bobtato:
The defining, foundational feature of an experiment is that it tests a hypothesis, and no clear hypothesis was proposed. “Let’s see what happens” is not a hypothesis.
To be scientific, an experiment must define, in advance, exactly what outcomes will or will not support the hypothesis. (The word “science” shares a root with “scissors” and literally refers to cutting what is factual from what is not). Open-ended investigation may help suggest avenues of enquiry but it is not, in itself, science. Science is specifically about finding ways to prove yourself wrong.
Quite a lot of science does not work that way, particularly in the biological sciences. Popper-style hypothesis testing is much more common in physics than elsewhere.
Most of the research I did was along the lines of “we have no fucking idea how this drug works; let’s dose up some critters and see what happens to their brains and behaviour”.
Observational science is still science.
(wandering on a tangent)
Before I went full neuroscientist, I spent a fair bit of time as a philosophy of science guy. Inevitably, the demarcation problem (“how do you define the difference between science and not-science?”) got a lot of attention.
There have been many failed attempts at solving the demarcation problem. Popper was first, coming up with a solution typical of a philosophising physicist: simple, elegant and wrong. Kuhn introduced history into the mix, but paid too much attention…
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