Science Education and Public Understanding - Essay Example

FACT, LAW AND THEORY Introduction In Science the use of the terms such as fact, law and theory, would have different meanings from their everyday use, Mertens (1998). Scientists use these terms in relation and in perspective of their work. The essay will concentrate in particular on the definition of Fact as this term in science is considered fairly different from its everyday usage. The purpose of this essay is to define and explain the terminologies fact, law and theory using the scientific knowledge and method that is available concerning the three terms. In addition, the article will critically examine the term fact and the kind of knowledge it produces in terms of logical positivism. Law Firstly, in Colloquial Use, Law in Science are a simple generalisation about how certain things in this natural world behave under certain conditions. In addition, the term is used to denote an existing experimental relationship between two or more parameters. In this case, it can be explained that Laws are commonly created after a lot of study and experiments have been conducted and hence a connected between two scientific quantities established. A good example of scientific the Laws include the thermodynamics, which explains the relationship between a given quantity of heat and the amount of kinetic energy that can be produced. In this case, the law shows how a quantity behaves rather than giving the explanation on why it behaves certain way. Another illustration of a scientific law is the famous Newtons Law of Gravity. The law gives a prediction on the behaviour of an objected when dropped from a certain height. However, the law does not give an explanation on why the object behaves in that particular manner. Theory On the other hand, scientific theories are very important aspects that are developed in an effort to explain certain behaviour. The theory normally forms an important basis on which research in science are conducted. A scientific theory reviews the hypothesis on which part of the research is carried out to determine whether a certain hypothesis has been supported with repeated testing. So a theory is only convincing as long as there exists no dispute in its evidence. Therefore, theories can be proved wrong. Basically, a theory is what scientists make every effort to work on based on their hypothesis to prove right. A hypothesis is a critical part to a theory. This is because the hypothesis predicts the outcome of a theory that will either be proven to be authentic or void. It is created when it has survived all challenges of falsifying the theory. Most scientists show demonstrate a large number of experiments that are enough for them to only give details of all the tests that it carries out. In the history of scientific theories, there are a few theories that have not stood the test of time. Theories such as the theory of expanding earth, phlogiston theory and spontaneous generation theories have failed to stand the world of expanding knowledge. This implies that even the theories that are common knowledge in the modern world may be challenged as new information is acquired in different fields. Therefore, theories give details of the examination with method and, since it gives that method of explanation, it is thought to higher than Law. Some popular theories are such as the Quantum Mechanics theory, the famous theory of evolution, and the theory of germs cause of disease, because of which we all now have the knowledge of what causes disease and how it can be cured. Another good example to be mentioned is the theory of Particles in Physics. This gives details of how essentially particles and forces act together in certain situations, Szacilowski (2012). This theory was based upon many experiments and examinations carried out and also use a firm mathematical structure. Within the theory there are many Laws that make up the structure, for instance how particles behave and also many observations to suggest things like the mass of the protons. Another example of a theory based research was J.Kepler’s Laws of Planetary Motion. Astronomer J.Kepler, researched for many years and made many thorough observations of the positions of the planets. Thorough all the data he had collected, he came up with a hypothesis that told of how planets in the universe moved and using these hypothesis, he predicted the positions of the planets in the future. Over the years when his findings were established, his hypothesis was elevated to Laws. Therefore, a law is what generally describes or even answers lot of the natural aspects of the world and a on the other hand is an idea. So if I had a theory that my pet would only eat if I feed it, then noticeably this statement could be true or false but it’s an idea that I have only, which is perhaps relied upon any observation that I could have made. But of course, its only an idea with equal chances of being either right or wrong, until i have evidence to support this idea, Szacilowski (2012). Fact A scientific fact is an observation that is accurate. A fact is normally based on examinations and findings that have been confirmed by all existing theories to be correct. A good example of a fact is that if a ball is kicked up in the air within the earth’s atmosphere, no matter what shape or weight, the ball will eventually fall back to the surface due to the effects of gravity. This demonstrates “fact” as a piece of evidence or information that has been proven beyond reasonable doubt to be true. When discussing factual things in nature, it is always important to consider the truthfulness of the relative objects that test the fact. A good paradigm of this would be to analyze whether the science discipline that is used to analyze facts is also factual. Since no one can guarantee that a fact is actually the final truth it cannot really be the last word. There is always a possibility that someone will uncover another aspect and that would mean that the fact could in reality be changed or unwanted some day. Facts cannot be independent to theory as facts can be proved wrong by theory, as much as theories can be proved by the facts. Therefore, the article can boldly make declaration that a fact is merely a factual as long as disputing evidence or another piece of information has been generated to challenge the fact. Moreover, facts are concluded based on proof, if the word proof was described as to getting at a logical conclusion, in regard of the evidence collected, then yes, there is a proof in science. There is no specific destination of conclusion for scientific discoveries in the world. As such, science is a discipline that has no limits for the kind of information that people are discovering. It keeps changing and manipulated in accordance to further research and examinations. A lot of the times people have tried to make a name for themselves and come up with theories and worked really hard to prove them right but this could only be achieved if there are facts and enough evidence to back your research. In this case, no matter how many times a scientist had carried out an experiment of a ball and a feather falling at the same pace in air. To demonstrate this hypothesis, they came up with evidence showing and explaining that gravity itself is not a force discharged by an object but to a certain extent a bending of the fabric of space itself, such as Einstein had. In spite of many evidences that support theories and facts, philosophers have proved that research is highly questionable so long as we think about what exactly we mean by facts. A fact can be objective as every individual will see it differently, Tseng (2004). If facts are objective then there must be an inter-subjective agreement, for example, any individual that carries the experiment will come out with the same results if it was carried out in the same circumstances. But, it is also true that in a lot of cases individuals will disagree only because they saw different things. However, facts can still be uncovered. There are many ways in which people can make observations more objective to agree and approach final conclusions. Although, there is no fixed truth in science, facts are the closest to the truth scientist have got to and based on these facts science has come a long way. Logical positivism Logical positivism embraces the concept of verificationism as a condition for accepting and assimilating facts, Smith (2007). In this case, the Logical positivism school of thought seeks to legitimize philosophical discourse on a ground shared with the best examples of empirical sciences. In this hypothesis of knowledge, only statements that are verifiable either empirically or logically would be cognitively meaningful. Efforts to convert scientific theories to this new scientific ideology were sanctioned to prevent perplexity rooted in ambiguous language and unverifiable claims. Logical positivism basically means that although it is possible to establish a proof for almost all theories and hypothesis, the theory will only make a meaningful contribution if it can make either logical or empirical sense. This philosophy is important as it challenges theorists to come up with hypothesis that are not only as good as the proof attached to it but also the kind of interpretative sense that it creates in the contemporary science, Tseng (2004). Bibliography Smith, B. W., (2007). Contemporary science (Vol. 126). CRC press. Szacilowski, K. (2012). Law and facts governing the universe: John Wiley & Sons. Tseng, A. A. (2004). Recent developments in scientific research and methodology:, 14(4), R15. Mertens, R. (1998). Proves and proofs of scientific theories. Sensors and Actuators B: Chemical, 49(1), 73-80. Read More