Scientific Knowledge PDF

Alaa Y. El-Daly Assistant Lecturer – English Department sinaiuniversity.net Why do you study Scientific Thinking? @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg The objectives of this course are to: 1. Encourage you to wonder about how our world works; 2. Improve your understanding of reality; 3. He...

Alaa Y. El-Daly Assistant Lecturer – English Department sinaiuniversity.net Why do you study Scientific Thinking? @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg The objectives of this course are to: 1. Encourage you to wonder about how our world works; 2. Improve your understanding of reality; 3. Help you -evaluate ways of knowing; -develop and adopt reliable ways of knowing; -recognize assumptions, bias, illusion, and fantasy; -learn about the universe we live in; -think more clearly; -understand what is; @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Scientific Thinking Scientific thinking refers to both thinking about the content of science and the set of reasoning processes that permeate the field of science: induction, deduction, experimental design, causal reasoning, concept formation, hypothesis testing, and so on. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Science can be thought of as both a body of knowledge (the things we have already discovered), and the process of acquiring new knowledge (through observation and experimentation—testing and hypothesizing). @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Science, any system of knowledge that is concerned with the physical world and its phenomena and that entails unbiased observations and systematic experimentation. In general, a science involves a pursuit of knowledge covering general truths or the operations of fundamental laws. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg What is science? Science is a methodical approach to studying the natural world. It asks basic questions, such as: @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Science attempts to answer these questions: • How does the world work? • How did the world come to be? • What was the world like in the past, what is it like now, and what will it be like in the future? @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Does science lead to an understanding of the truth? Most scientists would not say that science leads to an understanding of the truth. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Science is a determination of what is most likely to be correct at the current time with the evidence at our disposal. Science does try to build true knowledge of how the world works, but there are other sorts of knowledge that people also call “the truth.” For example, many have faith in spiritual truths, yet science cannot investigate this truth at all — or even tell us whether it exists. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg The truths that science aims at building are ones that reflect the way the natural world actually works — regardless of one’s point of view. Observations and experiments must be reproducible and verifiable by other individuals. In other words, good science is based on information that can be measured or seen and verified by other scientists. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Are scientific theories based on empirical evidence? Anything that cannot be observed or measured or shown to be false is not amenable to scientific investigation. Explanations that cannot be based on empirical evidence are not a part of science. Science disciplines share common rules of evidence used to evaluate explanations about natural systems. Science knowledge is based upon logical connections between evidence and explanations. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Science is a human endeavor and is subject to personal, prejudices and bias. Repeated reproduction and verification of observations and experimental results can overcome these weaknesses. Repetition allows researchers to confirm or refute their hypotheses. By repeating an experiment, scientists can test the validity of their results and ensure that they are not a fluke or a random occurrence. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Assumptions of scientific knowledge: • The world is real; • Humans can attempt to understand the physical universe. • Natural processes are sufficient to explain natural phenomena. • Our perceptions maybe inaccurate or biased. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Assumptions of scientific knowledge: • Scientific explanations are limited. Scientific knowledge is necessarily contingent knowledge rather than absolute. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Science is never finished because every discovery leads to more questions, new mysteries, to something else that needs explaining. It’s a case of ‘the more we know, the more we know we know nothing at all’. For example, the discovery of the double-helix structure of DNA revolutionized our understanding of biology, bringing up whole new areas to be studied such as genetic modification and synthetic biology. @Sinaiunieg [email protected] www.su.edu.eg Mark (T)rue or (F)alse : 1. Working on science, one should neglect others' points of view. 2. Science is restricted to the formal study of nature. 3. Much of our thinking, left to itself, is partial. 4. Science leads to an understanding of the truth of things. 5. All scientific experiments are repeatable. Mark (T)rue or (F)alse : 6. One studies philosophy to learn how to think logically. 7. Scientific explanations are limited. 8. Science is a methodical theory to studying the natural world. 9. Anything that cannot be observed is not amenable to scientific explanation. 10. Explanations that can be based on empirical evidence are not a part of science. Choose the correct answer: 1. _____________ can overcome the weakness of a scientific explanation. a. Repeated reproduction b. Elegant theories c. Blind believing 2. Our perception of things _____________ inaccurate. a. can’t be b. maybe c. is Choose the correct answer: 3. Science knowledge is based upon ___________ connections between evidence and explanations. a. illogical b. fictional c. logical 4. Humans can attempt to understand_____________. a. people actions b. the supernatural power c. the physical universe Choose the correct answer: 5. Our beliefs are reliable knowledge, _____________. a. if their basis is taken from a heritage system b. if their consequences match objective reality c. if they are connected to imagination 6. Science is never finished because _____________. a. some explanations are not discovered yet. b. every discovery leads to more questions c. humans have more perceptions. THANK YOU For any questions feel free to contact me by mail alaa.es haq@s u.edu.eg Alaa Y. El-Daly Assistant Lecturer – English Department