A common misperception of science is that it defines "truth".  Science is not truth, but rather it is a way of thought.  It is a process by which experimentation is used to answer questions.  For the members of the MacDoth Clan experimentation was real life.  This process of experimentation is called the scientific method and involves several steps:
  • Observation: Scientists are generally curious about their surroundings.  This curiosity leads them to ask questions about the world around them.
  • Hypothesis: As scientists formulate questions, they naturally try to answer those questions.  Those attempts to answer questions lead to hypotheses, or some would say guesses, regarding the question's answer.
  • Testing: Of all the steps in the scientific method, the one that truly separates science from other disciplines is the process of experimentation.  In order to prove, or disprove, a hypothesis, a scientist will design an experiment to test the theory.  An important aspect of scientific experimentation is repeatability.  In other words, if two different people in two different parts of the world perform the same experiment, they should both get the same results.
The scientific method can be most easily understood through an example.  In the late 16th century, it was generally believed that an object would fall at a speed proportional to its weight.  In other words, the bigger they come, the faster they fall.  The Italian scientist Galileo thought differently about this idea.  Galileo believed that the forces acting on a falling object were independent of the object's weight.  In 1590, Galileo planned out an experiment.  He climbed to the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa and dropped several different sized weights off the top of the Tower.  A colleague watched the weights as they fell and recorded his observations.

 

What did they find?  Let's repeat Galileo's experiment.  Magically transported to Italy, we find ourselves at the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa with a 1 kg and 10 kg weight.  To drop the weights, click on the tower.  What happens when we drop the objects off the Tower ('we squash cars' is not a correct answer)?  Repeat the experiment.  What happens?  Is the speed at which an object falls dependent or independent of its weight?  Some questions for you to think about:
  • What is the experimental hypothesis?
  • Is the experiment repeatable?

 

 

Galileo found that two objects with different weights fall at exactly the same speed.  This experiment disproved the previously held belief that objects with different weights fall at different rates.  Why do two objects with different weights fall at the same speed?  Galileo had discovered that the force of gravity (which would not be defined until several decades later by a scientist named Sir Isaac Newton) was constant.  Thus, despite their different weights, two objects will fall (actually the objects are pulled) to the earth at exactly the same rate.

 
In one of the most famous renditions of this experiment, the astronaut David Scott repeated Galileo's experiment on the moon using a falcon feather and a hammer.  On earth, light objects like feathers are slowed down by wind resistance.  The moon has no air and thus no wind resistance.

 

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