Scientific Method
Scientific method concerns the procedures of inquiry — observation, hypothesis, testing, and inference — by which science is thought to investigate nature.
Definition
Scientific method is the body of procedures and norms — including systematic observation, the formulation and testing of hypotheses, controlled experiment, and inference from evidence — taken to characterize and warrant scientific inquiry.
Scope
This topic covers inductivist, hypothetico-deductive, and error-statistical accounts of method, the question of whether there is a single universal method, and Feyerabend's anarchist denial that any fixed methodological rules govern scientific practice.
Core questions
- Is there a single method common to all the sciences?
- How do hypotheses get tested and inferences justified?
- What role do error probabilities and severe testing play?
- Does the history of science show that method is rule-free?
Key concepts
- observation and experiment
- hypothesis testing
- hypothetico-deductive method
- severe testing
- error probabilities
- methodological pluralism
Key theories
- Hypothetico-deductive method
- Scientists derive observable predictions from hypotheses and test them against experience, accepting or rejecting hypotheses according to the results.
- Error-statistical method
- Mayo holds that hypotheses are warranted when they pass severe tests that would very probably have detected an error if one were present.
- Methodological anarchism
- Feyerabend argues that no methodological rule holds universally and that scientific progress has often depended on breaking accepted rules.
History
From Bacon's inductivism and Mill's methods through the logical empiricists' hypothetico-deductivism, philosophers sought a canonical method. Feyerabend's 1975 Against Method challenged the very idea of a universal method, and Mayo's 1996 error-statistical account reframed method around severe testing and error control.
Debates
- One method or many?
- Defenders of hypothetico-deductivism and error statistics seek general norms of method, while Feyerabend argues that historical episodes such as the Galilean revolution succeeded only by violating prevailing rules.
Key figures
- Carl Hempel
- Paul Feyerabend
- Deborah Mayo
- Francis Bacon
Related topics
Seminal works
- hempel1966
- feyerabend1975
- mayo1996
Frequently asked questions
- Does 'anything goes' mean science has no standards?
- Feyerabend's slogan is meant as a critique of the idea that one fixed set of rules governs all good science, not as an endorsement of arbitrariness. He argues that methodological standards are local and historically variable rather than universal and fixed.