27 JUN 2013 by ideonexus
Psychology Studies Sample WEIRD Humans
[This paper is] about another exotic group: people from Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and
Democratic (WEIRD)societies. In particular, it’s about the Western, and more specifically
American, undergraduates who form the bulk of the database in the experimental branches of
psychology, cognitive science, and economics, as well as allied fields(labeled the “behavioral
sciences”).
[...]
Who are the people studied in behavioral science research? A recent analysis of the top
journa... 1 
notes
notesA culture not representative of the species.
21 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Experiments are Key to Finding Truth
The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what's true. We have a method, and that method helps us to reach not absolute truth, only asymptotic approaches to the truth—never there, just closer and closer, always finding vast new oceans of undiscovered possibilities. Cleverly designed experiments ar... 1 notes
notesOtherwise we are left with only feelings that tell us nothing.
21 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Ira Remsen Experiments with Nitric Acid
While reading in a textbook of chemistry, ... I came across the statement, 'nitric acid acts upon copper.' I was getting tired of reading such absurd stuff and I determined to see what this meant. Copper was more or less familiar to me, for copper cents were then in use. I had seen a bottle marked 'nitric acid' on a table in the doctor's office where I was then 'doing time.' I did not know its peculiarities, but I was getting on and likely to learn. The spirit of adventure was upon me. Having... 1 notes
notesAn amusing anecdote.
21 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Benjamin Franklin Discovers Electricity
As every circumstance relating to so capital a discovery as this (the greatest, perhaps, that has been made in the whole compass of philosophy, since the time of Sir Isaac Newton) cannot but give pleasure to all my readers, I shall endeavour to gratify them with the communication of a few particulars which I have from the best authority. The Doctor [Benjamin Franklin], after having published his method of verifying his hypothesis concerning the sameness of electricity with the matter lightnin... 1 notes
notesAn account of his kite experiment.
21 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Do What All Good Scientists Do
You all have learned reliance
On the sacred teachings of Science,
So I hope, through life, you will never decline
In spite of philistine Defiance
To do what all good scientists do.
Experiment.
Make it your motto day and night.
Experiment.
And it will lead you to the light. Folksonomies: experiment
Folksonomies: experiment
1 notes
notesExperiment.
21 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Superstition is Based on Personal Experience
Almost every major systematic error which has deluded men for thousands of years relied on practical experience. Horoscopes, incantations, oracles, magic, witchcraft, the cures of witch doctors and of medical practitioners before the advent of modern medicine, were all firmly established through the centuries in the eyes of the public by their supposed practical successes. The scientific method was devised precisely for the purpose of elucidating the nature of things under more carefully cont... 1 notes
notesAstrology and other pseudosciences are believed because they appear to work in the real world, it is up to experiment to disprove them.
28 APR 2012 by ideonexus
Experience is Experiment
The lessons of science should be experimental also. The sight of a planet through a telescope is worth all the course on astronomy; the shock of the electric spark in the elbow outvalues all theories; the taste of the nitrous oxide, the firing of an artificial volcano, are better than volumes of chemistry. 1 notes
notesEmerson describes the importance of feeling electric shocks, fake volcanoes, tasting NO, etc.
23 APR 2012 by ideonexus
Natural Science Consists of Facts
Natural science is founded on minute critical views of the general order of events taking place upon our globe, corrected, enlarged, or exalted by experiments, in which the agents concerned are placed under new circumstances, and their diversified properties separately examined. The body of natural science, then, consists of facts; is analogy,—the relation of resemblance of facts by which its different parts are connected, arranged, and employed, either for popular use, or for new speculati...Folksonomies: scientific method experiment
Folksonomies: scientific method experiment
1 notes
notesSir Humphry Davy describes the scientific method.
23 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
Measuring the Intent in a Child's Smile
It is well-known that those who have charge of young infants, that it is difficult to feel sure when certain movements about their mouths are really expressive; that is when they really smile. Hence I carefully watched my own infants. One of them at the age of forty-five days, and being in a happy frame of mind, smiled... I observed the same thing on the following day: but on the third day the child was not quite well and there was no trace of a smile, and this renders it probable that the pr... 1 notes
notesDarwin describes his methodology for determining if his infant's smile was intentional.
22 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
The Bell Jar
A famous experiment in high school physics involves putting an electric buzzer in a bell jar, a glass container from which the air can be removed by a pump. When the air is removed, the sound of the buzzer disappears. As early as the seventeenth century, it was recognized that sound needed some medium to travel in. In a vacuum, such as exists inside the bell jar, there is nothing to carry the sound waves, so you don't hear the buzzer inside. To be more specific, sound is a pressure wave, or d... 1 notes
notesA jar with a buzzer placed inside it from which the air is pumped out, eliminating the sound.
