BIO 600 Class 2

What is Science? 1. The observation, identification, description, experimental investigation, and theoretical explanation of phenomena. 1. Such activities restricted to a class of natural phenomena. 2. Such activities applied to an object of inquiry or study. 2. Methodological activity, discipline, or study: I've got packing a suitcase down to a science. 3. An activity that appears to require study and method: the science of purchasing. 4. Knowledge, especially that gained through experience. Dictionary.com

What is Science? 1. “Science is the concerted human effort to understand, or to understand better, the history of the natural world and how the natural world works, with observable physical evidence as the basis of that understanding. It is done through observation of natural phenomena, and/or through experimentation that tries to simulate natural processes under controlled conditions.” Science seeks to understand how nature behaves by observing and correlating available factual information. Our understanding of science is therefore based upon, and limited by, the factual information available. In science, fact-based explanations are called "theories." Theories may be good, bad, or indifferent. It all depends on the accuracy and amount of the factual information available, and how logically these facts are interpreted. chem.tufts.edu/science/FrankSteiger/sci-def.htm

Essential Characteristics of Science A descriptive definition was said to be that science is what is "accepted by the scientific community" and is "what scientists do." The obvious implication of this description is that, in a free society, knowledge does not require the imprimatur of legislation in order to become science. More precisely, the essential characteristics of science are:  It is guided by natural law;  It has to be explanatory by reference to natural law;  It is testable against the empirical world;  Its conclusions are tentative, i.e., are not necessarily the final word; and  It is falsifiable. Scientists theorize about things, organize vast research projects, build equipment, dig up relics, take polls, run experiments on everything from people to protons to plants; the list is almost endless. A description of science in terms of the sorts of things "scientists do," then, does not reveal much about the nature of science, for there does not seem to be anything scientists typically do. Said another way, there is little that scientists do not do. Thus, to understand just what science is, a different perspective is required. Instead one must explore why scientists study what they do. Secondly, one must understand the way in which scientific inquiry is conducted, no matter what its subject.

The Nature of Science Scientific Ideas are subject to change  “Science is a process for producing knowledge. The process depends on making careful observations of phenomena and on inventing theories for making sense out of those observations. Change is knowledge is inevitable because new observations may challenge prevailing theories.” (p. 2)  Ex: Andrew Wiles. Science cannot provide complete answers to all questions. Science demands evidence. Science is a blend of logic and imagination. Scientists try to identify and avoid bias.  “One safeguard against undetected bias in an area of study is to have many different investigators or groups of investigators working in it.” (p. 7) Science is a complex social activity.  Some scientists present their findings and theories in papers that are delivered at meetings or published in scientific journals. Those papers enable scientists to inform others about their work, to expose their ideas to criticism by other scientists, and, of course, to stay abreast of scientific developments around the world.” (p. 9) Science is organized into content disciplines and is conducted in various institutions. There are generally accepted ethical principles in the conduct of science.  “…research involving human subjects may be conducted with informed consent of the subjects, even if this constraint limits some kinds of potentially important research or influences the results.” (p. 11)