The Growth of Science

Chaos, Disorder, MisunderstandingFear, Anxiety

Order, UnderstandingPredictability, Confidence

religion

humanities

arts

philosophy

science

Science

scire

knowledge; especially, knowledge gained through experience

the observation, identification, description, experimental investigation,

and theoretical explanation of natural phenomena

scientia

“ to know ”, “to separate one thing from another”

Science

BehavioralSocial

Natural

History

Education

PsychologySociology

Anthropology

BiologicalPhysical

Physics Chemistry

Earth Science

Astronomy

PhysicalUniverse

MatterWhat?

EnergyHow?

SpaceWhere?

TimeWhen?

The Growth of Science“ The progress of science is the discovery, at each step, of a new order which gives unity to what had seemed unalike.” Jacob Bronowski

Curiosity

Imagination

Verification

The Growth of Science

Chaos & Disorder

Curiosity:what, where, when,

how, why

Questions science can not answer

Questions science can answer

Questions science can not answer

Religion, Humanities,Arts, Philosophy

ImaginationAssumptions

Established Beliefs

Faith, Myths, Stories, Art, Music, Dogma

Order, Understanding, Predictability

Questions science can answer

Belief that the Universe is Simple

Oscam's Razor"All thing being equal the simplest

answer is probably right."

"Nature may be subtle but she is not malicious."Albert Einstein

Observation and the

Development of New ConceptsExperiencing the Universe through our five senses provides the What, When, and Where information upon which our answers will be based.

The development of concepts provides a framework in whichpossible answers can be constructed. These concepts are necessaryif we are to be able to construct mental images of what we observeand communicate our ideas to others.

If our hypotheses are to be verifiable they must be unambiguous.Therefore, our concepts are defined operationally. That is they aredefined through measurements and mathematics, of necessity, becomes the language of Science,

"The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them." - Sir William Bragg

Imagination

Progress in scientific research is due largely to provisional explanations which are constructed by imagination, but such hypotheses must be framed in relation to previously ascertained facts (observations) and in accordance with the principles of the particular science.

Imagination is the process of forming in the mind new images which have not been previously experienced, or at least only partially or in different combinations. Thus the image of a centaur is the result of combining the common percepts of man and horse:

Hypothesis

An hypothesis is a provisional idea whose merit is to be evaluated. A hypothesis requires more work by the researcher in order to either confirm or disprove it. A hypothesis should be falsifiable, meaning that it is possible that it can be shown to be false, usually by observation. Note that if confirmed, the hypothesis is not necessarily proven, but remains provisional.

An hypothesis is a tentative statement that proposes a possible explanation to some phenomenon or event. A useful hypothesis is a testable statement which may include a prediction. A hypotheses should not be confused with a theory. Theories are general explanations based on a large amount of data. For example, the theory of evolution applies to all living things and is based on wide range of observations. However, there are many things about evolution that are not fully understood such as gaps in the fossil record.

The nature of today's research is to prove a hypothesis false. Experiments are designed to falsify the hypothesis by yielding evidence (data) to disprove it. If the evidence (data) that is gathered does support the hypothesis, the hypothesis is accepted on a trial basis only. It is never accepted as absolute truth. Future investigations may falsify the hypothesis.

A hypothesis has to be testable experimentally in order to falsify or support it. Consider, for example, the question: Do excessively high temperatures cause children to misbehave?

Temperature is certainly a well-defined, measurable, and controllable factor, but misbehavior is not scientifically measurable. Thus, a scientist could not investigate this question.

An hypothesis is a tentative (as opposed to a theory which is well tested) explanation for observed events. An hypothesis is not a prediction, but it must allow you to make predictions which can be tested by experiment. When the results of those experiments are as predicted, it lends support to the hypothesis as a good explanation, and its eventual acceptance as a theory. If the results are not as predicted, the hypothesis must be modified, or replaced with a better explanation. No statement is an hypothesis unless it suggests a cause for an effect, and unless it has the possibility of being wrong.

Verification

Truly revolutionary hypotheses, the kind that invalidate established beliefs, have often been initially rejected. This is especially true when a new idea contradicts that of well known scientists. Even scientists whose ideas were initially rejected accept this as the way science should work. For science is also full of examples of revolutionary ideas that did not stand up under the scrutiny of testing and verification. The non-discovery of cold fusion is probably one of the best known examples of this process in recent scientific history. Skepticism is one of the scientist's main tools.

Example: The Big Bang

In cosmology, the original observation was that we seem to live in a firmament. The sun seemed to rise and set, travelling on a huge transparent bowl which was set around our world. Various paradigms which explained our world, came and went, but the universe seemed static. Even Einstein believed this.

Observation: Hubble's redshift

In the 1920s Edwin Hubble of Mount Wilson observatory observed that the galaxies, on the whole, were moving away from each other. Thus we live in an 'expanding universe'. The speed of expansion was apparently constant (Hubble's 'constant'), as evidenced by light from the galaxies, which was doppler-shifted in color toward the red side of the spectrum.

Hypothesis about the abundance of the elements

If the universe is expanding, then it must have been much smaller and therefore hotter and denser in the past. George Gamow hypothesized that the abundance of the elements in the Periodic Table of the Elements, might be accounted for by nuclear reactions in a hot dense universe. He was disputed by Fred Hoyle, who invented the term 'Big Bang' to disparage it. Fermi and others noted that this process would have stopped after only the light elements were created, and thus did not account for the abundance of heavier elements.

Gamow's prediction: One consequence of this hypothesis was a 5 - 10 Kelvin black body radiation temperature for the universe, after it cooled during the expansion.

Observation: the microwave background

In 1965, Arno A. Penzias and Robert W. Wilson announced that microwave radiation was surrounding us in all directions, at a level which was of the order of magnitude predicted by Gamow. Penzias and Wilson got the Nobel Prize for this discovery.

Big Bang Hypothesis now corroborated

After this piece of evidence, Gamow's hypothesis was now more likely. The age of the universe is currently estimated to be 13.7 billion years after the Big Bang.

Current observations

More refined measurements, such as those from the COBE satellite, are best fit by radiation from a pure 2.7 Kelvin black body.

Scientific Laws

A scientific law (sometimes called a principle) is a powerful summary of many previously unrelated facts.

For instance, suppose that in studying the behavior of gasses, you notice that whenever the pressure on the gas increases, its volume decreases. (Actually, to be really useful in science, your observations need to be more specific than this - they must be quantitative - numerical measurements.) Other competent scientists confirm your observations - they become facts. Suddenly one day, it occurs to you in a flash of insight that your data (observations) contain a pattern - the relationship between pressure and volume for an enclosed gas appears to fit the equation:

pressure x volume = a constant

This simple hypothesis says a great deal about the behavior of gasses. It suggests a great many new experiments and observations that could be made. Amazingly, all of these experiments and observations indicate that your hypothesis is correct! Soon, scientists are calling your discovery a law.

* Can be expressed most simply and concisely in mathematical form. Boyle's Law can be written as PV = k.

Characteristics of Scientific Laws

A scientific law expresses our current knowledge of the laws of nature. Scientific laws do not tell nature what to do - they tell what nature does.

* Describes how nature behaves without explaining why nature behaves that way. Boyle's Law says that if you double the pressure on an enclosed gas, its volume will decrease by half. Boyle's Law says nothing about why a gas should behave that way.

* Are generally empirical (experimental) in nature - that is, they derive from, and generally talk about the results of experiment.

A theory is a synthesis of a large body of information that encompasses well-tested and verified hypotheses about certain aspects of the natural world.

Scientific Theories

Suppose that, in thinking about the behavior of gasses, it occurs to you that all of the facts and laws about the pressure, volume, and temperature of a gas could be explained if gasses were made of very tiny, independent particles moving about at high speeds. This is an interesting hypothesis which produces several experimental tests. Suppose that the predictions of this hypothesis all seem to indicate that the hypothesis is correct. Scientists begin to call your hypothesis a theory.

Characteristics of Scientific Theories

* A physical theory is explanatory. A theory attempts to explain why nature behaves as it does. Theories are sometimes called "models" for this reason. Boyle's Law describes how nature behaves, while the Kinetic Theory of Gasses explains why nature behaves that way. Unfortunately, this is not a "hard and fast" distinction - Quantum Theory, one of the most powerful and successful theories of physics, is not explanatory, it is descriptive. Quantum Theory does not provide a "model" of how the atom works!

# A physical theory is well tested. When someone says "I have a theory..." or "...but that's only a theory..." they are almost certainly confusing a theory with a hypothesis. Scientific theories are generally supported by a considerable body of evidence. Unfortunately, the word "theory" is often nowadays attached to things that have not been thoroughly tested - that are more properly classified as hypotheses. Such powerful ideas as "String Theory" and "Supersymmetry Theory" are called theories anyway - even though it may not be possible to test them, at least in the foreseeable future.

# A physical theory is mathematical in nature. For instance, starting with some basic hypotheses (or axioms), such as "gasses are made of tiny, independent particles", one can derive, in a purely deductive way, Boyle's Law as well as the Ideal Gas Law.

CuriosityQuestions Science

Can Answer

Questions ScienceCan not Answer

Belief that answersAre “simple”

Observation

Development ofconcepts

Imagination

Hypothesis

Predictions

Verification

Science…What we know,

Laws & Principles

TheoryModels & Paradigms

What?,When?,Where?

How?

Why?

Ability to Predict and Derive

New Laws

Verification requires predictions to be

unambiguous

Concepts must have operational definitions

Measurement & Mathematics

Revision ofHypothesis

ReligionHumanitiesPhilosophy

BeliefsMythsStories

Art

New Questions?