The Scientific Method

Robert Hazen and James Trefil

From Hazen and Trefil, The Physical Sciences (An Integrated Approach), New York !ohn "iley and Sons #$$%, &'(

Science is a discipline that asks and answers questions about the physical world. It is not primarily a set of facts or a catalo of answers! but rather a way of conductin an on oin dialo ue with our physical surroundin s. "ike any human acti#ity! science is enormously #aried and rich in subtleties. $e#ertheless! there are a few basic steps that! taken to ether! can be said to comprise the scientific method.

Observation
If our oal is to learn about the world! the first thin we ha#e to do is look around us and see what%s there. This statement may seem ob#ious to us& yet! throu hout much of history! learned men and women re'ected the idea that you can understand the world simply by obser#in it. The (reek philosopher )lato! li#in durin the (olden * e of *thens! would ha#e ar ued that one cannot deduce the true nature of the uni#erse by trustin to the senses. The senses lie! he would ha#e said. +nly the use of reason and the insi hts of the human mind can lead us to true understandin s. In his famous book The )ep*+lic, )lato compared human bein s to people li#in in a ca#e! watchin shadows on a wall! but unable to see the ob'ects causin the shadows. In 'ust the same way! he ar ued! obser#in the physical world will ne#er put us in contact with reality! but will doom us to a lifetime of wrestlin with the shadows. +nly with the ,eye of the mind, can we break free from illusion and arri#e at the truth. -urin the .iddle * es in /urope! a similar frame of mind e0isted! but with a de#out trust in wisdom passed down from classical scholars and theolo ians replacin human reason as the ultimate tool in the search for truth. There is a story 1probably apocryphal2 about a debate in an +0ford colle e on the question of how many teeth a horse has. +ne learned scholar quoted the (reek scientist *ristotle on the sub'ect! and another quoted the theolo ian St. *u ustine to put forward a different answer. Finally! a youn monk at the back of the hall ot up and noted that since there was a horse outside! they could settle the question by lookin in its mouth. *t this point! the manuscript states! the assembled scholars ,fell upon him! smote him hip and thi h! and cast him from the company of educated men., *s both of these e0amples illustrate! we can de#elop strate ies to learn about the

physical world by usin our reasonin powers alone! without actually makin obser#ations. Such approaches are not! howe#er! what we call the scientific method! nor did they produce the kinds of ad#anced technolo ies and knowled e we associate with modern societies. These other attempts to understand our place in the cosmos were! howe#er! perfectly serious! and were pursued by people e#ery bit as intelli ent as we are. 3 human bein s radually came to understand that obser#ation complements pure reasonin ! and thus has an important role to play in learnin about the uni#erse. In the remainder of this book! we will differentiate between obser#ations, in which we obser#e nature without manipulatin it! and e0periments! where we manipulate some aspect of nature and obser#e the outcome. *n astronomer! for e0ample! obser#es distant stars without chan in them! while a chemist e0periments by mi0in materials to ether and seein what happens.

Identifying Patterns and Regularities

4hen we obser#e a particular phenomenon o#er and o#er a ain! we be in to et a sense of how nature beha#es. 4e start to reco nize patterns in nature. /#entually! we will eneralize our e0perience into a synthesis that summarizes what we ha#e learned about the way the world works. 4e may! for e0ample! notice that whene#er we drop somethin ! it falls. This statement would represent a summary of the results of many obser#ations. Scientists often summarize the results of their obser#ations in mathematical form! particularly if they ha#e been makin quantitati#e measurements. In the case of a fallin ob'ect! for e0ample! they mi ht be measurin the time it takes an ob'ect to fall a certain distance! rather than 'ust noticin that the ob'ect falls. The ne0t step would be to collect data in the form of a table. These data could also be presented in the form of a raph! in which distance is plotted a ainst time. *fter preparin tables and raphs of their data! scientists would notice that the lon er the time somethin falls! the reater the distance it tra#els. Furthermore! the distance isn%t simply proportional to the time of fall. If the ob'ect falls for twice as lon ! it does not tra#el twice as far. Rather! if one ob'ect falls for twice as lon as another! it will tra#el four times as far& if it falls three time lon er! it will tra#el nine times as far& and so on. This statement can be summarized in three ways5 in words! in equation form! in symbols. .athematics is a concise lan ua e that allows scientists to communicate their results and to make #ery precise predictions! but anythin that can be said in an equation can also be said 1thou h in a less concise way2 in a plain /n lish sentence. 4hen you encounter equations in your science courses! you should always ask! ,4hat /n lish sentence does this equation represent6, This routine will keep the mathematics from obscurin the simple ideas that lie behind most equations. $ot e#ery scientific idea can be or has to be stated this precisely! thou h. * scientist

studyin the radual encroachment of a forest into an abandoned field! for e0ample! mi ht notice that certain plants seem to follow each other7weeds! followed by scrub trees! followed by pines! followed by hardwoods! for e0ample. 4e can conclude that a succession of plant types will be obser#ed e#erywhere in a particular climate zone. This conclusion can be tested! and so it is a part of scientific inquiry.

Hypothesis and Theory

+nce we ha#e summarized e0perimental and obser#ational results! we can form a hypothesis7a tentati#e! educated uess7about how the world works. In the case of our e#eryday e0perience with fallin ob'ects! a hypothesis could be #ery easily formulated. 4e could say! ,4hen I drop somethin ! it falls., In other cases! the formation of the hypothesis may be more complicated! and the hypothesis may be stated in the form of mathematical equations. 4hen confronted with a new phenomenon! scientists often wei h se#eral different hypotheses at once! much as a detecti#e in a murder mystery may consider se#eral different suspects. The word theory refers to a description of the world that co#ers a relati#ely lar e number of phenomena and has met many obser#ational and e0perimental tests. *fter obser#in hundreds of dropped ob'ects! for e0ample! we could state a theory such as! ,In the absence of wind resistance! all ob'ects fall a distance proportional to the square of the time of the fall., Just as a detecti#e announces a theory at the solution of a murder mystery! so! too! scientists reach a conclusion based on their obser#ations of nature.

Prediction and Testing

In science! e#ery hypothesis must be tested. 4e test hypotheses by usin them to make predictions about how a particular system will beha#e! then by obser#in nature to see if the system beha#es as predicted. For e0ample! if we hypothesize that all ob'ects fall when they are dropped! then that idea can be tested by droppin all sorts of ob'ects. /ach drop constitutes a test of our prediction! and the more successful tests we conduct! the more confidence we ha#e that the hypothesis is correct. *s lon as we restrict our tests to solids or liquids on the /arth%s surface! the hypothesis is consistently confirmed. Test a helium7filled balloon! howe#er! and we disco#er a clear e0ception to the rule. The balloon ,falls, up. The ori inal hypothesis! which worked so well for most ob'ects! fails for certain ases. *nd more tests would show that that%s not the only limitation. If you were an astronaut in the space shuttle! e#ery time you held somethin out and let it o it would not fall or rise. It would float in space. /#idently! our hypothesis is in#alid in orbit! as well. This e0ample illustrates an important aspect about testin hypotheses. Tests do not necessarily pro#e or dispro#e a hypothesis& instead! they often ser#e to define the ran e

of situations under which the hypothesis is #alid. 4e may! for e0ample! obser#e that nature beha#es in a certain way only at hi h temperatures or only at low ones& only at low #elocities or only at hi h ones. Such limitations indicate that the ori inal hypothesis doesn%t co#er enou h round and has to be replaced by somethin more eneral. In the e0ample of fallin ob'ects! we will see that the hypothesis that ,ob'ects fall when dropped, has to be replaced by a more sophisticated and eneral set of hypotheses called $ewton%s laws of motion and the law of uni#ersal ra#itation. These laws describe and predict the motion of dropped ob'ects both on the /arth and in space and are! therefore! a more successful set of statements than the ori inal hypothesis. 4hen a hypothesis has been tested e0tensi#ely and seems to apply e#erywhere in the uni#erse7when we ha#e had enou h e0perience with it to ha#e a lot of confidence that it is true7we enerally ele#ate the hypothesis to a new status. 4e call it a law of nature. 4e will encounter a number of such laws in this book! all backed by countless obser#ations and measurements. It is important! howe#er! to remember where these laws come from. They are not written on tablets of stone! nor are they simply ood ideas that someone once had. They arise from repeated and ri orous obser#ation and testin . They represent our best understandin of how nature works. Remember 8 we ne#er stop questionin the #alidity of our hypotheses! e#en after we call them laws. Scientists constantly think up new! more ri orous e0periments to test the limits of our theories. In fact! one of the central tenets of science is that e,ery law of nat*re is s*+-ect to change, +ased on new o+ser,ations.

The Scientific Method in Operation

The elements of obser#ation! hypothesis formation! prediction! and testin to ether comprise the scientific method. In practice! you can think of the method as workin as shown in Fi ure 9. In this ne#er7endin cycle! obser#ations lead to hypotheses! which lead to more obser#ations. If obser#ations confirm a hypothesis! then more tests may be de#ised. If the hypothesis fails! then the new obser#ations are used to re#ise it! after which the re#ised hypothesis is tested a ain. Scientists continue this process until the limits of e0istin equipment are reached! in which case researchers often try to de#elop better instruments to do e#en more tests. If it appears that there%s 'ust no point in oin further7when numerous e0periments confirm a i#en hypothesis7that hypothesis may e#entually be ele#ated to a law of nature. Se#eral important points should be made about the scientific method. 9. 4hile scientists attempt to be ob'ecti#e! they often obser#e nature with preconceptions about what they are oin to find. .ost e0periments and obser#ations are desi ned and undertaken with a specific hypothesis in mind! and

most researchers ha#e a stron hunch about whether that hypothesis is ri ht or wron . )erhaps the most important point about the scientific method is that scientists ha#e to belie#e the results of their e0periments and obser#ations! whether they fit preconcei#ed notions or not. Science does not demand that we ha#e no ideas when we enter the cycle 1Fi ure 92 8 only that we be ready to chan e those ideas if the e#idence forces us to.

Fi . 9. The scientific method can be represented as an endless cycle of collectin obser#ations 1data2! identifyin patterns and re ularities in the data 1synthesis2! formin hypotheses! and makin predictions! which lead to more obser#ations.

:. There is no ,ri ht, place to enter the cycle. Scientists often start their work by makin e0tensi#e obser#ations! but they can also start with a theory and test it. 4here#er they enter the cycle! the scientific process will take them all the way around. ;. +bser#ations and e0periments must be reported in such a way that anyone with the proper equipment can #erify the results. Scientific results! in other words! must be reproducible. <. There is no end to the cycle! but each cycle lifts us to a new le#el of understandin . Science does not always pro#ide final answers! nor is it always a search for ultimate truth. Science is a way of producin successi#ely more detailed and e0act descriptions of the physical world7descriptions that allow us to predict the beha#ior! of that world with hi her and hi her le#els of confidence. =. Finally! while the orderly cycle shown in Fi ure 9 pro#ides a useful framework to help us think about science! science is not a ri id! cookbook7style set of steps to follow. >ecause science is undertaken by human bein s! it in#ol#es occasional

bursts of intuition! sudden leaps! a 'oyful breakin of the rules! and all the other sorts of thin s we associate with human acti#ities.

G OSS!R"
#$peri%ent 8 the manipulation of some aspect of nature to obser#e an outcome. Hypothesis & a tentati#e uess about how the world works! based on a summary of e0perimental or obser#ational results and phrased so that it can be tested by e0perimentation. a' of (ature 8 an o#erarchin statement of how the uni#erse works! followin repeated and ri orous obser#ation and testin of a theory or roup of related theories to show that the theory seems to apply e#erywhere in the uni#erse. Observation & the act of obser#in nature without manipulatin it. Prediction 8 a uess about how a particular system will beha#e! followed by obser#ations to see if the system did beha#e as e0pected within a specified ran e of situations. Reproducible 8 a criterion for the results of an e0periment. In the scientific method! obser#ations and e0periments must be reported so that anyone with the proper equipment can #erify the results. Scientific Method 8 a continuous process used to collect obser#ations! form and test hypotheses! make predictions! and identify patterns in the physical world. Theory 8 a description of the world that co#ers a relati#ely lar e number of phenomena and has met many obser#ational and e0perimental tests. * conclusion based upon obser#ations of nature.