Talk:Scientific method/Draft

Revert

I reverted the work of Gareth Leng. Altough it is a nice work, I think it is too poetic. The earlier version was more factual.

--Matthias Brendel 16:44, 26 December 2006 (CST)

Just as an example. The first sentence I find very bad is "This simple account begs many questions. What do we mean by ‘facts’? "

1) This is out of the blue, since the "facts" were not mentioned before. So how does the kknowtion of "facts" come here? 2) Then there is an unnecessary dispute about how we can trust facts. We should not start to explain the scientific method by this dispute. 3) The dispute about the basis of scientific knowledge was repeated later as the protocol-sentence debate. So quoting here Bacon is very outdated. If somebody wants to present this question, then let him quote the latest accounts on this! Even the protocol-sentence debate is outdfate I think.

--Matthias Brendel 16:52, 26 December 2006 (CST)

This I think is not how we work at Citizendium. We do not bulk revert in this way, but gain consensus civilly and seek understanding. In particular, this is a new CZ article in progress, and it is replacing a deeply flawed ungainly repetetive and inaccurate WP version (Bayesian inference is not a way of generating hypotheses; Einstein's theory was indeed a refutation of Newton's, and the idea that it represented progress was questioned by Kuhn, who commented that Einstein's theory was closer to Aristotle's than either was to Newton; alchemy was characterised by very precise measurements; Lakatos is unexplained but introduced as though he was a Kuhnian when in fact he was a Popperian etc etc). As for the lead, facts refers directly to the introductory quote from Darwin. Understanding the nature of facts, and how they depend on a theory, is central to the understanding of the importance of theory in science and hence to understanding the incommensurability of theory. Gareth Leng 17:04, 26 December 2006 (CST)

So you just write a new article instead of an existing. This is also a reverting. And your version is just your opinion, there are serious NPOV errors in your article. All of ypour statements here are dispoted by seroius thinkers. You even mention Kuhn. Lakatos was not a Popperian. So I just se a deeply flawed article.

--Matthias Brendel 06:22, 15 January 2007 (CST)

I am "rollingback" this article to the version Dr. Gareth Leng wrote. I base this decision on the fact that Mr./Dr. Brendel used a reversion and a "semi-protection," to freeze this article in the form he preferred. As the template explains, such a semi-protection has the purpose of stopping vandalism, or anonymous, unregistered, or new users from editing an article. Dr. Leng is none of these. Nevertheless, this "semi-protection" is not functioning properly; it is stopping Dr. Leng from editing. Mr./Dr. Brendel, please do not use tools that are misfunctioning.

I do not want to see revert wars. You are both Editors. Please discuss a compromise.

Chief Constable, --Ruth Ifcher 00:00, 20 January 2007 (CST)

Many thanks Ruth. This is Citizendium, not Wikipedia; the article that Mathias reverted to is the Wikipedia article, I would certainly not arbitrarily revert original Citizendium contributions; this is vandalisn as is made clear in the policy document. I suggest therefore Mathias that you detail any specific criticisms of the Citizendium article here, perhaps starting with any dispute about any factual statements, any errors in repoting opinions, or any miscitations? If there are any, let's start by correcting those.Gareth Leng 05:38, 20 January 2007 (CST)

Matthias, we do value your contributions, but you are expected to work with people here, and not simply revert to a version you prefer. That may be all right on Wikipedia (it certainly wasn't in my day!), but it isn't here. Also, the name for our neutrality policy is not and never will be "NPOV" but "the neutrality policy." We are a different community. So I support Ruth Ifcher's action here as Chief Constable, which concerned the behavior of reverting wholesale, not the merits or demerits of any version of an article. I do hope you will work with us here, in any event! --Larry Sanger 12:14, 21 January 2007 (CST)

In my opinion there was a good article here present and Dr. Gareth Leng deleted it and just wrote his own version. If there was any vandalism here, then Dr Leng's action was the first one. If we should reach compromise, then (i) I wish to see that Gareth Leng incorporates the valuable content of the first article in his article, (ii) I wish that he formulates his article in a more neutral way. I will go into details if I see any readiness to compromise from Gareth Leng.

--Matthias Brendel 04:55, 22 January 2007 (CST)

To repeat, the article that I replaced was the old Wikipedia article, that remains on Wikipedia. This is Citizendium, and we have indeed now deleted all old Wikipedia articles. I'm happy to work with anyone constructively, and again suggest that we start with any dispute about any factual statements, any errors in reporting opinions, or any miscitations? If there are any, let's start by correcting those; I'm sure there will be some Gareth Leng 09:45, 22 January 2007 (CST)

I support Dr. Leng's position here, Matthias. He is correct that no Citizendian is obligated to use or develop the Wikipedia version; that's been made clear in several places. Unless you had worked here on CZ on the Wikipedia version of this article, then no one may insist that we adopt it, rather than Dr. Leng's, as a starting point. This we can say without even considering the merits of either article! --Larry Sanger 23:48, 22 January 2007 (CST)

Just a few thoughts

Hello. Being just an author I would like attract your attention to the reader's perspective. While in general I appreciate the idea of illustrating the "scientific method" by actual views of notable scientists, I suggest we consider the following:

• In the lead I would put a brief summary of the content. I think our concise definition could be somehow elaborated, explained and illustrated. I would put it instead of two citations (no problem, they can be used elsewhere).
• Feyerabend, although contemporary to Popper and Kuhn, and influential enough to be compared with them, gets a distinguished place in the introductory section (and is not described in the "main body" of the article). Does neutral view policy suggest that we treat the three philosophers "equally"?
• Overall style resembles an essay, especially introductorybeginning part; while otherwise it sounds quite interesting or even intriguing, maybe it could be more "encyclopedic", "assertive"?

Just few thoughts (but I can formulate more concrete/explicit propositions) Aleksander Halicz 17:12, 22 January 2007 (CST)

Popper, Kuhn, and Feyerabend just happen to be three prominent philosophers of science. There are many others. I doubt any particular philosopher should be mentioned in the introductory section, except as part of a longer list. --Larry Sanger 23:50, 22 January 2007 (CST)

I'm planning on hanging out here, so here's an intro

I'm newly arrived from Wikipedia where I've been working on the History of scientific method article. Regarding Wikipedia, that article is still where my interest lies, since the Scientific method article at Wikipedia is a kind of collage of common opinion without much in the way of citation. My own goal here will be to describe scientific method without having it become The Citizendium Scientific Method.

To get started straight away, I'm wondering whether to add a condensed history section to this article. I'm tempted instead to begin a separate article since my knowledge (and the existing Wikipedia history article), is incomplete. It would be nice to have a fuller picture before deciding to say anything about the history and development of scientific method in this article. --Christian Steinbach 02:17, 23 January 2007 (CST)

Either would be great; I'd certainly like to see a substantial History article developed; there are so many important threads that I think it will need space. I'd suggest writing a new article and then adding a short section to this that is a summary of /introduction to the main articleGareth Leng 07:49, 23 January 2007 (CST)

Restructuring and rewriting of the article

The Wikipedia article was better, then this article, because it vcontained some kind of SYSTEMATIC list of the elements of the scientific method. This articvel does not contain any such systematic list. You can read about a lot of arbitrary opinions, but you do not get an idea, what is the scientific method, which is accepted. You do not get the neutral point of view, the view, which is accepted by most of the philosophers of science and scientists.

The Wikipedia article was better in this respect.

The other problem with this article is, that it contains some unsignificant quotations, like of " Sir Peter Medawar" who cares about his opinion? Why is that important? Charles Darwin and Carl Sagan are good scientists, but I would not quote their opinion either.

And why is this important at all? " Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals [509 U.S. 579 (1993)] decision,"

On the other hand, there is nothing in the article from the logical positivists view. Altough logical positivism was the establisher of philosophy of science. And nothing about postpositivistic views except of Kuhn and Feyerabend. There are some others.

So this article is:

• Unsysthematic
• Unstructured
• Biased
• Arbitrary
• Incomplete
• There are too many quotations and history in the article. This is not Wikiquote!

This article should not contain too much history of philosophy of science, since there is another article on that. This article is about the scientific method. So it should be restricted on that. Not all issues of pphilosophy of science should be discussed here!

I suggest to restructure the article as follows:

• Elements of scientific method

Here we can describe the most common elements and requirements of scientific method, which are accepted by most of the philosophers. Thsi shall be the description of the neutral point of view.

• Philosophycal issues

Here we can discuss such contoroversies, as Poppar and Carnap on induction, Kuhn and Popper on falsification, Feyerabend and everybody else on method. And so on.

I repeat my opinion: this is an awful article, and it is worse than Wikipedia. Is your intention to be worse than Wikipedia?

--Matthias Brendel 08:13, 6 February 2007 (CST)

The Wikipedia article was quite good. I do not understand why was it deleted, and why did you rewrite it. The Wikipedia article is still much better. I would like to start from that as a basis.

Why is it good that a good article is rewritten by a scientist, who has quite a few knowledge about philosophy of science? Gareth Leng is not an expert, and I do not see, why should it be good for Citizendium that he replaces the Wikipedia article with his essay about HIS personal picture of science.

--Matthias Brendel 08:19, 6 February 2007 (CST)

This article has as its stem a guide to scientific method as explained by a Research charity - i.e. a practical guide to scientific method, as followed by its research scientists. There are elements in this article that are retained from the Wikipedia article, not much, arguably too much, and most of it I removed as inaccurate, repetitive or simply illogical. Peter Medawar incidentally apart from being a Nobel Laureate was a close friend of Karl Popper and wrote extensively about Popper, as a popular writer of science widely regarded as the best of his time, he along with Einstein contributed significantly to the enormous influence that Popper's work had on active scientists. The article is dominated by Popper Kuhn and Feyeraband of recent philosophers, I think that these probably only these in recent times have had a major widespread influence on scientists views.

Quotes - well this is a style preference. In my opinion, quotes ensure a stem of verifiability, and can bring the authors views to life. Some of these are retained from the Wikipedia article in fact, including the Darwin and Sagan quotes. Why the Dow decision is significant, well that is explained in the link. Given that many philosphhers and scientists dispute whether there is a single scientific method, legal recognition of its existence and central importance is I think significant.

This article, like many, falls into the category of having many interested readers with relevany expertise, although I think it should be overseen by Philosophy Editors, if we have one interested. Gareth Leng 10:27, 6 February 2007 (CST)

I am a little surprised that you think that the article does not convey the view of scientific method accepted by most scientists - the CancerUK guide is quoted directly and I think is an uncontroversial as far as scientists are concerned. Peter Medawar's view at the outset might be challenging but I think is not really disputed. Scientific method is what scientists actually do, not what they are taught, and the essence of Feyeraband and Kuhn was in what scientists actually do. I am not a professional philospher, but I have read and still re-read these, ever since the Philosophy of Science that I studied at University; but that was before I became a scientist :-) I don't know how much this is a personal picture of science; I guess it is a picture that is true to science as I know it - as a scientist that is; I would hardly write an article that was inconsistent with what I know about science after all. But I haven't heard that anything in this is incorrect, that any quote is miscited or out of context or unrepresentative, and I'm not sure what significant opinions are not represented. Carnap's views should be mentioned no doubt. As for issues about the philosophy of science unrelated to scientific method - what would those be exactly in this article? Gareth Leng 10:47, 6 February 2007 (CST)

Just to bring a mixture of opinion to the discussion, I think our article is an excellent starting point and I honestly prefer it to the current Wikipedia article. Quoting the Cancer UK guide is a great way to elaborate on scientific method. Compare this to the Wikipedia article which uses the discoveries of DNA and General Relativity for the same purpose. That approach has, and probably always will have, issues with historical accuracy.

Regarding quotes I will only say that I prefer quotes embedded in the article rather than floating at the top. That’s just a matter of taste.

I’m not too worried about potential overlap between this article and the history article, although I’ll grant that we should keep an eye out or repeated or conflicting material. We probably can’t do justice to this topic without delving into the past, but the history article is more about the development and abandonment of ideas. It is potentially also about the people behind those ideas. I don’t expect we will be saying an awful lot about the syllogism or Descartes here.

By all means, Matthias, add something about Carnap. I for one would appreciate a concise description of his thoughts on Bayesian reasoning, this being one of many lacunae in my understanding of scientific method.

Not sure I’m with you on the restructuring suggestion. I expect there to be philosophical issues for almost anything we care to mention in this article. We may be able to create a substantial 'Elements' section without mention of any particular philosopher (though I don’t see that as a worthy goal), but to keep it free of philosophy? But maybe that's not what you meant. --Christian Steinbach 17:53, 6 February 2007 (CST)

• The article is in the category: Philosophy Workgroup. Not Science Workgroup!
• This indicates that this article is a descritpion of the scientific mehthod as philosophers think of it.
• Science is what scientists do. But that is not the same what scientist think they do!
• Kuhn, Popper and Feyerabend have a lot of impact, especially in the English speaking regions. But logical positivism still has a great impact.
• On the other hand you also forget the Edinburgh schhol, Larry Laudan and other philosophers.
• It is quite clear that this article is not neutral, it is you point of view.
• Peter Medawar despite of being a nobel laurate and a popular writer about science, and even an author on Popper, but there are so many Nobel-laurates, popular writers, and so many historians of phiolosophy of science. I do not see why he would be of any relevance.
• Your article is very different from any textbook about the method of science.
• There was a good list in the Wikipedia article about the elements of scientific method. You have no list. It is very hard to find what are the elements.

So I repeat my opinion:

• Unsysthematic
• Unstructured
• Biased
• Arbitrary
• Incomplete
• There are too many quotations and history in the article.

And finally, THE WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE WAS BETTER.

--Matthias Brendel 04:27, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Elements of scientifivc method

In the Wikipedia article there was a tabe\le like this:

I do not think that this table is perfect, but it is SYSTEMATICAl. You can see what are the elements of scientific method. It is a better starting point.

--Matthias Brendel 04:39, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Introduction

In thw Wikipedia article the introduction was like this:

"Scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating phenomena and acquiring new knowledge, as well as for correcting and integrating previous knowledge. It is based on observable, empirical, measurable evidence, and subject to laws of reasoning.

Although specialized procedures vary from one field of inquiry to another, there are identifiable features that distinguish scientific inquiry from other methods of developing knowledge. Scientific researchers propose specific hypotheses as explanations of natural phenomena, and design experimental studies that test these predictions for accuracy. These steps are repeated in order to make increasingly dependable predictions of future results. Theories that encompass whole domains of inquiry serve to bind more specific hypotheses together into logically coherent wholes. This in turn aids in the formation of new hypotheses, as well as in placing groups of specific hypotheses into a broader context of understanding.

Among other facets shared by the various fields of inquiry is the conviction that the process must be objective so that the scientist does not bias the interpretation of the results or change the results outright. Another basic expectation is that of making complete documentation of data and methodology available for careful scrutiny by other scientists and researchers, thereby allowing other researchers the opportunity to verify results by attempted reproduction of them. Note that reproducibility can not be expected in all fields of science. This also allows statistical measures of the reliability of the results to be established. The scientific method also may involve attempts, if possible and appropriate, to achieve control over the factors involved in the area of inquiry, which may in turn be manipulated to test new hypotheses in order to gain further knowledge. "

I foind this much more neutral, much more biased, much more informative than your introduction. Its not perfect, but much better as a starting point.

--Matthias Brendel 04:39, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Philosophycal issues

Here you can include Popper and Kuhn and Feyerabend and Carnap, and Bloor, and Poincare and Duhem, and Quine, and others. Yopu can include here the protocollsentence-debate, the foundation-issue, the question of induction and falsification, the question of method (if there is a method at all). I would be very brief and refer to the philosophy of science article, and to the article of the mentioned philosophers and problems.

--Matthias Brendel 04:39, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Mattias, reading the above I feel a bit overwhelmed. If you had to decide, what is the single objection you feel most strongly about? I ask because we may make some progress if we focus our discussion and take things a bit at a time. --Christian Steinbach 04:43, 7 February 2007 (CST)

• Bad structure
• Not neutral
• Not biased

I think this article is a badly structured essay on some views about the scientific method favoured by the main author. Nothing more.

I cannot correct it, since its structure is completly bad. We should agree first on the main structure.

--Matthias Brendel 05:31, 7 February 2007 (CST)

User:Matthias Brendel/Scientific method

Here is my version. I just copied together some thing, the details are not so important, but a structure and scope, like this would be important.

--Matthias Brendel 05:00, 7 February 2007 (CST)

I've commented on that version on the relevant discussion page. Clearly we have a content dispute with irreconcileable views, and need the involvement of a Philosophy Editor.Gareth Leng 09:44, 7 February 2007 (CST)

As an interested reader I would like to see the Citi system of dispute resolving in action. The bad news is that, apparently, we have no relevant editor - at least when I scanned through the category, I found that none of them has made more than one edit outside his user page :( Humor me and prove that I'm wrong, please. Aleksander Halicz 16:31, 7 February 2007 (CST)

I read the beginning few sections of both articles and I must say I share some of Matthias' doubts. In the introduction I like Gareth's version more because it mentions in a concise ways some of the concept of the scientific method. Matthias's versions OTOH starts with a recursive explanation (the method is a method) and then immediately starts with restrictions of applicability (it gets better after a few sentences ;-).

But in the second section ("Elements...") my preference changes by 180 degrees. Reading Gareth's version I thought "Yes, but please, what in more detail is the scientific method". In contrast, with Matthias' version I immediately started to think about how much of my daily power-point drawing is actually still scientific work. Even more at the end of Gareth's Elements section, after having read several times that there is no scientific method, I actually expected that the next chapter would declare Creationism a science, too, given that the so claimed scientific method and its elements are denounced by all philosophers.

I very much doubt that that impression is the intention of the author, but putting all those statements at the beginning of an article acts that way (at least for me). Maybe if reading the whole article everything would fall into place, but IMHO an encyclopedic article should be like a newspaper article (and not like a scientific paper): Short rough description. More detailed but still concise description of the all the important concepts. Then expand on individual concepts in order of decreasing importance, uniqueness, ... . Of course that is not always possible but you should not have to read the whole article to get all the important facts into context.

Now of course that is just my personal view and I can neither cite philosophers on that nor am I one. But then, philosophy is not following the scientific method anyway (*ducks away back into the Computers section*). Markus 18:05, 7 February 2007 (CST)

I read through both articles top to bottom, Gareth's first then Matthias'. My impression from Gareth's was that I was drawn deeper and deeper into the flow of thought, perhaps it is his ability to write in a prose fashion and get his point across. Going to Matthias', I definitely saw the method, but left with nothing new or special. The chart was no help and may have detracted. If I had read in the opposite order, I don't know if I would have felt the same. When I saw who each of these two capable authors were, I see that perhaps it has more to do with where each are coming from; Gareth from the more life science and medicine background and then Matthias from artificial intelligence with a hard science background. Perhaps you are both right, and perhaps that was what Gareth was talking about when he writes of each field having their own method, thus a particular science's method is it's scientific method. For Matthias, it just happens to be the scientific method. I would continue to work together until you are both satisfied that you have it right. --Matt Innis (Talk) 21:28, 7 February 2007 (CST)