The Scientific Method and Knowledge
The Scientific Knowledge
What makes knowledge like astronomy and medicine scientific, while astrology and traditional healing are not? What distinguishes scientific knowledge, and what is the scientific method? Answering these questions helps explain the prestige and certainty attributed to science and its strong influence on society.
Specific Nature of Scientific Knowledge
“Specific nature” refers to the set of characteristics that distinguish scientific knowledge from other forms of knowledge. These characteristics weren’t always present in scientific thought, so we can discuss their origins. Sciences also differ from each other, leading to their classification.
1 The Origins of Science
Science emerged alongside philosophy when humans sought rational explanations for natural phenomena. They stopped viewing phenomena as chaotic or random and began trying to understand the order and investigate the natural causes. However, around the Scientific Revolution (16th century), science started to become independent of philosophy and acquire its own specific traits.
2 Specific Characteristics
Galileo Galilei, in establishing his scientific method, summarized two key characteristics:
- Experimentation: Scientific explanations, proposing hypotheses to explain phenomena, must be controlled by experience, by contrasting them with reality. However, experiments are not pure data or experience but are idealized situations with controlled parameters.
- Mathematization: Scientific hypotheses must be expressed through mathematical equations. Galileo stated that the language of nature is mathematics.
3 Classification of Sciences
Within scientific statements, we distinguish between empirical propositions (whose truth depends on experience) and formal propositions (whose truth is determined by formal coherence). This leads to the following classification:
- Formal Sciences: Logic, Mathematics
- Empirical Sciences:
- Natural Sciences: Physics, Chemistry, Biology
- Social Sciences: Sociology, History, Psychology
The Scientific Method and Its Limits
Scientific knowledge is deemed scientific if the method used to acquire it is scientific.
1 The Scientific Language
Science creates an artificial language for accuracy and objectivity. This language includes:
- Concepts: Classificatory (eukaryotic, prokaryotic), Comparative (hardness), Metric (meter, kilogram)
- Laws: True statements in science, developed from basic theory, relating concepts within the theory. These statements must be non-contradictory and universally valid.
- Theories: Sets of statements related by interference, explaining a group of phenomena (e.g., Newton’s theory of universal gravitation, thermodynamics, set theory).
2 The Scientific Explanation
A scientific explanation, using theories, answers questions arising from observed phenomena. Philosopher Ernest Nagel identified four types of explanation:
- Deductive Explanation: Explains a fact from a set of principles (e.g., why did the pipes burst?).
- Probabilistic Explanation: A fact has a higher probability than its alternatives (e.g., why did a minor commit a crime?).
- Teleological Explanation: (From ‘telos,’ meaning ‘end’ in Greek) Explains a fact as a means to an end (e.g., why did Henry VIII create the Anglican Church?).
- Genetic Explanation: Explains a fact by investigating its origin (e.g., why are there Arabic influences in Catalan?).
3 The Scientific Method
The word ‘method’ comes from Greek, meaning ‘path.’ A method is a procedure with specified rules, steps, and a clear objective. Different sciences employ different methods.
- Deductive Method (Formal Science): Starts with principles or axioms and uses inference rules to draw logical conclusions.
- Inductive Method (Empirical Science): Infers general statements from specific data. While it establishes general principles from similar cases, its validity depends on the number of observations. Therefore, inductive conclusions are not universally guaranteed and offer only probability, not absolute certainty.