Scientific Terminology

It is my personal belief that the lack of some basic scientific knowledge (or even basic knowledge of how science works) has lead to a mistrust of science, specifically evolution. In this post I will attempt, to the best of my ability, to outline a couple of basic principles in science which should, hopefully, show that distrust of science is unwarranted. The two pieces of scientific terminology I will try to explain are “The Scientific Method” and “Theory”:

1. The Scientific Method

The scientific method is a means of reaching conclusions around how the universe works, in my opinion it is one of the greatest concepts ever devised, it can be broken down into the five following points (I will use an analogy of plants growing to try and expedite the explanation):

1) Observation - By making observations of natural phenomena around us we begin to form assumptions of how and why certain things happen. In terms of my analogy we might observe that plants start to die off when the days become darker and shorter.

2) Hypothesis - From our observations we can then develop a hypothesis (a conjecture) as to why we are seeing what we are. So for my analogy we might hypothesise that plants need light to grow.

3) Prediction - From our hypothesis we can develop predictions as to how certain events will occur. From out hypothesis that plants need light to grow we might make a prediction that plants exposed to light will grow whereas plants deprived of light will not, and that plants exposed to light for longer periods of time will grow at a faster rate.

4) Testing/Experimentation - This is where we put our predictions to the test to see whether they are valid or not. For our example a good test might be to have three batches of freshly planted seeds, kept separately being exposed to different levels of light (no light, 12 hours continuous light, 24 hours continuous light) whilst all other variables (temperature, soil water levels, etc) are kept the same, we could then periodically measure the growth of plants from each batch to gain our results.

5) Analysis - once we have carried out our testing we would analyse our results to determine if they are statistically significant, if they are we would then go on to carry out further testing to see if we can explain this phenomena further so as to understand it better, if however out results are not significant or do not agree with our hypothesis/predictions we would go back to our hypothesis and adjust it to match what we have discovered; going back to our analogy if we found that plants exposed to light for 24 hours grew at a slower rate than at the 12 hours exposure we might alter our hypothesis to state that although light is needed for growth too long an exposure is somehow harmful/less beneficial for plant growth.

And that in a nutshell is it, I have intentionally kept my analogy simple so as to prevent it from becoming too long and confusing. The scientific method is rather elegantly designed as a means of gaining knowledge about how the world around us works; it allows us to update and correct falsely held hypothesis, whilst giving us a rigid framework within which we can learn more about the universe.

2. Theory (scientific)

You may wonder why I included “scientific” in parentheses in the above sub-heading, the reason is that there are multiple definitions of the word theory; when we talk about germ theory or the theory of evolution we are talking about a scientific theory not the generalised term. A theory is derived from rigorous testing using the above outlined scientific method; once we have amassed enough evidence supporting our hypothesis it may be elevated to the status of a theory, the below is the Wikipedia definition of a scientific theory:

“A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, based on knowledge that has been repeatedly confirmed through observation and experimentation. Scientists create scientific theories from hypotheses that have been corroborated through the scientific method, then gather evidence to test their accuracy. As with all forms of scientific knowledge, scientific theories are inductive in nature and aim for predictive and explanatory force.

The strength of a scientific theory is related to the diversity of phenomena it can explain, and to its elegance and simplicity (Occam's razor). As additional scientific evidence is gathered, a scientific theory may be rejected or modified if it does not fit the new empirical findings, leading to a more accurate theory. In certain cases, the less-accurate unmodified scientific theory can still be treated as a theory if it is useful (due to its sheer simplicity) as an approximation under specific conditions (e.g. Newton’s laws of motion as an approximation to special relativity at velocities which are small relative to the speed of light).

Scientific theories are testable and make falsifiable predictions. They describe the causal elements responsible for a particular natural phenomenon, and are used to explain and predict aspects of the physical universe or specific areas of inquiry (e.g. electricity, chemistry, astronomy). Scientists use theories as a foundation to gain further scientific knowledge, as well as to accomplish goals such as inventing technology or curing disease. Scientific theories are the most reliable, rigorous, and comprehensive form of scientific knowledge. This is significantly different from the common usage of the word "theory”, which implies that something is a guess (i.e., unsubstantiated and speculative).“

It is worthwhile spending some time reading more about scientific theory so I will include a link at the bottom of this post. However it should be clear from the above definition alone that a scientific theory is not a guess, so if you ever hear someone utter the phrase "it’s just a theory” (I’ve probably heard this at least a few hundred times in debates) tell them to go and find out what the word actually means. I would hope that by clarifying the above points I have demonstrated that science doesn’t just make things up, it doesn’t just chose it’s favorite concept, it uses rigorous testing and a strict framework to better understand our world, which, in my eyes is something to be admired.

Wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_theory