Scientific Method Term Paper

Scientific Method

Scenario 1: You come home after a long day at work and you flip on the light switch and nothing happens; light does not come on. Now what?

Miriam Webster's dictionary defines the scientific method as all of the "principles and procedures for the systematic pursuit of knowledge involving the recognition and formulation of a problem, the collection of data through observation and experiment, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses."

Ask a Question

Asking questions is an extremely important part of the scientific method and of scientific experimenting. It is actually perhaps the most important part of scientific research because everything else that is done is based on the question that is asked at the beginning of an investigation. All of the other components of the project will be to answer the question posed. Scientists have stated that "almost all scientific inquiry begins with an observation that piques curiosity or raises a question" (Harris 2012). Without a question, there is nothing for the scientist to investigate and therefore there is no experiment to conduct. Before the scientist can get to their work, they must formulate a question. The question is also what is known as the purpose of the experiment because it asks you to find the purpose of your scientific investigation.

Why are the lights not turning on in this house?

Step 2: Do Background Research

It is important to be as informed as possible on any subject before beginning a scientific experiment. For example, if a person did not know about the dangers of mixing acids and bases before doing a chemistry experiment, they could seriously harm themselves or others.The individual checked other light switches in the house and determined that they are also not going on. From here, the person should see if any other devise in the house is coming on, such as those which usually have a light source, like the clock on the microwave. After this is checked, the person has determined that power is not going to any sources in the house that they can see.

Step 3: Construct a Hypothesis:

A hypothesis is an educated guess as to what explains something or answers a given question. It is called an educated guess, because it is almost always based on knowledge that a person has gained about a given topic. For a theory to become a hypothesis it must be testable, that means something which can be tested with scientific inquiry. Also, the guess must be something which can be proven to be untrue. A hypothesis can either be proven to be true or false. If there is no chance of its being proven wrong then it is not a true hypothesis. Dr. Anne Marie Helmenstine (2012) says, "It's easiest to test the null or no-difference hypothesis because you can prove it to be wrong. It's practically impossible to prove a hypothesis is correct."

My hypothesis is that the power has gone out because of the weather.

Step 4: Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment:

An experiment is the way to test whether or not the hypothesis is true or….....