Science
Science (from the Latin scientia, meaning "knowledge") refers to any sy
stematic knowledge-base or prescriptive practice that is capable of resulting in a prediction or predictable type of outcome. In this sense, science may refer to a highly skilled technique or practice.[1]
In its more restricted contemporary sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on scientific method, and to the organized body of knowledge gained through such research.[2][3] This article focuses on the more restricted use of the word. Science as discussed in this article is sometimes called experimental science to differentiate it from applied science - the application of scientific research to specific human needs - although the two are often interconnected.
Science is a continuing effort to discover and increase human knowledge and understanding through disciplined research. Using controlled methods, scientists collect observable evidence of natural or social phenomena, record measurable data relating to the observations, and analyze this information to construct theoretical explanations of how things work. The methods of scientific research include the generation of hypotheses about how phenomena work, and experimentation that tests these hypotheses under controlled conditions. Scientists are also expected to publish their information so other scientists can do similar experiments to double-check their conclusions. The results of this process enable better understanding of past events, and better ability to predict future events of the same kind as those that have been tested.
stematic knowledge-base or prescriptive practice that is capable of resulting in a prediction or predictable type of outcome. In this sense, science may refer to a highly skilled technique or practice.[1]In its more restricted contemporary sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on scientific method, and to the organized body of knowledge gained through such research.[2][3] This article focuses on the more restricted use of the word. Science as discussed in this article is sometimes called experimental science to differentiate it from applied science - the application of scientific research to specific human needs - although the two are often interconnected.
Science is a continuing effort to discover and increase human knowledge and understanding through disciplined research. Using controlled methods, scientists collect observable evidence of natural or social phenomena, record measurable data relating to the observations, and analyze this information to construct theoretical explanations of how things work. The methods of scientific research include the generation of hypotheses about how phenomena work, and experimentation that tests these hypotheses under controlled conditions. Scientists are also expected to publish their information so other scientists can do similar experiments to double-check their conclusions. The results of this process enable better understanding of past events, and better ability to predict future events of the same kind as those that have been tested.
Basic classifications
Scientific fields are commonly classified along two major lines: natural sciences, which study natural phenomena (including biological life), and social sciences, which study human behavior and societies. These groupings are empirical sciences, which means the knowledge must be based on observable phenomena and capable of being tested for its validity by other researchers working under the same conditions.[3] There are also related disciplines that are grouped into interdisciplinary and applied sciences, such as engineering and health science. Within these categories are specialized scientific fields that can include elements of other scientific disciplines but often possess their own terminology and body of expertise.[4]
Mathematics, which is sometimes classified within a third group of science called formal science, has both similarities and differences with the natural and social sciences. It is similar to empirical sciences in that it involves an objective, careful and systematic study of an area of knowledge; it is different because of its method of verifying its knowledge, using a priori rather than empirical methods.[3] Formal science, which also includes statistics and logic, is vital to the empirical sciences. Major advances in formal science have often led to major advances in the empirical sciences. The formal sciences are essential in formulating and evaluating hypotheses, theories, and laws,[3] both in discovering and describing how things work (natural sciences) and how people think and act (social sciences)
History
Main articles: History of science and Scientific revolution
While empirical investigations of the natural world have been described since antiquity (for example, by Aristotle, Theophrastus and Pliny the Elder), and scientific methods have been employed since the Middle Ages (for example, by Ibn al-Haytham, Abu Rayhan Biruni and Roger Bacon), the dawn of modern science is generally traced back to the early modern period, during what is known as the Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries. It was a time roughly coinciding with the later part of the Middle Ages and through the Renaissance in which scientific ideas in physics, astronomy, and biology evolved rapidly.[5]
Etymology and usage of the word science
DNA determines the genetic structure of all life
The word "science" comes through the Old French, and is derived from the Latin word scientia for knowledge, the nominal form of the verb scire, "to know". The Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root that yields scire is *skei-, meaning to "cut, separate, or discern".[6] Similarly, the Greek word for science is 'επιστήμη', deriving from the verb 'επίσταμαι', 'to know'. From the Middle Ages to the Enlightenment, science or scientia meant any systematic recorded knowledge.[7] Science therefore had the same sort of very broad meaning that philosophy had at that time. In other languages, including French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian, the word corresponding to science also carries this meaning.
Far into the eighteenth century, science and natural philosophy were not quite synonymous, but only became so later with the direct use of what would become known formally as the scientific method, which was earlier developed during the Middle Ages and early modern period in Europe and the Middle East (see History of scientific method). Prior to the 18th century, however, the preferred term for the study of nature was natural philosophy, while English speakers most typically referred to other philosophical disciplines (such as logic, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics and aesthetics) as moral philosophy. Today, "moral philosophy" is more-or-less synonymous with "ethics". By contrast, the word "science" in English was still used in the 17th century to refer to the Aristotelian concept of knowledge which was secure enough to be used as a sure prescription for exactly how to do something.[8]
Personification of "Science" in front of the Boston Public Library
By the early 1800s, natural philosophy had begun to separate from philosophy, though it often retained a very broad meaning. In many cases, science continued to stand for reliable knowledge about any topic, in the same way it is still used in the broad sense (see the introduction to this article) in modern terms such as library science, political science, and computer science. In the more narrow sense of science, as natural philosophy became linked to an expanding set of well-defined laws (beginning with Galileo's laws, Kepler's laws, and Newton's laws for motion), it became more popular to refer to natural philosophy as natural science. Over the course of the nineteenth century, moreover, there was an increased tendency to associate science with study of the natural world (that is, the non-human world). This move sometimes left the study of human thought and society (what would come to be called social science) in a linguistic limbo by the end of the century and into the next.[9]
Through the 19th century, many English speakers were increasingly differentiating science (meaning a combination of what we now term natural and biological sciences) from all other forms of knowledge in a variety of ways. The now-familiar expression “scientific method,” which refers to the prescriptive part of how to make discoveries in natural philosophy, was almost unused during the early part of the 19th century, but became widespread after the 1870s, though there was rarely total agreement about just what it entailed.[9] The word "scientist," meant to refer to a systematically-working natural philosopher, (as opposed to an intuitive or empirically-minded one) was coined in 1833 by William Whewell.[10] Discussion of scientists as a special group of people who did science, even if their attributes were up for debate, grew in the last half of the 19th century.[9] Whatever people actually meant by these terms at first, they ultimately depicted science, in the narrow sense of the habitual use of the scientific method and the knowledge derived from it, as something deeply distinguished from all other realms of human endeavor.
By the twentieth century, the modern notion of science as a special brand of information about the world, practiced by a distinct group and pursued through a unique method, was essentially in place. It was used to give legitimacy to a variety of fields through such titles as "scientific" medicine, engineering, advertising, or motherhood.[9] Over the 1900s, links between science and technology also grew increasingly strong.
Scientific method
Main article: Scientific method
The Bohr model of the atom, like many ideas in the history of science, was at first prompted by and later partially disproved by experiment
A scientific method seeks to explain the events of nature in a reproducible way, and to use these reproductions to make useful predictions. It is done through observation of natural phenomena, and/or through experimentation that tries to simulate natural events under controlled conditions. It provides an objective process to find solutions to problems in a number of scientific and technological fields.[11]
Based on observations of a phenomenon, a scientist may generate a model. This is an attempt to describe or depict the phenomenon in terms of a logical physical or mathematical representation. As empirical evidence is gathered, a scientist can suggest a hypothesis to explain the phenomenon. This description can be used to make predictions that are testable by experiment or observation using scientific method. When a hypothesis proves unsatisfactory, it is either modified or discarded.
While performing experiments, scientists may have a preference for one outcome over another, and it is important that this tendency not bias their interpretation.[12][13] A strict following of a scientific method attempts to minimize the influence of a scientist's bias on the outcome of an experiment. This can be achieved by correct experimental design, and a thorough peer review of the experimental results as well as conclusions of a study.[14][15] Once the experiment results are announced or published, an important cross-check can be the need to validate the results by an independent party.[16]
Once a hypothesis has survived testing, it may become adopted into the framework of a scientific theory. This is a logically reasoned, self-consistent model or framework for describing the behavior of certain natural phenomena. A theory typically describes the behavior of much broader sets of phenomena than a hypothesis—commonly, a large number of hypotheses can be logically bound together by a single theory. These broader theories may be formulated using principles such as parsimony (traditionally known as "Occam's Razor"). They are then repeatedly tested by analyzing how the collected evidence (facts) compares to the theory. When a theory survives a sufficiently large number of empirical observations, it then becomes a scientific generalization that can be taken as fully verified. Sometimes a theory will become so thoroughly confirmed that it is regarded as beyond dispute by scientists in its particular field, and might come to be regarded as a scientific "law".
Unlike a mathematical proof, a scientific theory is empirical, and is always open to falsification if new evidence is presented. Even the most basic and fundamental theories may turn out to be imperfect if new observations are inconsistent with them. Critical to this process is making every relevant aspect of research publicly available, which allows ongoing review and repeating of experiments and observations by multiple researchers operating independently of one another. Only by fulfilling these expectations can it be determined how reliable the experimental results are for potential use by others.
Mathematics
Data from the famous Michelson–Morley experiment
Mathematics is essential to the sciences. One important function of mathematics in science is the role it plays in the expression of scientific models. Observing and collecting measurements, as well as hypothesizing and predicting, often require extensive use of mathematics. Arithmetic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry and calculus, for example, all are essential to physics. Virtually every branch of mathematics has applications in science, including "pure" areas such as number theory and topology.
Statistical methods, which are mathematical techniques for summarizing and analyzing data, allow scientists to assess the level of reliability and the range of variation in experimental results. Statistical analysis plays a fundamental role in many areas of both the natural sciences and social sciences.
Computational science applies computing power to simulate real-world situations, enabling a better understanding of scientific problems than formal mathematics alone can achieve. According to the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, computation is now as important as theory and experiment in advancing scientific knowledge.[17]
Whether mathematics itself is properly classified as science has been a matter of some debate. Some thinkers see mathematicians as scientists, regarding physical experiments as inessential or mathematical proofs as equivalent to experiments. Others do not see mathematics as a science, since it does not require an experimental test of its theories and hypotheses. Mathematical theorems and formulas are obtained by logical derivations which presume axiomatic systems, rather than the combination of empirical observation and logical reasoning that has come to be known as scientific method. In general, mathematics is classified as formal science, while natural and social sciences are classified as empirical sciences.[18]
Scientific community
Main article: Scientific community
The scientific community consists of the total body of scientists, its relationships and interactions. It is normally divided into "sub-communities" each working on a particular field within science.
Fields
Main article: Fields of science
The Meissner effect causes a magnet to levitate above a superconductor
Institutions
Louis XIV visiting the Académie des sciences in 1671
Learned societies for the communication and promotion of scientific thought and experimentation have existed since the Renaissance period.[19] The oldest surviving institution is the Accademia dei Lincei in Italy.[20] National Academy of Sciences are distinguished institutions that exist in a number of countries, beginning with the British Royal Society in 1660[21] and the French Académie des Sciences in 1666.[22]
International scientific organizations, such as the International Council for Science, have since been formed to promote cooperation between the scientific communities of different nations. More recently, influential government agencies have been created to support scientific research, including the National Science Foundation in the U.S.
Other prominent organizations include the National Scientific and Technical Research Council in Argentina, the academies of science of many nations, CSIRO in Australia, Centre national de la recherche scientifique in France, Max Planck Society and Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft in Germany, and in Spain, CSIC.
Literature
Main article: Scientific literature
An enormous range of scientific literature is published.[23] Scientific journals communicate and document the results of research carried out in universities and various other research institutions, serving as an archival record of science. The first scientific journals, Journal des Sçavans followed by the Philosophical Transactions, began publication in 1665. Since that time the total number of active periodicals has steadily increased. As of 1981, one estimate for the number of scientific and technical journals in publication was 11,500.[24] Today Pubmed lists almost 40,000, related to the medical sciences only.[25]
Most scientific journals cover a single scientific field and publish the research within that field; the research is normally expressed in the form of a scientific paper. Science has become so pervasive in modern societies that it is generally considered necessary to communicate the achievements, news, and ambitions of scientists to a wider populace.
Science magazines such as New Scientist, Science & Vie and Scientific American cater to the needs of a much wider readership and provide a non-technical summary of popular areas of research, including notable discoveries and advances in certain fields of research. Science books engage the interest of many more people. Tangentially, the science fiction genre, primarily fantastic in nature, engages the public imagination and transmits the ideas, if not the methods, of science.
Recent efforts to intensify or develop links between science and non-scientific disciplines such as Literature or, more specifically, Poetry, include the Creative Writing Science resource developed through the Royal Literary Fund.[26]
Philosophy of science
Main article: Philosophy of science
Velocity-distribution data of a gas of rubidium atoms, confirming the discovery of a new phase of matter, the Bose–Einstein condensate
The philosophy of science seeks to understand the nature and justification of scientific knowledge. It has proven difficult to provide a definitive account of scientific method that can decisively serve to distinguish science from non-science. Thus there are legitimate arguments about exactly where the borders are, which is known as the problem of demarcation. There is nonetheless a set of core precepts that have broad consensus among published philosophers of science and within the scientific community at large. For example, it is universally agreed that scientific hypotheses and theories must be capable of being independently tested and verified by other scientists in order to become accepted by the scientific community.
There are different schools of thought in the philosophy of scientific method. Methodological naturalism maintains that scientific investigation must adhere to empirical study and independent verification as a process for properly developing and evaluating natural explanations for observable phenomena.[27] Methodological naturalism, therefore, rejects supernatural explanations, arguments from authority and biased observational studies. Critical rationalism instead holds that unbiased observation is not possible and a demarcation between natural and supernatural explanations is arbitrary; it instead proposes falsifiability as the landmark of empirical theories and falsification as the universal empirical method. Critical rationalism argues for the ability of science to increase the scope of testable knowledge, but at the same time against its authority, by emphasizing its inherent fallibility. It proposes that science should be content with the rational elimination of errors in its theories, not in seeking for their verification (such as claiming certain or probable proof or disproof; both the proposal and falsification of a theory are only of methodological, conjectural, and tentative character in critical rationalism).[28] Instrumentalism rejects the concept of truth and emphasizes merely the utility of theories as instruments for explaining and predicting phenomena.[29]
Critiques
Scientific fields are commonly classified along two major lines: natural sciences, which study natural phenomena (including biological life), and social sciences, which study human behavior and societies. These groupings are empirical sciences, which means the knowledge must be based on observable phenomena and capable of being tested for its validity by other researchers working under the same conditions.[3] There are also related disciplines that are grouped into interdisciplinary and applied sciences, such as engineering and health science. Within these categories are specialized scientific fields that can include elements of other scientific disciplines but often possess their own terminology and body of expertise.[4]
Mathematics, which is sometimes classified within a third group of science called formal science, has both similarities and differences with the natural and social sciences. It is similar to empirical sciences in that it involves an objective, careful and systematic study of an area of knowledge; it is different because of its method of verifying its knowledge, using a priori rather than empirical methods.[3] Formal science, which also includes statistics and logic, is vital to the empirical sciences. Major advances in formal science have often led to major advances in the empirical sciences. The formal sciences are essential in formulating and evaluating hypotheses, theories, and laws,[3] both in discovering and describing how things work (natural sciences) and how people think and act (social sciences)
History
Main articles: History of science and Scientific revolution
While empirical investigations of the natural world have been described since antiquity (for example, by Aristotle, Theophrastus and Pliny the Elder), and scientific methods have been employed since the Middle Ages (for example, by Ibn al-Haytham, Abu Rayhan Biruni and Roger Bacon), the dawn of modern science is generally traced back to the early modern period, during what is known as the Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries. It was a time roughly coinciding with the later part of the Middle Ages and through the Renaissance in which scientific ideas in physics, astronomy, and biology evolved rapidly.[5]
Etymology and usage of the word science
DNA determines the genetic structure of all life
The word "science" comes through the Old French, and is derived from the Latin word scientia for knowledge, the nominal form of the verb scire, "to know". The Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root that yields scire is *skei-, meaning to "cut, separate, or discern".[6] Similarly, the Greek word for science is 'επιστήμη', deriving from the verb 'επίσταμαι', 'to know'. From the Middle Ages to the Enlightenment, science or scientia meant any systematic recorded knowledge.[7] Science therefore had the same sort of very broad meaning that philosophy had at that time. In other languages, including French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian, the word corresponding to science also carries this meaning.
Far into the eighteenth century, science and natural philosophy were not quite synonymous, but only became so later with the direct use of what would become known formally as the scientific method, which was earlier developed during the Middle Ages and early modern period in Europe and the Middle East (see History of scientific method). Prior to the 18th century, however, the preferred term for the study of nature was natural philosophy, while English speakers most typically referred to other philosophical disciplines (such as logic, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics and aesthetics) as moral philosophy. Today, "moral philosophy" is more-or-less synonymous with "ethics". By contrast, the word "science" in English was still used in the 17th century to refer to the Aristotelian concept of knowledge which was secure enough to be used as a sure prescription for exactly how to do something.[8]
Personification of "Science" in front of the Boston Public Library
By the early 1800s, natural philosophy had begun to separate from philosophy, though it often retained a very broad meaning. In many cases, science continued to stand for reliable knowledge about any topic, in the same way it is still used in the broad sense (see the introduction to this article) in modern terms such as library science, political science, and computer science. In the more narrow sense of science, as natural philosophy became linked to an expanding set of well-defined laws (beginning with Galileo's laws, Kepler's laws, and Newton's laws for motion), it became more popular to refer to natural philosophy as natural science. Over the course of the nineteenth century, moreover, there was an increased tendency to associate science with study of the natural world (that is, the non-human world). This move sometimes left the study of human thought and society (what would come to be called social science) in a linguistic limbo by the end of the century and into the next.[9]
Through the 19th century, many English speakers were increasingly differentiating science (meaning a combination of what we now term natural and biological sciences) from all other forms of knowledge in a variety of ways. The now-familiar expression “scientific method,” which refers to the prescriptive part of how to make discoveries in natural philosophy, was almost unused during the early part of the 19th century, but became widespread after the 1870s, though there was rarely total agreement about just what it entailed.[9] The word "scientist," meant to refer to a systematically-working natural philosopher, (as opposed to an intuitive or empirically-minded one) was coined in 1833 by William Whewell.[10] Discussion of scientists as a special group of people who did science, even if their attributes were up for debate, grew in the last half of the 19th century.[9] Whatever people actually meant by these terms at first, they ultimately depicted science, in the narrow sense of the habitual use of the scientific method and the knowledge derived from it, as something deeply distinguished from all other realms of human endeavor.
By the twentieth century, the modern notion of science as a special brand of information about the world, practiced by a distinct group and pursued through a unique method, was essentially in place. It was used to give legitimacy to a variety of fields through such titles as "scientific" medicine, engineering, advertising, or motherhood.[9] Over the 1900s, links between science and technology also grew increasingly strong.
Scientific method
Main article: Scientific method
The Bohr model of the atom, like many ideas in the history of science, was at first prompted by and later partially disproved by experiment
A scientific method seeks to explain the events of nature in a reproducible way, and to use these reproductions to make useful predictions. It is done through observation of natural phenomena, and/or through experimentation that tries to simulate natural events under controlled conditions. It provides an objective process to find solutions to problems in a number of scientific and technological fields.[11]
Based on observations of a phenomenon, a scientist may generate a model. This is an attempt to describe or depict the phenomenon in terms of a logical physical or mathematical representation. As empirical evidence is gathered, a scientist can suggest a hypothesis to explain the phenomenon. This description can be used to make predictions that are testable by experiment or observation using scientific method. When a hypothesis proves unsatisfactory, it is either modified or discarded.
While performing experiments, scientists may have a preference for one outcome over another, and it is important that this tendency not bias their interpretation.[12][13] A strict following of a scientific method attempts to minimize the influence of a scientist's bias on the outcome of an experiment. This can be achieved by correct experimental design, and a thorough peer review of the experimental results as well as conclusions of a study.[14][15] Once the experiment results are announced or published, an important cross-check can be the need to validate the results by an independent party.[16]
Once a hypothesis has survived testing, it may become adopted into the framework of a scientific theory. This is a logically reasoned, self-consistent model or framework for describing the behavior of certain natural phenomena. A theory typically describes the behavior of much broader sets of phenomena than a hypothesis—commonly, a large number of hypotheses can be logically bound together by a single theory. These broader theories may be formulated using principles such as parsimony (traditionally known as "Occam's Razor"). They are then repeatedly tested by analyzing how the collected evidence (facts) compares to the theory. When a theory survives a sufficiently large number of empirical observations, it then becomes a scientific generalization that can be taken as fully verified. Sometimes a theory will become so thoroughly confirmed that it is regarded as beyond dispute by scientists in its particular field, and might come to be regarded as a scientific "law".
Unlike a mathematical proof, a scientific theory is empirical, and is always open to falsification if new evidence is presented. Even the most basic and fundamental theories may turn out to be imperfect if new observations are inconsistent with them. Critical to this process is making every relevant aspect of research publicly available, which allows ongoing review and repeating of experiments and observations by multiple researchers operating independently of one another. Only by fulfilling these expectations can it be determined how reliable the experimental results are for potential use by others.
Mathematics
Data from the famous Michelson–Morley experiment
Mathematics is essential to the sciences. One important function of mathematics in science is the role it plays in the expression of scientific models. Observing and collecting measurements, as well as hypothesizing and predicting, often require extensive use of mathematics. Arithmetic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry and calculus, for example, all are essential to physics. Virtually every branch of mathematics has applications in science, including "pure" areas such as number theory and topology.
Statistical methods, which are mathematical techniques for summarizing and analyzing data, allow scientists to assess the level of reliability and the range of variation in experimental results. Statistical analysis plays a fundamental role in many areas of both the natural sciences and social sciences.
Computational science applies computing power to simulate real-world situations, enabling a better understanding of scientific problems than formal mathematics alone can achieve. According to the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, computation is now as important as theory and experiment in advancing scientific knowledge.[17]
Whether mathematics itself is properly classified as science has been a matter of some debate. Some thinkers see mathematicians as scientists, regarding physical experiments as inessential or mathematical proofs as equivalent to experiments. Others do not see mathematics as a science, since it does not require an experimental test of its theories and hypotheses. Mathematical theorems and formulas are obtained by logical derivations which presume axiomatic systems, rather than the combination of empirical observation and logical reasoning that has come to be known as scientific method. In general, mathematics is classified as formal science, while natural and social sciences are classified as empirical sciences.[18]
Scientific community
Main article: Scientific community
The scientific community consists of the total body of scientists, its relationships and interactions. It is normally divided into "sub-communities" each working on a particular field within science.
Fields
Main article: Fields of science
The Meissner effect causes a magnet to levitate above a superconductor
Institutions
Louis XIV visiting the Académie des sciences in 1671
Learned societies for the communication and promotion of scientific thought and experimentation have existed since the Renaissance period.[19] The oldest surviving institution is the Accademia dei Lincei in Italy.[20] National Academy of Sciences are distinguished institutions that exist in a number of countries, beginning with the British Royal Society in 1660[21] and the French Académie des Sciences in 1666.[22]
International scientific organizations, such as the International Council for Science, have since been formed to promote cooperation between the scientific communities of different nations. More recently, influential government agencies have been created to support scientific research, including the National Science Foundation in the U.S.
Other prominent organizations include the National Scientific and Technical Research Council in Argentina, the academies of science of many nations, CSIRO in Australia, Centre national de la recherche scientifique in France, Max Planck Society and Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft in Germany, and in Spain, CSIC.
Literature
Main article: Scientific literature
An enormous range of scientific literature is published.[23] Scientific journals communicate and document the results of research carried out in universities and various other research institutions, serving as an archival record of science. The first scientific journals, Journal des Sçavans followed by the Philosophical Transactions, began publication in 1665. Since that time the total number of active periodicals has steadily increased. As of 1981, one estimate for the number of scientific and technical journals in publication was 11,500.[24] Today Pubmed lists almost 40,000, related to the medical sciences only.[25]
Most scientific journals cover a single scientific field and publish the research within that field; the research is normally expressed in the form of a scientific paper. Science has become so pervasive in modern societies that it is generally considered necessary to communicate the achievements, news, and ambitions of scientists to a wider populace.
Science magazines such as New Scientist, Science & Vie and Scientific American cater to the needs of a much wider readership and provide a non-technical summary of popular areas of research, including notable discoveries and advances in certain fields of research. Science books engage the interest of many more people. Tangentially, the science fiction genre, primarily fantastic in nature, engages the public imagination and transmits the ideas, if not the methods, of science.
Recent efforts to intensify or develop links between science and non-scientific disciplines such as Literature or, more specifically, Poetry, include the Creative Writing Science resource developed through the Royal Literary Fund.[26]
Philosophy of science
Main article: Philosophy of science
Velocity-distribution data of a gas of rubidium atoms, confirming the discovery of a new phase of matter, the Bose–Einstein condensate
The philosophy of science seeks to understand the nature and justification of scientific knowledge. It has proven difficult to provide a definitive account of scientific method that can decisively serve to distinguish science from non-science. Thus there are legitimate arguments about exactly where the borders are, which is known as the problem of demarcation. There is nonetheless a set of core precepts that have broad consensus among published philosophers of science and within the scientific community at large. For example, it is universally agreed that scientific hypotheses and theories must be capable of being independently tested and verified by other scientists in order to become accepted by the scientific community.
There are different schools of thought in the philosophy of scientific method. Methodological naturalism maintains that scientific investigation must adhere to empirical study and independent verification as a process for properly developing and evaluating natural explanations for observable phenomena.[27] Methodological naturalism, therefore, rejects supernatural explanations, arguments from authority and biased observational studies. Critical rationalism instead holds that unbiased observation is not possible and a demarcation between natural and supernatural explanations is arbitrary; it instead proposes falsifiability as the landmark of empirical theories and falsification as the universal empirical method. Critical rationalism argues for the ability of science to increase the scope of testable knowledge, but at the same time against its authority, by emphasizing its inherent fallibility. It proposes that science should be content with the rational elimination of errors in its theories, not in seeking for their verification (such as claiming certain or probable proof or disproof; both the proposal and falsification of a theory are only of methodological, conjectural, and tentative character in critical rationalism).[28] Instrumentalism rejects the concept of truth and emphasizes merely the utility of theories as instruments for explaining and predicting phenomena.[29]
Critiques
Pseudoscience, fringe science, and junk science
Main articles: Pseudoscience, Fringe science, Junk science, Cargo cult science, and Scientific misconduct
An area of study or speculation that masquerades as science in an attempt to claim a legitimacy that it would not otherwise be able to achieve is sometimes referred to as pseudoscience, fringe science, or "alternative science". Another term, junk science, is often used to describe scientific hypotheses or conclusions which, while perhaps legitimate in themselves, are believed to be used to support a position that is seen as not legitimately justified by the totality of evidence. A variety of commercial advertising, ranging from hype to fraud, may fall into this category. There also can be an element of political or ideological bias on both sides of such debates. Sometimes, research may be characterized as "bad science", research that is well-intentioned but is seen as incorrect, obsolete, incomplete, or over-simplified expositions of scientific ideas. The term "scientific misconduct" refers to situations such as where researchers have intentionally misrepresented their published data or have purposely given credit for a discovery to the wrong person.
Main articles: Pseudoscience, Fringe science, Junk science, Cargo cult science, and Scientific misconduct
An area of study or speculation that masquerades as science in an attempt to claim a legitimacy that it would not otherwise be able to achieve is sometimes referred to as pseudoscience, fringe science, or "alternative science". Another term, junk science, is often used to describe scientific hypotheses or conclusions which, while perhaps legitimate in themselves, are believed to be used to support a position that is seen as not legitimately justified by the totality of evidence. A variety of commercial advertising, ranging from hype to fraud, may fall into this category. There also can be an element of political or ideological bias on both sides of such debates. Sometimes, research may be characterized as "bad science", research that is well-intentioned but is seen as incorrect, obsolete, incomplete, or over-simplified expositions of scientific ideas. The term "scientific misconduct" refers to situations such as where researchers have intentionally misrepresented their published data or have purposely given credit for a discovery to the wrong person.
Media and the scientific debate
The mass media face a number of pressures that can prevent them from accurately depicting competing scientific claims in terms of their credibility within the scientific community as a whole. Determining how much weight to give different sides in a scientific debate requires considerable expertise regarding the matter.[30] Few journalists have real scientific knowledge, and even beat reporters who know a great deal about certain scientific issues may know little about other ones they are suddenly asked to cover.[31][32]
Politics
Many issues damage the relationship of science to the media and the use of science and scientific arguments by politicians. As a very broad generalisation, many politicians seek certainties and facts whilst scientists typically offer probabilities and caveats. However, politicians ability to be heard in the mass media frequently distorts the scientific understanding by the public. Examples in Britain include the controversy over the MMR inoculation, and the 1988 forced resignation of a Government Minister, Edwina Currie for revealing the high probability that battery eggs were contaminated with Salmonella.[33]
Philosophical critiques
Historian Jacques Barzun termed science "a faith as fanatical as any in history" and warned against the use of scientific thought to suppress considerations of meaning as integral to human existence.[34] Many recent thinkers, such as Carolyn Merchant, Theodor Adorno and E. F. Schumacher considered that the 17th century scientific revolution shifted science from a focus on understanding nature, or wisdom, to a focus on manipulating nature, i.e. power, and that science's emphasis on manipulating nature leads it inevitably to manipulate people, as well.[35] Science's focus on quantitative measures has led to critiques that it is unable to recognize important qualitative aspects of the world.[35]
Psychologist Carl Jung believed that though science attempted to understand all of nature, the experimental method used would pose artificial, conditional questions that evoke only partial answers.[36] David Parkin compared the epistemological stance of science to that of divination.[37] He suggested that, to the degree that divination is an epistemologically specific means of gaining insight into a given question, science itself can be considered a form of divination that is framed from a Western view of the nature (and thus possible applications) of knowledge.
Several academics have offered critiques concerning ethics in science. In Science and Ethics, for example, the philosopher Bernard Rollin examines the relevance of ethics to science, and argues in favor of making education in ethics part and parcel of scientific training.[38]
See also
Science portal
Main articles: List of basic science topics and List of science topics
Wikipedia:Books/Science
Notes
^ "Online dictionary". Merriam-Webster. http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/science. Retrieved on 2000-05-22. "a department of systematized knowledgelolo as an object of study
^ "Online dictionary". Merriam-Webster. http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/science. Retrieved on 2009-05-22. "knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method . . . such knowledge or such a system of knowledge concerned with the physical world and its phenomena"
^ a b c d Popper, Karl (2002) [1959]. The Logic of Scientific Discovery (2nd English edition ed.). New York, NY: Routledge Classics. ISBN 0-415-27844-9. OCLC 59377149.
^ See: Editorial Staff (March 7, 2008). "Scientific Method: Relationships among Scientific Paradigms". Seed magazine. http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2007/03/scientific_method_relationship.php. Retrieved on 2007-09-12.
^ "The Scientific Revolution". Washington State University
^ Etymology of "science" at Etymology Online. See also details of the PIE root at American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th edition, 2000..
^ MacMorris, Neville (1989). The Natures of Science. New York: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. pp. pp. 31–33. ISBN 0838633218.
^ In this differing sense of the two words, the philosopher John Locke in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding wrote that "natural philosophy [the study of nature] is not capable of being made a science". Locke, J. (1838). An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Printed by Thomas Davison.
^ a b c d Thurs, Daniel Patrick (2007). Science Talk: Changing Notions of Science in American Popular Culture. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. ISBN 978-0813540733. OCLC 170031241.
^ Ross, S. (1962). "Scientist: The story of a word" (PDF). Annals of Science 18 (2): 65–85. doi:10.1080/00033796200202722. http://www.informaworld.com/index/739364907.pdf. Retrieved on 2008-02-08.
^ Backer, Patricia Ryaby (October 29, 2004). "What is the scientific method?". San Jose State University. http://www.engr.sjsu.edu/pabacker/scientific_method.htm. Retrieved on 2008-03-28.
^ van Gelder, Tim (1999). ""Heads I win, tails you lose": A Foray Into the Psychology of Philosophy" (PDF). University of Melbourne. http://www.philosophy.unimelb.edu.au/tgelder/papers/HeadsIWin.pdf. Retrieved on 2008-03-28.
^ Pease, Craig (September 6, 2006). "Chapter 23. Deliberate bias: Conflict creates bad science". Science for Business, Law and Journalism. Vermont Law School. http://law-and-science.net/Science4BLJ/Scientific_Method/Deliberate.bias/Text.htm. Retrieved on 2008-03-28.
^ Shatz, David (2004). Peer Review: A Critical Inquiry. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 074251434X. OCLC 54989960.
^ Krimsky, Sheldon (2003). Science in the Private Interest: Has the Lure of Profits Corrupted the Virtue of Biomedical Research. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 074251479X. OCLC 185926306.
^ Bulger, Ruth Ellen; Heitman, Elizabeth; Reiser, Stanley Joel (2002). The Ethical Dimensions of the Biological and Health Sciences (2nd edition ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521008867. OCLC 47791316.
^ Graduate Education for Computational Science and Engineering, SIAM Working Group on CSE Education. Retrieved 2008-04-27.
^ Bunge, Mario Augusto (1998). Philosophy of Science: From Problem to Theory. Transaction Publishers. p. 24. ISBN 0-765-80413-1.
^ Parrott, Jim (August 9, 2007). "Chronicle for Societies Founded from 1323 to 1599". Scholarly Societies Project. http://www.scholarly-societies.org/1599andearlier.html. Retrieved on 2007-09-11.
^ "Benvenuto nel sito dell'Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei" (in Italian). Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. 2006. http://positivamente.lincei.it/. Retrieved on 2007-09-11.
^ "Brief history of the Society". The Royal Society. http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/page.asp?id=2176. Retrieved on 2007-09-11.
^ Meynell, G.G.. "The French Academy of Sciences, 1666-91: A reassessment of the French Académie royale des sciences under Colbert (1666-83) and Louvois (1683-91)". Topics in Scientific & Medical History. http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/page.asp?id=2176. Retrieved on 2007-09-11.
^ Ziman, Bhadriraju (1980). "The proliferation of scientific literature: a natural process". Science 208 (4442): 369–371. doi:10.1126/science.7367863. PMID 7367863.
^ Subramanyam, Krishna; Subramanyam, Bhadriraju (1981). Scientific and Technical Information Resources. CRC Press. ISBN 0824782976. OCLC 232950234.
^ ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/pubmed/J_Entrez.txt
^ Petrucci, Mario. "Creative Writing <-> Science". http://writeideas.org.uk/creativescience/index.htm. Retrieved on 2008-04-27.
^ Brugger, E. Christian (2004). "Casebeer, William D. Natural Ethical Facts: Evolution, Connectionism, and Moral Cognition". The Review of Metaphysics 58 (2).
^ Popper, Karl (2002). Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge. Routledge.
^ Newton-Smith, W. H. (1994). The Rationality of Science. London: Routledge. p. 30.
^ Dickson, David (October 11, 2004). "Science journalism must keep a critical edge". Science and Development Network. http://www.scidev.net/Editorials/index.cfm?fuseaction=readEditorials&itemid=131&language=1. Retrieved on 2008-02-20.
^ Mooney, Chris (2007). "Blinded By Science, How 'Balanced' Coverage Lets the Scientific Fringe Hijack Reality". Columbia Journalism Review. http://cjrarchives.org/issues/2004/6/mooney-science.asp. Retrieved on 2008-02-20.
^ McIlwaine, S.; Nguyen, D. A. (2005). "Are Journalism Students Equipped to Write About Science?". Australian Studies in Journalism 14: 41–60. http://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:8064. Retrieved on 2008-02-20.
^ "1988: Egg industry fury over salmonella claim", "On This Day," BBC News, December 3, 1988.
^ Jacques Barzun, Science: The Glorious Entertainment, Harper and Row: 1964. p. 15. (quote) and Chapters II and XII.
^ a b Fritjof Capra, Uncommon Wisdom, ISBN 0-671-47322-0, p. 213
^ Jung, Carl (1973). Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle. Princeton University Press. p. 35. ISBN 0691017948.
^ Parkin 1991 "Simultaneity and Sequencing in the Oracular Speech of Kenyan Diviners", p. 185.
^ Rollin, Bernard E. (2006). Science and Ethics. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521857546. OCLC 238793190.
References
Feyerabend, Paul (2005). Science, history of the philosophy, as cited in Honderich, Ted (2005). The Oxford companion to philosophy. Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0199264791. OCLC 173262485. of. Oxford Companion to Philosophy. Oxford.
Feynman, R.P. (1999). The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best Short Works of Richard P. Feynman. Perseus Books Group. ISBN 0465023959. OCLC 181597764.
Papineau, David. (2005). Science, problems of the philosophy of., as cited in Honderich, Ted (2005). The Oxford companion to philosophy. Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0199264791. OCLC 173262485.
Parkin, D (1991), Philip M. Peek, ed., African Divination Systems: Ways of Knowing, Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press .
Further reading
Augros, Robert M., Stanciu, George N., "The New Story of Science: mind and the universe", Lake Bluff, Ill.: Regnery Gateway, c1984. ISBN 0895268337
Baxter, Charles "Myth versus science in educational systems"PDF (66.4 KB)
Becker, Ernest (1968). The structure of evil; an essay on the unification of the science of man. New York: G. Braziller.
Cole, K. C., Things your teacher never told you about science: Nine shocking revelations Newsday, Long Island, New York, March 23, 1986, pg 21+
Feynman, Richard "Cargo Cult Science"
Gopnik, Alison, "Finding Our Inner Scientist", Daedalus, Winter 2004.
Krige, John, and Dominique Pestre, eds., Science in the Twentieth Century, Routledge 2003, ISBN 0-415-28606-9
Kuhn, Thomas, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 1962.
MacComas, William F. "The principal elements of the nature of science: Dispelling the myths"PDF (189 KB) Rossier School of Education, University of Southern California. Direct Instruction News. Spring 2002 24–30.
Obler, Paul C.; Estrin, Herman A. (1962). The New Scientist: Essays on the Methods and Values of Modern Science. Anchor Books, Doubleday.
Thurs, Daniel Patrick (2007). Science Talk: Changing Notions of Science in American Popular Culture. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. pp. 22–52. ISBN 978-0-8135-4073-3.
Levin, Yuval (2008). Imagining the Future: Science and American Democracy. New York, Encounter Books. ISBN 1594032092
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