This happens age after age. In the early 1800s geologists met with violent condemnation because they differed with the Genesis account of creation. Later in the same century, geology was safe, but theories of evolution were condemned and the teaching of them forbidden. This most likely continues. "At every crossway on the road that leads to the future, each progressive spirit is opposed by a thousand men appointed to guard the past. "Every age has one or more groups of intellectual rebels who are persecuted, condemned, or suppressed at the time;but to a later age, they seem harmless and often essential to the elevation of human conditions.
这种事情一个时代接着一个时代发生。19世纪初,地质学家们因同《创世纪》有关创世的叙述相左而遭到强烈谴责。同一世纪的晚些时候,地质学安全了,但关于进化的理论却遭到谴责,被禁止讲授。这种情况很可能会继续下去。“在通往未来的每一个十字路口,每一个具有进步思想的人都会遭到受命维护过去的千名卫道士的反对。”每个时代都有一批或几批叛逆的知识分子在当时遭到迫害、谴责或镇压,但对后一个时代来说,他们便似乎无害了,而且对于改善人类的状况往往还是必不可少的。
The enormous success of science has led to the general belief that scientists have developedand ate employing a "method" --- a method that is extremely effective in gaining, organizing,and applying new knowledge. Galileo, famous scientist of the 1600s, is usually credited withbeing the "Father of the Scientific Method." His method is essentially as follows:
科学的巨大成功导致人们普遍产生了这样一种信念,即科学家们已经制定出并正在运用着一种“方法”——一种在获取、组织和运用新知识方面极为有效的方法。17世纪的著名科学家伽利略通常被认为是“科学方法之父”。他的方法主要如下:
1. Recognize a problem.
1. 确认一个问题
2. Guess an answer.
2. 猜测一个答案
3. Predict the consequences of the guess.
3. 预言这一猜测的后果
4. Perform experiments to test predictions.
4. 做实验以检验这些预言
5. Formulate the simplest theory organizes the three main ingredients: guess, prediction, experimental outcome.
5. 用公式表述能概括猜测、预言和实验结果这三大要素的最简明的理论