INTRODUCTION: THE FIELD AND PROBLEMS OF BIOLOGY 5 



we live. It assumes that the phenomena with which it is concerned are 

 more or less interrelated, and sets out to analyze and precisely describe 

 them and to discover their relationships. Observation and experiment 

 establish facts (i.e., result in agreed-upon descriptions of isolated phe- 

 nomena) ; but science is much more than a compilation of such observa- 

 tions. It attempts to summarize and classify its observations and estab- 

 lish relationships among them. Here it utilizes one of its most valuable 

 devices, the hypothesis. 



A hypothesis is a statement that goes beyond the available observa- 

 tions. It postulates a generalization or relationship that is suggested 

 but not proved by the facts already known. Its usefulness consists in 

 that it provides an interpretation of available knowledge that can be 

 tested by further observations and experiments. The results of these 

 observations and experiments decide the fate of the hypothesis: 



1. It may be found to be untenable, an incorrect summary or 

 assumption. 



2. It may be found to be partially tenable, in need of modification 

 and then of further tests. 



3. It may prove to be very difficult of direct test and either be gradu- 

 ally substantiated by indirect evidence or be abandoned for other and 

 more fruitful hypotheses ; or it may long retain its status as an unproved 

 but useful concept. 



4. It may be clearly demonstrated or shown to be so highly probable 

 that it ceases to be regarded as a hypothesis and then becomes one of the 

 accepted principles or "laws" of the science. 



Any science consists, then, of a mass of "facts" derived from observa- 

 tion and experiment, and of summations, classifications, and interpreta- 

 tions of these facts that are in part regarded as proved (principles, 

 "laws") and in part are hypotheses in various stages of acceptance or 

 rejection. 



One of the main requisites of science and the scientific method is the 

 objective viewpoint. This is the ideal and, largely, the practice of making 

 all observations and all proposals and tests of hypotheses without any 

 personal bias. It holds that how gratifying or how abhorrent an observa- 

 tion or a hypothesis may seem has no possible bearing on the scientific 

 truth or falsity of that observation or hypothesis, that the testimony of 

 checked and repeated observation and experiment is the final authority on 

 which truth or falsity must rest. 



The gathering of precise observations, the free use of hypotheses, and 

 the objective viewpoint are all characteristics of the scientific method; 

 but their fruitful use depends upon the desire to know, a construc- 

 tive imagination that "sees" relationships between formerly isolated 

 observations, and a degree of critical skepticism that scrutinizes the 



