- published: 21 May 2008
- views: 483501
Natural science is a branch of science concerned with the description, prediction, and understanding of natural phenomena, based on observational and empirical evidence. Validity, accuracy, and social mechanisms ensuring quality control, such as peer review and repeatability of findings, are amongst the criteria and methods used for this purpose.
Natural science can be broken into two main branches: life science (or biological science) and physical science. Physical science is further broken down into branches, including physics, astronomy, chemistry, and Earth science. All of these branches of natural science are divided into many further specialized branches (also known as fields), and each of these is known as a "natural science".
In Western society's analytic tradition, the empirical and especially natural sciences use tools from formal sciences, such as mathematics and logic, converting information about nature into measurements which can be explained as clear statements about the "laws of nature". The social sciences also use such methods, but rely more on qualitative research, so that they are sometimes called "soft science", whereas natural sciences, insofar as emphasizing quantifiable data produced, tested, and confirmed through the scientific method are sometimes called "hard science".
When the ebbing tide retreats
Along the rocky shoreline
It leaves a trail of tidal pools
In a short-lived galaxy
Each microcosmic planet
A complete society
A simple kind mirror
To reflect upon our own
All the busy little creatures
Chasing out their destinies
Living in their pools
They soon forget about the sea...
Wheels within wheels in a spiral array
A pattern so grand and complex
Time after time we lose sight of the way
Our causes can't see their effects
A quantum leap forward
In time and in space
The universe learned to expand
The mess and the magic
Triumphant and tragic
A mechanized world out of hand
Computerized clinic
For superior cynics
Who dance to a synthetic band
In their own image
Their world is fashioned
No wonder they don't understand
Science, like nature
Must also be tamed
With a view towards its preservation
Given the same
State of integrity
It will surely serve us well
Art as expression
Not as market campaigns
Will still capture our imaginations
Given the same
State of integrity
It will surely help us along
The most endangered species
The honest man
Will still survive annihilation
Forming a world
State of integrity
Sensitive, open and strong
Wave after wave will flow with the tide
And bury the world as it does
Tide after tide will flow and recede