Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The formal scientific definition of theory is quite different from the everyday meaning of the word. It refers to a comprehensive explanation of some aspect of nature that is supported by a vast body of evidence. Many scientific theories are so well established that no new evidence is likely to alter them substantially.
The United States National Academy of Sciences defines scientific theories as follows: The formal scientific definition of "theory" is quite different from the everyday meaning of the word. It refers to a comprehensive explanation of some aspect of nature that is supported by a vast body of evidence. Many scientific theories are so well ...
Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. [1] [2] Modern science is typically divided into two or three major branches: [3] the natural sciences (e.g., physics, chemistry, and biology), which study the physical world; and the social sciences (e.g., economics, psychology, and sociology), which ...
Testability is a primary aspect of science [1] and the scientific method. There are two components to testability: Falsifiability or defeasibility, which means that counterexamples to the hypothesis are logically possible. The practical feasibility of observing a reproducible series of such counterexamples if they do exist.
Scientific evidence is evidence that serves to either support or counter a scientific theory or hypothesis, [1] although scientists also use evidence in other ways, such as when applying theories to practical problems. [2] Such evidence is expected to be empirical evidence and interpretable in accordance with the scientific method.
Aristotle's scientific explanation in Physics resembles the DN model, an idealized form of scientific explanation. [7] The framework of Aristotelian physics—Aristotelian metaphysics—reflected the perspective of this principally biologist, who, amid living entities' undeniable purposiveness, formalized vitalism and teleology, an intrinsic morality in nature. [8]
Professor of biology Jerry Coyne sums up biological evolution succinctly: [3]. Life on Earth evolved gradually beginning with one primitive species – perhaps a self-replicating molecule – that lived more than 3.5 billion years ago; it then branched out over time, throwing off many new and diverse species; and the mechanism for most (but not all) of evolutionary change is natural selection.
The history of scientific method considers changes in the methodology of scientific inquiry, not the history of science itself. The development of rules for scientific reasoning has not been straightforward; scientific method has been the subject of intense and recurring debate throughout the history of science, and eminent natural philosophers and scientists have argued for the primacy of ...