• Question: How do you know if all ideas will be successful?

    Asked by littleman43 to Austin on 14 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Austin Elliott

      Austin Elliott answered on 14 Jun 2012:

      You don’t – a lot of it is ‘trial and error’, which is a big reason that science can be tough.

      Obviously you look at all the stuff you already know, and say “well. THIS explanation fits what we know so far”… and then “So IF that’s right, then the result of this next experiment I’ve thought of SHOULD be this…” …And then you try it. But it definitely doesn’t always come out the way you predict. So then you have to go back and say “So what does that last result mean? Was the theory wrong? can we change the theory? Or can we check if the experiment was working?” …and so on.

      Anyway, as a scientist, you have to be ready for your ideas to turn out to be wrong, as well as right..!

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