We want to rely on scientists' statements, especially when things are difficult. Remember your feelings at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic? With changing rules, changing advice, and new treatments?
However, we need to understand that science is constantly evolving. New ideas, technologies, and procedures provide new knowledge. In medicine, new study findings can call decades-old concepts into question. Anyone who merely believes in the validity of scientific statements has insufficient faith in science. Science entails looking at things with open eyes and an open mind, challenging given opinions, and embracing new discoveries.
We have a brilliant example of this in our today’s holiday blog.
The Blue Color of the Sea
Have you ever been at the seaside and admired the deep blue color of the sea? Have you wondered, why your glass of water seems colorless instead?
Simply the Reflection of the Sky
In 1899, the English physicist Lord Rayleigh reported his observations after his voyage round Africa regarding the color of the sea in the most renowned scientific journal, Nature. He resumed that if the water is clear, there is nothing to send the light back to the observer, and the proper color of the water cannot be seen. Therefore, he claimed, “The much-admired dark blue of the deep sea has nothing to do with the color of water but is simply the blue of the sky seen by reflection.”
A Travel with Open Eyes
In September 1921, a largely unknown Indian scientist named Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman with a specialty in vibrations of stringed instruments such as the violin, was returning from his first trip overseas, where he had attended an international university congress in Oxford. As his ship, the SS Narkunda, made its way to Bombay via the Suez Canal, he had a lot of time to consider more deeply a question that had begun to concern him ever since his first voyages. Why is the sea blue?
This question and his experiments and observations aboard the SS Narkunda would change forever the direction of Raman’s future. During the fifteen-day voyage, staring over the steamer’s rail, his restless and probing mind became fascinated with the deep blue color of the Mediterranean. Unable to accept Lord Rayleigh’s explanation that the color of the sea was just a reflection of the color of the sky, Raman proceeded to outline his thoughts on the matter while still at sea and sent a letter to the editors of the journal Nature when the ship docked in Bombay With the aid of a special prism to eliminate reflected sky light, he had been able to see that the blue was more intrinsic and outlined, that “the hue of the water is of such fullness and saturation that the bluest sky in comparison with it seems a dull grey.”
Scattering Light Creates Color – And a Nobel Prize
Rayleigh had explained the blue of the sky using a formula to describe the scattering of sunlight by molecules in the air. When Raman had completed further experiments in Calcutta, he confirmed that a similar effect pertained for light encountering water molecules, with the blue light scattered most effectively and other colors quickly absorbed, leading the sea to appear saturated by blue. Raman’s almost painterly obsession with the nature of light and color would lead to other discoveries, and in 1930 won him the early accolade of the Nobel Prize for Physics, the first time the prize had been awarded to a non-Western scientist.
Science is Ever Evolving – Think About Helicobacter
We often rely on scientists’ statements. And we get confused, when scientists or doctors change their opinions or advice. We start to mistrust them and assume, they made an error. But science is ever evolving, with new ideas and discoveries reshaping our understanding and new knowledge.
In medicine, for example, recent study findings can call decades-old concepts into question. Think about stomach ulcers. Until the early 1980s, it was assumed they resulted from chronic stress and an unhealthy lifestyle resulting in elevated production of gastric acid. Large operations were performed to cure patients from their gastric ulcers – or they were sent to psychotherapy. In 1982, Barry Marshall and Robin Warren made the remarkable and unexpected discovery that inflammation in the stomach (gastritis) as well as ulceration of the stomach or duodenum (peptic ulcer disease) is the result of an infection caused by the bacterium Helicobacter pylori. Thanks to this open-minded pioneering discovery, peptic ulcer disease is no longer a chronic, frequently disabling condition, but a disease that can be permanently cured – just by medication. The Nobel Prize was awarded for it in 2005.
Simply believing in the current validity of scientific statements isn’t enough – true science involves approaching the world with open eyes and an open mind.
Raman Spectroscopy
Based on Raman’s early findings, we now employ Raman spectroscopy as one of the most effective ways for assessing a sample’s chemical makeup. Raman spectroscopy is a popular tool for identifying pharmacological medicines. Measurements can be conducted via plastic bottles to test medications without contaminating them by opening the bottle. Border patrol agents employ handheld Raman spectroscopy instruments to quickly and precisely evaluate the spectra of unknown confiscated substances and securely dispose of harmful compounds. Raman spectroscopy is frequently used in microscopy and diagnostic medical procedures.
Further research on the applications of Raman spectroscopy in clinical medicine has the potential to provide a noninvasive, rapid, and accurate diagnostic tool for various diseases, including cancers, infections, and neurodegenerative diseases.
All this research began a century ago, with a young scientist’s question: “Why is the sea blue?”
