Topics Science

Question Is the scientific method anything more than a good algorithm?

Accepted:
November 13, 2005

Comments

I don't think scientific research is algorithmic, unless you use the term so broadly so that any non-random behavior counts. Research certainly doesn't follow rules that the scientists can articulate, and I think there are reasons to believe that they aren't following anything like a full set of tacit rules either. Thomas Kuhn mounts an extended case for an alternative to a rule-based account of research in his classic The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.

People often speak of "the scientific method", but it means nothing.There is no such method -- and one proof of that is the greatfascination and challenge scientific inquiry holds for so many people,something it would not have if its practice merely consisted in turningthe crank of The Method. However, the myth persists and it not onlygives a false picture of science, but also encourages the thoughtthat science and philosophy are very different kinds of enterprises.There are differences, to be sure, but they don't consist inphilosophy's not yet having found its method.

Question Is the scientific method anything more than a good algorithm? Accepted:November 13, 2005

Question Is the scientific method anything more than a good algorithm?

Accepted:
November 13, 2005