CHAPTER ONE What Is Science Inquiry Most people have probably heard the story about Isaac Newton sitting under an apple tree One day an apple fell on his head and he discovered the law of gravity But it didn’t really happen that way The falling apple made Newton think about why the apple fell in the first place What was it that brought the apple to the ground A series of questions unfolded As Newton answered his own questions he saw that a force acted on the apple That force was gravity 4 Sir Isaac Newton 1643 1727
Newton arrived at the idea of gravity in a way similar to how scientists work today Scientific inquiry is the way scientists study the natural world As they explore they develop explanations based on what they learn from their work 5
Scientists explore the unknown to understand their world through scientific inquiry They investigate and provide explanations for what they find Most new discoveries don’t fall into someone’s lap or on their head Scientists follow a specific process that helps them make scientific discoveries Scientists make observations and ask questions They make a hypothesis based on what they have seen They conduct experiments to learn more 6
Over time when many experiments have shown the same results this body of knowledge becomes accepted Now it’s a scientific theory A scientific theory is built on layers of knowledge and many tests Sound reasoning supports the many facts It’s nowhere near a guess 7
