The big idea
📐
"Just a theory" gets it backwards
In science a theory is the most robust kind of explanation there is.
Scientific Thinking · Lesson 4
Scientific Theories, Laws and Models
beginner⏱ 16 min · 7 cards
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Different jobs
Law
Describes what happens
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Theory
Explains why
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Theories do not get promoted into laws. They answer different questions.
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Model Boundaries
“Ignoring air resistance to time a dense ball dropped two metres.”
Does what the model ignores matter here?
Decide when what a model ignores actually matters.
Key term
Every model
In what sense is every model wrong?
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Useful simplification
All of them leave things out — that is what makes them usable. The question is whether the omission matters for your purpose.
Nuance
Mercury’s orbit
Maester Note
Newton was not exposed as a fraud. His law was revealed as an outstanding approximation with a defined domain — which is what most knowledge turns out to be.
Quick check
What single question best tests whether a claim is scientific?
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