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Discovery (observation)

 

 
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Discovery observation
Observation

Observation is either an activity of a living being , consisting of receiving knowledge of the outside world through the senses, or the recording of data using scientific instruments....
s form acts of detecting and learning something. Discovery observations are acts in which something is found and given a productive insight. Serendipity
Serendipity

Serendipity is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely. The word has been voted as one of the ten English words that were Words hardest to translate in June 2004 by a United Kingdom translation company....
 is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely.

discoveries are acquired through various sense
Sense

Senses are the physiological methods of perception. The senses and their operation, classification, and theory are overlapping topics studied by a variety of fields, most notably neuroscience, cognitive psychology , and philosophy of perception....
s and are usually assimilated with pre-existing knowledge
Knowledge

Knowledge is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as expertise, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject, what is known in a particular field or in total; facts and information or awareness or familiarity gained by experience of a fact or situation....
 and action
Action (philosophy)

In philosophy, action has developed into a sub-field called philosophy of action. Action is what an Agency can do.For example, throwing a ball is an instance of action; it involves an intention, a goal, and a bodily movement guided by the agent....
s.






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Discovery observation
Observation

Observation is either an activity of a living being , consisting of receiving knowledge of the outside world through the senses, or the recording of data using scientific instruments....
s form acts of detecting and learning something. Discovery observations are acts in which something is found and given a productive insight. Serendipity
Serendipity

Serendipity is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely. The word has been voted as one of the ten English words that were Words hardest to translate in June 2004 by a United Kingdom translation company....
 is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely.

Description

New discoveries are acquired through various sense
Sense

Senses are the physiological methods of perception. The senses and their operation, classification, and theory are overlapping topics studied by a variety of fields, most notably neuroscience, cognitive psychology , and philosophy of perception....
s and are usually assimilated with pre-existing knowledge
Knowledge

Knowledge is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as expertise, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject, what is known in a particular field or in total; facts and information or awareness or familiarity gained by experience of a fact or situation....
 and action
Action (philosophy)

In philosophy, action has developed into a sub-field called philosophy of action. Action is what an Agency can do.For example, throwing a ball is an instance of action; it involves an intention, a goal, and a bodily movement guided by the agent....
s. Questioning is a major form of human thought and interpersonal communication, and plays a key role in discovery. Discoveries are acquired through question
Question

A question may be either a linguistic expression used to make a request for information, or else the request itself made by such an expression. This information is provided with an answer....
s. With reference to science and academic disciplines, discovery is the observation of new phenomena, new actions, or new events and providing new reasoning to explain the knowledge gathered through such observations with previously acquired knowledge from abstract thought and everyday experience. In scientific research, exploration is one of three purposes of research (the other two being description and explanation). Discovery is made by providing observational evidence and attempts to develop an initial, rough understanding of some phenomenon. Some observational discoveries lead to invention
Invention

An invention is the creation of a new configuration, composition of matter, device, or process. Some inventions are based on pre-existing models or ideas....
 of object, process, or techniques. A discovery may sometimes be based on earlier discoveries, collaborations or ideas, and the process of discovery requires at least the awareness that an existing concept or method can be modified or transformed. However, some discoveries also represent a radical breakthrough in knowledge.

Example discoveries

Within the course of scientific innovation
Timeline of scientific discoveries

The timeline below shows the date of publication of major science theories and discoveries, along with the discoverer. In many cases, the discovery spanned several years....
, major scientific theories and discoveries were developed by various people. In many cases, the discovery spanned several years. The following are a few discoveries by observation:
  • JJ Thomson discovery of the electron
    Electron

    The electron is a subatomic particle that carries a negative electric charge. It has elementary particle and is believed to be a point particle....
     model.
  • The discovery of the structure of DNA
    DNA

    Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetics instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms and some viruses....
    .
  • The discovery of quasar
    Quasar

    A Quasi-stellar radio source is a powerfully energetic and distant active galactic nucleus. Quasars were first identified as being high redshift sources of electromagnetic energy, including radio frequency and visible spectrum, that were point-like, similar to stars, rather than extended sources similar to galaxy....
    s.
Another discovery was that the Earth
Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun. Earth is the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in diameter, mass and density. It is also referred to as the World and Wiktionary:Terra.Note that by International Astronomical Union convention, the term "Terra" is used for naming extensive land masses, rather...
 was not flat
Flat Earth

The flat Earth model is an ancient view of the Earth's shape which conceived of it as flatness like a piece of paper or an infinite plane .This belief contrasts with the view introduced around the 4th century BC by natural philosophers of Classical Greece that the spherical Earth....
. In Western culture
Western culture

File:Clash of Civilizations map.pngWestern culture are terms which are used to refer to cultures of European origin. This terminology originated as a way of describing what was different about the Graeco-Roman culture and its descendants, in contrast to the older neighboring civilizations of the Middle East, which in many ways continued...
, Greek philosophers realized that the Earth was round by the fourth century BCE; non-western cultures noticed it even earlier. Indeed, the curvature of the earth is fairly obvious to seagoing people--for example, watching a ship disappear bottom-first over the horizon.

Exploration

Discovery can also be used to describe the first incursions of peoples from one culture into the geographical and cultural environment of others. Western culture
Western culture

File:Clash of Civilizations map.pngWestern culture are terms which are used to refer to cultures of European origin. This terminology originated as a way of describing what was different about the Graeco-Roman culture and its descendants, in contrast to the older neighboring civilizations of the Middle East, which in many ways continued...
 has used the term "discovery" in their histories to subtly emphasize the importance of "exploration
Exploration

Exploration is the act of searching or traveling a terrain for the purpose of discovery, e.g. of unknown people, including space , for Petroleum, gas, coal, ores, caves, water , or information....
" in the history of the world, such as in the "Age of Exploration". Since the beginning expansion from Europe to the rest of the world, the "discovery" of every continent, island, and geographical feature, for the European traveller, lead to the notion that the native people were "discovered" (though many were there centuries or even millennia before). In that way, the term has Eurocentric and ethnocentric meaning often overlooked by westerners.

See also

  • Creativity techniques
    Creativity techniques

    Creativity techniques are methods that encourage original thoughts and divergent thinking. Some techniques require groups of two or more people while other techniques can be accomplished alone....
  • Serendipity
    Serendipity

    Serendipity is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely. The word has been voted as one of the ten English words that were Words hardest to translate in June 2004 by a United Kingdom translation company....


External articles and references

Scholar articles
  • B Barber, Resistance by scientists to scientific discovery. Science, 1961 (ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)
  • QIN Yulin, AS Herbert, Laboratory Replication of Scientific Discovery Processes. Cognitive Science, 1990.
  • A Silberschatz, A Tuzhilin, What makes patterns interesting in knowledge discovery systems. Knowledge and Data Engineering, IEEE Transactions on, 1996 (ieeexplore.ieee.org)
  • T Imielinski, H Mannila, A database perspective on knowledge discovery. Communications of the ACM, 1996 (portal.acm.org)


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