Science: What It Is — and What It Is Not

“Following” science = cognitive dissonance. If following means obeying her as an authority figure. Following can also have other meanings, such as wanting to stay informed about a certain subject, such as science.

Science is a tool, not a belief system

Science is a way of learning about the world. It uses observation, experiments, and measurements to build models that help explain how things work. It is not a religion, it does not tell us what is morally right or wrong, and it does not deliver absolute truth. Scientific explanations are always open to improvement or revision.

Science moves forward by questioning

Progress in science comes from asking hard questions, testing ideas, and checking each other’s work. Debate, criticism, and replication are essential. When scientific conclusions are treated as rules that must be followed without question, the process that makes science reliable begins to break down.

There is no single, final “science”

At any moment, science includes uncertainty, disagreement, and competing explanations. Saying “the science is settled” can be misleading, because scientific understanding is always evolving. What we have are the best explanations available right now, not final answers.

Science is done by people, and people make mistakes

Scientists are human. They can be influenced by bias, career pressure, funding sources, or social expectations. While scientific methods are designed to reduce error, they cannot remove it entirely. This is why transparency, peer review, and ongoing scrutiny matter.

A key idea: scientific claims must be testable (falsification)

One of the most important features of science is that its ideas must be open to being proven wrong. A scientific claim must make clear predictions that can fail if the idea is incorrect. If a claim cannot be tested or challenged, it is not scientific.

Why the Falsification Principle Matters

The principle of falsification, articulated most clearly by Karl Popper, distinguishes science from dogma. A scientific theory must make risky predictions—claims that could fail under observation. This requirement ensures that science remains self-correcting rather than self-justifying.

Falsification protects science from becoming ideology. Without it, theories can be endlessly adjusted to accommodate any outcome, making them immune to criticism and indistinguishable from belief systems. By demanding vulnerability to error, falsification preserves science as an open-ended, critical enterprise rather than a closed doctrine.

Falsifiable:

“All swans are white.”

A single black swan would prove this wrong.

Not falsifiable:

“Some swans might be a magical color that only appears when no one is looking.”

There is no way to check this claim.

“A good scientific idea is one where you can imagine how it could be proven wrong.”