphere of blue-tinted glass surrounding earth in space. Even without knowing the relevant physics (as I suspect most of us don't), we would need a good reason to think the green sky hypothesis is plausible before we seriously considered it.

I don't think there's anything wrong with studying why the sky is blue without questioning it because of a silly reason like the one above. But at the same time, it would make sense to stop and question any part of the explanation you read, to make sure that the thought behind it is convincing. Sometimes all you can do is say: If I accept a certain principle (which all physicists do), then I can understand how the sky would appear blue. You don't have access to the experimental equipment (and you probably don't have the time anyway) to verify the principle, but that's okay.

Anyway, those are just my ramblings about how to understand things. I probably don't understand how to understand things well enough to have a good opinion though. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

PS -- If anyone is interested in why the sky is blue, I bet a great place to look would be Feynman's Lectures on Physics.