Scientific accuracy

“ I have been compelled to use the words ‘science’ and ‘scientific’ because these terms have become firmly adherent to a group of subjects such as Physics, Chemistry, Geology, Botany, etc., and cannot now be detached from them. Unfortunately ‘scientific’ is used in another sense as implying accuracy of experimental method and in deduction from results. So that in calling ourselves scientific men we run the risk of seeming to claim a monopoly of method, as though we pretended to be somehow superior to the trained workers in other branches. ”

“ We should rather recognise a place for fools' hypotheses, as Darwin did for "fools' experiments." But to complete the scientific character, there must be great patience, accuracy, and impartiality in examining and testing these conjectures, as well as great ingenuity in devising experiments to that end. ”

“ It is quite true that absolute accuracy is often unattainable; you can only approach it. But the greater the exertion you make [Pg 301] to reach it, the greater will be the success of your investigations. The effort after accuracy will be transferred from your scientific work to your every-day life and become a habit of mind, advantageous both to yourselves and to society at large. ”

“ But I would like to call attention here to what appears to me a fundamental condition of scientific work and thereby a necessary result of scientific training. Science is naught if not exact. Accurate observation, accurate record, accurate deduction from data, all of which may be reduced to simple, plain honesty. Anything else is error, not science. ”

“ They know that men of science throughout the world subject each other’s results to the most searching examination; and that error is mercilessly exposed and rejected as soon as discovered. And, finally, they know that still more conclusive testimony is to be found in the daily verification of scientific predictions, and in the never-ceasing triumphs of those arts which Science guides. ”

“ Although we cannot always isolate our factors, control our processes, and otherwise apply scientific method, with results as conclusive as those obtained in laboratories of chemistry, physics, or biology, we need not therefore reject scientific method in favor of a rule-of-thumb. ”

“ I replied truthfully, "even before my experience of this evening went so far toward convincing me. But, with the examples I have seen, I felt that true scientific control was lacking. With all their science, most of the investigators trust too greatly." ”

“ The fact that science is capable of being resolved into separate processes of verification, is that which renders it possible to form a great body of scientific truth, by adding together a vast number of truths, of which many men, at various times and by multiplied efforts, have satisfied themselves. ”

“ But my contention is, that no new principle of action has any claim to scientific acceptance, save upon evidence as complete and satisfactory as that which would be required in any other scientific investigation. ”

“ The popular idea of scientific investigation is a vehement, aimless collection of little facts, collected as a bower bird collects shells and pebbles, in methodical little rows, and out of this process, in some manner unknown to the popular mind, certain conjuring tricks—the celebrated “wonders of science”—in a sort of accidental way emerge. ”

“ We have reason to hope that the empirical processes which are at present employed will be replaced by scientific methods, the trustworthiness of which no one will be able to put in doubt, and the efficacy of which will endure every test. ”

“ We see in many of the brute creation the exercise of one, at least, of the same powers of reasoning as that which we ourselves employ.
The method of scientific investigation is nothing but the expression of the necessary mode of working of the human mind. It is simply the mode at which all phenomena are reasoned about, rendered precise and exact. ”

“ In science we do the same thing;—the philosopher exercises precisely the same faculties, though in a much more delicate manner. In scientific inquiry it becomes a matter of duty to expose a supposed law to every possible kind of verification, and to take care, moreover, that this is done intentionally, and not left to a mere accident, as in the case of the apples. And in science, as in common life, our confidence in a law is in exact proportion to the absence of variation in the result of our experimental verifications. ”

“ At a very early stage in the study of the science, anything more accurate would be useless, and therefore pedantic. In a merely initiatory definition, scientific precision is not required: the object is, to insinuate into the learner's mind, it is scarcely material by what means, some general preconception of what are the uses of the pursuit, and what the series of topics through which he is about to travel. ”

“ It is on this same basis that physical science pursues, with ever-increasing success, its quest of laws of nature. Nor need this restriction hamper the scientific study of human life, in which the real difficulties are the practical ones of enormous complexity of evidence, and imperfection of methods of observation. ”

“ The only sense in which necessity can be ascribed to the conclusions of any scientific investigation, is that of legitimately following from some assumption, which, by the conditions of the inquiry, is not to be questioned. In this relation, of course, the derivative truths of every deductive science must stand to the inductions, or assumptions, on which the science is founded, and which, whether true or untrue, certain or doubtful in themselves, are always supposed certain for the purposes of the particular science. ”

“ Still, it is not so much in laws based upon direct observation or experiment, that the material validity of scientific reasoning appears, as in the cumulative evidence that arises from the co-ordination of laws within each science, and the growing harmony and coherence of all sciences. ”

“ Throughout the trial the defense tended to take the view that science could carry the day just by being scientific. But in doing this, one assumes that there are no points outside the empirical realm from which one can form judgments about science. Science, by this conception, must contain not only its facts, but also the means of its own evaluation, so that the statements about the statements of science are science too. ”

“ The inaccuracy of the observational and manual work done by older pupils, the indefiniteness of expression, the lack of system, and the inability to do comparative and inferential work, were so many revelations of the true aims of science teaching. The absolute necessity for accuracy in every study and every department of work made accuracy the first object to be attained in every science lesson ”

“ Science being proved truth, scientific method requires that all the factors which concern the subject of research shall be duly considered, in order to arrive at correct thought respecting the special subject of inquiry. ”

“ The legitimate aim of all systematic, exact experiments is to lay a foundation of well-ascertained and closely related facts on which may be developed a superstructure of science to supersede the theoretical speculations which form an important part of the prelude of scientific discovery. ”

“ It was thought that the temper of the really scientific man, so patient in research, so accurate and conscientious, so slow to dogmatize, so deferential to others, might be fostered by experimental science in the schools, acquiring "knowledge at first hand," making experiments, looking with great respect at balances, weighing and measuring, and giving an account of results. ”

“ The tests which we are making are given for the advancement of science and for the information of the person tested. By scientific means we will be able to separate characteristics derived from heredity and environment and to treat each class separately. ”

“ While the technical and difficult questions of natural history by which the truth or falsity of the doctrine must be determined are beyond the reach of unscientific readers, and belong to the biologists to decide, the question here raised as to whether the investigation, as conducted, is legitimately scientific or not, is one of which all intelligent persons ought to be capable of forming a judgment. ”

“ But whereas the metaphysician will claim a priori knowledge or else, whether he admits it or not, will be deducing his knowledge from the crudest facts of daily experience, the theoretical scientist will base his deductions on extremely accurate observations embracing all the phenomena known to science. ”

“ That which is not decided with dogmatic infallibility is for the time susceptible only of a scientific determination, which advances with the progress of science, and becomes absolute only where science has attained its final results. ”

“ Since one of the most important tasks of verification is to ascertain with accuracy the magnitude of the quantities which enter, as elements, into the theory which occupies men during the period; the improvement of instruments, and the methods of observing and experimenting, are principal features in such periods. ”

“ Add to this the fact that every conclusion is not only based upon these fundamental scientific principles, but has been carefully verified by investigation and observation in not only hundreds but thousands of cases, and has been used daily for years under the trying conditions of actual commercial practice, and this science has passed out of the merely experimental stage. ”

“ It is not enough merely to present plausible generalizations; scientific conclusions are followed swiftly either by proof or disproof. With this check always in mind, the scientist feels the necessity for the most rigid verification of his data, methods, and principles. ”

“ They become objects of minute, accurate, and experimental scrutiny. Since the body of propositions that forms natural science hangs upon them, for scientific purposes their nature as evidence, as signs, entirely overshadows their natural status, that of being simply natural events. The scientific man, as scientific, cares for perceptions not in themselves, but as they throw light upon the nature of some object reached by evidence. And since every such inference tries to terminate in a further perception (as its test of validity) , the value of inferential knowing depends on perception. ”

“ There are plenty of questions, especially in matters of theory and doctrine in concrete subjects, which science cannot directly and absolutely decide either one way or the other, but respecting which, by the aid of new knowledge and of inference based upon it, science gradually accumulates so large a preponderence of evidence as conclusively settles them to the conviction of every unprejudiced and reasonable person. ”

“ These results having been established by the most accurate experiments known to science, there is every reason to accept them until such time at least as their validity is disproved by further experiments still more precise in nature. ”

“ He advocated three methods of reaching truth which are now followed by all scientific men. In the first place, he proposed that natural objects and changes should be examined with great care, in order that the observer might determine exactly what happened in any given case. This has led in modern times to incredibly refined measurements and analysis. ”

“ Nearly all our medical and surgical knowledge has been obtained by observation and study, either of the results of experiments made by ourselves, or by the course of nature for us; and the former is often attended by immeasurably less pain and expence than the latter. No one who has ever made in a proper manner new experiments, would venture to assert that valuable knowledge is not gained by them; and this statement is as correct of experiments in physiology as in all the other sciences. ”

“ All we require of our hypothesis is that when you start with facts capable of experimental verification, the application of it shall lead to other facts capable of experimental verification. For this reason we may justifiably conclude that to any experience which is aware of things in their concrete individuality they must present aspects which are not represented in our scientific hypotheses, and again cannot appear to it as the precise counterpart of the schemes according to which we quite legitimately reconstruct them for the purpose of scientific investigation. ”

“ The volume to which the reader's attention is called is chiefly an exposition of the author's views on the scientific value of biological experimentation. With some of his conclusions, there will be little or no dispute among members of the medical profession. But in defending the moethods of physiological experiment, has he been scrupulously accurate and uniformly fair? Is there to be discerned any tendency to exaggeration, to over-statement or to suppression of vital facts? Eager as he is to charge inaccuracy upon others, has he been always accurate himself? ”

“ The experiments of Joule, of England, and the generalizations of Helmholtz, of Germany, are entitled to special mention.
Scientists are naturally and necessarily conservative. So many startling pseudo-scientific facts are announced, that every startling scientific theory, before it is accepted, is submitted to the most careful and crucial tests. ”

“ No instrument and no organ of observation can be conceived to measure to more than a finite degree of accuracy, and the best value for any physical ‘fact’ will always be the mean of a number of good observations after all the accessible sources of error have been allowed for. ”