General Features of Science

(Some of this material is adapted from Del Ratzsch’s Science and Its Limits)

Question: What is Science?

As we will see this is not an easy question to answer.  But we can make some headway by drawing our attention to some very broad features of science.  

Applied vs Theoretical

For the most part, in this course, we will be concerned with the theoretical sciences. These are the sciences that are mainly concerned with understanding and not with how to make something or whatever. So, for example, we might consider examples from physics, but we will not consider examples from engineering. 

But a number of other disciplines--disciplines that most do not consider to be a part of the sciences--deal with the theoretical: theology, philosophy, math, logic, etc.  Science by contrast seems to deal primarily with material things and events.

So to a first approximation science is a theoretical discipline that is concerned with material things and events.

But theology is also a theoretical discipline concerned with material things and events (as is philosophy).  

Science attempts to locate patterns and regularities within the material realm and to explain these patterns and regularities in naturalistic terms; theology is not constrained in that way.

Empiricality

The methods of science typically draw upon experiment and observations.  So science has a deep connection with empirical discovery.  As such it is, for the most part, an a posteriori discipline.  The a posteriori is to be contrasted with the a priori. The former is knowledge that requires some kind of experience or empirical investigation, while the latter is knowledge that can be obtained independently of experience or empirical investigation.

Thus the results of science will be restricted to what can be known via empirical methods.  If we think that empirical methods are the only means for knowing, then science will surely be the best way of gathering knowledge.  But if we do not think that empirical methods are the only means for knowing, then while science might be a great way for gaining understanding in some areas it won’t be the only way and it may not be the best way in other areas. Indeed, if empiricism (the claim that all knowledge is the result of some kind of empirical investigation) is false, then science will likely not be the best way to get knowledge about a lot of areas.  

Objectivity

Simply basing one’s conclusions on an empirical base does not mean that one is doing science or good science.  There must be some objectivity involved.  In other words, I might claim that bigfoot exists on the basis of empirical data, but I might refuse to look at other explanations of that data or I might refuse to look at more data.  Or, I might claim that acupuncture is a great stress reliever or way to eliminate back pain on the basis of some empirical data without considering other explanation or additional data. This kind of biased treatment of the data is a problem.  But there may be biased treatments of data that are inevitable and not as problematic.  We’ll try to get a bit clearer on what objectivity is supposed to look like.

Rational

Simply basing one’s conclusions on empirical data in an objective way will still not get us into the science door or especially into the good science door.  We need to make sure that the theory proposed is connected in the right sort of way to the empirical data gathered.  

Example: suppose you gather the following bits of data: the refrigerator door is open; the milk is open and on the counter; the bag of cookies is open and there are cookie crumbs everywhere; the kid’s mouths are covered in crumbs and they have a milk mustache.  Now suppose you conclude from this the following:

            A: God exists

            B: The neighbors are getting divorced

            C: Aliens have eaten the cookies and drank the milk and made it look like my kids did it

            D: my kids have eaten the cookies and drank the milk 

Some of these are more connected to the data than the others.  

So, scientific theorizing needs to be based on empirical data that is objectively gathered and conclusions based on that data must be connected to it in the right sort of way.

We now have three broad features that seem to be present in all sciences: Empiricality, Objectivity, and Rationality

As we will start to see, things are not as simple as we have presented them.

Question: how would you answer the question 'what is science?' Does your answer leave out areas that are clearly not science? Does your answer leave out areas that are clearly part of science?

Question: Are the three criteria we have so far--empiricality, objectivity, and rationality--sufficient? Have we left out a criterion that should be included? Are they necessary? Can some discipline lack one of the three and still be a legitimate part of science?