All of science is based on a few major assumptions that no scientist can prove.
- First is that the universe is orderly and lawful. Science assumes that every event that occurs in the universe, including human behavior, has an antecedent cause and follows natural laws.
- The second is the assumption that there are natural causes (never supernatural ones) for everything that happens in the world around us. That is, all events are caused by things in the material world and not, for example, the supernatural world.
- The third is the assumption that this order and causes of events in the universe are discoverable.
- The fourth is that evidence from the natural world can be used to learn or discover this order and causes.
- The fifth is that the human brain is capable of doing the discovery.
All of the amazing wonders of science, from antibiotics to planes and landing humans on the moon, are built on those assumptions. Although built on assumptions that no human being is capable of proving, science has been shown to be a process of knowing that works.
Some sources and what they say
“All scientists make two fundamental assumptions. One is determinism—the assumption that all events in the universe, including behavior, are lawful or orderly. The second assumption is that this lawfulness is discoverable. Notice that the first assumption does not necessarily imply the second assumption. In other words, we can assume that behavior is lawful without presuming that we will discover this lawfulness” (Lammers 2004, ch3).
“The process of building scientific knowledge relies on a few basic assumptions that are worth acknowledging. Science operates on the assumptions that:
- There are natural causes for things that happen in the world around us.
- Evidence from the natural world can be used to learn about those causes.
- There is consistency in the causes that operate in the natural world.” (U. C. Berkeley).
“Every scientist must make two assumptions which are quite unproveable, even in theory. The first is that the universe is orderly and the second is that man’s brain is capable of unravelling the mysteries of that order. No scientist I know ever thinks about these assumptions, still less worries about them. They in no significant sense influence practical scientific activity. Nevertheless, they are made and they are worth examining briefly because the conclusions of science cannot be more reliable than the fundamental assumptions on which science is based” (Horrobin 1969, n.p.).
Bibliography
“Basic Assumptions of Science.” Understanding Science. Accessed February 23, 2020. https://undsci.berkeley.edu/article/basic_assumptions.
Horrobin D.F. (1969) The Assumptions of Science. In: Science is God. Springer, Dordrecht
Lammers, William J. Fundamentals of Behavioral Research. Belmont: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 2004. Chapter 3. https://uca.edu/psychology/fundamentals-of-behavioral-research-textbook/.
