We’ve all developed at least some loose sense of what science is and what it focuses on. However, these views are often cobbled together from stereotypical media presentations of the scientist and science lab (white lab coat, beakers of smoking green liquid, …nerds) and the usual subjects taken in elementary and high school (biology, physics, etc.). Unfortunately, these stereotypical images and prototypical subjects don’t provide a very good picture of the scope of scientific inquiry—in other words, they don't give us much in the way of a clear and complete representation of what science is.
Further, textbooks often suggest to students that science is defined by the scientific method, which on paper appears to be a clean (and, let’s just say it: boring) cycle of hypothesizing, experimenting, analyzing, and reporting (see figure 1)
To get one thing cleared up straight away, the scientific method is better seen as a set of principles than as a defined sequence or cycle of steps scientists move through in practice. Although many scientists go through something akin to this sort of process some of the time, it’s too rigid to capture the complexity, messiness, and creativity of what’s really happening in the diverse fields that take a scientific approach.
Further, the scientific method, on its own, misses core features of what makes modern science such a powerful machine for producing real knowledge, such as the role of the larger scientific community of scientists beyond the individual scientist’s lab.
To summarize, science is not defined by the nerd in the white lab coat pictured above (obviously), a collection of scientific “facts”, or by the typical science courses you took in high school. Science is also not really defined by the standard picture of the scientific method, which scientists are often not explicitly following.
1. Seeking to find out what’s real
It may seem obvious, but before getting into less apparent stuff, I think it bears stating that science aims to find out what’s true about the universe. That may entail investigations as large as the history of our galaxy (cosmology), human-level stuff such as what’s going on in your brain when you do something difficult that you feel is right, like stopping yourself from swearing around young children when you stub a toe (neuroscience), and very, very small things like the absurdly weird behaviour of electrons (atomic physics).
Science is not about trying to find support for what we want to be true, what we think is morally right, or what an authority or higher power says is true. Of course, individual scientists, as human beings (most of them), are complex and fallible in their motivations—see more on this below.
This search for truth, while a critical foundation of science, doesn’t distinguish it from all other forms of inquiry. We all want to know what's real at least some of the time. Children are always trying to figure out what’s real and how things work. So were pre-science ancient philosophers. Mom and dad actually want to know why you haven't been answering their calls. So, there’s must be more than just the search for truth about the world around us that distinguishes modern science—we’ll get there.
However, those who are not participating in science (e.g., kids, the general public, politicians, activists, & even off-duty scientists) are not restricted by a requirement to always be authentically searching for truth. That is, they may be seeking to grasp what’s real but are not rule-bound to do so. Outside of science people may be just as likely to seek support for what an authority says is true or what they and their social, political, cultural or religious group want to be true.
For example, many people who falsely belief that MMR vaccines cause autism will seek out evidence for their view and not look to the preponderance of empirical research that’s been conducted or listen attentively to reasonable criticisms of their views. While they may say they’re interested in what’s true (and may believe that they are), they’re not reasoning and behaving in ways that are getting them and their cohorts closer to the truth (see more below).
Others who may call themselves scientists or would be labelled scientists on paper have sought to deceive their colleagues and the public by faking research. These people are not engaging honestly in the scientific pursuit—they’re not authentically seeking to discover what’s real about the world, perhaps conducting some sort of shoddy, half-baked “research” and producing data for other reasons, such as career advancement, notoriety, or financial gain. They’re not doing science.
So, science is aimed at discovering what’s really true about the world around us. But, again, there are others who are engaged in this same pursuit. How, then, does science in particular go about investigating reality? What sets science apart as different and what has made it so successful?
2. Arguing with reference to empirical evidence
The crux of science is what Strevens (2020) refers to as the Iron Rule. Simply put, “all argument must be carried out with reference to empirical evidence” (p.7).
But what is empirical evidence? Empiricism involves approaches to inquiry that are tied directly to observation and measurement.
When scientists are expressing their conclusions, whether simply stating their case apart from what anyone else thinks or resolving a difference of opinion with other scientists, they must be backing up their views with empirical research. This rule doesn’t allow philosophizing or moralizing, citing authority, or calling on a higher power as evidence. Evidence comes from observation and measurement only—conclusions must come out of this foundation.
A scientist can’t simply say that their hypothesized view of the world is true and leave it at that. A good scientist won’t believe other scientists—or anyone else—who confidently spouts off conclusions without empirical evidence to back it up (you can probably see here that while not everyone can do science, anyone can develop their critical thinking by aiming to think like one when it’s useful).
Importantly, this rule of arguing using empirical evidence directs only what counts as evidence (again, observation and measurement). It does not, by contrast, govern the scientist’s thought processes (which are generally unbound by any real rules). Scientists are free to have wild flights of imagination and to share their hypotheses with their colleagues (i.e., to not keep private) without necessarily having yet run their empirical tests. They can also share their very subjective inferences with colleagues after having collected the data, but generally it should be made clear that these are ideas and speculations. This is the subjective piece—where scientists have a bit more freedom to get creative and where things get a bit looser and more subjective.
It's noteworthy that empirical investigation was certainly conducted before the advent of modern science.
“The natural philosophy that came before the Scientific Revolution was not less creative than modern science, and as practiced by thinkers such as Aristotle was no less methodical and no less concerned with the evidence of the senses.” (Strevens, 2020, p. 3)
Non-scientists today do it too—children and astrologers (disparate examples of non-scientists), alike, look to the world around them for data about how things work. What, then, distinguishes the empiricism of science? It’s not simply the rigorous, tedious, and costly observation and measurement done by scientists (of course, that painstaking work is essential and does generally differ in its rigour from the data that non-scientists often collect). Rather, it’s the preclusion of arguing in the absence of empirical evidence.
A scientist doesn’t get to dabble in empirical methods and use them here and there to support their views where they can and, otherwise, use loose philosophizing or citation of authority where they can’t. A scientist must reference the observed data. If they don’t have empirical research to back things up, they won’t generally be taken seriously on the scientific stage—they may not even be allowed on (just like in a chess tournament or in the NBA, you can’t just go rogue and flout the rules).
A caveat: when a scientist takes issue with the reasoning or the empirical methods of another scientist, they’re free to critique without having their own research to cite—in a given field, there may be an enormous body of research already sitting there ready to speak to a particular hypothesis. In any case, the discussion revolves around the investigations of scientists who have put their empirical observations out there for the scientific community to see and build on (see more on critique and community in science below).
This focus on empiricism means that there are subjects that science doesn’t generally get to participate in—science doesn’t belong everywhere! For example, scientists do not have the capacity to do research investigating whether a god exists, whether supernatural entities influence the material world, or an array of moral and political questions that philosophers might be interested in pondering (e.g., is it ever right to steal?).
But it also means that there are many subject people might not intuitively consider to be science that are indeed science (again, science is not comprehensively captured by those typical subjects from high school—not at all). Yes, science is the only sensible basis for studying vaccine efficacy and how neurons in the brain work. But scientists are also working to empirically investigate strategies for effective learning in the classroom and online. Others want to know if screen time and social media impact mental health. Likewise, scientists have devised methods and conducted research to find out if people who claim to be psychic are really reading people’s minds and moving objects via telekinesis (there’s no good evidence for either).
It's always critical to note, though, that some who might be interested in investigating particular phenomena may be motivated to find evidence in support of their hypotheses rather than to find out what’s true (regardless of whether it aligns with one's theory or hypotheses), thus resulting in biased methods, faulty analysis, and unreasonable inferences (see pseudoscience). Science depends on more than just observation and measurement.
3. The scientific community and participation in critique
A given scientist doesn’t get to decide research on a subject in complete and the matter is settled. Scientists would not function very well as islands, independently working away on investigating their ideas; they need to be connected to a large community of other scientists, and for good reason.
"Individual scientists … can be famously bull-headed, overly enamored of pet theories, dismissive of new evidence, and heedless of their fallibility … But as a community endeavor, [science] is beautifully self-correcting." — Atul Gawande (2016; brackets added by Strevens, 2020)
Science is practiced by humans, and cognitive science has shown us that human thought is incredibly fallible. So, just like any other realm of human life, science is loaded with psychological, moral, political, and sociocultural baggage. Scientists carry with them particular desires, such as the drive for their preferred theories and political orientations to be the correct ones. Scientists have incentives for career advancement, notoriety, and financial gain. The biases that carry individual scientists away from objectivity are many and varied—these biases can, and often do, result in errors in reporting and flawed interpretation of evidence.
Coupled with this, “scientific judgments must sometimes be made using decidedly incomplete evidence” (Strevens, 2020, p. 57). Scientists, like humans in all domains of life, do not have access to all the information. That is, empiricism is limited by temporal and financial constraints, technological limitations of the methods for collecting data, etc.
In short, individual scientists are limited by incomplete access to information and fallible minds. A major part of science, then, is the requirement to put one’s research out into the scientific community for critique—regardless of whether a given scientist wants to have their work criticized, exposing one’s work—warts and all—is a requirement for participation in modern science.
Now, individual scientists will range in their willingness to engage in self-critique and their openness to hearing the critiques of others. Too bad for those who don’t want their work criticized—serious scientists, if they hope to have any impact at all (let alone having a career in science), must share their work in scientific journals, at conferences, etc., thus exposing their arguments and observations upon which they’re based to the skeptical eye of their colleagues.
Further, scientists will range in their willingness to criticize others and the extent to which their work is oriented toward such a cause. Some scientists want nothing more than to rip into their colleagues’ work while others just want to play nice (note: critique can be done kindly—no need for ad hominems!). Like elsewhere in science, things are messy. The beauty is that, as a group, the scientific community works together to call out the flaws in weaker—or downright terrible—research and miniscule problems of good and great research (all research has shortcomings), all the while generating new ideas and, gradually, getting rid of the ones that don’t quite work, perpetually advancing our knowledge about the world around us.
4. A (slowly) self-correcting process
Recently, during the Covid-19 pandemic, a great weight was put on science to grasp the nature of viral transmission, determine if, when, and which masks were effective, develop and study the efficacy of vaccines, and find out whether and how learning online could be effective. We urgently needed a quick turnaround in knowledge production in an uncertain and scary time. During this time—and, I think, to some degree, all the time—misunderstandings about how science works, what it can tell us, and when understanding is ready for public consumption meant people had unrealistic expectations of speed and certainty of science.
Unfortunately, science is slow (often extraordinarily so). A given research study—empirical investigation into a hypothesis—doesn’t tell us very much all by itself. It lays out the rationale and nature of the investigation, the data, and the scientists views about what those data are saying primarily for other scientists to look at, critique, and build on. “More research needed” is a constant (and, frankly, quite tired) refrain in the scientific literature. It’s true: more research is generally needed to be ever more assured about what’s true of world around us.
Science is slow. A single study or set of studies from a single group of researchers cannot tell us what’s real about the world. What we might call a scientific fact is only established, Stephen J. Gould suggests, when a finding is "confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent." Even a cluster of studies from different groups of researchers finding the same sort of thing, isn’t the end of the story—the research and discussion about what the observations are telling us has only just begun.
Science is slow (let’s keep saying it!). Financial resources and the participation of an enormous community of researchers can speed things up a bit—the global effort during Covid-19 was phenomenal. However, to let science self-correct and arrive at a place approaching—but rarely achieving—tentative conclusions, time is a necessary ingredient. Science can only bend to so far to society’s needs. This seems to be missing from most people’s understanding.
If so much time was needed even with the global pandemic effort, just think about those poorly funded, niche areas of science where the empirical investigation is deeply limited and critique is but a trickle (much research goes completely under the radar and even largely unnoticed by other scientists in the field—so much for community and critique!). Most of science is incredibly slow.
But it moves forward (let's say science is a snail—a very wise snail). This is what differs about science: with truth at the forefront, dependence on rigorous empirical research and resulting data, and a community focused on open sharing and critique, science slowly advances our understanding of the world, and this despite the limitations of research methods and the shortcomings inherent in relying on the fallible minds of individual scientists. It’s a community effort—a larger machine made of humans—that history has stumbled on as best way we have of discovering what is and is not real.
Recommended reading:
Strevens, M. (2020). The Knowledge Machine: How Irrationality Created Modern Science
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