This paper presents the evolution of the scientific method that has been instrumental in promoting the advancement of science and also technology throughout history. It is important to note that the scientific method refers to a cluster of basic rules of how to be the procedure in order to produce scientific knowledge, either new knowledge, either a correction or an increase of previously existing knowledge. The scientific method, therefore, is nothing more than the logic applied to science. The search for a suitable scientific method guided the action of most thinkers of the sixteenth and seventeenth highlighting among them Galileo Galilei, Francis Bacon, René Descartes and Isaac Newton, who with their contributions were crucial to the structure of what we call today of modern science. In addition to these thinkers, it was also important later contributions of Hegel, Marx, Engels, Popper, Russell, Duhem, Poincaré, Morin, etc.

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SCIENCE AND EVOLUTION OF THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD
Fernando Alcoforado *
Scientific method refers to a cluster of basic rules of how to be the procedure in order to
produce scientific knowledge, either new knowledge, either a correction or an increase
of previously existing knowledge. In most scientific disciplines, the scientific method is
to gather verifiable empirical evidence based on systematic and controlled observation,
usually resulting from experience or laboratory or field research and analyze them with
the use of logic. The scientific method is nothing more than the logic applied to science.
The search for a suitable scientific method guided the action of most thinkers of the
sixteenth and seventeenth foremost among them Galileo Galilei, Francis Bacon, René
Descartes and Isaac Newton, who with their contributions were crucial to the structure
of what we call today of modern science.
Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) was the first theoretician of the method or empirical that is
a break from the more abstract Aristotelian method, which seeks the very essence of the
individual substances. Because of this, Galileo is considered the "father of modern
science". According to Galileo the purpose of investigations must be the knowledge of
the law that presides the phenomena. Furthermore, the main focus of science must be
quantitative relations. From 1623, Galileo Galilei founded modern science with the
formulation of the inductive scientific method that is used today. Galileo's method is
known as experimental induction. With Galileo, the study of nature began to take a
different approach to Aristotle when science has become more experimental than
speculative. With the establishment of the scientific method, it broke up the Aristotelian
paradigm that prevailed before. Scientific conceptions of Aristotle used a merely formal
and not empirical methodology. Galileo was the first theoretician of the experimental
method [PESSOA Jr., Osvaldo. Teoria do Conhecimento & Filosofia da Ciência
(Theory of Knowledge and Philosophy of Science). São Paulo: USP, 2014. Available on
website < http://www.fflch.usp.br/df/opessoa/TCFC1-14.htm>].
The creation of the scientific method is attributed to René Descartes, but has its roots a
little deeper into two thinkers of similar names: Roger and Francis Bacon. Roger Bacon
(1220-1292) was the first to stand experimentation as a source of knowledge. Francis
Bacon (1561-1626) was, however, who would eventually set the basis of what
Descartes become the modern scientific method. The new approach of Francis Bacon
was heavily influenced by discoveries of scientists such as Copernicus and Galileo that
led him to propose a new approach to scientific research through inductive thinking as
opposed to deductive thinking since Aristotle predominated over the sciences. Francis
Bacon is considered one of the founders of modern science and is responsible for
developing the empirical method of scientific research, where the reason is subject to
experimentation. Bacon propose inductive reasoning or induction, which goes from the
particular to the general and where the goal of the arguments is lead to conclusions
whose content is much broader than the assumptions on which were based (LAKATOS,
E. M. e MARCONI, M. de A. Metodologia científica (Scientific methodology). São
Paulo: Atlas, 1991).
It was the work Discurso do método (Discourse on Method) (Porto Alegre: L & PM
POCKET, 2005) that Rene Descartes (1596-1650) launched in fact, the foundations of
the modern scientific method. Descartes transcends the thought of Francis Bacon to
propose an instrumentalization of nature, the mathematics the explanation and rational
of the phenomena and things and his mechanization. Descartes defended the thesis that

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understands the parts it is sufficient to understand the whole. Inductive thinking
proposed by Bacon leaves the scene to make way for Cartesian deduction where
experiences only serve to confirm the general principles outlined by reason. According
to René Descartes, the scientific method comprises two approaches to complementary
knowledge: the empirical (inductive) and rational (deductive). In the inductive
approach, employed in descriptive sciences such as biology, anatomy and geology, are
extracted general principles from analysis of data collected through observation and
experimentation. The main features of the inductive method were defended by the
English Francis Bacon, who considered the data from sensory experience as knowledge
bases. In the deductive approach, employed in mathematics and theoretical physics, the
truths are derived from elementary principles. The deductive method was formulated in
the seventeenth century by René Descartes.
In Discurso do método (Discourse on Method) (2005), his major work, Descartes
expressed his disappointment with the knowledge of his time. Much of what he believed
had proved false. Descartes decided then only seek knowledge he could find within
yourself or in nature. He endeavored to find an irrefutable truth that serve as a basic
principle of knowledge. René Descartes considered the mathematical method as the
safest way to get knowledge. Applying mathematical reasoning to philosophical
problems, we can achieve the same certainty and clarity evident in geometry. The
Cartesian deductive method perfectly complements the inductive approach of Bacon,
which emphasizes observation and experimentation. The scientific achievements of
modern times originated in skillful synchronization of inductive and deductive methods.
Isaac Newton (1643-1727) was the great synthesizer of the works of Copernicus,
Kepler, Bacon, Galileo and Descartes, developing a mathematical formulation of the
mechanistic view of nature. From Newton was fully established mechanistic or
Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm. Regarding the scientific method, Newton adds the
empirical-inductive method and the rational-analytic-deductive, and beyond. Before
Newton, two opposing tendencies oriented science: 1) the empirical, inductive method
represented by Bacon; and 2) the rational method, deductive, represented by Descartes.
Going beyond Bacon in his systematic experimentation and Descartes in his
mathematical analysis, Newton unified the two trends. Thus was set the model of
science in force to date, which was largely responsible for the advances and regressions,
the benefits and harmful effects that the current modern society lives to date. It was
Newton who gave life to the dream of Descartes completing the Scientific Revolution.
As science is a constantly changing area, the scientific method of Descartes happens to
be questioned in the early twentieth century after Einstein's discovery of relativity and
Niels Bohr on quantum physics that call into question one of the fundamental precepts
of mechanistic model of Descartes. By the early twentieth century predominated in
science the scientific method based on mechanistic model proposed by René Descartes
in his Discurso do método (Discourse on Method) (2005). But the theories of Albert
Einstein's relativity (1879-1955) and quantum mechanics Niels Bohr (1885- 1962) put
into question some of the pillars of the Cartesian model. The discoveries of Einstein and
Bohr proved the impossibility of determining even the reality of the results of an
observation, knocking down the precept that "to know all, just know the parts" to show
that many phenomena have no explanation if not seen within a situation or system and,
above all, brought down the precept that the object is separate and independent of the
observer, showing that we know what we believe is the real object is only the result of
our intervention in it and not the object itself.

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The new conception also showed the impossibility to structure universal and absolute
concepts as our own knowledge is limited, resulting in a change to a model where there
are only probabilistic laws. The mechanistic model of Descartes long served the
principles to which it proposed and enabled the development of various fields of
science. However, it was proven the unsustainability of certain concepts that were
considered fundamental by the Cartesian model. In formulating the theory of
complexity, Edgar Morin criticized the mechanistic model of Descartes looking connect
what is separated. According to Morin, scientific knowledge, heir to the Cartesian
paradigm produced a reducing thought hiding the solidarity, inter-retroactions, systems,
organizations, emergencies, wholes and raised unidimensional concepts, fragmented
and real maimed. Therefore, in its principles, scientific rationality can also feed and
behave "errors and blind spots" of knowledge. A clear example of these "errors and
blindness" of scientific knowledge is not to have mechanisms that enable the
recognition of uncertainty in their truths. Complexity theory is heir to the principle of
uncertainty in scientific knowledge. The "chance" and "uncertainty" therefore constitute
important categories of this theory and should be considered as elements that inaugurate
a new look on the future of science in the context of twenty-first century [MORIN.
Edgar. O Método 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,6 - Coleção (Method 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.6 - Collection). Porto
Alegre: Editora Sulina, 2005].
One of the issues that most afflict the human being, of course, concerns the search of the
truth and therefore the validity of science. It is known that the scientist's task is to define
the scientific laws and, therefore, should adopt a method. Since Francis Bacon, science
has followed the principle that to describe a law of nature is necessary to test repeatedly,
collect and record the results, wait a repeat with several other researchers to then be
considered valid. This is, a scientific law is valid when the scientific community,
founded in particular experiences, get similar results or supposedly equal repeatedly. It
is often called "inductive" an inference if it goes private statements, or experiments, to
universal statements, such as hypotheses or "theories". Karl Popper (1902-1994)
questions that is possible to move from singular statements to universal with the
certainty of truth. To begin to solve the problem, advocates of induction understand it is
necessary to establish an induction principle, which can guarantee the process. For
Popper, it is impossible or even superfluous, since this principle does not guarantee
anything since it is based on the same method inconsistent. To be valid, one induction
principle should be universal and as the researcher begins always from singular, this
does not allow him to logically arrive at universal, according to Popper [POPPER,
Karl. Lógica da Investigação Científica, in Os Pensadores (Logic of Scientific Research,
in Thinkers). São Paulo: Abril Cultural, 1975].
To try to solve this problem, Popper established what he called "deductive method of
testing". To test a theory, Popper follows four steps, or types of evidence: 1) Internal
tests: seek consistency of conclusions drawn from the statement; 2) Tests of the form:
consists of the testing of whether the theory is in fact an empirical or scientific theory or
merely tautology, i.e. analytic proposition that is always true, since the attribute is a
repetition of the subject; 3) innovation tests: check if the theory really is new or is
already understood by others in the system; and, 4) Empirical tests: assessing the
applicability of the conclusions drawn from the new theory. These are the main tests
because the theory can pass unscathed in the previous three steps and be distorted by the
empirical application of its findings, in which case the theory will not be valid.

4. 4
Karl Popper says that the support of a theory is always provisional since its conclusions
will always be tested empirically. While the theory to sustain, no progress have been.
Conversely, when a test makes false current theory, then science will evolve. In this
sense it is that it should therefore always seek to make false the theory and not confirm
it, also because the attempt of confirmation would be infinite in time and space. Thus,
Popper says that a theory is more valid the more it is makes false, that is, the more
possibilities there are to make it false, and yet, she keeps responding to scientific
problems. Once proposed, the speculative theories have proven to be accurate and
relentlessly by observation and experimentation. Theories that do not exceed the
observable and experimental evidence should be eliminated and replaced by speculative
conjecture.
According to Popper, science progresses through the trial and error, the conjectures and
refutations. The method of science is the method of audacious conjectures and
cunningly followed of rigorous attempts to falsify them. Only the fittest theories
survive. You can never say legally that a theory is true, it can be said with optimism that
is the best available, which is better than any that existed before. According to
falsifiability, it can be shown that some theories are false using the results of
observation and experimentation. But Popper, to try to overthrow the inductive method
also created another problem, namely the need for a new criterion of demarcation
between what is science and what is not, because until then the inductive method was
characteristic of Science and distinguished it of Metaphysics, the latter known to be
speculative. In other words, it is not delimited, solely by induction, what is and what is
not science, for anyone, more secular, may make a statement of this kind. So which
demarcates the science of not science is the falsifiability, as Popper says. Anyway, for
Popper, the statement is needed can be tested empirically, not by its verifiability, but by
its falsifiability. Thus, it is evident, the overthrow of the myth of scientific truth,
especially the failure of its methods, which should lead us to reflect about scientific
solutions.
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) was concerned to examine, in the same way that David
Hume (1711-1776), if the repetition of a phenomenon in a number of experiences in the
past, is or not a guarantee of its subsequent occurrence in the future. Russell (1989)
made two other issues: (a) past experiences are the source of our future expectations?
(B) How to justify such expectations? Russell question: the finding of a number of
occurrences of a law being satisfied in the past provides evidence that the same law
continues to be fulfilled in the future? The English thinker maintains that as the same
events repeat themselves, their occurrence in the future will become more likely.
Therefore, his argument is inclined to replace the justification of induction by the
justification of probability of induction. Our experience with nature has shown up to
now, says Russell (here in strict accordance with Hume), that the frequent repetition of a
succession or events of coexistence has been the cause we expect that the same
succession or coexistence of events continue in the future. The simple fact that
something happened a number of times causes animals and men to expect that will
happen again (RUSSELL, Bertrand. Les problems de philosophie. Paris: Payot, 1989).
What Russell therefore questioned is the relevance or otherwise of our conviction in the
permanent regularity between past and future, which is based on the realization that the
future continually became past, always ended up being similar to the past, so that it can
confirm the presence of a future experience in our perception, in more precise terms,
times that were formally future, and we can call in serving the terminology employed by

5. 5
Russell, past future. Recourse to the experience can base the inductive reasoning
regarding the examples already examined. With respect, however, the future cases, only
the belief in inductive principle could obviously without any appeal to experience,
justify any inference certifying the regularity of the already observed and unobserved.
Russell states that deductive reasoning effectively not provides us the ability to make
predictions about future events, to the extent that its statements necessarily derive from
generalizations established.
Pierre Duhem (1861-1916), French physicist and historian of science, says that science,
far from being able to prove their claims through a logical derivation of self-evident
principles, has as its method to derive empirical predictions of his theories and compare
them with what is observed. By this method, however, no theory can be established
definitively because it is always possible that more than one theory fits well to empirical
data. That is, for any set of observational data, an indefinite number of theories may be
appropriate to it. Duhem (2003) states that the experimental method cannot turn a
hypothesis of Physics an incontestable truth because one can never be sure that they
have exhausted every conceivable hypotheses that can be applied to a group of
phenomena (DUHEM, Pierre. Sauver les apparences. Paris: Vrin, 2003).
In turn, Henri Poincaré (1854-1912), French mathematician, physicist and philosopher
of science and Albert Einstein (1879-1955), German theoretical physicist, despite
significant differences in their respective philosophies of scientific knowledge had in
common the conviction that scientific ideas, the preparation of physical and
mathematical theories, are free of thought constructions. In this sense, they understood
that they are not induced logically and unequivocally necessary and compulsory, from
the experiment data, and moreover, they are not placed in a structure innate or a priori
of thought. It is in this space of freedom that comes the idea of creating the scientific
work leading to the discovery. Most clearly, Poincaré and Einstein, both insisted that
respect that it was, for them, the most important feature of the activity of knowledge,
and that effectively stood in the center of their epistemologies.
According to Henri Poincare (1995), science can teach us nothing about the truth, can
only serve us as rule of action. From this perspective, science is no more than a rule of
action, because we would be powerless to know whatever it is, and yet as we need to act
we signed rules. The set of these rules we call science. Almost all contemporary
philosophers of science came to the conclusion that science can not literally describe an
unobservable world of microscopic particles and intangible waves. And a significant
number of philosophers of science came to the conclusion that science cannot be
successful in this objective since it is beyond the reach of human perception. All
contemporary philosophers of science accept that scientific theories aim to literally
portray one unobservable world and conclude that for this reason would be a mistake to
believe any scientific theories (POINCARÉ, Henri. Science et hipothèse. Paris:
Flammarion, 1902).
Besides the inductive, deductive, hypothetical-deductive according to Popper methods,
is also used the dialectical method that, applied to the social sciences that it is a way to
analyze the reality from the confrontation of theories, hypotheses or theories. Dialectics
is research through the opposition of conflicting elements and understanding the role of
these elements in a phenomenon. The researcher must confront any concept taken as
"truth" with other realities and theories to get a new conclusion, a new theory. Thus, the
dialectic does not analyze the static object, but contextualizes the object of study in

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historical dynamics, cultural and social. The dialectical argument was also used in
metaphysics, and systematized by idealistic thinker German Friedrich Hegel, exponent
of classical German philosophy, which identified three basic moments in the dialectical
method: the thesis (an allegedly true idea), the antithesis (the contradiction or denial of
this thesis) and synthesis (the result of confrontation of both concepts). The synthesis
becomes a new thesis and the dialectical cycle begins again (GEORG, Gadamer. La
dialética de Hegel. Madrid: Editora Catedra, 1988).
The specific methods of the social sciences are: 1) the inductive which from the
occurrence of the phenomena are originated the laws and theories; 2) the deductive
which from the theories and laws has been the occurrence of phenomena; 3) the
hypothetical-deductive which formulates hypotheses and tests the occurrence of its
phenomena; 4) the dialectical which analyze conflicting elements; 5) the historical
which investigate the past to relate their influence on this phenomenon; 6) the
comparison which is used to check similarities and explain differences; 7) the
monographic which studies that certain group of factors for generalizations; 8) the
statistical which aims to analyze complex sets to, through this, to establish relationships
with each other and provide a quantitative description of this study group; 9) the
typological which serving as a model for the analysis and understanding of existing
cases; 10) the functionalist which is a method of interpretation that aims to study a
particular group through their system of organization; 11) the structuralist which is used
to analyze the concrete reality of different phenomena; 12) the ethnography which
focuses primarily on the analysis of the cultural aspects of a particular group in society;
and 13) the clinician which is used in case studies and has psychoeducational
intervention with an intimate relationship between researcher and researched and can be
qualitative or quantitative level [LAKATOS, E. M. e MARCONI, M. de A. Métodos
específicos das ciências sociais in Metodologia científica (Specific methods of social
sciences in Scientific methodology). São Paulo: Atlas, 1991].
* Fernando Alcoforado, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor of Territorial
Planning and Regional Development from the University of Barcelona, a university professor and
consultant in strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is
the author of Globalização (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1997), De Collor a FHC- O Brasil e a Nova
(Des)ordem Mundial (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1998), Um Projeto para o Brasil (Editora Nobel, São
Paulo, 2000), Os condicionantes do desenvolvimento do Estado da Bahia (Tese de doutorado.
Universidade de Barcelona, http://www.tesisenred.net/handle/10803/1944, 2003), Globalização e
Desenvolvimento (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2006), Bahia- Desenvolvimento do Século XVI ao Século XX
e Objetivos Estratégicos na Era Contemporânea (EGBA, Salvador, 2008), The Necessary Conditions of
the Economic and Social Development-The Case of the State of Bahia (VDM Verlag Dr. Muller
Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG, Saarbrücken, Germany, 2010), Aquecimento Global e Catástrofe
Planetária (P&A Gráfica e Editora, Salvador, 2010), Amazônia Sustentável- Para o progresso do Brasil e
combate ao aquecimento global (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2011),
Os Fatores Condicionantes do Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2012) and
Energia no Mundo e no Brasil- Energia e Mudança Climática Catastrófica no Século XXI (Editora CRV,
Curitiba, 2015).