Questions tagged [scientific-method]
The Scientific Method is meant to answer questions based on observation and experimentation.
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Wittgenstein on Mechanics
Can someone explain what Wittgenstein was trying to say in Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus ? Specifically propositions 6.341-6.343. What does he mean when he says that a system like Newtonian Mechanics ...
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How to reconcile that physicists and science educators use the word “theory” incompatibly?
When science denialists say "just a theory", they are roundly chastised. Science educators (teachers, reporters, essayists, etc) are united that the word theory has a strong requirement:
Berkeley: "a ...
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What is Quine’s Confirmation theory?
I have just read that Quine relies on his confirmation theory to establish if a scientific theory is “valid” or not. But I am not sure to have understood what is Quine’s confirmation theory and why ...
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Is phenomenology a science?
Is phenomenology a science? I know Husserl was fond of saying it is. Specifically, is any of it scientific? By "phenomenology" I mean
the study of structures of consciousness as
experienced from ...
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Would answering belief challenges be the same as the scientific method?
Let's say I believe this statement: "all swans are white". Someone comes and asks me these Socratic questions: "is it true that all swans are white?", "is there an instance that a swan is not white?", ...
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What is the historical relationship between physics and philosophy?
I often hear people say that physics is/was part of philosophy or that philosophy gave birth to physics but I think this isn't correct.
Imagine a big country called anonati. After a civil war, ...
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Explanation vs. prediction in statistics and in the philosophy of science?
In the realm of statistics and machine learning, a lot of discussion has arisen recently around the difference between explaining and predicting: That the two are not the same, and that the difference ...
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What are the accomplishments of critical theory vs. logical positivism
Coming from a natural science viewpoint, I find that logical positivism is much more important for scientific research than is critical theory.
I've read the critics/flaws of logical positivism, and ...
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Can a theory that is now wrong be right in the future?
For example we take as granted that energy is conserved (Energy conservation Principle). Imagine someone “build” a theory where the energy conservation doesnt apply. Scientific community should reject ...
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What are the relationships between Foucault's medical gaze, scientific investigation, and Buddhist detachment?
From this note from a clinical psychologist, the Foucault's gaze is described as:
... with this powerful gaze the physician could penetrate illusion and see through to the underlying reality, that ...
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Name of Principle Giving Precedence to a More General Hypothesis
As far as I know, there is a principle that gives precedence to a theory that is more general than a more specific one, i.e the more general one is more acceptable.
What is the name of that principle?
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How can the credibility of dietary recommendations of medical sciences and EBM be upheld in light of a history of radical changes of its claims?
I know the typical argument is that science is a work in progress and is constantly self-improving.
However, self-improvement demands some continuity in claims. For example, relativistic physics was ...
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Is it scientific or a logical error to claim something is true because I can't think of another explanation
The situation
Let's say, someone is wrong on the internet. She says
The forums on that newspaper article is closed. Apparently the newspaper want to suppress public debate.
I reply:
That's ...
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Can hypotheses have parts that are supported or falsified individually?
Can an hypothesis that is part of the scientific method have multiple parts which can be falsified or supported individually?
Let's say the experiments provide evidence that Part A models correctly ...
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What is the principle of underdetermination?
While studying I read about the principle of underdetermination of scientific theories. I made some researches online but I am more confused than before. I read about the Quine-Duhem holistic thesis, ...
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What hisorical time period does Kuhn's “pre-paradigm state” correspond?
In Thomas Kuhn's analysis of scientific development, in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, the "pre-paradigm state" is a condition in which all members of the scientific community practice ...
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What makes epistemology unscientific?
Epistemology is called a branch of philosophy and not science. There are several epistemic theories some of which actually were mainstream sometimes. But it appears that, for example, some of them ...
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Philosophy of Science and the nature of observation: what counts as 'observable'?
In the realist-antirealist debate within philosophy of science, the distinction between the 'observable' and 'unobservable' is made very often though I have seen that this distinction is also ...
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With regard to the methodological incommensurability, does Kuhn talk about astrology?
According to Kuhn's methodological incommensurability, puzzle-solutions from different eras of normal science are evaluated by reference to different paradigm and methods.
This implies that what was ...
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Responses to the problem of Underdetermination
Underdetermination and the arationality in the process of theory choice is often brought up by anti-realists on science as a proof of the problems with the scientific process in tracking truth.
What ...
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Models of explanations and their conditions
Carl Hempel's idea of explanation (D.N. model) in the sciences is that you should be able to make some deductive argument by which the fact you're trying to explain is the conclusion. I.e. you form an ...
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What is the logical fallacy in assuming scientific method?
When I assume that whatever some authority figure says is the truth, it becomes a logical fallacy called "appeal to authority". But then how do I assume that the scientific method is (most likely) ...
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In order for politics to be “scientific”, what does it require? Are there existing scientific political ideologues (measurement et al)?
In order for politics to be "scientific", what does it require? Are there existing scientific political ideologues (measurement et al)?
Particularly, because I still feel that a lot around politics ...
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What is the philosophical status of the enlightenment project?
"“Enlightenment is man’s release from his self-inflicted immaturity. … ‘Have courage to use your own reason!’—that is the motto of enlightenment.” -Kant
.
"the difference between science and ...
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What is the Null Hypothesis for a negative claim?
If my claim is: There are no purple swans.
How should this look like in a null/alternative hypothesis form?
Like this?
Null: There are purple swans
Alternative: There are no purple swans
Or like ...
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1answer
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What is the difference between epistemic targets and epistemic motivations for simulations and experiments?
Now I am reading an article here about philosophy and epistemology of science. And here is a quote:
Peschard's more sophisticated picture involving a distinction between
epistemic targets and ...
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1answer
107 views
Are axioms assumptions and should they be minimized?
Are axioms nothing but assumptions and, if yes and in accordance to Occam's Razor, should they be minimized?
When postulating scientific theorems which, unlike axioms, are subject to the scrutiny of ...
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On the explanation of facts
As a chemist, I have some philosophical doubts about explanation of facts.
Short intro
In Bertrand Russell's book 'History of Western Philosophy' he says that leading-to scientific knowledge is the '...
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4answers
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Thought as a physical process
Short background
I suppose everyone sometime ask to the mirror: what is thought? Answer requires some definitions or analogies. 'Thought is like motion', for example. But the question that leads to ...
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What is scientific mind?
How can you define scientific mind?
What i think , it is a bend of mind that can be developed by any person(also one not related to field of science).This mind is fulfilled with abilities to observe ...
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Do theories come from observations or do they determine what is observed?
While re-reading Shimon Malin’s “Nature Loves to Hide” I was trying to get a better grasp of the distinction between Ernst Mach’s philosophy that theory comes from observable magnitudes alone and what ...
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Should I analyse my dataset first and formulate hypotheses later, or formulate my hypothesis first and analyse the relevant part of the dataset later?
I've got a huge dataset with hundreds of variables. However, I'm not sure which scientific method is more sophisticated in this case. The two scenarios are the following:
Analyse my huge dataset ...
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Can shared-subjective knowledge be part of science?
On one hand, Einstein's relativity was non-scientific knowledge until it was proven using the scientific method. Since then, we can say that relativity is part of scientific knowledge.
On the other ...
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It is posible a Resourced Based Economy? [closed]
When I refer to a resource-based economy, I refer to the proposal of the groups of The Zeitgeist Movement and The Venus Project
https://www.thevenusproject.com/resource-based-economy/
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Is the business of science to construct models of objects and processes?
Prominent theoretical physicist and science educator David Hestenes begins his widely cited paper Modeling Games in the Newtonian World (American Journal of Physics 60, 732 (1992)) with this:
The ...
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Is the scientific method ideological?
A scientific method being defined as a method whose rejection of less descriptive hypotheses of experience (acceptance of hypotheses that are 'accurate from more frames of reference') is always and ...
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Did Descartes really doubt the existence of God?
I've learned about Descartes' universal doubt and as I understood it, he says mind that is supposed to interact with God isn't part of res extensa and therefore isn't part of the senses we can doubt. ...
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How to argue for science against religion (ft. IASIP)?
(I previously asked posted this in Skeptics SE but was told that this might be a better SE for my specific question.)
I was watching this scene from "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" where Mac (a ...
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Of which philosophy is this when these points stick together? [closed]
God made the Big-bang
God created Earth
God created creatures on Earth
God created laws of nature including biology and evolution
There are creatures created by God: Adam, Eva, other humans, …
There ...
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Does Probability come before Scientific Method?
I am interested in the following epistemological problem.
Usually, Probability is seen as a mathematical theory that we use to describe the physical world. Precisely, following the Scientific Method ...
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What role do values have in science according to Popper?
I have read a lot about Popper but I still can not answer.
What is the role of values in Popper's philosophy? What role do they have in science according to Popper?
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Is holism likely incompatible with scientific method?
I've been reading on the holism-reductionism continuum. Reductionism strikes me as compliant with general principles of the scientific approach and method because it seeks to explain complex phenomena ...
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1answer
901 views
What is the difference between a scientific theory and a model?
What is the difference between a scientific theory and a model?
Can someone explain the ideas with the help of a theory in physics and a model of physics?
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Deduction vs Induction — are they equally valid?
I've been reading on deduction vs induction as two primary modes of reasoning. Can't exactly remember where but I have also seen deduction being described as backward and induction as forward thinking....
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What in the philosophy of science makes it not mathmatics? What would I ask someone to filter out the bad faith? [closed]
I recently had someone make an argument from a mathematics background, to argue a point that had no actual correlation to the material world. When I began I asked them if they accepted objective ...
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If consciousness was an illusion, would it be less real?
Even though qualia are generally considered to be unexplainable, there are philosophers like Daniel Dennett attempting to get to the core of consciousness with scientific methods. In his view, ...
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Could some of our conceptions about the physical universe be wrong? [closed]
I managed to create cold fission by placing a carbon crucible into a polysyrene cut out, put a few small sticks of glow stick stuff from the dollar store, put the lid on and generated a 5 meter field ...
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Big Data's effects on questions in philosophy of science
The Oxford English Dictionary recently named ‘post- truth’ its word of the year. The term, whose use is reputed to have increased 2000% in the past year, is defined as: “…relating to or denoting ...
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Fallibilism and truth by science
I know that a fallibilist believes that our current beliefs may not be true but i'm trying to argue that one can be a fallibilist and also believe that science progresses towards the truth. Does it ...
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Basic understanding of the Scientific Method
As a layperson non-specialist I am trying to verify if I understand scientific method.
Can someone look at the example I made up and tell me if it fits with scientific method. I'm using this diagram ...
