Definitions
Definitions (continued)
Deductive Reasoning
Inductive Reasoning
NJ ASK Questions
100
What is science?
What is investigation of the natural world to detect its underlying patterns and to learn the rules by which it works?
100
What is observation?
Observation is information gathered by senses or through measurement.
100
Aristotle claimed that heavy objects fall faster than lighter ones. How could you test this claim?
You can hold something heavy and something light at arm's length and drop them at the same time.
100
State one reason why most people rejected the claim that Copernicus made that said that the Earth orbited the sun.
Most people rejected the claim because other philosophers said that the Earth was motionless at the center of the universe.
100
What process do engineers use to determine both the positive and negative effects of a new technology?
What is a risk-benefit analysis?
200
What is technology?
What is the use of the knowledge gained through scientific investigations to make products that meet the needs of a society?
200
What is Description?
Description is an accurate account of an event or a process.
200
Using deductive reasoning, answer the following question: For centuries, people who studied nature were called natural philosophers. In the nineteenth century, the word "scientist" was invented for such people. Suggest why the name changed why it did.
The name changed why it did because our world has become systematic, concerned with more empirical evidence, and based in experiment and observation, the word natural philosopher is no longer adequate.
200
Describe one special role that popular culture assumes that scientists or technologists have in modern society.
Popular culture depicts scientists and technologists as "crazy people" that have a lot of knowledge and have the tools to improve human life.
200
Scientists say the sun appears to move in the sky because the Earth is rotating on its axis. What is this an example of?
What is an explanation?
300
What is society?
Society is a group of people who share a set of political, economic, and cultural institutions.
300
What is explanation?
Explanation is an account that tells why or how an event or process happened.
300
Using deductive reasoning, give one example for the past two centuries in which some kind of authority has influenced scientific research or thought, either positively or negatively
Ptolemy used deductive reasoning to predict the motion of planets but his basic assumption was incorrect.
300
Name a technology that has benefited from Newton's work on gravity.
What are rockets and satellites?
300
Engineers perform risk-benefit analyses of technologies. What is one benefit of wind power?
What is that fact that it does not emit hydrocarbons.
400
What is deductive reasoning?
Deductive reasoning is a type of thinking that starts with an assumption and then reaches conclusions based on that assumption.
400
What is inference?
Inference is a conclusion reached by using what we have observed and what we think to be true.
400
What is deductive reasoning?
Deductive reasoning is when you a type of thinking that starts with an assumptions and then reaches conclusions based on the original assumption.
400
Name one scientific discovery that was not possible until the invention of the microscope.
What is the discovery of cells?
400
Why does scientific knowledge change over time?
Because science must explain new observations that challenge existing theories.
500
What is inductive reasoning?
The process of reaching conclusions based on observation and experiment.
500
What is a risk-benefit analyst
Risk-benefit analyst is a study that examines the risk and benefits that technology might bring to individual humans, human society, natural environment.
500
What is inductive reasoning?
The process of reaching conclusions based on observation and experiment.
500
Which of the following correctly matches the person with their book?
What is Ptolemy and the sun, planets, and the stars revolve around the Earth.