PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE

                      scientific explanation

ABSTRACT

                                                                                                                                     

We have good, scientific explanations for most of what we see in the natural world. A scientific explanation uses observations and measurements to explain what we see in the natural world.  Science is the study of alternatives Explanations. Is an explanation the answer to the question of why it happens? Therefore a scientific explanation should make a claim about the problem, provide evidence for the claim and provide reasoning that links the evidence to the claim. In this article, I hope to present scientific explanations logically through evidence.  Scientific explanations should be as consistent with the evidence as possible.

 

Keywords: science, explanation, claim, reasoning, evidence

1.       Introduction

 

Scientific explanations for the problems have been around since pre-Socratic times. However, modern discussion actually begins with the developmental reduction-nominal model. That was the premise of a recent discussion science sometimes provides explanations. The task of a "theoretician" or "model" of scientific explanation is to characterize the structure of such explanations.  Philosophical literature assumes that there is a significant continuity between the explanations found in science and some explanations found in general, non-scientific contexts. Therefore theories cannot be proven, but one can definitely disprove them.

Mainly a good scientific explanation should explain all the observations and data we have and it should allow us to make predictions that can be tested using future experiments. An example is 'Why is the sky blue?'  It’s all about light scattering.  The scientific explanation for this is that we receive white light from the sun, which fills the Earth's atmosphere.  So the sky is blue.  Most of the light that travels above continues to travel and never reaches our eyes.  But some of it is scattered by air molecules and jumps into our eyes.  The sky looks blue to us because blue light diffuses better than any other color.

 

2.       TYPES OF explanation

An explanation is a set of statements usually made to describe a set of facts that explain the causes, context, and consequences of those facts.  This description may establish rules or regulations, and may explain existing laws regarding any objector phenomenon being examined.  Also, the explanation may or may not be scientific. Non-scientific explanations suggest supernatural phenomena and non-scientific explanations based on belief. A scientific explanation is a way of explaining something we see in the natural world that’s based on observations and measurements.

2.1   Explanation vs. Confirmation

Scientific explanations should match the evidence and be logical, or they should at least match as much of the evidence as possible. The term confirmation is used in epistemology and the philosophy of science whenever observational data and other information that is taken for granted speak in favor of or support scientific theories and everyday hypotheses.

Confirmation is the giving of reasons to believe that certain statements (scientific theories) are true. The first step in explaining the concept of scientific explanation is to make a sharp distinction between explaining why a phenomenon occurs and giving reasons for believing that it does occur.

2.2 Parts of the scientific explanation

A claim, evidence, and reasoning (CER) is a scientific explanation. It is a way that we explain our evidence-based claims.  This process shows in figure1.  

o   Claim: answers the question

o   Evidence: has at least 2 pieces of evidence that supports the claim

o   Reasoning: explains how the evidence supports the claim

 3. CONCLUSION

A scientific explanation is the final claim of the scientist made upon analyzing the experiment data (evidence). Scientific explanations should match the evidence and be logical or they should at least match as much of the evidence as possible.

REFERENCES

[1]    https://study.com/academy/lesson/scientific-explanation-definition-examples.html

[2]    How to Write a Scientific Explanation - YouTube

[3]    Scientific Explanation | Encyclopedia.com