Introduction to the scientific method

The Foundation of Scientific Method — logical Reality Checks You can understand and enjoy the adventure of science, because the thinking used in science is not strange and mysterious, it's the same thinking you use in daily life. In scientific logic, as in daily life, you use reality checks to decide whether "the way you think the world is" matches "the way the world really is.

This module was supported by National Science Foundation Grants and Empirical claims An epistemology is a theory of knowledge. Modern science is predicated on the epistemological view called empiricism. According to this view, we are not born knowing anything about "the world.

But insofar as knowing that anything is true, empiricists believe that the mind is a "blank slate" -- or "tabla rasa" -- echoing the view championed by the empiricist philosopher John Locke in his An Essay Concerning Human Understanding So, if we are not born with knowledge about the world, how is it acquired?

In a word, experience -- from our observations and perceptions, as well as those of others. Knowledge gained through experience is called empirical knowledge. Science contributes to our empirical knowledge by providing the theoretical frameworks and research methods within which we are able to describe, to explain, and to predict the nature of "the world" successfully.

And make no mistake about it. Science has been very successful. Yet despite the deep understanding of the world that we have gained through science, there is an important feature of empirical knowledge that is worth noting at the outset.

It is expressed as the claim in the following argument: So, what should we conclude from this? That we do not know anything about the world? That science is unreliable? That we should not believe what science textbooks teach us? It may be comforting to hear that none of these things follow. But to see why this is so, you need to understand something about empirical claims -- assertions about how the world was, is, or will be.

And the first thing to note is that every empirical claim is a contingent statement -- an assertion that is neither necessarily true nor necessarily false.

And whether a contingent statement is true depends on or is "contingent" upon whether what it asserts accords with the way the "the world" is. To put it baldly, if what a contingent statement asserts corresponds to "the world" in terms of either meaning for words or reference for objectsthen the statement is true.

If this correspondence is not present, then the statement is false. While this accounts for whether a contingent statement or empirical claim is true, it does not account for how we know it.

Since our knowledge about the world empirical knowledge depends on our ability to tell whether a contingent statement is true, a great deal hinges upon the answer to this question: How do we know whether an empirical claim is true or false? Experience provides us with the evidence justification for believing that certain statements about the world are true while others are false.

For example, consider the following empirical claim: Is this claim true? Yes, we believe so. How do we know? Well, for starters, there has not been a single documented case in human history where an individual lost her brain and continued to live.scientific method - testing a hypothesis with continued observations Testing a hypothesis means testing the predictions based upon the hypothesis.

The classic Scientific Method test is the controlled experiment, but that will be treated a little bit later. The scientific method was developed in the 17th century as a method of inquiry to acquire new knowledge or modifying our existing understanding of natural phenomena through process of observation and experimentation.

Empiricism is a core principle of scientific method, which maintains that true knowledge is best achieved through sensory experience.. This method .

Introduction to the Scientific Method pg.4 • Class 3: 1.

Review with students the scientific method and how their experiment followed each of the steps. Have students restate their hypothesis. Make sure they still have their worksheets from Class 1 and 2 where they recorded everything.

scientific method - testing a hypothesis with continued observations Testing a hypothesis means testing the predictions based upon the hypothesis. The classic Scientific Method test is the controlled experiment, but that will be treated a little bit later. The scientific method is a process for experimentation that is used to explore observations and answer questions. Does this mean all scientists follow exactly this process? No. The scientific method is an empirical method of knowledge acquisition which has characterized the development of science since at least the 17th century. It involves careful observation, An Introduction to Science: Scientific Thinking and a scientific method by Steven D. Schafersman.

2. Put the classroom data up in a table on the board. Introduction to the Scientific Method The scientific method is the process by which scientists, collectively and over time, endeavor to construct an accurate (that is, reliable, consistent and non-arbitrary) representation of the world.

A Simple Introduction To The Scientific Method The Scientific Method may seem ominous and confusing, but really simply put, it’s just a way of asking a question and then finding an answer to that question. Because scientific tests are impossible without the evidence-claim relation present in every argument, arguments are an inseparable part of the scientific method.

The scientific method Although empirical questions engender scientific tests, strictly speaking, scientific tests are not tests of empirical questions.