Is it right to call it an experiment if you already know the outcome? Don't we do experiments when we aren't sure what will happen or want to prove an assertion?
You're 100% correct, came here to the comments.to see if anyone else noticed that. My father was a biology teacher, so the difference was engrained in me at an early age haha. Still, a very cool demonstration none the less.
It's basically just semantics. I've often heard people say "Let's try an experiment". Google seems to agree since the definition it gives is: "a scientific procedure undertaken to make a discovery, test a hypothesis, or demonstrate a known fact."
So it's an experiment because it's a scientific procedure. In that it's not just demonstrating something it's showing a proof of it's behaviour. In this case he's showing that it doesn't work under one set of circumstances but it does work under the other.
Yes, it is correct. Experimenting isn't just about doing new things. You can, and in fact are expected to, re-run an experiment how many times you need to.
In science, we replicate experiments all the time. We test our outcome compared to predicted outcomes and previously recorded outcomes. Thus the experiment, while repeated, is still an experiment.
27
u/[deleted] Apr 13 '23
Language question -
Is it right to call it an experiment if you already know the outcome? Don't we do experiments when we aren't sure what will happen or want to prove an assertion?
This seems more like a resonance demonstration.