Science In Real Life: Science
Science In Real Life: Science
It may seem incongruous at first for one of these essays to be about all of science, but I feel it worthwhile to clarify the true nature of this venerable institution. Today you all get to peek into the methods behind the biggest thing to hit civilization since that carpenter from Nazareth. Words like 'scientific', 'scientist', and 'science' are thrown around quite a bit what with the technological tendencies of our culture, and sometimes they are used incorrectly, or at least without regard to the subleties behind the lab coats.
For starters, a lab coat does not a scientist make. If you ask a hundred people what they first think of when they hear the word "scientist", lab coats, petri dishes, and bubbling beakers will comprise the majority of the answers (crazy hair and death rays optional). Fact is, many people who wear lab coats are not scientists, and many scientists don't wear lab coats. A scientist is anyone conducting an investigation to determine the rules that govern the Universe according to the principle of reproducible results.
That one principle is at the heart of the scientific perspective. Most of us in grade school were taught "the scientific method", a list of up to ten separate steps handed down from on high like a certain other list of ten things I won't mention. Now, following those lists is a perfectly valid way of conducting science, but taken alone they present a distorted and incomplete picture of how science actually happens. For example, often a scientist will not have a specific hypothesis in mind when conducting an experiment, but will instead draw conclusions directly from patterns observed in the data. The lists also do not tell us why this method is scientific - the answer is the principle of reproducible results.
It goes all the way back to the goal of science: to discover the rules that govern the Universe. A rule, by definition, is never broken, no matter how hard mischievous little children try. Suppose I observe something, and I decide that I saw factor A and factor B combine to make factor X. Before I go declaring the new rule that A plus B makes X, I have to check that this is always the case. So I go back home, break out the alphabet soup, and combine A and B again. If they don't make X, then "A plus B makes X" is not a rule. Maybe factor C was also present and I missed it, or maybe they make factor Y and I thought it was X, or maybe it was something else entirely. That is science, and this is why philosopher Karl Popper credited falsifiability as the defining principle of scientific investigation - it is the testing of claims that could be proven wrong.
Now, here's the kicker. Suppose I get home and find that once again, A plus B makes X. I still can't say that A plus B always makes X, because that would require an infinite and continuous array of tests, running all the time forever, and who has that kind of time? Instead, what I do is put the word out to all my fellow scientists all over the world that it looks like A and B make X. They all run the test themselves, under a variety of conditions. If even one of them reports back that A and B don't make X, then the potential rule "A plus B makes X" is invalidated, and needs to be amended to account for whatever additional condition(s) need to be present to make X.
The basic structure I've constructed here is called inductive reasoning. The sun has risen in the east every day of recorded human history - it hasn't missed a day in 10,000 years (and you thought you had a good attendance record). So inductively we conclude that the sun will almost certainly rise in the east tomorrow. But that "almost" is crucial. There is a chance, however small, that the sun will rise in the west tomorrow, or not rise at all, or suddenly be a bowl of spaghetti. All the conclusions that science has drawn about the Universe could be invalidated next Tuesday if the experiments give us different results. All the "laws" of science are only valid in an up-to-now sense.
Which brings me to my final and most important point. Science is a process, not a body of knowledge. Science is a means of obtaining information, not the information itself. Science is a way of thinking, not a thing to believe. Unfortunately for those of us in a global 21st century civilization, science had a head start that would make Doogie Howser jealous. The body of knowledge it has produced is massive, so the majority of our experience with science growing up is "Here, learn everything in this book." As a result, the misconception spreads that Science is an impenetrable monolithic entity accessible only to geniuses of superhuman intellect. This is patently false - as a scientist I can tell you that science is neither impenetrable nor monolithic.
But seriously, anyone can do science. Yes, even you. In fact, you already have. Probably today. Any time you look at something twice to make sure you saw what you thought you saw, or check whether something you heard is actually true, or taste-test that mysterious leftover in the fridge to see if it's still good, you are using a scientific methodology to acquire information about your enviroment. Cool, huh?
I leave you with a rule of thumb to guide you on what is and isn't science: any subject that has the word "science" in its name isn't one.
As usual, I welcome your questions and suggested topics.
It may seem incongruous at first for one of these essays to be about all of science, but I feel it worthwhile to clarify the true nature of this venerable institution. Today you all get to peek into the methods behind the biggest thing to hit civilization since that carpenter from Nazareth. Words like 'scientific', 'scientist', and 'science' are thrown around quite a bit what with the technological tendencies of our culture, and sometimes they are used incorrectly, or at least without regard to the subleties behind the lab coats.
For starters, a lab coat does not a scientist make. If you ask a hundred people what they first think of when they hear the word "scientist", lab coats, petri dishes, and bubbling beakers will comprise the majority of the answers (crazy hair and death rays optional). Fact is, many people who wear lab coats are not scientists, and many scientists don't wear lab coats. A scientist is anyone conducting an investigation to determine the rules that govern the Universe according to the principle of reproducible results.
That one principle is at the heart of the scientific perspective. Most of us in grade school were taught "the scientific method", a list of up to ten separate steps handed down from on high like a certain other list of ten things I won't mention. Now, following those lists is a perfectly valid way of conducting science, but taken alone they present a distorted and incomplete picture of how science actually happens. For example, often a scientist will not have a specific hypothesis in mind when conducting an experiment, but will instead draw conclusions directly from patterns observed in the data. The lists also do not tell us why this method is scientific - the answer is the principle of reproducible results.
It goes all the way back to the goal of science: to discover the rules that govern the Universe. A rule, by definition, is never broken, no matter how hard mischievous little children try. Suppose I observe something, and I decide that I saw factor A and factor B combine to make factor X. Before I go declaring the new rule that A plus B makes X, I have to check that this is always the case. So I go back home, break out the alphabet soup, and combine A and B again. If they don't make X, then "A plus B makes X" is not a rule. Maybe factor C was also present and I missed it, or maybe they make factor Y and I thought it was X, or maybe it was something else entirely. That is science, and this is why philosopher Karl Popper credited falsifiability as the defining principle of scientific investigation - it is the testing of claims that could be proven wrong.
Now, here's the kicker. Suppose I get home and find that once again, A plus B makes X. I still can't say that A plus B always makes X, because that would require an infinite and continuous array of tests, running all the time forever, and who has that kind of time? Instead, what I do is put the word out to all my fellow scientists all over the world that it looks like A and B make X. They all run the test themselves, under a variety of conditions. If even one of them reports back that A and B don't make X, then the potential rule "A plus B makes X" is invalidated, and needs to be amended to account for whatever additional condition(s) need to be present to make X.
The basic structure I've constructed here is called inductive reasoning. The sun has risen in the east every day of recorded human history - it hasn't missed a day in 10,000 years (and you thought you had a good attendance record). So inductively we conclude that the sun will almost certainly rise in the east tomorrow. But that "almost" is crucial. There is a chance, however small, that the sun will rise in the west tomorrow, or not rise at all, or suddenly be a bowl of spaghetti. All the conclusions that science has drawn about the Universe could be invalidated next Tuesday if the experiments give us different results. All the "laws" of science are only valid in an up-to-now sense.
Which brings me to my final and most important point. Science is a process, not a body of knowledge. Science is a means of obtaining information, not the information itself. Science is a way of thinking, not a thing to believe. Unfortunately for those of us in a global 21st century civilization, science had a head start that would make Doogie Howser jealous. The body of knowledge it has produced is massive, so the majority of our experience with science growing up is "Here, learn everything in this book." As a result, the misconception spreads that Science is an impenetrable monolithic entity accessible only to geniuses of superhuman intellect. This is patently false - as a scientist I can tell you that science is neither impenetrable nor monolithic.
But seriously, anyone can do science. Yes, even you. In fact, you already have. Probably today. Any time you look at something twice to make sure you saw what you thought you saw, or check whether something you heard is actually true, or taste-test that mysterious leftover in the fridge to see if it's still good, you are using a scientific methodology to acquire information about your enviroment. Cool, huh?
I leave you with a rule of thumb to guide you on what is and isn't science: any subject that has the word "science" in its name isn't one.
As usual, I welcome your questions and suggested topics.