What characterizes science? Navigating the site:
Focus of scientific study:
measurement | reliable information | accuracy | doubt | tested | reinforced | modified | discarded
Key adherents who are mentioned below represent a commitment to basic axioms or postulates in science.
The examples mentioned here reveal how numbers or measurement create reliable information whose accuracy can be subjected to doubt, carefully tested and then either reinforced, modified, or discarded.
measurement by numbers is an idea shared by Pythagoras & Galileo with contemporary scientists.
rational: logos of Heraclitus vs. logic of Aristotle
- mathematical geometry, Plato and later Kepler.
- rational from ratio, Descartes' x&y coordinate system.
- radiation from the sun is electromagnetic; therefore electricity can be generated from light, especially ultraviolet radiation.
measurement | reliable information | accuracy | doubt | tested | reinforced | modified | discarded
repeatable: gravity and acceleration are indistinguishable [the same] said Einstein.
reliable: helical molecules of heredity resolved by Wilkins, Franklin, Watson & Crick.
measurement | reliable information | accuracy | doubt | tested | reinforced | modified | discarded
accurate: observations of mocking birds, finches, turtles and lizards by Darwin.
trustworthy: biological heritage is a process where species are evolving together to maintain the world, Wilson – because it has a degree of knowing with recognized uncertainty.
unseen forces: Frank Wilzeck, MIT lecture on particle physics.
measurement | reliable information | accuracy | doubt | tested | reinforced | modified | discarded
fungible: in that one kind of characteristic can be thought of as another with different–even contrary– attributes. For example matter may be a form of energy, or genes are not what they seem according to Keller.
revolutionary: the idea that concepts and facts are always replaced by new findings that are more theoretically reasonable descriptions or more testable narratives. Doubt plays a significant role in the overthrow of prevailing postulates. That is to say the reform of widely accepted ideas is possible and encouraged by discovery.
measurement | reliable information | accuracy | doubt | tested | reinforced | modified | discarded
method as opposed to a body of knowledge
measurement | reliable information | accuracy | doubt | tested | reinforced | modified | discarded
axioms refer to given information, for example: assumptions that are rarely, if ever disputed, such as the belief that nature is intelligible. That is to say people can understand nature and describe it with some degree of certainty.
postulates are statements that one derives from proofs about material conditions based on experiment, explanations, theories and heuristics, or discoverable properties of things. That is certain numerical constant's represent actual decipherable relations in nature that can be expressed in numbers, For instance the neutrons and protons have a density just less than 2000 times that of the electrons and that the neutrons and protons move about nucleus at 40,000 miles a second.
measurement | reliable information | accuracy | doubt | tested | reinforced | modified | discarded
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