Book contents
- What Science Is and How It Really Works
- What Science Is and How It Really Works
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Part I
- Part II
- 4 How Scientific Reasoning Differs from Other Reasoning
- 5 Natural Properties of a Rule-Governed World, or Why Scientists Study Certain Types of Things and Not Others
- 6 How Human Observation of the Natural World Can Differ from What the World Really Is
- 7 Detection of Patterns and Associations, or How Human Perceptions and Reasoning Complicate Understanding of Real-World Information
- 8 The Association of Ideas and Causes, or How Science Figures Out What Causes What
- Part III
- About the Author
- Index
6 - How Human Observation of the Natural World Can Differ from What the World Really Is
from Part II
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 July 2019
- What Science Is and How It Really Works
- What Science Is and How It Really Works
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Part I
- Part II
- 4 How Scientific Reasoning Differs from Other Reasoning
- 5 Natural Properties of a Rule-Governed World, or Why Scientists Study Certain Types of Things and Not Others
- 6 How Human Observation of the Natural World Can Differ from What the World Really Is
- 7 Detection of Patterns and Associations, or How Human Perceptions and Reasoning Complicate Understanding of Real-World Information
- 8 The Association of Ideas and Causes, or How Science Figures Out What Causes What
- Part III
- About the Author
- Index
Summary
Traditionally, scientists and philosophers of science have worked under the assumption that humans are pretty good at making observations of the natural world. Many thinkers, as far back as antiquity, recognized that experience could lead us astray and thus favored deductive systems of reasoning; however, to justify deduction, early philosophers argued for humans’ innate ability to perceive fundamental truths and correct base axioms. Empiricists clearly rejected this idea, favoring our ability to observe nature by using our senses over some perception of fundamental truths. However, both camps seemed to accept that humans could observe, or at least gather base information, about the natural world in a meaningful way, although there has not been uniform agreement on this.1
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- Information
- What Science Is and How It Really Works , pp. 155 - 184Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019