Nature of Science

It looks like your students have some questions about the Nature of Science. Reflect on what you have just learned and see how well you can respond. Just click on their raised hands!

You could respond:

"Ask him to show you. If he tries and fails, you have evidence that he can’t do it. If he refuses to try, you still won’t know."

You could respond:

"We can’t know for sure unless we get unmistakable signals from them or send a probe to investigate. However, we can hypothesize about whether the conditions on other planets are favorable to the existence of life, and design experiments to test those ideas."

You could respond:

"Well, if he enjoys reading, then it is not a waste of his time, but it is not science. Astrology is based on the notion that there are twelve personalities in the world and what happens to these personalities depends on the sun’s position relative to the stars. There is no evidence that this relationship has anything to do with your personality or how well your day will go. Science is based on evidence and reasoning. These are both missing here."

You could respond:

"Science has theories and data that are exceedingly well-supported, but it is a basic tenet of science that ideas are always open to modification or falsification as new evidence is gathered. In this way, science is always becoming more accurate."

You could respond:

"I mean that we favor the simplest explanation that accounts for all the facts. If I knew that you brought an apple to school today and that you ate an apple for lunch, I would probably guess that you ate the apple that you brought to school. It’s a much simpler (parsimonious) explanation than guessing that you brought an apple to school, but accidentally forgot it in second period, and then traded your package of potato chips for a different apple to eat."

You could respond:

"No. Scientists are human. They make mistakes just like everybody. But the process of science works so that scientific knowledge gets more accurate over time."

You could respond:

"Not really. They disagree, argue, debate, and get really upset sometimes, but ultimately, evidence (and not popularity) determines which explanation is the best one."