Scientific Method

[Allen Coniglio]

The scientific method is presented here for those who do not know what it is. Notice Aristotle's
mistake in the first paragraph. This is the mistake of many, including the quackbusters. Randi, who
is quoted in the introduction, is a quackbuster and a twit. he should know better. One must
investigate BEFORE making pronouncements of true or false.

Allen

The scientific method
Science is best defined as a careful, disciplined, logical search for knowledge about any and all
aspects of the universe, obtained by examination of the best available evidence and always subject
to correction and improvement upon discovery of better evidence. What's left is magic. And it
doesn't work. -- James Randi
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It took a long while to determine how is the world better investigated. One way is to just talk
about it (for example Aristotle, the Greek philosopher, stated that males and females have different
number of teeth, without bothering to check; he then provided long arguments as to why this is the
way things ought to be). This method is unreliable: arguments cannot determine whether a statement
is correct, this requires proofs.
A better approach is to do experiments and perform careful observations. The results of this
approach are universal in the sense that they can be reproduced by any skeptic. It is from these
ideas that the scientific method was developed. Most of science is based on this procedure for
studying Nature.
What is the ``scientific method''?

The scientific method is the best way yet discovered for winnowing the truth from lies and
delusion. The simple version looks something like this:
a.. 1. Observe some aspect of the universe.
b.. 2. Invent a tentative description, called a hypothesis, that is consistent with what you have
observed.
c.. 3. Use the hypothesis to make predictions.
d.. 4. Test those predictions by experiments or further observations and modify the hypothesis in
the light of your results.
e.. 5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until there are no discrepancies between theory and experiment and/or
observation.

When consistency is obtained the hypothesis becomes a theory and provides a coherent set of
propositions which explain a class of phenomena. A theory is then a framework within which
observations are explained and predictions are made.

[Julian Winston]

At 12:58 AM -0400 4/26/04, allen coniglio wrote:

[snip]
What Randi left out is his a priori assumptions about a lot of stuff,
including homeopathy.
Is this description fromJames Randi himself?
Cinchona cures ague. Curious as to why, I take some. I get sxs of ague.
Cinchona cures ague because it creates similar symptoms.
Belladonna would be good in Scarlet Fever. Cuprum, Camphora, and
Verat alb would be useful in Cholera.
Whoo! Seemed to work!
170 years later, still testing it out. Seems to still work when the
match is right.
I'll call it homeopathy. Seems to be pretty consistent.

Eh? Randi?

JW