The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence

From The burden of proof by Ethan Siegel. A nice explication of the knowledge frontier and the hierarchy of useful knowledge.

The shorter version of the article is

Data lead to -

Scientific Laws (facts) lead to -

Hypotheses lead to -

Scientific Theory


Observable data lead us to postulate predictable patterns which we call Scientific Laws. Scientific Laws predict what will happen under specific conditions. But we can know something will happen without knowing how it happens. We can speculate as to the mechanisms that explain the pattern and we call that speculation Hypotheses of which there might be several. We test those hypotheses to affirm one and rule others. Once that has been done many times by numerous independent observers, we have a working Scientific Theory.