Hello people, how has your week been? Today is a Saturday, which means no work….yaaay…. now I can write something for my awesome readers. Because of my love for research, I have decided to dedicate today to write about the concept of science as it relates to research. Tomorrow, we would be looking at hypothesis as it relates to research. Be sure to check out an example of a full research project here. I Hope you learn from this guys, have a great weekend and cheers.

What is science?

Science may be regarded both as a body of knowledge and as a method of investigation and explanation. It may also be referred to as a system of behavior by which men acquire mastery over their environment. Science is related to philosophy in at least three ways: in basic conception of reality, in basic conception of knowledge and in basic ethical judgements.

Science comes to us in propositional form. It is concerned with the real world, it is logical, and to get content into logical forms, science is operational. Science is public in the sense of not allowing private biases. Science is problem solving, it tends to be abstract and moves towards a system. No research stands by itself.

The scientist is often pictured as being detached and aloof; he is allegedly disinterested in the world around him and is completely absorbed by his experiments. The scientist is “passionately logical”, he will accept the consequence of scientific discovery even if it makes him emotionally uncomfortable. Weber argues that the scientist is committed to the situation of being proved wrong. Every known theory has undergone change and modification. The scientist has fundamental faith in scientific methodology even while questioning some particular technique. He develops a philosophy upon which his whole conception of science rests.

Francis Bacon was interested in the scientific method. He is said to be an empiricist. The experimental method in science is important because it can be used not just by the natural sciences but also in social sciences. We can say that two interrelated methods developed out of this and are still in use, the method of induction and deduction. The scientific method is often associated with the method of induction, that is, observation from particular instances to general principles. In deduction, you work from general principles to particular instances.

Renee Descartes on the other hand, being a mathematician, often associated with co-ordinate geometry. He is also associated with rationalism and the method of deduction. Descartes ideas in science involved an important step called methodological doubt. He adopted the method of doubting everything even those things that had been taught. Descartes only accepted a theory when it had been proved to be true to him. He attempted to see life clearly through rational thinking and to see it as a complete whole. In fact, he wished to interprete it in form of mathematical laws. That the mathematical model and methods were the most powerful methods which man has at his disposal.