It’s a brand new age, and science, particularly biology, is everywhere. To illustrate the value of scientific thinking in understanding the world, let’s look at what happens in its absence, by considering some unusual behaviors in the common laboratory rat.

Rats can be trained, without much difficulty, to push a lever to receive a food pellet from a feeding mechanism (FIGURE 1-3). When the mechanism is altered so that there is a 10-second delay between the lever being pushed and the food pellet being dispensed, however, strange things start to happen. In one cage, the rat will push the lever and then, very methodically, run and push its nose into one corner of the cage. Then it moves to another corner and again pushes its nose against the cage. It repeats this behavior at the third and fourth corners of the cage, after which the rat stands in front of the feeder and the pellet is dispensed. Each time the rat pushes the lever it repeats the nose-in-the-corner sequence before moving to the food tray.

Figure 1-3“In the absence of the scientific method …” Rats develop strange, superstition-like behaviors if there is a 10-second delay between when they push a lever and when food is delivered.

In another cage, with the same 10-second delay before the food pellet is dispensed, a rat pushes the lever and then proceeds to do three quick back-flips in succession. It then moves to the food tray for the food pellet when the 10 seconds have elapsed. Like the nose-in-the-corner rat, the back-flip rat will repeat this exact behavior each time it pushes the lever.

In cage after cage of rats with these 10-second-delay food levers, each rat eventually develops its own peculiar series of behaviors before moving to the food dish to receive the pellet. Why do they do this? Because it seems to work! They have discovered a method by which they can get a food pellet. To some extent, the rats’ behaviors are reasonable. They associate two events—pushing the lever and engaging in some sequence of behaviors—with another event: receiving food. In a sense, they have taken a step toward understanding their world, even though the events are not actually related to each other.

Humans can also mistakenly associate actions with outcomes in an attempt to understand and control their world. The irrational belief that actions or circumstances that are not logically related to a course of events can influence its outcome is called superstition (FIGURE 1-4). For example, Nomar Garciaparra, a former major league baseball player, always engaged in a precise series of toe taps and adjustments to his batting gloves before he would bat.

Figure 1-4Superstitions abound. As comforting as myths and superstitions may be, they are no substitute for really understanding how the world works.

Thousands of different narratives, legends, fairy tales, and epics from all around the globe exist to help people understand the world around them. These stories explain everything from birth and death to disease and healing.

As helpful and comforting as stories and superstitions may be (or seem to be), they are no substitute for understanding achieved through the process of examination and discovery called the scientific method.

The scientific method usually begins with someone observing a phenomenon and proposing an explanation for it. Next, the proposed explanation is tested through a series of experiments. If the experiments reveal that the explanation is accurate, and if others complete the experiments with the same result, then the explanation is considered to be valid. If the experiments do not support the proposed explanation, then the explanation must be revised or alternative explanations must be proposed and tested. This process continues as better, more accurate explanations are found.

While the scientific method reveals much about the world around us, it doesn’t explain everything. There are many other methods through which we can gain an understanding of the world. For example, much of our knowledge about plants and animals does not come from the use of the scientific method, but rather comes from systematic, orderly observation, without the testing of any explicit hypotheses. Other disciplines also involve understandings of the world based on non-scientific processes. Knowledge about history, for example, comes from the systematic examination of past events as they relate to humans, while the “truths” in other fields, such as religion, ethics, and even politics, often are based on personal faith, traditions, and mythology.

Scientific thinking can be distinguished from these alternative ways of acquiring knowledge about the world in that it is empirical. Empirical knowledge is based on experience and observations that are rational, testable, and repeatable. The empirical nature of the scientific approach makes it self-correcting: in the process of analyzing a topic, event, or phenomenon with the scientific method, incorrect ideas are discarded in favor of more accurate explanations. In the next sections, we look at how to put the scientific method into practice.