Talk:Scientific method

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I disagree with the last edit of the intro paragraph. It used to read

The scientific method is the way scientists investigate the world and produce knowledge about it. Colloquially the term usually refers to an idealized, systematic approach that is supposed to characterize all scientific investigation.

The objection in the subject line of the edit by Eclecticology was "They are scientists because they use it,; not the reverse." I don't think that objection sticks to this intro, a) because the intro doesn't claim that they are scientists "because" and b) nobody is a scientist "because" they follow the scientific method. At least in the common sense of the word "science" is a profession, and people are scientists if they do certain kind of activities in a lab, and even they work non-methodically and produce junk science (which is called junk science because it's produced by scientists, who don't cease to be scientists because they worked unscientifically). The scientific method makes you scientific, not a scientist.

The new sentence also loses the word "colloquially," which was there to indicate the important point that in fact most experts DO NOT suppose "an idealized, systematic approach" characterizes "all scientific investigation." The sentence substitutes "usually":

The scientific method is a way to investigate the world and produce knowledge about it. Those who use it may be called scientists. The term usually refers to an idealized, systematic approach

These feel like overwhelming objections to me and so at least for the moment I'm going to revert. 168... 16:40, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I see why someone might feel a need to make the point that the scientific method is what makes a person scientific, but I think that the original wording implicitly fulfills the same need, which I think ultimately is just to show that something essential to science rides on this concept of method we are about to explain. Providing an additional and more abstract statement about this essentialness pushes the intro toward long windedness. 168... 17:46, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

In a sense 168... makes my point. To say that "the scientific method makes you scientific, not a scientist," is puzzling, and creates confusion. It suggests that the two terms derive from different interpretations of "science", and that they differ by more than what would simply be implied by the suffixes. We can use either a strict or broad interpretation of "science", but we should certainly avoid mixing the two in the same sentence without explanation.☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

Since language is far from wholly logical, I think it's the wrong approach to be looking at suffixes and analyzing how the paragraph might be understood by a robot. Do you really dispute that "scientist" connotes a professional and that readers encountering the first sentence will interpret it another way?168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Language may be far from wholly logical, but in the absence of implanted neuro-computer interfaces it will have to do. It's not the suffixes that I'm disputing, but whether they are attached a root with the same meaning. "Professional" may sometimes be a part of the connotation of "scientist", but it is not a part of its denotation. The risk that readers will interpret "scientist" as a professional is very real. A person doesn't need to "do" science for a living to be a scientist. ☮ Eclecticology 22:39, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

Inluding laboratory technologists and practitionars of junk science in the definition of "scientist" is certainly giving a broad interpretation of the word....☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

I didn't include lab techs and perhaps I should have said bad science instead of junk science, since I'm not sure how you're taking it, but my point is that people commonly understand "scientists" foremost as a kind of person, e.g. as an "expert." You don't cease to be an expert because you're sloppy or performing inexpertly on a given day.168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Bad science and junk science can still be defined with reference to science. Where I was going was in reference to this bit of sophistry: At least in the common sense of the word "science" is a profession, and people are scientists if they do certain kind of activities in a lab, and even they work non-methodically and produce junk science (which is called junk science because it's produced by scientists, who don't cease to be scientists because they worked unscientifically). Under this definition lab techs are scientists, even if they do nothing more than pour a substance from one test-tube to another. Reference to "experts" does not help us to define science. ☮ Eclecticology 22:39, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

Please do not label my point as "sophistry," which implies bad faith, of which there was none, and besides misrepresents my point as less than pertinent, which it certainly was. You misunderstood my definition, reading necessary conditions as sufficient conditions. 168... 06:45, 3 Nov 2003 (UTC)

but that begs the question of just who we mean when we say that the scientific method is "the way scientists investigate..." Simply stating it that way suggests all scientists, including technologists and practitioners of junk science, and that it is the only way rather than simply a way.☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

the full phrase is "the way scientists investigate the world and produce knowledge about it." Your point is a good one but I don't think your change fixes the problem. In fact, I think there's no perfect fix here that will avoid long-windedness or wishywashiness or bold assertions that shouldn't be made without offering evidence. So I think we're forced to resort to delicacy, which is what I tried to use in crafting that first sentence. I believe the word "and" goes a good distance toward rescuing it from the inaccuracy that you say it is committing. Though it begs the question of what "knowledge" is, the "and" implies that if a scientist is not producing knowledge, he or she is not using the scientific method. 168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I wasn't even addressing the "produce and investigate" aspect. Saying that it is "the way" would require more evidence than "a way"; the latter merely implies that it is not the only way. A better, more generic and more "delicate" replacement for "scientist" mught be "investigator". I share your concern about the latter part of the sentence, but did not intend to tackle that problem at this time. ☮ Eclecticology 22:57, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

"the" requires less evidence than "a" when one understands "scientific method" to mean roughly what most students of scientific method understand it to mean--which is "whatever scientists do to achieve progress." "the" is supposed to enable the sentence to be read as accurate by people who use the term that way as well as by believers in "the scientific method," who I believe believe that "whatever scientists do to achieve progress" = "the scientific method." Using "scientists" in this sentence does not exclude non-scientists, and a subsequent sentence now says explicitly that "the scientific method" is a paradigm for all kinds of investigation. 168... 06:53, 3 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I am far less committed to preserving the added sentence saying that the use of the scientific method may define what a scientist is. What it does is simply make it clear that the science is more important than the scientist. I perhaps tried to be too succinct in the previous subject line. The word "because" may have been too simplistic. My intent was really to pull the explanation of the term out of the circular argumentation.☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

Circular? Again I think you are overanalyzing and/or are analyzing more than the vast majority of readers will. The method is in the end, even for the idealists I suspect, something we extract from what scientists do, and in any event in scientists' activitities is where we see it. The approach of the intro is to be concrete, not circular. "The scientific method makes you scientific" is quite circular, and doesn't do a good job of bringing readers into what people think of when they they say "the scientifc method."168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

If what we mean by "scientific method" depends on what a scientist is, and what we mean by "scientist" depends on what scientific method is we have a circular argument. If I happen to be analyzing more than most readers that's of no consequence. I would prefer a clear definition that does not depend at all on who scientists are.☮ Eclecticology 00:39, 2003 Nov 1 (UTC)

There is no avoiding circularity if we are to acknowledge what most science studies people mean by "scientific method." 168... 07:03, 3 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I found the use of the term "colloquially" to be uninformative. Following the OED it would refer to a term used in an ordinary or familiar conversation, not formally or literary. ☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

Yes, exactly.168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

By whom? Does it mean everybody except the scientific scientists? Is the usage by unscientific scientists and philosophers of science to be termed "colloquial"? Is the use of the scientific method by investigators in subject areas not usually associated with "science" to be nothing more than a colloquial application of the expression? ☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

"Colloquially" excludes the formal speech and writing of experts or scholars of the scientific method, such as sociologists and historians and philosophers. In the sentence in which it appears it is meant to address the fact that more than one usage of the term "scientific method", and that the sense the sentence is describing predominates among non-experts and non-scholars. It doesn't say that no experts or no scholars ever use it in this way. The consruction might be taken to suggest that such experts and scholars would be in the minority of those using the word "scientific method," but I believe that's a demographically accurate implication.168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

It seems hardly appropriate to have colloquiality determined by demographics. "Colloquially" suggests a usage by the uninformed common man, and there is considerable ambiguity about whether you are excluding the usage by the philosophers of science from the "scientists'" usage or from the colloquial usage. ☮ Eclecticology 00:39, 2003 Nov 1 (UTC)

I just don't see "colloquially" as ambiguous at all. As I posted elsewhere, I can see why you might perceive it as a slight, even though the word is fair and accurate, but I can't understand how you can see it as ambiguous. Anyway, I posted an edit in which the word does not appear. 168... 07:03, 3 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I would certainly not agree with a definition of the scientific method that is limited in its use to an exclusive subset of scientists. ☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

I don't understand how you came to the above point. Besides, I take you to be implying that one is only a scientist when one is practicing the scientific method, which is certainly a subset of people for a subset of the time.168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

In a strict sense yes. At any given moment, of course, his entire energy may be focused on only one of the steps in the method. Even the time spent fund-raising for the necessary equipment can be considered a part of hypothesis testing. ☮ Eclecticology 00:39, 2003 Nov 1 (UTC)

The scientific method is primarily a method, and as such available for anybody's use. On this basis I am restoring my edits. ☮ Eclecticology 18:27, 2003 Oct 31 (UTC)

The "scientific method" is a disputed concept that means different things to different people. I think "an idealized, systematic approach that is supposed to characterize all scientific investigation" clearly expresses the concept you want, that it is a method, and that formulation does not exclude people. The second paragraph says the scientific method is even a paradigm for activities outside science. But there are more phenomenolical or historical concepts of the scientific method that are more akin to "whatever scientists do," and so it's important to mention the scientists. To me what all of this implies is that your edit--as you justify it above--is POV, and if only for that reason the article is better off without it. 168... 19:50, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Suggesting that someone else's arguments are POV while implying that your own are not debases the value and credibility of your arguments.

You are right that the "idealized, systematic approach..." is closer to my vision of the scientific method. It avoids dependence on who is doing the science. Your characterization of this approach as colloquial creates the illusion that it is somehow inferior to that which would be imposed by the elitists of science.

In the course of looking at this problem I visited the article on the French Wikipedia where the definition is based on the works of Fred Kerlinger. It seems far more workable, and I suggest that we adopt it here. ☮ Eclecticology 00:39, 2003 Nov 1 (UTC)

I have a POV, but my argument wasn't POV. The intro as it was was carefully balanced to represent two POV's and you are arguing in effect for a tilting of that balance in arguing for your edits. I can see why you might feel your POV is slighted by "colloquially" and yet the statement is accurate and not misleading. As I said before, it doesn't say "only colloquially." You proposed "usually", which is accurate but misleading in a way that helps a POV. If you can come up with something fair and better than "colloquially" to describe who uses "scientific method" or how the term is used in the idealized sense, then by all means propose one. 168... 07:15, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)

As it stood, the first paragraph won’t do.

It asserted that the scientific method is the way scientists investigate, yet also claims that most scholars do not think such a method exists. What conclusion should a casual reader reach?

I also hope this new intro avoids some of the POV arguments. But then maybe not. No doubt I will be told. Banno 20:25, 6 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I believe that's a very unusual reading of the first paragraph, which said that it's the reality of a single applicable idealization that people doubt ("However, most historians, philosophers and sociologists regard the actual operations of science as more complicated and less orderly than the idealized method implies"). You seem to have ignored my request that you describe in what way the intro was biased, by the way. That request was at the bottom of the page, right after your last post and where a lot of the recent correspondence has been taking place.168... 20:56, 6 Nov 2003 (UTC)

No, I’m not ignoring you. I have other things to do. I placed my comment at the end of the thread about the first paragraph. Sorry for confusing you. Banno 08:15, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Some material sent to /Archive 5

Perhaps we should just make scientific method a disambiguation page with links to two articles. scientific method(idealized) and scientific method(in practice).168... 16:34, 4 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Or we could move this article to The scientific method, and call the other whatever else you want. ☮ Eclecticology 20:51, 2003 Nov 4 (UTC)

Really? Then I'd like to call it scientific method.168... 22:19, 4 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I don't think that's necessary. Rather, the article itself could distinguish between the actual process of scientific discovery and the "method" of tying everything up neatly so that it conforms to the "steps". --Uncle Ed 16:53, 4 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I agree. The article should distinguish between descriptive and proscriptive methods. Banno 08:38, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

What the argument really seems to be about is whether the view of the philosophers or of the scientists should have priority. I don't accept the view that there are two definitions, but even if I do there remains the question of which comes first. ☮ Eclecticology 20:51, 2003 Nov 4 (UTC)

I don't see that as the question at all. You may not like the intro sentence I wrote or you may not understand it to mean what I mean it to mean, but it is supposed to be a statement consitent with both perspectives on scientific method. I keep objecting to your changes of it because I see them as turning it into a one-perspective sentence. Perhaps there is no 2-perspective sentence we can agree on and one perspective by necessity must come first. But the order is not the question. The question is more whether we can describe each perspective fairly and accurately and without doing injustice to the other perspective. That includes statements about what people and how many of them use it to mean what, and it also includes avoiding assertions about how science works without attributing them to one of the two schools of thought.168... 22:19, 4 Nov 2003 (UTC)

The article as it now stands has a clear bias towards a particular view of scientific method. Might I suggest that instead of attempting to develop a compromised article that is acceptable to all, or separating the view points into other articles with obscure or pedantic titles, we attempt to articulate exactly where the point of difference is – after all, if we find it a topic worth discussing, won’t the reader as well? Banno 11:15, 5 Nov 2003 (UTC)

If you want to eliminate bias, it would help if you could say exactly how it's biased.168... 15:58, 5 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I don’t really know how to answer this question. If you cannot see that removing comment about all except one philosopher of science biases the article, there is little I can do for you.Banno 19:00, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Sorry, no, I cannot see that mentioning only one philosopher of science per se argues for one particular view of scientific method, especially given that the article explicitly described two views. 168... 20:30, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I've proposed a new intro which takes some inspiration from Bannos intro. Bannos intro itself I didn't like at all, however, because a)it made the subject of the article about idealized method, b)it implied that "scientific method" has only one meaning and c) the first sentence described the SM as how scientists "understand" the world, which to me wrongly suggests that the method no so much about about doing and discovering as about how we think about the world. 168... 22:01, 6 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Interesting comments. Point by point:

a) Idealized scientific method

I agree with 168 that the subject of the article should not be idealized Scientific Method(whatever that might be). Do a search for Idealized scientific method on Google and guess what comes up first? Is it appropriate to use a term in an encyclopaedia article that is hardly in use outside that article?

So we would agree, no doubt, that your first sentence is inappropriate, since it sets up the article to be about idealised scientific method?’

Actually, your research makes me rather proud for having coined this succinct and clarifying distinguishing term We certainly were having trouble understanding each other before I thought of it.168... 20:30, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

b) What other meaning, apart from 'the process used by scientists to understand the world', does the term scientific method have? Certainly no other is presented in the present introduction…

I explained my objection to "understand" already. 168... 20:30, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

c) By all means, if the word 'understand' offends you, pluck it out. Perhaps 'to make sense of…', or 'to discover how the world works'. Banno 19:00, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

My own last proposal was that we forget trying to create a dual perspective introductory remark. 168... 20:30, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

New changes:

Removed 'The', and references to idealised scientific method as discussed above
changed to prediction and evaluation for consistency with rest of article
linked to sociology of knowledge
Removed 'Among scholars there is much more sympathy for idealized methods viewed as prescriptions for how science ought to be done.' Which Scholars? Who would dare to tell sceintists how they ought to do science?

Removed redundancy and hopefully made purpose of second paragraph clear.

Banno 20:06, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Banno, you yourself used the word ought yourself in this intro you proposed: "There are different descriptions of how scientists work. Some are...intended to advocate ways in which scientists ought to work." This is just the prescriptive vs descriptive distinction which you proposed (astutely I thought) that we should make. With your professed skepticism about the scholars I was referring to, are you saying Popper has no advice for scientists? The fact that scholars abstract and articulate rules for how science ought to be done does not imply they do so to lecture scientists or that, if they did lecture them, they would be telling them something they didn't already in some sense know.168... 20:30, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Yep. You are right, I hadn’t thought it through. Any methodology must be proscriptive. I take back the comment about distinguishing "ought". Banno 20:42, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Kuhn

I've removed the material on Kuhn. My apologies if this causes offence. My aim is simply to construct a better article, not to gag the author. Perhaps the author (168?) would like to move the material to the article on Kuhn himself?

I strongly recommend that the article not contain any material about particular philosophers, historians or sociologists, and instead contain a more extensive set of links to other articles. Why?:

This will prevent many of the claims to bias
It would be far better to keep discussion of the pros and cons of individual methodologies to the articles on those methodologies
The links will provide a outline of the debate itself

Banno 20:18, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Secularity

Since there has been a misspelling in view the actual progress of science as more complicated and haphazzard, what about replacing the phrase with

view the actual progress of science as non-secular

My motivation is that the first 3 paragraphs are commentary about science, and not about the scientific method per se. 169.207.85.87 21:34, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)