Video Games Require the Scientific Method

Video games aren’t as easy as they seem to the uninitiated. One cannot simply sit down and immediately begin shooting those aliens. One must first learn how to play the game. Gee (2003) suggests that skilled players learn to play using a four-step probing process (p. 90): 1. The player must probe the virtual world by looking around the current environment, clicking on something, or engaging in a certain action. 2. On the basis of the probing results, the player must form a hypothesis abou...

 Consensual VS Dissension Approach to Science

The debate surrounding the consensus on climate change is complicated by the complexity of both the scientific and the associated sociopolitical issues. Underlying this debate is a fundamental tension between two competing conceptions of scientific inquiry: the consensual view of science versus the dissension view [24]. Under the consensual approach, the goal of science is a consensus of rational opinion over the widest possible field [25]. The opposing view of science is that of dissensi...

 Science Unites

One of the great advantages of the naturalist worldview is that it serves as a basis for bringing people together under a common set of ground rules. Knowledge in science is public, not private, because it must be submitted to others for verification or falsification. A naturalist believes that the empirical truth is waiting to be discovered, and that we can all agree on the empirical truth so long as we believe in a few important criteria. Science can exist in any culture and any nation. It ...

 Science is Built on a Swamp

Science does not rest upon solid bedrock. The bold structure of its theories rises, as it were, above a swamp. It is like a building erected on piles. The piles are driven down from above into the swamp, but not down to any natural or 'given' base; and when we cease our attempts to drive our piles into a deeper layer, it is not because we have reached firm ground. We simply stop when we are satisfied that they are firm enough to carry the structure, at least for the time being.

 Theories Must be Falsifiable

In so far as a scientific statement speaks about reality, it must be falsifiable: and in so far as it is not falsifiable, it does not speak about reality.