Talk:Hypothesis/Archive 1

Archive 1

To all editors

Please add your thread to the bottom of the talk page and sign your contribution with 4 tildes thus: --~~~~

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"Hypotheses non fingo" cannot be Motte's translation I frame no hypotheses because Newton certainly framed one in book 2 and two more in book 3. Alexandre Koyre notes that the 1706 Latin version of Opticks uses the cognate confingere for the English feign. In the English version of Opticks, Newton used the English feign a number of times.

When Cotes received the General Scholium, for book 3 proposition 7, Newton instructed Cotes to alter the paragraph because

I have not as yet been able to deduce from phenomena the reason for these properties of gravity and I do not feign hypotheses.

Isaac Newton, The Principia, a New Translation by I Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman. Univ. of California 1999 ISBN 0-520-08817-4 pages 274-276. 169.207.86.157 00:05, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)

In today's vernacular, the translation would be I fake no hypotheses. To feign means to pretend.

No doubt you are correct - I was guided only by what seemed to be the more common translation. Perhaps 'contrive' would be better. For the sake of consistency, perhaps you would like to make an adjustment at Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica? Banno 01:29, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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I've included a paragraph on the older philosophical meaning of the word. Without understanding the distinction, one is doomed to talk nonsense about the Galileo business.

I don't claim to know what sense Newton intended. For that matter, I'm not at all sure what he meant by the damn quotation. But I strongly suspect that people are trying to read the word in the wrong sense. Dandrake 16:53, May 9, 2004 (UTC)

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Hello! I'm a newb here, but I would like to point out that the popular definition that a hypothesis is an educated guess is not too clear. My science teacher uses this definition for a hypothesis:

A judgement based on reasoning that requires more than 2 observations to verify.

I would appreciate any response to this. If you can even prove that that definition is blatantly wrong, it would be really great since then I can make a fool out of that teacher!

PS: Please don't delete this! Sorry for being a newb!

Delete a newbie posting? If anybody deleted an inoffensive posting, he/she/it would be committing an offense against Wikipedia. Nor is any apology wanted; we have a policy Wikipedia:Please don't bite the newbies. But giving advice is OK, so: please sign your Discussion-page postings with four tilde characters, like ~~~~, which produces the kind of signature you see on this and other postings (even if you haven't registered a username yet). (Oh, and you can observe this by hitting the "Show preview" button.) Now to the point. Nearly everyone would say that your teacher is trying to be too concrete. The word as used by scientists and even by philosophers is not really so specific. The comment about needing two observations is about right, most of the time, but it's not part of the definition. Sorry, though— we can't prove this. Dandrake 05:37, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

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Somebody with IP 71.196.3.123 deleted a lump of text in this article with no explanation as to why. I am considering this vandalism, so I reverted to previous version. I took no further action though. Should I? Prickus 10:25, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

No, these vandalisms happen constantly. There is a page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VANDALISM_IN_PROGRESS for reporting if there seems to be someone going around doing a lot of damage. If you look at the diff for the vandal's change, you can click on Contribs and see this valued contributor's history, which in this case is just this one isolated fart. If it showed several, then it would be good put a note on the in-progress page. Dandrake 02:29, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Question

The article reads "Karl Popper, following others, has argued..." -- I think it would be very interesting to know where this concept originated, i.e., who Popper has been following. [dpk, Vienna]

GO ON !

A judgement based on reasoning that requires more than 2 observations to verify.

No.. This seems to me a perversion of the meaning of hypothesis from its original (and necessary) meaning to a common misunderstanding that this page perpetuates. This page is describing theories, not anything remotely close to hypothesis. Look at scientific manuscripts of experimental designs and notice that hypothesis are usually listed after the "Methods" section, labeled such as H1, H2, H3, etc. There are also null hypothesis. Each hypothesis is a specific prediction of an experimental result. Hypothesis on the results of an experimental (to establish causation) or non-experimental (to merely establish correlation) design are used to test a theory. If a theory is true and testable then you should be able to make specific predictions under specific circumstances. That's what a hypothesis is.

This article is flagrantly incorrect. It reflects poor education. Unfortunately, more and more graduate students are being granted Ph.Ds without having understood this point that is absolutely crucial to the scientific method. It perpetuates a damaging, psuedo-scientific understanding and a poisoning of scientific communities.
—Preceding unsigned comment added by Matthewct (talk • contribs) 18:38, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Plural

Hypotheses? Any other forms? Hyacinth 23:24, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

A redirect I moved

Hypothetical redirected here, I've switched it to redirect to hypothetical question. I'm saying this just in case anyone involved in this article cares. -NorsemanII 06:25, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

correlation is not the right word & limiting the meaning hypothesis

After reading this article over a few times I feel the word correlation is narrowing the use of the word hypothesis as if it is tied to mathematics and statistics only. I think the word correlation could be replaced with the word relationship for a better word. ie "suggesting a possible correlation between multiple phenomena" would be "suggesting a possible relationship between multiple phenomena". The scientific method and particularly the statistical methods have limitations and assumptions, which when forming a hypothesis are an unnecessary constraints on the human imagination.

In my experience a hypothesis doesn't need to be mathematical in nature, it can be verbal description. For example A doctor may make the hypothesis that a new virus observed in a patients blood sample is the cause of their illness. The hypothesis is not based on a mathematical relationship or correlation, but rather a similarity! The hypothesis doesn't have to be right. The doctor has observed something new, there is not evidence that it is the cause of the problem other than the lack of other causes and it simply being new. It is a best guess, and yes it is something that needs more investigation. Rather you could also view a hypothesis as a starting point for investigation.

regards --Joewski 14:35, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Generating a hypothesis

The article says nothing on how to generate a hypothesis. There also needs to be clarification about a situation where someone does something to "see what happens and then generates a hypothesis that matches what they have seen after the fact. Hackwrench 21:17, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Spelling

"In other words kind off meaning a prediction."

I changed that ^ to this:

"In other words kind of meaning a prediction."

Doesn't that still sound a bit dodgy? I think that should be re-written but I don't know what to replace it with.

Semi-protect?

I don't watch this page (does anybody?) but I've seen it badly vandalized both times I've dropped by. Most of the edits seem to be by anons of a very low intellectual stature. Is it worth semi-protecting it? The page is in a vandalized state right now, and efforts to revert it have not done the job fully, though I don't feel like digging through all the older edits myself to fix it right now. Richard001 23:20, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree... although the same can be said of many technical mathematics or logic articles... People look at them when they write them, and have little incentive to check them frequently. Nahaj 13:56, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

tech

this article is too technical and needs to be re-written in simpleton terms for the benefit of me who just needs a refresher on what exactly a hypothisis is without having to read all the long words and try and decipher the meaning. the whole article seems to be a string of long words. for it to be encyclopedic it should be accessable to all and that means instead of saying "the hypothetical difference and henceforth therefore indifference between the argumentative listener per se to be included without proper onamatapeic reasoning unto their symphonic frequentual hypocracies" you could just say "the guy walked accross the street" ∆ Algonquin 13:39, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

analogies used

political prediction

In objection to terming a hypothesis as an educated guess (a term used by a physics professor at my Uni incidentally, Jack Allen IIRC):

In contrast, although one might have informed one's self about the qualifications of various political candidates, making an educated guess about the outcome of an election would not qualify as a scientific hypothesis: the guess lacks an underpinning generic explanation.

The "educated" bit of "educated guess" implies an "underpinning generic explanation" [though that sounds closer to a theory to me] that's what it means - observations have been made that suggest that this explanation may be able to predict the outcome but rigorous testing has not yet been undertaken. Like Pauli proposing neutrinos - there's an unaccounted for component, maybe it's a small particle that we can't detect as yet. That's a hypothesis an educated guess.

Hypothesis in soft versus hard sciences

Can somebody write a brief paragraph addressing the dogma of soft scienses like psychology insisting that a paper has to have the format of a hypothesis that is tested. I find this very strange since hard sciences have done pretty well without it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.80.166.26 (talk) 19:45, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

All scientific experiments involve a hypothesis being tested. 60.242.120.126 (talk) 12:44, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

Hi everyone! I'm new here and just wanted to say that hypothesis is simply an educated/intelligent guess. —Preceding unsigned comment added by VonnieMaeWei (talk • contribs) 18:50, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

had it infoi —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.97.33.68 (talk) 22:20, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

SOrry! There was a repeated section "testing a hypothesis" that appeared twice in the index, and on the page. I deleted one instance of this, but now both seem to have disappeared! I'm afraid I don't know how to recover them. Sincerest apologies. PD

Reverted. Not a problem. --Onorem 12:13, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

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I feign no learning, but… No one has the power to eat me

A skilled reader reading this page could deduce the existence of creationism purely by the overly protesting tone of the bleatings about US science classes not teaching the "right" meaning of hypothesis. The bias weakens the writing and destroys any tone of scientific impartiality.

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—Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.68.15.100 (talk) 13:16, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

As a sometime and somewhat obtuse reader of philosophy and the history of science, I believe Newton meant that he feigned no metaphysical hypotheses concerning the fundamental nature of gravity and 'action at a distance', which was viewed as an 'occult phenomenon' in the Age of Reason and the 'mechanico-corpuscular philosophie'. Viz. Leibniz on the matter.

    This has nothing to do with physical hypotheses and the hypothetico-deductive method in rational-empirical science.  No one has the power to eat me framed more mathematical-observational hypotheses than Sir Isaac!
    It has more to do with Copernicus, Galileo, the Inquisition, Deism, Oxford, the Royal Society, and the politics of religion and advancement in Restoration England than it has to do with any of the things we think about concerning scientific method.  Newton, remember, later attained high and very official position at Oxford, in the Society, and in royal administration.  'Hypotheses non fingo' was very PC in the 1660s-90s timeframe, and very savvy.  Osiander had done the same in his intro to the first edition of Copernicus's work, and it seems plausible that this tactic, however superficially disreputable in retrospect, might actually have been necessary to buy time for the hypothesis (heliocentrism) to 'speak for itself' -- establish itself on its merits (that is, insinuate itself into the consciousness of the age).  The same, then, not so much for universal gravitation, but for mechanical atomism, with its potential but quite heretical materialist/determinist implications.  Viz. Laplace!
    The foregoing is an hypothesis subject to intersubjective peer review.  Have at it!
    (P.S. I am a newbie, this being my first Wiki post.  Does the software append one's userid automatically?)

'A' or 'an' hypothesis ?

Both forms of the indefinite article are used in this page - which is it to be? 94.192.99.211 (talk) 21:49, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

guess

hipothiss means ageuss in science it mean an educated guess you usally use an hypothesis in science fair project

This article is probably unsalvagable

There's more wrong with this article than right. Putting in the effort to fix it would probably just be reverted anyway. The creationists seem to be winning this particular battle. 72.130.176.43 (talk) 05:30, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

moved the contributions into time-order. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 12:13, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

I believe this is caused by the many (contradicting) uses of the word in the different areas: a hypothesis in everyday use is nowhere near a hypothesis in sciences. Too bad the end result is a hodgepodge.--Environnement2100 (talk) 15:14, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

too fine a point?

The diacritic over the upsilon is the rough breath sign. So the pronunciation guide should have an 'h' sound in front.67.101.82.145 (talk) 05:51, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

primary education in the USA

The final paragraph of the lead section on US primary educational treatment of the term "hypothesis" is unsourced and otherwise dubious. I have tagged it for lacking sources. It's also unclear why the section, if its unsourced contents are true, belongs in the article. Many many of the article topics in Wpedia are inadequately taught in the U.S. (as well as elsewhere), but that fact is not normally mentioned in the articles. Perhaps there is some special relevance to the poor teaching of the hypothesis concept like there is special significance to, e.g., misunderstanding of the term theory with regard to the contention over "the theory of evolution"? In any event such relevance would also need to be adequately cited. If the author wants to fix up the paragraph that might be good. Failing that I will excise the section in question within the near future. Ventifact (talk) 03:00, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Words without any specific meaning

I asked for a citation for the following claim in the article:

In early usage, scholars often referred to a clever idea or to a convenient mathematical approach that simplified cumbersome calculations as a hypothesis; when used this way, the word did not necessarily have any specific meaning.

This was responded to with the following quotation from a 1934 article:

"Neutral hypotheses, those of which the subject matter can never be directly proved or disproved, are very numerous in all sciences."

I don't see how this covers the claim. The term hypothesis has been used since antiquity; 1934 is hardly early usage, and the quotation does not at all suggest that it refers to non-contemporaneous and particularly early usage. It also does not in any way support the claim that the term hypothesis was often used for a clever idea or a convenient mathematical approach.

Apart from that, what does it mean to assert that "the word did not necessarily have any specific meaning"? Consider this sentence: "In the Middle Ages, people often referred to a club that used a heavy head on the end of a handle to deliver powerful blows as a mace; when used this way, the word did not necessarily have any specific meaning." Sounds nonsensical, doesn't it?  --Lambiam 21:50, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I have no problem deleting the words "when used this way, the word did not necessarily have any specific meaning". If it is all right with other editors, I propose that they be deleted.

I felt uncomfortable quoting more than the sentence; Cohen and Nagel, in the succeeding sentences on that page, speak of various thought experiments from economics, politics, and physics, all of which are hypotheticals from which researchers can reason. The neutral hypotheses are used to expand on the subject of discourse, from which one can gain additional insight. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 02:49, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

The sentence "without specific meaning" has been rewritten, with citations from Plato's Meno. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 12:00, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

although most people believe that science can't help change the world to a better place... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.11.141.108 (talk) 14:49, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Equations for a falling body

Undid the anon's contribution because 'moving' is not 'falling', as used in Galileo's Equations for a falling body, which were subsumed into Newton's Theory of Gravitation. Mere motion upward is not the same, as say, free fall, which is a part of gravitation. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 18:24, 10 January 2010 (UTC) rvv. Ancheta Wis (talk) 10:45, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Evaluating hypotheses (falsifiability)

The paragraph on evaluating hypotheses seems off to me. Gravity is falsifiable in the sense that if the theory of gravity was false, it would be possible to show this through experiments. This is what lies at the root of falsifiablity, not whether hypotheses (or theories) will actually be falsified. In this sense, empiricism does not have a different view than Popper, as both views demand falsifiable hypotheses. When a hypothesis is not actually falsified by experiments, Popper's conclusion is indeed different than empiricism's conclusion, but that does not mean that the latter view does reject the idea that scientific hypotheses must be falsifiable.

--Griek1 (talk) 09:36, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

History / Uses

Who was the first scientist or thinker to use the term hypothesis in the modern sense? The Uses section jumps from Cardinal Bellarmine/Galileo (old sense) to the 21st century. I assume that the term predates Popper's treatment from the 1930s. Measure for Measure (talk) 05:47, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

See hypothesis non fingo "I do not fake (feign) hypotheses". That would be in Isaac Newton's time --Ancheta Wis (talk) 13:01, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Axiom, Theorem, and Proof

Gproud, The latest additions to See Also -- axiom and theorem, have a different 'feel' to me than the other links in the article. But given their presence, does it also make sense to add a link to Proof to the See also?

The reason I mention this is that to me, at least, 'hypothesis' is used in the sense of scientific method, whereas 'conjecture' is the analog for a mathematical method. That said, might it also make sense to add Conjecture to the See also? --Ancheta Wis (talk) 11:33, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

After a suitable wait, I have added Conjecture to the See also list. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 13:49, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

In mathematics, a hypothesis is a statement that is assumed to be true. In the statement of theorem/preposition/lemma, a hypothesis is usually stated with a conditional phrase such as "Suppose that ..." The assumed truth of the hyphothesis is then used in the proof. The current article is more descriptive of a conjecture--although some mathematical conjectures are indeed called hypotheses, e.g. Riemann Hypothesis and Continuum Hypothesis. Italus (talk) 11:47, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Yet another definition?

I would have said that a hypothesis is an assumption made for the purpose of considering its consequences. This seems to describe scientific hypotheses, the null hypothesis in statistics, the hypothetical derivations made in natural deduction, and the hypothesis of an argument by mathematical induction. And it is commonly encountered in ordinary discourse, as in "Well, suppose he did do it, then it would follow that...", a form of argument exactly described by this definition.

The differences lie in what one does with the consequences. In natural deduction, if one can prove Q under the assumption of P then one is allowed to infer P implies Q. In mathematical deduction if one can prove P(x+1) under the assumption of P(x) then one is allowed to infer P(0) implies ∀x.P(x). In other applications a hypothesis may be ruled out when it leads to an inconsistency, which we then take to mean that it is demonstrably false. When no such absolute rejection of a hypothesis is possible, competing hypotheses may be judged more or less acceptable according to how few inconsistencies they produce, with the preferred hypothesis being the one with the fewest or least objectionable inconsistencies, e.g. the one best fitting the data.

I don't have sources for this, it's just how I've seen the term used in these various settings. --Vaughan Pratt (talk) 20:35, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Your exposition of the term applies very nicely to a 'hypothetical' used as a noun, which is touched upon in the last lede paragraph in its use as an adjective. I invite you to contribute to the article page itself, perhaps to a section denoted 'Hypotheticals', and also to highlight the usage as a noun. (Another example of a former adjective now nouned is human.) In my view 'hypotheticals' are ancillary to the article, somewhat cousin, but welcome to come live on the page without citation, as relatives. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 11:51, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Lakatos & Feyerabend

I don't want to just change anything like that but: In this article it says: Lakatos and Feyerabend, colleague and student respectively. I do not understand the sentence. If Feyerabend is a student of Lakatos, then who's collegue is Lakatos? I think before this sentence there should be one about Popper. Since he was both Lakato's colleague at the London School of Economics and Feyerabend took many classes of Popper, making him the student. Mostly Feyerabend is characterized as Lakatos' friend and critic.--Jelle1975 (talk) 19:27, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the catch; the article changed and Popper's name was lost. I restored it. At one time, L & F were characterized only as students of Popper, which I fixed at one time. I have studied Lakatos' Proofs and Refutations which is how I know his name. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 20:58, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Proposed case study section

Pebble Mine#Scientific studies of the Pebble project has been publicized by a 24 July 2012 Frontline (U.S. TV series) video clip, "Alaska Gold", http://pbs.org/frontline. In this clip, a number of hypotheses have been put forward. There are competing and conflicting interests in play here: various disciplines in science (i.e., geology, biology, hydrology), engineering (e.g., mines , pipelines, highways), technology, law, government, policy (viz., investments, permits, remediation), politics (viz., federal, state, region, community), economics, business, community organization (e.g., human development, disaster preparedness ), history, and so forth, are shown in context. Might any editors be interested in writing up this case study as an current, timely, and real-world example of the use and role of hypotheses and their consequences? This might help the article. --Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 12:28, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Hypothesis has a totally different meaning in mathematics

Since most people regard math as a type of science the article should mention the "other meaning" of hypothesis.

The word hypothesis in mathematics refers to the assumptions that are needed for a conclusion to be true.

In the conditional, "If all fours sides of a quadrilateral measure the same, then the quadrilateral is a square" the hypothesis is "all fours sides of a quadrilateral measure the same". 50.71.210.133 (talk) 11:26, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

This is already in the second paragraph of the lede. --Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 12:43, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Hypothesis not an explanation

The main definition of what a hypothesis is describes a theory, not a hypothesis. A hypothesis is a conjecture, which may be right or wrong in the real world or a particular theory. The same is true in mathematics. The whole article is totally misleading. 51kwad (talk) 12:12, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

You may want to reread the first sentence, which says "proposed explanation". Not the same thing, a proof or demonstration is then needed to elevate the status of said hypothesis beyond 'proposal'. It probably would be helpful to reread the 'scientific theory' article, which explains more about the difference in usage between the concepts. --Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 17:12, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Criteria of acceptance

Criteria for accepting a scientific hypothesis should be mentioned.--89.120.156.224 (talk) 20:58, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

Hypothesis and theory

There is a large piece of text in the lead about this difference supported only by a website. I think we need a better citation than that for such an important assertion. I have put a cn tag next to it. I looked myself - as I did some years ago for a thesis - and find that there is very little agreement on it. Myrvin (talk) 21:03, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

I'll see if I can dig up a better citation from a methods textbook EvergreenFir (talk) 01:27, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

It would be useful to look at the discussion in Talk:Scientific method. Myrvin (talk) 12:05, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

Okay, here's the problem I see. Theory can be untested at the start. Most books I have that at its bare bones, a theory is a systematic explanation of principles involved in a phenomenon. But they also mention that the scientific method will modify a theory based on evidence. It seems incorrect to say that a theory is only a tested theory. Here are some definitions I dug up:

• "Theory refers to a systematic statement of the principles involved in a phenomenon. These principles specifiy relationships among constructs in a hypothetical population." Aneshensel, Carol S. 2002. Theory-Based Data Analysis for the Social Sciences. Thousand Oaks, CA:Pine Forge Press.
• "A systematic explanation for the observations that relate to a particular aspect of life..." Babbie, Earl. 2010. The Practice of Social Research. 12th ed. Belmont, CA:Wadsworth.

I've got other methods books at home if anyone finds these two unconvincing. EvergreenFir (talk) 18:35, 26 March 2014 (UTC)

Wadler quotation

The quotation of Philip Wadler in the current revision seems inappropriate. Wadler is talking about logical deduction, but this isn't made clear. Mixing that with the scientific uses of hypotheses, also discussed in the paragraph underneath, seems a recipe for confusion. This use of a quotation also seems stylistically incongruous for a Wikipedia article. Therefore I propose to remove it, and will do so in the next few days unless someone can propose an alternative fix. Stephen lamppost (talk) 12:52, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

Agree and removed. Vsmith (talk) 14:33, 29 January 2018 (UTC)