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LECTURE NOTES ON OBJECTIVE OF SCIENCE:

EXPLANATION, PREDICTION & PROGRESS
Module: AT10503 Pengantar Ilmu Saintifik
Session 1, 2019/2020

DR. MD SAYED UDDIN

 Science
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 “Science” cannot be easily defined.

The difficulty arises due to tendency to confuse the content of science with it
methodology.
 Scholars in science and social sciences defined the term science in different ways and employed it
in different contexts.
 Science has no special subject matter of its own.
 The word science derived from the Latin word scientia (to know).
 In general, science is a knowledge about the nature of natural and social phenomena.
 Science is divided in two categories – natural and non-natural science.
 Non-natural science can be two categories – social and humanities.
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 Greek philosophers PLATO (c.427-347) and ARISTOTLE (384-322 B.C.E.)

 They provided thoughts on what they believed society ought to be like, rather
than describing how society was.
 Issac Newton’s (1642-1727) the discovery of the laws of gravity and motion and
the development of calculas, inspired social thinkers to believe that similar
advantages could be made in systematically studying human behaviour.
 His name consider MODEL OF A TRUE SCIENTIST.
 Like natural sciences, social thinkers sought to develop a scientific
understanding of social life.
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 The Age of Enlightenment (Age of Reason)

 The period in the 18th century when many writers and scientists began to argue
that science and reason were more important than religion and tradition.
 Skepticism of the primacy of religion as a source of knowledge & traditional
authority
 Before 18th century the religion and traditional authority are the main power of
society, they were the source of knowledge and welfare of the society
 Society was ruled by Aristocracy (the political organization) and other political
leadership.
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 In France, the Enlightenment (age of reason) was dominated by

Philosophes
 Who are they?
-C. Montesquieu
-Rousseau
-Turgot
 These men were optimistic about future, believing that human society
could be improved through scientific discoveries.
 Scientific revolution= which could bring welfare of the society.
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 Finally, the Enlightenment produced an intellectual

revolution in how people thought about social change,
progress, and critical thinking.
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Middle Shift to self-

Ages: interest:
Personal liberty
Society is an
and individual
expression of rights
God's will

Gradual attack of French

tradition: Revolution:
Thomas Hobbes Greater break
(1588–1679), with politics and
social tradition:
John Locke (1632– Tocqueville
1704), and (1805–1859)
Adam Smith (1723–
1790)
 Science and Sociology: A New View

• Saw sociology as product of a three-stage historical

development

• Theological stage (Church in the Middle Age

Auguste • Metaphysical stage(Renaissance in the

fifteenth century) (Enlightenment and the
Comte ideas of Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau)

• Scientific stage (Modern physics, chemistry,

sociology, and the work of Copernicus, Galileo,
and Newton)
A traditional “progress” narrative
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Consider the tale of astronomy in the “Scientific
Revolution”:
• Ancient cosmology from Aristotle to Ptolemy:
Earth at centre of universe; sun and other
planets orbiting; crystalline spheres
• Copernicus puts Earth in orbit, 1543
• Tycho, though geocentric, abolishes crystalline
spheres and improves accuracy of readings,
1570s
• Kepler conforms Tycho’s data to
Copernicanism; introduces ellipses, 1609
• Galileo promotes impetus theory, 1632
• Newton synthesises these developments to
describe universal gravitation, 1687
“Before Kepler, all men were blind. Kepler had
one eye, and Newton had two” (Voltaire, 1730s?)
 Scientific Knowledge
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 Scientific Knowledge:
Not necessarily every science about a particular subject matter is considered as
scientific knowledge.
- Scientific knowledge is knowledge that has been systematically
gathered, classified, related, and interpreted.
- Scientific knowledge is all knowledge collected by the means of the “scientific
methodology”.
- It is concerned with learning the concepts and applying those concepts to
particular, rather than just learning a vast amount of information (Elgin F.H &
David C.C. 2011).
 Scientific Knowledge
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 Scientific Knowledge:

 Four factors are essential to the classification of an item of information as

scientific knowledge:
(1) independent and rigorous testing,
(2) peer review and publication,
(3) measurement of actual or potential rate of error, and
(4) degree of acceptance within the scientific community.
 Scientific Knowledge
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 Scientific method:

 A method to be use by natural or social scientists to acquire knowledge of

sciences.
 The scientific method is not one single thing. T refers to the ideas, rules,
techniques, and approaches that the scientific community uses.
 Method are comprising procedures and tools.
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 Scientific Attitude:
It is better to focus on the scientific attitude, or a way
of looking at the world. It is an attitude that values
craftsmanship, with pride in creativity, high-quality
standards, and hard work.
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 Journal Articles in Science:

 When the scientific community creates new knowledge, it appears in
academic books or scholarly journal articles.
 The primary forms in which research findings or new scientific
knowledge appear are scholarly journal articles. It is how scientists
formally communicate with one another and disseminate the results of
scientific research.
 E.g.
A researcher gains prestige and honor within the scientific community, respect from peers, and
a reputation as an accomplished researcher through such publications.
 Each discipline or field has over 100 journals, each of which published
many articles every year.
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 Science as a Transformative Process:

 You can think of research as the use of scientific methods to transform ideas,
hunches, and questions, sometimes called hypotheses, into scientific
knowledge.
 Transformation means altering something, converting it from one thing into
another.
 In the research process, a researcher starts with guesses or questions and
applies specialized methods and techniques to this raw material. At the end of
the process, a finished product of value appears: scientific knowledge.
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 Steps of the research process:

 The research process requires a sequence of steps.

Choose Topic

Inform Focus
Others research
Question

Interpret Design
Data Study

Analyze
Data Collect Data
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 Steps of the research process:

 The seven steps discussed here:

 (1) The research process begins with a researcher selecting a topic – a general
area of study or issue such as divorce, crime, homelessness.

 (2) A topic too broad for conducting research. The researcher narrows down, or
focuses, the topic into a specific research question that he or she can address in
the study (e.g., “Do people who marry younger have a higher divorce rate”?)
- for this a researcher reviews past research, or the literature.
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 Steps of the research process:

 (3) Design study: After specifying a research question, the researcher plans how
he or she will carry out the specific study or research project. (e.g. whether to
use a survey or observe in the field, which questions to ask).

 (4) Collect Data: After design the study, now the researcher is ready to gather
the data or evidence (e.g., ask people the questions, record answers).

 (5) & (6) Analyze & Interpret Data : Once the researcher has collected the data,
his or her next step is to manipulate or analyze the data to see any pattern that
emerge. The patterns in the data or evidence help the research interpret or give
meaning to the data (e.g. “People who marry young in cities have higher divorce
rates, but those in rural areas do not.”
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 Steps of the research process:

 (7) Inform others: Finally, the researcher writes a report that describes the
background to the study, how he or she conducted it, and what he or she
discovered.
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 Scientific inquiry refers to activities and practices

involving scientists’ pursuit of knowledge.

 Science as a way of knowing refers to the belief that

the actions of science are based on logic, evidence
and reasoning.
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 Science is based on empirical research.

-Empirical research relies on systematic observation and
experimentation, not on opinions and feelings.
 How Are Scientific Theories Developed?
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 A scientific theory is the end product drawn from comprehensive research,

which combines all the most current, valid evidence to explain a wide range of
phenomena (scientific observations). A scientific theory represents the most
powerful explanation that scientists have to offer.
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 Explanation in Science:

Carl Hempel’s widely influential account of explanation and prediction as the

fundamental goals of scientific research.

According to Carl Hempel and his many follower, the fundamental goals of
scientific research are to predict (and , whenever possible, control) the events
that occur in the world, and to explain to them.
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 “Among the divers factors that have encouraged and sustained

scientific inquiry through its long history are two pervasive human
concerns which provide, I think, the basic motivation for all scientific
research. One of these is man’s persistent desire to improve his
strategic position in the world by means of dependable methods for
predicting and, whenever possible, controlling the events that occur in
it…” ----Carl Hempel
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 “…But besides this practical concern, there is a second basic motivation

for the scientific quest, namely, man’s insatiable intellectual curiosity,
his deep concern to know the world he lives in, and to explain, and thus
to understand, the unending flow of phenomena it presents to him.”
Carl Hempel
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 Other philosophers say: “Theories are the crown of science, for in them
our understanding of the world is expressed. The function of theories is
to explain.” -- Rom Harre, The Philosophies of Science, 1985
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Prediction vs. Explanation

Prediction:
What will happen next?

Explanation:
Why did it happen?
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Why did it happen?

 Why did it have to happen?

 How is it possible for this to happen?
 Why did this happen rather than something else?
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Hempel’s Covering Law Model of

Explanation
 Scientific Explanations are given in response to ‘Explanation Seeing
WHY questions’.
 To give explanations is to provide satisfactory answer to these questions.
 Scientific Explanations should have logical structure of argument.
 A set of premises followed by a conclusion.

Example:
A Premise why sugar dissolves in water

Explanation

Conclusion: sugar dissolves in water

 Conclusion
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 Scientific knowledge has basis in empirical evidence.

 Scientific knowledge is based upon observations and inferences.
 Scientific knowledge is heavily dependent upon theories.
 Scientific knowledge is created from human imagination and logical reasoning.
 Scientific knowledge can be obtained by a variety of scientific methods.
 Science is a human endeavor influenced by society and culture.
 References
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 Janet A. Kourany. (1998). Scientific Knowledge: Basic Issues in the Philosophy

of Science. United States of America: Wadsworth Publishing Company. 262-
267pp.
 W. Lawrence Neuman (1997). Social Research Methods: Qualitative and
Quantitative Approaches. third edition. United States of America: Allyn &
Bacon. Pp. 9 – 11.