Science raises more questions than it answers?

Since time immemorial, science has excited, stimulated, and puzzled many great thinkers. Science has had many major findings over the years, and these findings have no doubt caused our life to be better. However, these findings have also raised many more questions than they have solved, even so in today's scientifically advanced society.

Prima facie, it may seem logical that with every theory declared, every conclusion made, and every finding obtained, more questions will be answered, and there should be no increase in the number of questions, simply because Science is a vehicle for man to lessen his questions. However, upon deeper inspection, we find that it is not true.

Many observations in Science do not always lead to a direct, single, conclusion and theory. Very often, novel observations puzzle Scientists for many years, and there are many theories formed. This influx of theories and hypothesises will inevitably lead to many Scientists questioning which is the correct answer, and looking for the correct answer. Thus, whenever a new finding is made in Science, most of the time, it will send many Scientists scrambling to find the correct answer, and asking many questions in the process. History has proven this relentless times, a pertinent example being the Heliocentrism versus Geocentrism debate. Many scientists and thinkers have tried their hand in this, each producing a different model. It was interesting to note that almost every scientist produced a different model of the universe, eventually leading to at least five models of the universe. At that time, it was a heated topic in science, and it had lead to many people, especially Scientist, questioning the accuracy of each model. No doubt, this topic in Science has raised countless questions, and has only produced one answer, after a few centuries. Such situations are not exempt in today's world. A telling case in point would be the origin of the moon debate. There are four different theories about the origin of the moon, each wrecked with their individual anomalies. Even today, after a number of visits to the moon, Scientists have yet to conclusively declare exactly how the moon came about. This too has led to many questions in the scientific community. This debate is still ongoing, and it continues to plague us with countless questions without providing us with an answer.

In addition, the Scientific method, on which all observations are based on, requires Scientists to question new observations consistently. Every step of the Scientific method requires questioning; to make an observation Scientists must question what is special in our world, to come out with a hypothesis Scientists must question how such a thing could happen, to test the hypothesis with an experiment Scientist must question if the experiment has proven his hypothesis. Whenever a new finding has been produced, Scientists must question its accuracy before it can be accepted as a theory. In Science, there is practically no example where a finding was not ironed out with countless questions. The foundation of Science is questions, and as such, it is almost a truism that Science will lead to many questions. If a finding is not questioned, it cannot be part of Science.

There are two different kinds of results that plague our society with questions to a large extent, the first being skewed findings. Sometimes, Scientists will fabricate a breakthrough in Science so as to gain fame or to keep their job. This happened when two Scientists claimed to have discovered a process for cold fusion in 1989. Some companies may also bribe Scientists to fabricate data to promote their products. When Scientists succumb to temptation and pressure and fabricate certain substantial findings, they caused many questions among the scientific community. Other scientists, upon seeing that hearing that a major finding has been made, would immediately rush to reproduce the experiment. This will cause a great ruckus, as Scientists and the public alike will question the possibility of a major advancement. When these results are proven to be incorrect, it will cause another round of questioning, as scientists question the reliability of the scientists and the results. Such instances also lead to a great number of questions from the public, as many members of the public question the accuracy of Science.

The second kind of results that will shake the scientific community and lead to countless questions are paradigm shifts. Paradigm shifts occur when a scientist find an anomaly in the scientific theory that all other scientists have been basing their work on. Paradigm shifts will cause a huge ripple, and lead to many questions, from scientists all over the world. A paradigm shift to them is to us our teacher telling us that we have done an essay on the wrong topic; it completely trashes their previous breakthroughs and achievements. Sceptics will mushroom, and they will question the accuracy of the new result. Companies and scientific magazines which had based their products on the old theories will also join these scientists in condemning and questioning the new theory. As you can see, paradigm shifts, regardless of their accuracy, will cause many questions to be asked, just for the sake of a single finding.

Thus, in conclusion, Science does raise many more questions than it solves, as a finding is most of the time not conclusive, and is open to questioning, and the Scientific method requires questioning. In addition, certain types of findings are especially prone to questioning. I believe that it is inevitable that Science will lead to questions, not matter how much we progress in science. Science is made to answer our questions, however, there are infinite questions that can be asked. However, there is nothing wrong with questions. Questions spur the progress of Science to a large extent, and it is something that motivates scientists. While we work towards improving our knowledge of the world through Science, we should not fear questions that may arise.