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The Scientific Method
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1. Scientist makes an observation.
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2. The observation leads to a question. (The question may come first.)
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| 3. An hypothesis is formed as a tentative explanation for the observation. It must be testable. |
4. An experiment is designed to test the hypothesis.
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5. Data is gathered, recorded, and carefully analyzed and interpreted.
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6. A conclusion is reached and carefully interpreted with respect to the hypothesis.
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- It may support the hypothesis
- It may require the hypothesis be modified in some way
- It may show the hypothesis to be completely inaccurate and require that a new one be formed.
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| 7. After a number of experiments, the scientist may be able to summarize the results in a natural law, which describes how nature works but does not explain why why nature behaves in a certain way. |
8. Finally, the scientist may be able to formulate a theory.
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- The theory explains WHY nature behaves in the way described by the natural law.
- It answers not only the original question, but also any other questions that were raised during the process.
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| 9. The theory also predicts the results of further experiments, which is how it is checked. |
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| Common misconceptions about the scientific method: |
- An hypothesis is NOT an educated guess. It is a tentative explanation. There must be a real-time way of testing the hypothesis for it to be an hypothesis - otherwise it is only a guess and invalid for experimantal purposes.
- A theory DOES NOT become a law. See the definitions above. Laws tell what happened over and over ond over. Theories attempt to exlain why the observed behavior happened over and over and over.
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