Chronology | Current Month | Current Thread | Current Date |
[Year List] [Month List (current year)] | [Date Index] [Thread Index] | [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] | [Date Prev] [Date Next] |
On Tue, 21 Apr 1998, Raacc wrote:
I went to my daughter's 6th grade science fair tonight. The experiments
ranged from the battery that lasted the longest, to the paper towel that
absorbed the most. It was an introduction to the scientific method and I was
pleasantly surprised at the turn out.
Surprised at the turn out, but were you surprised at the quality of the
experiments and their interpretation/analysis?
Having judged science fairs in my mis-spent youth, I am rather unconvinced
that they are operated in a way which promotes "scientific method"
(whatever that is).
This goes back to the 50s when they were doing experiments on the "power
of prayer on plants." An interesting reported result was that negative
prayer (praying for the plant to die) was more effective than positive
prayer. I still have the book of this title, which was a hot seller at the
time. Of course the studies claimed proper controls, use of control
groups, etc. etc.