So I Wrote A Book On The Scientific Method

Unlike my geology book, I'm not going to post it here in installments, because I would like this one to be published by a real publisher on laminae fabricated from the corpses of innocent trees.However, if anyone here would like a look at it in advance, so as to supply me with some criticism before I start submitting it to publishers, I would be grateful for the feedback.And the rest of you can just wish me luck.

But when I've briefly persuaded you to be honest on this subject, you have admitted that we can, for example infer living stegosauruses in the past from their bones in the present. In explaining the scientific method, then, it is my job to explain why and how this is the case, not to deny that it's the case.

Except when you wish to make assertions about the past, when you post stuff like this: When we point to terrestrial sediments with footprints in, and say that it's terrestrial, then all statements about the past are mere conjecture. When you wish to point to the same sediment and pretend that it's aqueous, this is so certain that it takes dishonesty to deny it. Sometimes, one standard is not enough.

Send me your email address. And I'll want your good opinions, not the ones about whether it's fun to glue dwarfs together.Thanks.

OK, that's nwr, NosyNed, NoNukes, CosmicChimp, and Tanypteryx.Have I missed anyone who's volunteered so far? If not, that's enough people, thanks.---If I'm keeping count, I have emailed copies to Tanypteryx and CosmicChimp, who have supplied email addresses, but not to the others, who haven't. PM me, guys.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I repeat, that's enough people. Thanks. I have made the last exception I'm going to. (Modulous. You're welcome.) Beyond a certain point, it'll just become a nuisance to add more people and then wait to see what they say.I think I've now emailed everyone except NoNukes and NosyNed, is that right?

And that should be everyone.---I have been mentioned in a published book. Alas, I am by no means the only one to have been recognized in this way by the phone company, and I feel that this cheapens the honor.

It's as well to have it properly spelled and punctuated, it makes me look like I know what I'm doing. It's terribly hard to proof-read one's own work, though I did read the whole thing out loud, which is a big help.You can skype me if you want, PM me, email me, whatever suits you best.How are you liking it so far?

You've all gone very quite. Is that the sound of awed silence, or ... ?

I don't see how you can soy such a mutable thug, my style is perfucktly fnurdible mangrove poop.

Cool. Thanks.

Well, very briefly what I say about it is as follows:* A theory is a collection of laws and facts.* When we talk of the "predictions" of a theory, we mean its logical consequences.* These predictions divide conceivable observations into things which can happen if the theory is true and things which can't.* We gain confidence in a theory if we go on seeing the things it says we can see and not the things it says we can't see. And, of course, we lose confidence if we see the things it says we can't see.* This is the only test of a theory. Although a theory can do other things for us --- in particular, it can explain things --- its utility in this respect can't be used to judge whether a theory is true. (In those instances where you think its explanatory power is so impressive as to confirm the theory, it can always be shown that there is an equivalent and related aspect of its predictive power which is what is really making the theory credible.)Now these last few facts don't appear in the definition of a theory --- just as the definition of a good wine doesn't appear in the definition of wine. But they're still true.

Try this.

Or here's a nice short argument; if people like it I'll add it to the appropriate place in my book.On the one hand, for every prediction there is a test: if a theory predicts something, then by seeing if that something is the case, we'd be testing the theory.But on the other hand, for every test there is a prediction. Because if some procedure really does put a theory to the test --- that is, if failing the test would discredit the theory --- then to affirm the truth of the theory is to predict that it will pass the test.

For example, the change from "atoms are indivisible" to "atoms aren't indivisible" required the modification of only a single word.