Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Jacqui.W - Natural Sciences

"Science is built with facts just as a house is built with bricks, but a collection of facts cannot be called a science any more than a pile of bricks can be called a house." (Henri Poincare, 1854-1912)

I think what Poincare is trying to tell us here is that Science is something that is based on facts and the ideas and concepts of it are developed upon these facts. However, if we just have facts that we don’t relate to each other and explain it, this cannot conclude to be Science because the point is that Science is something developed and put into order and made sense of. There has to be a reason behind everything and (for example) why you decided that these 2 specific facts related to each other.

An example in life could even be as simple as a spray can. A spray can releases gas and the nozzle gets cold after this. This is a fact worldly known by most people. Simply by looking at this fact, there is nothing related to science at all. But if we explain things, go into detail and link the fact to something to explain it, it can become science. By explaining that, within a spray can, there is a liquid form of the gas that will be released. When we press down on the nozzle, it causes a reaction to take place, changing the liquid into a gas and being released. This chemical reaction takes in energy in order to break the bonds, changing it into a gas state and the change in energy here is positive therefore it is an endothermic reaction, causing the nozzle to be cold as the taking in of energy causes the nozzle to be less hot.

I agree with Poincare as Science in general is a very organised and well structured subject. If there is no order or explanation in Science, it makes it hard to understand and loses the meaning of it.

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