An interesting item on doing science from Chad Orzel represents more than a nod and a wink to the late, great Carl Sagan, although I didn’t see his name mentioned for whatever reason. Anyway, Prof Orzel distils the scientific process down to the following and has triggered an interesting debate nevertheless:
Science is a Process, Not a Collection of Facts The essence of science, broadly defined, is that it is a systematic approach to figuring out how the world works:
- look at the world around you
- come up with an idea for why it might work that way
- test your idea against reality
- tell everybody you know the results of the test
Put those steps together, over and over, and you have the best method ever devised for increasing our store of reliable knowledge.
That’s basically it. Not too scary is it? So, why do we seem to have such a vast gulf in understanding between those who eschew science and its proponents?