Scientific Method
By: Mike • Research Paper • 691 Words • April 1, 2010 • 1,760 Views
Scientific Method
Scientific method is a process that outlines a number of principles for answering questions. Many people in day-to-day situations use scientific method. For example, if I were to try to start my car and it doesn’t work, my first reaction would be to think of reason my car is not starting. This is just a brief example of scientific method. The principles in Scientific method should be used in an orderly manner to answer your questions. Scientific method lets people research true things as well as false. There is no guessing when using Scientific method it is completely natural. From my military career I can say from experience that Integrity is one of our Five Army Values. I like to think the Scientific method is having entire integrity, due to the fact that it is this method of discovery, and justification for that discovery, which must be accomplished entirely with integrity (www.scientificmethod.co.uk).
Scientific method consists of five steps: observation, hypothesis, experiment, conclusion and scientific theory. You must identify your problem when doing observation. Second you must gather as much information about the problem as possible. Third you want to form a hypothesis. A hypothesis is an unproved explanation for a natural event. Based on observation a hypothesis is a scientist best explanation. One reason why hypothesis is so important is because it is the comparison for experimental data. Next you have experiments, which is basically testing your hypothesis. Deductive reasoning includes the logic of the experiment and pretty much making a prediction on supported studies. Inductive and Deductive reasoning differ by the fact that inductive reasoning is based on experience or observation, while deductive reasoning is based on laws, rules or other widely accepted principles. The final step to scientific method is the conclusion. Scientist must analyze the data in order to reach a conclusion as to whether the hypothesis is supported or not.
The main goal of science is to distinguish the necessary from the not so necessary. In doing this, science distinguished laws from theories. A theory is an axiomatic system constituting a self-contained world. A law is what is real within-constituent of- an axiomatic system, and an accidental generalization is untrue within- not constituent of- an axiomatic system. Since a statistically significant correlation can be real in one axiomatic system and unreal in another, what is a law in one axiomatic system need not be a law in another system. (Gцdel’s Proof 27)
A scientific law is usually a statement of fact that is meant to explain a set of action. Scientific laws are generally accepted