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The Nature of Scientific Research

Did you ever discover you could do a cool new trick? Or, have you ever asked a friend to double-check
your essay for mistakes?

Well, scientists love to discover cool new things, write about them, and then have their peers double-
check their work for mistakes, too.

That's the nature of scientific research!

Scientific research is the systematic investigation of scientific theories and hypotheses.

Who Does It? Why Do It?

By the way, just in case you didn't already know, a hypothesis is a single assertion, a proposed
explanation of something based on available knowledge, for something yet to be explained. One that is
subject to further experimentation.

In science, the people who create such hypotheses are researchers. Most researchers work for
companies or academic institutions. Many of them, but not all, have a PhD in an appropriate field
related to their research. For example, a person conducting research on a new drug may have a PhD in
chemistry - a PhD in history probably wouldn't do much good.

Anyways, scientific researchers try to answer the many questions we have about how the world works.
But a lot of their work doesn't really have to do with the questions at the forefront of our minds.

I mean, yes, we're all fascinated with knowing whether or not there may be life on other planets, but for
many reasons such research isn't as common as finding out whether or not a drug you never heard of
has a potentially dangerous side effect.

We may not think about this kind of research very often, but it impacts us or people we know far more
so than the search for life on other planets. Until, of course, we find out we're not alone in this universe
and are potentially going to be invaded by little green men.

The Scientific Method


Furthermore, scientists don't just come up with explanations about the world around us willy-nilly. Not
even close. Scientists use the scientific method, a process that helps construct an accurate depiction of
our universe and its processes, in order to answer whatever question they may have!

What this means is, researchers observe the world around them, formulate potential explanations for
the phenomena they observe, test their hypotheses out with experiments, and analyze their results to
see if they were right or wrong.

The key thing about the scientific method is that it carries no prejudice, meaning you don't even have to
believe whatever it is the researcher wrote or said! Using the scientific method, you can repeat the
experiment to find out for yourself whether or not the other researcher's assertions are true. This is a
key factor that separates science from dogma!

The other important part of scientific research is that a hypothesis must be falsifiable. A falsifiable
hypothesis or theory is one where an experiment or another discovery can prove it to be wrong, untrue,
and false. This is another critical factor that separates science from the world of religion, astrology, and
pseudoscience.

If I were to say that Bigfoot exists but always hides when humans are around and leaves no evidence
behind, that, in the words of Penn and Teller, is bologna! There is no way to disprove such a statement
and it is therefore unscientific.

Overall, scientific research helps people come up with rational, objective, testable, and disprovable
questions and methods that help us explain the world and its ever-changing nature.

In science, you don't have to believe anything. You are free to test it out for yourself and prove or
disprove anything you want in an objective and unbiased manner.

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