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In the end, science comes down to a pretty simple sequence: Propose a question and a
reasoning for what you expect to happen, measure or observe, and see how what you
found matches what you expected. Sometimes things don’t match, and you have to
re-evaluate the way you thought something worked.
Like professional athletes, skilled tradespeople, and many other professions, there are
ways of thinking that are critical to successful scientific inquiry. In this lesson, you’ll learn
the basics of scientific reasoning.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Identify and describe the philosophical assumptions and limitations of scientific reasoning
Describe and apply the scientific method of reasoning including basic techniques such as
positive and negative experimental controls, drawing conclusions from data, and
accounting for uncertainty
Differentiate among facts, hypotheses, theories, and predictions
Apply critical thinking and scientific reasoning to evaluate claims
Distinguish between dependent and independent variables and identify relationships
between them
The human brain is the root of scientific observation and experimentation. Our brains
process massive amounts of information constantly and have developed complex pattern
recognition abilities which allow our minds to take short cuts.
How reliable do you think your eyes and ears are in making observations? 1 is completely
unreliable and 10 is completely reliable.
Eyes:
As you’ve seen, our senses and minds work against us, clouding our observations and
data. To counter this, one thing scientists strive for isobjectivity - observations and
measurements which are not based on emotion or opinion, but the same for all observers:
facts, in other words.
Another way of countering bias is by using multiple people to make and check
observations, a process calledpeer review. In this way, the biases of each observation
sort of “cancel out.”
Shown to the right are all the choices made by your class about what they saw in the
basketball video. If you are one of the first students to complete this exercise, it may be
empty, however, think about what answers will look like as more entries are shown.
There was a white hat, white shoes, and a dancing bear - every other choice was not
actually present
The actual value of the mass of the object, called a 聽 calibration mass, is 250.0 g.
Balance 1 was affected most by random error - error without a specific cause or pattern.
How might you account for this error?
Another way of thinking about error in measurement is two often used terms: accuracy
and precision.
An accurate measurement is one which is very close to the actual or accepted value of
the measurement.
A precise measurement is one which is very close to other measurements made of the
same object.
HE L P
DESIGN
Experimental Design
With error and bias skewing your observations and data at every turn, you’ll need a way of
designing experiments and accounting for the untrustworthy nature of your instruments,
both mechanical and biological. This is the oft-referred toscientific method.
Often reduced to a poster in classrooms with a set of steps to follow, like the one shown at
right, the scientific method of inquiry is actually a way to reduce the amount of
uncertainty about a problem rather than a set of steps to follow blindly.
HE L P
DESIGN
Experimental Design
With error and bias skewing your observations and data at every turn, you’ll need a way of
designing experiments and accounting for the untrustworthy nature of your instruments,
both mechanical and biological. This is the oft-referred toscientific method.
Not all variables are dependent or independent, though. When designing an experiment,
it’s important to havecontrolled variables, or variables that are held constant or
unchanging. In an experiment, you want to be certain that the effects you are seeing are
only the result of changing one variable at a time. Which of the following are variables that
should be held constant during an experiment counting cars on the highway at various
times of the day?
Some experiments also have what are called controls. These controls are used to ensure
that the experiment is giving the data expected. A positive control is a sample or
measurement that is expected to show some sort of result, while a negative control is a
sample or measurement that is expected to show no result.