Designing an Experiment

What is Experiment Design?

Experimental design is the process of creating, building, analyzing and then repeating until you have the design you like and works.  This process should be used when doing any experiment.  Experiment design uses what we know about the scientific method by making us search for data and results.


Why do Experiment design?

-Search for results
-Find Data to help your design
-Produces fun hands on work
-Helps you learn valuable skills
-Helps you grow as a problem solver


Steps for successful experiments:

1. Define your experiment
2. Learn new knowledge by researching
3. State a hypothesis to look for information on
4. Design before doing: State your goals, make ideas, set assumptions, narrow down to best ideas, work on making those ideas better.
5. Execute the plan and search for data
6. Record and document everything
7. Look back on your results, reflect on what you did and found
8. Repeat your process


Science versus Alchemy:

Science is based more on facts and data where as alchemy is based more on emotions and ideas, but it can still be related to science.  Many people have trouble changing their ideas even when there is scientific evidence stating a fact because of this it is hard for people to not rely on their own views and listen to science.  This is because emotions are some of the strongest feelings that the human mind can focus on so many times it is what drives people.

Believe in science because science can lead and has lead to many great discovers that has helped numberous people.  This is one of the few ways to really find truth and understand how things work so we can evolve and create better items to help us.


Examples of the scientific method:

1. When I am trying to learn a new skill such as solving differential equation problems, I can test myself with people who already know and are good at differential equations.  If they can follow my work through a problem then that means I have been learning since I am doing it correctly, thus proving that I am learning.  Then when I am able to teach what I have learned to someone else, that makes myself even more fluent and ensures that I have the concepts down.

2. When designing a product with a team, the group can generate ideas and togather work down to one or two we like which we can then work on prototyping.  After prototyping we can test the designs to see which one would be the best to go further with.  This way we take our emotions and views out of the equation and rely on only what the facts tell us.

3. When building a math model we start simple and work our way up while testing little parts experimentally as we go.  If we get results that are close to what we should be getting, then we can confirm that our math model is on the right track.  If there are errors, we know we need to look back and find them, and it is easier to find errors and work on a small model than working it till the end and having an error.