Concept
Scientific demonstration
Overview
A scientific demonstration is a procedure carried out for the purposes of demonstrating scientific principles, rather than for hypothesis testing or knowledge gathering (although they may originally have been carried out for these purposes).
Most scientific demonstrations are simple laboratory demonstrations intended to demonstrate physical principles, often in a surprising or entertaining way. They are carried out in schools and universities, and sometimes in public demonstrations in popular science lectures and TV programs aimed at the public. Many scientific demonstrations are chosen for their combination of educational merit and entertainment value, which is often provided by dramatic phenomena such as explosions.
Public scientific demonstrations were a common occurrence in the Age of Enlightenment, and have long been a feature of the British Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, which date back to 1825. In the television era, scientific demonstrations have featured in science-related entertainment shows such as MythBusters and Brainiac: Science Abuse.
Many scientific demonstrations are potentially dangerous, and should not be attempted without considerable laboratory experience and appropriate safety precautions. Many older well-known scientific demonstrations, once mainstays of science education, are now effectively impossible to demonstrate to an audience without breaking health and safety laws. Some older demonstrations, such as allowing the audience to play with liquid mercury, are sufficiently dangerous that they should not be attempted by anyone under any circumstances.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Scientific demonstration is discussed.
Dom., Serm. xxxviii). In proof of this we must consider that what is comprehended is perfectly known; and that is perfectly known which is known so far as it can be known. Thus, if anything which is capable of scientific demonstration is held only by an opinion resting on a probably proof, it is not comprehended; as, for instance, if anyone knows by scientific demonstration that a triangle has three angles equal to…
Aquinas Thomas, Summa Theologica, Part I
states what it is; names the idea
Demonstration is defined by Leibniz as by Locke. The former recognizes, however, two sorts,--analytic and synthetic. Synthesis goes from the simple to the complex.
John Dewey, Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding
states what it is
This is already known to be the case with the first of the sciences we have mentioned, astronomy; that it is not generally recognized as true of the others, is probably one of the reasons why they are not in a more advanced state. § 4. If what is called pure observation is at so great a disadvantage, compared with artificial experimentation, in one department of the direct exploration of phenomena, there is another…
John Stuart Mill, A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive
states what it is
This, being analysed, consists of two propositions; the one an assumption with respect to a matter of fact, the other a genuine definition. "A figure may exist, having all the points in the line which bounds it equally distant from a single point within it:" "Any figure possessing this property is called a circle." Let us look at one of the demonstrations which are said to depend on this definition, and observe to…
John Stuart Mill, A System of Logic
states what it is
Matter, as defined at the end of Lecture V, is a logical fiction, invented because it gives a convenient way of stating causal laws. Except in cases of perfect regularity in appearances (of which we can have no experience), the actual appearances of a piece of matter are not members of that ideal system of regular appearances which is defined as being the matter in question. But the matter is, after all, inferred…
Bertrand Russell, The Analysis of Mind
states what it is
Philosophers who discussed Scientific demonstration
Related ideas
Place in the tradition
Part of Atomism.