LCD 105 - Professor Nathacia

1. Introduction to the Scientific Method
LCD 105 – Class 10 – Professor Nathacia

2. What is
Truth?

3. Truth: is defined by its lastingness through
time. (History)
Truth or Absolute Truth?

7. The MYTH era
• Until 600 b.C., all questions from human kind were
answered mysthically.
• A myth is a tale of divine figures (or spiritual
entities, or of an upper nature) that aims
explaining why life is as it is.
• Oral Tradition.

8. “In the beginning, there was just water. All the animals lived above it and the sky was
overcrowded. They were all curious about what was beneath the water and one day Dayuni'si, the
water beetle, volunteered to explore it. He explored the surface but could not find any solid
ground. He explored below the surface to the bottom and all he found was mud which he brought
back to the surface. After collecting the mud, it began to grow in size and spread outwards until it
became the Earth as we know it.
After all this had happened, one of the animals attached this new land to the sky with four
strings. The land was still too wet so they sent the great buzzard from Galun'lati to prepare it for
them. The buzzard flew down and by the time that he reached the Cherokee land he was so tired
that his wings began to hit the ground. Wherever they hit the ground a mountain or valley
formed.
The animals then decided that it was too dark, so they made the sun and put it on the path in
which it still runs today.”
Myth of Creation – Cherokee - http://www.crystalinks.com/nativeamcreation.html
The MYTH era

9. • Divine acts upon nature.
• Knowledge leads to control and manipulate nature.
• The wizard => link between nature, humans and spirits
• The World is controlled by super natural forces (that can be found in
animals, plants, wind, etc).
• These supernatural forces are guided or manipulated by super natural
entities (spirits).
• Knowledge = Power
The MYTH era

10. • WRITING -> It has raised questioning upon myths, and
it has shaken myths' truth value; more fidelity on
transmitting information.
• Critical distancing and greater discussion upon issues.
• Mythological knowledge ====> Knowledge built from
experience and reasoning.
The Beginning Science

11. Way better!

12. THE EMERGENCE OF HYPOTHETICAL THOUGHT
• Due to the advance of mathematical sciences;
• Astronomy is one of the first sciences -> interest in the
unknown;
• Egypt: Advance of medical sciences
The Beginning Science

13. • Natural events start to be credited to natural causes.
• The scientific point of view is not more logic than the
mythological one (it is just a matter of different premises.
• The scientific point of view contributes in a more
effective way to the aggregation of knowledge, and in
predicting and controlling the natural world.
The Beginning Science

14. • The scientific thought is credited to the Ancient Greece, approximately at VI century
b.C.
• Philosophers of Nature: Bounced from dogmatic thought of myths to scientific
thought based on skepticism.
• The dogmatic thought puts the Ideas as superior to what can be observed.
• The skeptical thought puts what can be observed as superior to the Ideas.
• Socrates: consolidation of scientific thought through scientific evidence, that is, an
observed fact (empirical) that can be replicated.
• Greece: Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Geography e Paleontology.
The Beginning Science