social sciences, the formation of models or theories may involve skills in mathematical computation and derivation, in evaluating consistency,

in imagining new theoretical possibilities, in assessing the structure of a taxonomy, or in relating one area of investigation to other areas. The means for testing theories or generating new Procedures for attaining scientific knowledge are known as empirical knowledge vary widely, and include systematic scientific methods. These methods include formulating theories and testing them against observation or experiment. observation, unsystematic observation, checks against background theories or knowledge, and various experimental Ancient and medieval thinkers called any systematic procedures, including sophisticated statistical body of knowledge a science, and their methods were techniques, the construction of special instruments or aimed at knowledge in general. According to the most apparatus and the use of specially bred laboratory animals. common model for scientific knowledge, formulated by 2 Ideas of method from the Greeks to Thomas Kuhn Aristotle, induction yields universal propositions from which all knowledge in a field can be deduced. This model was Because science originally meant any systematic body of knowledge, ranging from mathematics to theology, the refined by medieval and early modern thinkers, method of science was the method for obtaining, or perhaps and further developed in the nineteenth century by Whewell merely for presenting and teaching, knowledge in and Mill. As Kuhn observed, idealized accounts of scientific method must general. Methods varied in relation to beliefs about what there is to be known. be distinguished from descriptions of what scientists actually do. The methods of careful observation and The writings of Plato and Aristotle embody contrasting conceptions of both the objects of knowledge and the experiment have been in use from antiquity, but method for knowing them. In Republic VI, Plato divided the became more widespread after the seventeenth century. objects of knowledge into two realms: the visible and Developments in instrument making, in mathematics and the intelligible (see Plato 14). He considered the former to statistics, in terminology, and in communication technology include the objects of the senses, about which only have altered the methods and the results of science. opinion but not genuine knowledge is possible, and the latter 1 Method and science to include geometry and astronomy, in which Method comes from the Greek meta (after) plus hodos investigators assume the existence of their objects (such as (path or way). A method is a way to achieve an end; a geometrical objects) and reason from them as from scientific method is a way to achieve the ends of science. hypotheses. In the highest reaches of the intelligible realm, What those ends are depends on what science is or is reason attempts to reach the first principle of all that taken to be. The word science now means primarily natural science, examples of which are physics, astronomy, Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Version 1.0, London and New York: Routledge (1998) biology, chemistry, geology and psychology, and it applies Scientific method secondarily to social sciences such as economics and sociology. Discussions of method focus on the cognitive aims exists, from which it then comes down to a conclusionproceeding by means of Forms and through of science, which may include knowledge, understanding, explanation, or predictive success, with respect Forms to its conclusions which are Forms, without any reference to the to all or part of nature or to some domain of natural or social phenomena. Abstractly described, scientific method visible world. Plato conceived the sensible world as a dim reflection of the intelligible Forms, and he held that the is the means for attaining these aims, especially by Forms themselves are best known through direct forming models, theories, or other cognitive structures and intellectual contemplation, independent of sensory experience. testing them through observation and experiment (see The notion of an intelligible world behind the Experiment; Models; Observation; Theories, scientific). sensible world, and especially of a world described by Investigations of scientific method may describe the mathematics, has played an important role in physical methods actually employed by scientists, or they may science since Platos time. formulate proposals about the procedures that should be Aristotle rejected Platos intelligible realm because it followed to achieve scientific knowledge (see Naturalized removed the objects of mathematical sciences such as philosophy of science). astronomy from the sensible world, where he believed the The main features traditionally ascribed to the scientific method - including clear statement of a problem, careful forms of things are to be found. He carried out extensive observations (including dissections) in biology and developed confrontation of theory with fact, open-mindedness, and a preliminary taxonomic scheme. Aristotles (potential) public availability or replicability of evidence are common to many cognitive endeavours, including much principal discussion of method is the Posterior Analytics, a founding work in the philosophy of science. He work in the humanities. Although there is no single accepted the Platonic distinction between a direction of method that distinguishes science from other intellectual cognition that is going to the forms and the direction of practices, the following features are characteristic of the natural and social sciences: the use of quantitative data and of cognition (as in syllogistic demonstration) that proceeds from the forms, but he conceived these processes as theories formulated mathematically; the use of artificially created experimental situations; and an interest in starting from sensible objects and arriving at knowledge of the common natures or essences of things as existing in universal generalizations or laws (see Demarcation problem; Laws, natural 1; Unity of science). (But note that those objects. Such knowledge (for instance, of the essence of a specific kind of mineral, or kind of living thing) biological taxonomies are not intrinsically yields a set of core propositions in each science, from which quantitative, and that neither astronomy nor economics is other knowledge is to be deductively derived. based primarily on experiment.) In both the natural and Medieval philosophers, including Roger Bacon, John Duns

Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

Scientific method

Scotus and William of Ockham, commented include quantitative observation (as in chemistry or extensively on Aristotles methodological writings, which astronomy) and the perception of similarities (as in natural history); observation includes both the collection and were later discussed at the University of Padua together classification of facts. Clear ideas result from intellectual with those of Galen. A central topic was the distinction education (including both the mathematical sciences and between analysis and synthesis, or, as it was sometimes called, between resolution and composition. In the analytic natural history), and from discussion, including Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Version 1.0, London phase of inquiry, one resolves the object of investigation into its basic constituents or least elements so as and New York: Routledge (1998) Scientific method to determine its first principles. In the synthetic phase, one explains a subject matter from its first principles, (sometimes metaphysical) discussions of definitions, such as whether uniform force acting in free fall should be or presents a body of knowledge by deriving it from defined relative to space or to time. Science proceeds by such principles. In a common example, the analytic phase induction, including the use of quantitative techniques would include the search for the axioms, postulates and definitions of geometry; the synthetic phase the demonstration to smooth out the irregularities of observation (that is, the of theorems from those axioms and postulates. method of curves by which a curve is fitted to data Bacon suggested that the first principles achieved in the points, the method of means and the method of least analytic or inductive phase can be tested by deducing and squares) and the formation and empirical testing of checking new consequences (a feature of hypotheticotentative hypotheses. Laws of phenomena are usually formed deductive tests of theories). Scotus outlined a method of first, but theories of true causes are desired, such as agreement, in which a possible cause for an effect is found by (Whewell explained) have been found in physical astronomy, listing the circumstances that co-occur with the physical optics, and geology, and might be found effect and looking for one that is present every time. Ockham with respect to heat, magnetism, electricity, chemical suggested a method of difference, in which a compounds and living organisms. circumstance that is present when the effect is present and In A System of Logic (1843), Mill analysed the methods of absent when it is absent is considered as a possible science even more fully than had Whewell, now cause for the effect. including psychology and the social sciences (also known as The seventeenth century, a time of fundamental change in the mental and moral sciences). In his analysis of physics and astronomy, saw continuing attention to experimental method, Mill included the methods of agreement method within the inductive-deductive framework established and difference already mentioned, and added the by Aristotle. Francis Bacon outlined inductive method of residues, which directs the investigator to look for procedures in detail, calling for extensive collections of data the (as yet unknown) causes of those effects that (named histories) which are to be culled remain after all other effects have been assigned to known systematically for general principles or laws. Galileo urged causes, and the method of concomitant variations, that mathematical descriptions be fitted to natural according to which those phenomena that vary regularly in phenomena through observation and experiment (see Galilei, quantitative degree with one another are assumed to be G.). Descartes wrote in Discourse on the Method causally related. Like Whewell, Mill emphasized the role of (1637) that the derivation of an effect from a cause may serve new or pre-existing concepts and names in scientific as an explanation of the effect, and also as an observation, and the role that classification plays in induction. empirical proof of the posited cause (see Descartes, R. 6). He proposed that psychology and the social sciences should adopt the explanatory structures of the natural Newton, in Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (1729), laid down several hypotheses or sciences, a proposal frequently criticized since his time, notably by the Neo-Kantians Wilhelm Dilthey, Heinrich rules for reasoning in natural philosophy. He advised investigators to avoid multiplying causes in relation to effects, Rickert and Ernst Cassirer, who discussed methods pertaining to the social or human sciences, and who to generalize from properties found in bodies that have been observed to all bodies in the universe, and to accept included the humanities as a form of science (in German, Wissenschaft) (see Neo-Kantianism; Positivism in the social inductively supported propositions as accurately or very nearly true until new observations improve upon their sciences). Philosophers in the first half of the twentieth century, accuracy or limit their scope (see Newton, I. 4). During the nineteenth century, the philosophy of science especially the Vienna Circle and Karl Popper, sought to analyse science and to reconstruct scientific reasoning using or the logic of science became, in the writings of William Whewell, John Stuart Mill and others, a main staple the new symbolic logic or the new theory of probability (see Vienna Circle). They continued the of philosophy (see Philosophy of science in the nineteenth century). Whewells Philosophy of the Inductive investigation of theory confirmation, focusing on recent theories in physics (see Confirmation theory). Rudolph Sciences (1840) analyses scientific knowledge of external nature (excluding the mind itself). Whewell held Carnap attempted unsuccessfully to develop a quantitative theory of inductive support. Carl Hempel, who favoured a that scientific knowledge is based upon sensations and ideas, the former being the objective element (caused by hypothetico-deductive account of scientific confirmation (involving the testing of theories by their objects), the latter a subjective element (provided by deductive consequences), revealed certain paradoxes that the knowing subject). Consciously entertained facts and result when the relation between scientific generalizations and theories correspond to sensations and ideas, but not completely, because all facts implicitly include ideas (and so, confirming instances are expressed in predicate logic and certain (plausible) assumptions are made. Popper possibly, theory). Whewell divided the methods of science into methods of observation, of obtaining clear ideas, concluded that the defining feature of the empirical methods of science is that statements are always subjected to and of induction. The methods of observation falsification by new data.

In the second half of the twentieth century philosophical opened up hitherto unforeseen theoretical possibilities in analyses of scientific method broadened to again include physical cosmology. The development of probability and sciences such as biology and geology, and paid greater statistics permitted the formulation of statistical laws, as attention to the history of science. N.R. Hanson recalled the in mathematical genetics, quantum physics and sociology (see often implicit role of theory in observation, questioning the Probability, interpretations of; Statistics; Statistics notion of a theory-neutral observation language (see and social science). Inferential statistics is widely used in the Observation 4). Thomas S. Kuhn emphasized the social analysis of quantitative data in psychology and other nature of scientific communities and the common training sciences. that produces a shared vocabulary and set of experimental Clear and precise terminology is an important feature of procedures. Kuhn and Paul Feyerabend stressed the scientific methodology. Astronomy, optics (as the science need to distinguish the idealized accounts of scientific method of vision), natural history and medicine developed technical given by some scientists and philosophers from the vocabularies in antiquity. Newton profoundly altered actual methodological practices of scientists. In studying the the terminology of physics, which continues to change as latter, historical and sociological investigation theories change. Carl von Linnaeus invented important supplements the participatory acquaintance with scientific taxonomies in botany and zoology; after Darwins theory of research possessed by scientists themselves and by natural selection gained acceptance, evolutionary some philosophers. history influenced biological taxonomy (see Evolution, theory 3 Scientific method in scientific practice of; Taxonomy). Molecular biology has produced The methods of careful observation and description (including another new terminology (see Molecular biology). In quantitative description) and of controlled psychology, long-standing mentalistic terminology was experiment arose in antiquity and were practised by Greek, purged by twentieth-century behaviourists (see Behaviourism, Hellenistic and Islamic investigators (see Philosophy methodological and scientific), and has since been of science in Islam 2). Examples include Aristotles reintroduced, partly under the influence of the computer biological observations, the many Greek and Arabic (and metaphor for mental processes (see Mind, computational earlier Babylonian) tables of astronomical data, Ptolemy and theories of). Likewise, economics, anthropology and Alhazens careful studies of binocular vision and sociology use refined technical vocabularies. distance perception, and Galens use of the ligature and other A sense of the various instruments and techniques of data collection and analysis now used can be gleaned from experimental techniques in physiology. From antiquity, instruments aided the precision of observation the materials, methods and results sections of scientific journals. Journals and other means of communication are in astronomy and optics. In the early seventeenth themselves of methodological significance. The available century Johannes Kepler used Tycho Brahes precise methods for presenting observational data were radically astronomical data (obtained with improved instruments) to establish the elliptical orbits of the planets and to determine altered by the development of printing (for both text and images), and again through computer-generated images the relations among the sizes and periods of those orbits. In 1609 Galileo used the newly invented telescope to and electronic communication. The mass production of standardized illustrations and printed data permits observe previously unseen heavenly bodies (including worldwide dissemination, utilization and hence testing of the moons of Jupiter). Later in the century the microscope scientific findings. opened new fields of observation. The nineteenth and twentieth centuries have seen the development of refined and The structure of scientific research groups and their interaction with scientific institutions, including the processes often complex instrumentation in all branches of natural science, including biology, chemistry and psychology, for deciding whether to fund research or to publish results, are also part of the method of science (broadly ranging from improved balances to the electron Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Version 1.0, London conceived). The methodological effectiveness of science can be evaluated at various scales, including the and New York: Routledge (1998) individual experiment, the individual investigator, the Scientific method laboratory group, or the institutional structures by which microsope and the space telescope. Photography has been collective instruments such as particle accelerators are used to record data in nearly every field. The computer permits collection and manipulation of larger bodies of data administered. One might further examine the normative consequences of having relative homogeneity of than was previously practical. In psychology, the methodological and theoretical belief across an active science, computer allows generation of precisely controlled stimuli as and the recording of data with highly accurate temporal opposed to the hedged bet of methodological and theoretical measurement. The development of mathematics, including probability and diversity. The student of scientific methods may investigate any aspect of the linguistic, conceptual, statistics, has yielded new forms of theory statement and new descriptions of observational or experimental data. psychological, instrumental, social and institutional features of Mathematical sciences from antiquity to the seventeenth century used geometry almost exclusively. The the sciences that affects their cognitive products. See also: Crucial experiments; Discovery, logic of; development of algebraic geometry and of the calculus Explanation; Inductive inference; Feminism and social permitted new statements of Newtonian mechanics in the science; eighteenth century, and opened up new possibilities Gender and science; Heideggerian philosophy of science; (theoretical as well as experimental) for describing and Objectivity; Philosophy of science in Islam; Postcolonial investigating functional relations among quantities. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, new mathematics has been philosophy of science GARY HATFIELD demanded by or has facilitated mathematical References and further reading physics. Thus, the discovery of non-Euclidean geometries

Aristotle (c.mid-4th century BC) Posterior Analytics Company, 1992.(Contains a discussion of knowledge and (Analytica Posteriora), in J. Barnes (ed.) Complete Works of methods of knowing.) Aristotle, vol. 1, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2 Whewell, W. (1840) The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences vols, 1984.(A founding work in philosophy of Founded upon their History, London: J.W. Parker, science.) 2 vols.(Difficult but seminal work in philosophy of science.) Bacon, F. (1620) Novum organum, London: Longmans; repr. in T. Fowler (ed.) Bacons Novum organum, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1888; trans. P. Urbach and J. Gibson, Chicago, IL: Open Court, 1994.(Seminal statement of an empirical methodology for investigating nature.) Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Version 1.0, London and New York: Routledge (1998) Scientific method Descartes, R. (1637) Discours de la mthode pour bien conduir sa raison et chercher la vrit dans les sciences plus la dioptrique, les meteores, et la geometrie, qui sont des essais de cete methode (Discourse on the Method for Properly Conducting Reason and Searching for Truth in the Sciences, as well as the Dioptrics, the Meteors, and the Geometry, which are essays in this method), in J. Cottingham, R. Stoothoff, D. Murdoch and A. Kenny (eds and trans.) The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, vol. 1, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984-91, 2 vols.(Seminal statement of a programme for investigating all of nature.) Hanson, N.R. (1958) Patterns of Discovery, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.(Important study of fundamental concepts in science, with reference to actual historical cases.) Jardine, N. (1984) Birth of History and Philosophy of Science: Keplers Defence of Tycho against Ursus, with Essays on Its Provenance and Significance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.(Detailed analysis of an early modern work in philosophy of science.) Kitcher, P. (1993) The Advancement of Science: Science without Legend, Objectivity without Illusions, New York: Oxford University Press.(Advanced work in philosophy of science, relevant to method.) Kuhn, T. (1962) Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press; 2nd edn, 1970. (Widely read analysis of the historical development scientific knowledge.) Losee, J. (1993) Historical Introduction to the Philosophy of Science, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 3rd edn. (An introduction, with references, to many topics in the philosophy of science.) Mill, J.S. (1843) A System of Logic; repr. in J.M. Robson (ed.) Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, London: Routledge and Toronto, Ont.: University of Toronto Press, 1991.(Lengthy but readable and important nineteenth-century examination of the structure and empirical basis of scientific knowledge.) Newton, I. (1687) Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica, London: Joseph Streater (for the Royal Society); 2nd edn, Cambridge, 1713; 3rd edn, London: Guil. & Joh. Innys (for the Royal Society), 1726; repr. in A. Koyr and I.B. Cohen (eds) with assistance of A. Whitman Isaac Newtons Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica (3rd edn 1726, with variant readings), Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1972, 2 vols. (Newtons monumental contribution, forever transforming science. Contains the Rules of Reasoning in Philosophy.) Plato (c.380-367 BC) Republic, trans. G.M. Grube, revised by C. Reeve, Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing