Editing Scientific method (section)

===Beliefs and biases===
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 | image1 = Jean Louis Théodore Géricault 001.jpg
 | caption1 = Flying gallop as shown by this painting ([[Théodore Géricault]], 1821) is [[Falsifiability|falsified]]; see below.
 | image2 = The Horse in Motion high res.jpg
 | caption2 = [[Sallie Gardner at a Gallop|Muybridge's photographs]] of ''The Horse in Motion'', 1878, were used to answer the question of whether all four feet of a galloping horse are ever off the ground at the same time. This demonstrates a use of photography as an experimental tool in science.
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Scientific methodology often directs that [[Hypothesis|hypotheses]] be tested in [[Scientific control|controlled]] conditions wherever possible. This is frequently possible in certain areas, such as in the biological sciences, and more difficult in other areas, such as in astronomy.

The practice of experimental control and reproducibility can have the effect of diminishing the potentially harmful effects of circumstance, and to a degree, personal bias. For example, pre-existing beliefs can alter the interpretation of results, as in [[confirmation bias]]; this is a [[heuristic]] that leads a person with a particular belief to see things as reinforcing their belief, even if another observer might disagree (in other words, people tend to observe what they expect to observe).<ref name="beliefCreatesReality">{{cite book | chapter-url=https://doi.org/10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60146-X | doi=10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60146-X | chapter=When Belief Creates Reality | title=Advances in Experimental Social Psychology Volume 18 | date=1984 | last1=Snyder | first1=Mark | volume=18 | pages=247–305 | isbn=978-0-12-015218-6 }}</ref>

{{Blockquote|text=[T]he action of thought is excited by the irritation of doubt, and ceases when belief is attained.|author=[[C.S. Peirce]]|source=''How to Make Our Ideas Clear'' (1877)<ref name= How/>}}

A historical example is the belief that the legs of a [[Horse gallop|galloping]] horse are splayed at the point when none of the horse's legs touch the ground, to the point of this image being included in paintings by its supporters. However, the first stop-action pictures of a horse's gallop by [[Eadweard Muybridge]] showed this to be false, and that the legs are instead gathered together.<ref>{{harvp|Needham |Wang|1954|p=166}} shows how the 'flying gallop' image propagated from China to the West.</ref>

Another important human bias that plays a role is a preference for new, surprising statements (see ''[[Appeal to novelty]]''), which can result in a search for evidence that the new is true.{{sfnp|Goldhaber|Nieto|2010|page=940}} Poorly attested beliefs can be believed and acted upon via a less rigorous heuristic.<ref name= mythIsAbelief >Ronald R. Sims (2003). ''Ethics and corporate social responsibility: Why giants fall.'' p. 21: {{"'}}A myth is a belief given uncritical acceptance by members of a group ...' – Weiss, ''Business Ethics'' p. 15."</ref>

{{anchor|robustTheory}}Goldhaber and Nieto published in 2010 the observation that if theoretical structures with "many closely neighboring subjects are described by connecting theoretical concepts, then the theoretical structure acquires a robustness which makes it increasingly hard{{snd}}though certainly never impossible{{snd}}to overturn".{{sfnp|Goldhaber|Nieto|2010|page=942}} When a narrative is constructed its elements become easier to believe.{{sfnp|Lakatos|1976|pp=1—19}}<ref name= narrativeFallacy >{{harvp|Taleb|2007|p=72}} lists ways to avoid the narrative fallacy and confirmation bias; the narrative fallacy being a substitute for explanation.</ref>

{{anchor|genesisOfScientificFact}}{{harvp|Fleck|1979|p=27}} notes "Words and ideas are originally phonetic and mental equivalences of the experiences coinciding with them. ... Such proto-ideas are at first always too broad and insufficiently specialized. ... Once a structurally complete and closed system of opinions consisting of many details and relations has been formed, it offers enduring resistance to anything that contradicts it". Sometimes, these relations have their elements assumed ''[[A priori and a posteriori|a priori]]'', or contain some other logical or methodological flaw in the process that ultimately produced them. [[Donald M. MacKay]] has analyzed these elements in terms of limits to the accuracy of measurement and has related them to instrumental elements in a category of measurement.{{efn-lg|name= macKay| 1=The scientific method requires testing and validation [[Empirical evidence|''a posteriori'']] before ideas are accepted.<ref name= conjugatePairs>{{cite book |quote=Invariably one came up against fundamental physical limits to the accuracy of measurement. ... The art of physical measurement seemed to be a matter of compromise, of choosing between reciprocally related uncertainties. ... Multiplying together the conjugate pairs of uncertainty limits mentioned, however, I found that they formed invariant products of not one but two distinct kinds. ... The first group of limits were calculable ''a priori'' from a specification of the instrument. The second group could be calculated only ''a posteriori'' from a specification of what was ''done'' with the instrument. ... In the first case each unit [of information] would add one additional ''dimension'' (conceptual category), whereas in the second each unit would add one additional ''atomic fact''. |pages=1–4 |last=MacKay |first=Donald M. |year=1969 |title=Information, Mechanism, and Meaning |place=Cambridge, MA |publisher=MIT Press |isbn=0-262-63032-X}}
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