Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The better an explanation is at making predictions, the more useful it frequently can be, and the more likely it will continue to explain a body of evidence better than its alternatives. The most successful explanations – those that explain and make accurate predictions in a wide range of circumstances – are often called scientific theories ...
Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the world. [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 behavioural sciences (e.g., economics, psychology, and sociology), which ...
[23] [24] Visual patterns in nature find explanations in chaos theory, fractals, logarithmic spirals, topology and other mathematical patterns. For example, L-systems form convincing models of different patterns of tree growth. [19] The laws of physics apply the abstractions of mathematics to the real world, often as if it were perfect.
A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, based on a body of facts that have been repeatedly confirmed through observation and experiment. Such fact-supported theories are not "guesses" but reliable accounts of the real world. The theory of biological evolution is more than "just a theory".
Four causes. Aristotle 's Four Causes illustrated for a table: material (wood), formal (structure), efficient (carpentry), final (dining). The four causes or four explanations are, in Aristotelian thought, four fundamental types of answer to the question "why?" in analysis of change or movement in nature: the material, the formal, the efficient ...
For the anime film series, see The Laws of the Universe. Scientific laws or laws of science are statements, based on repeated experiments or observations, that describe or predict a range of natural phenomena. [ 1 ] The term law has diverse usage in many cases (approximate, accurate, broad, or narrow) across all fields of natural science ...
Explanations include information-processing rules (i.e., mental shortcuts), called heuristics, that the brain uses to produce decisions or judgments. Biases have a variety of forms and appear as cognitive ("cold") bias, such as mental noise, [ 5 ] or motivational ("hot") bias, such as when beliefs are distorted by wishful thinking .
Occam's razor. In philosophy, Occam's razor (also spelled Ockham's razor or Ocham's razor; Latin: novacula Occami) is the problem-solving principle that recommends searching for explanations constructed with the smallest possible set of elements. It is also known as the principle of parsimony or the law of parsimony (Latin: lex parsimoniae).