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Post by Vene on Apr 1, 2009 18:09:06 GMT -5
Hey, it's not my fault you lost them during development.
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Post by Paradox on Apr 1, 2009 22:15:21 GMT -5
Bah, you know damn well that those were never gills Vene. They become our cheeks, or so I recall.
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Post by Jedi Knight on Apr 2, 2009 16:31:42 GMT -5
Stephen Hawking has an excellent explanation of what a scientific theory is, unfortunately I can't find that now either. I hate being sick, my brain is bogged down with mucus. Is this what you're looking for? "Any physical theory is always provisional, in the sense that it is only a hypothesis: you can never prove it. No matter how many times the results of experiments agree with some theory, you can never be sure that the next time the result will not contradict the theory. On the other hand, you can disprove a theory by finding even a single observation that disagrees with the predictions of the theory. As philosopher of science Karl Popper has emphasized, a good theory is characterized by the fact that it makes a number of predictions that could in principle be disproved or falsified by observation. Each time new experiments are observed to agree with the predictions the theory survives, and our confidence in it is increased; but if ever a new observation is found to disagree, we have to abandon or modify the theory" Can't help it, I LOVE Wikiquote.
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Post by MaybeNever on Apr 2, 2009 23:06:48 GMT -5
The only point on which I would disagree is that science does not inherently start with an observation, but with curiosity. How much science begins with somebody thinking "I wonder if X will address Y... TO THE SCIENCE-ITORIUM!"? Or, for that matter, a scientist says "wait, nobody's tried process Z with regard to problem Q. TO THE HYPOTHEMAT!"
I guess you could argue that these both rely on initial observations, but only in a very general sense. On the other hand, just calling it "observation" works for a basic rundown for the scientifically illiterate.
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Post by antichrist on Apr 2, 2009 23:47:01 GMT -5
Stephen Hawking has an excellent explanation of what a scientific theory is, unfortunately I can't find that now either. I hate being sick, my brain is bogged down with mucus. Is this what you're looking for? "Any physical theory is always provisional, in the sense that it is only a hypothesis: you can never prove it. No matter how many times the results of experiments agree with some theory, you can never be sure that the next time the result will not contradict the theory. On the other hand, you can disprove a theory by finding even a single observation that disagrees with the predictions of the theory. As philosopher of science Karl Popper has emphasized, a good theory is characterized by the fact that it makes a number of predictions that could in principle be disproved or falsified by observation. Each time new experiments are observed to agree with the predictions the theory survives, and our confidence in it is increased; but if ever a new observation is found to disagree, we have to abandon or modify the theory" Can't help it, I LOVE Wikiquote. THAT'S IT!! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!! runs off to stash it away before she loses it again
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Post by dharmasatya on Apr 10, 2009 18:41:04 GMT -5
Stephen Hawking has an excellent explanation of what a scientific theory is, unfortunately I can't find that now either. I hate being sick, my brain is bogged down with mucus. Is this what you're looking for? "Any physical theory is always provisional, in the sense that it is only a hypothesis: you can never prove it. No matter how many times the results of experiments agree with some theory, you can never be sure that the next time the result will not contradict the theory. On the other hand, you can disprove a theory by finding even a single observation that disagrees with the predictions of the theory. As philosopher of science Karl Popper has emphasized, a good theory is characterized by the fact that it makes a number of predictions that could in principle be disproved or falsified by observation. Each time new experiments are observed to agree with the predictions the theory survives, and our confidence in it is increased; but if ever a new observation is found to disagree, we have to abandon or modify the theory" Can't help it, I LOVE Wikiquote. Great quote. That pretty much sums up the way science is an ongoing, never ending process. Always being refined, always being tested. Ahhhh... Science. So damn beautiful.
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