What Makes a Good Experiment? : Reasons and Roles in Science / Allan Franklin.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Franklin, Allan, 1938-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Experimental design.

Science--Experiments--Juvenile literature.

Science.

Science--Methodology--Juvenile literature.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (383 p.)

Place of Publication:

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania : University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

What makes a good experiment? Although experimental evidence plays an essential role in science, as Franklin argues, there is no algorithm or simple set of criteria for ranking or evaluating good experiments, and therefore no definitive answer to the question. Experiments can, in fact, be good in any number of ways: conceptually good, methodologically good, technically good, and pedagogically important. And perfection is not a requirement: even experiments with incorrect results can be good, though they must, he argues, be methodologically good, providing good reasons for belief in their results. Franklin revisits the same important question he posed in his 1981 article in the British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, when it was generally believed that the only significant role of experiment in science was to test theories. But experiments can actually play a lot of different roles in science-they can, for example, investigate a subject for which a theory does not exist, help to articulate an existing theory, call for a new theory, or correct incorrect or misinterpreted results. This book provides details of good experiments, with examples from physics and biology, illustrating the various ways they can be good and the different roles they can play.

Contents:

Contents; Acknowledgments; Introduction; Part I. Conceptually Important Experiments: Those That Lead to Significant Changes in Theory; 1. Gregor Mendel, "Experiments in Plant Hybridization": The Best Experiments Ever Done!; 2. The Discovery of Parity Nonconservation; 3. The Meselson-Stahl Experiment": The Most Beautiful Experiment in Biology"; 4. CP or Not CP: A Convincing Experiment; 5. The Nondiscovery of Parity Nonconservation: A Missed Opportunity; Part II. Measuring a Quantity of Importance; 6. Measuring a Quantity of Importance and Testing an Equation: Millikan and Planck's Constant

7. Robert Millikan and the Charge of the ElectronPart III. Evidence for Entities; 8. "Observing" the Neutrino: The Reines-Cowan Experiments; 9. The Discovery of the η Meson; 10. Is There a Second Neutrino?; 11. The Missing Piece of the Puzzle: The Discovery of the Higgs Boson; Part IV. Solving a Vexing Problem; 12. William Wilson and the Absorption of β Rays; 13. Ellis and Wooster, the Continuous Energy Spectrum in β Decay: Something Is Missing; 14. The Solar-Neutrino Problem; Part V. Measuring Nothing; 15. The Disappearance of the 17-keV Neutrino; 16. The Michelson-Morley Experiment

17. A Tale of Two Experiments: Is There a Fifth Force?18. The Search for Magnetic Monopoles; Conclusion; Notes; References; Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780822981008

0822981009

OCLC:

949985011