• Question: Have you tested your theory inn lots of different ways?

    Asked by shaanzafar to PB, Lyn, Katy, Paul, Ruth on 14 Jun 2013. This question was also asked by edwardo.
    • Photo: Peter Balfe

      Peter Balfe answered on 14 Jun 2013:

      No biologist ever trusts a conclusion based on doing something once, or doing something just one way. Test, re-test and test again. Then get someone else to do it and get the same answer. To prove it go and do it a completely different way with different approaches. Only then do you think you just might be on to something.

    • Photo: Katy Brown

      Katy Brown answered on 18 Jun 2013:

      We always try to test our theories in as many ways as possible.

      For me, this means that if I find a virus using the computer, I try to find it again in the lab, or the other way around. Its also important to repeat everything to make sure the same results show up every time. We also use controls to check what we’ve found is real – we run experiments which should always work, or never work, to check that the method is working properly.

    • Photo: Ruth Mitchell

      Ruth Mitchell answered on 18 Jun 2013:

      Yes, the more ways you can test it the better because then you have more proof that your theory is correct. It’s about looking at the questions from a different angle.
      My theory I have tested in 2 different ways: in cells and in a whole organism. And many people have also tested my theory.

    • Photo: Ee Lyn Lim

      Ee Lyn Lim answered on 18 Jun 2013:

      We do quite like to test our theories in as many ways as we can, because the more experiments support the theory, the more confident we can be of it! I’ll give you an example from my own project: my theory is that, if I knock out Protein A in Cell X, then Cell X become weak and can’t do its job anymore. I test this theory by 1) seeing if Cell X (minus Protein A) grows as fast as a normal cell; 2) seeing if Cell X can kill tumour cells as well as a normal cell; 3) seeing if Cell X produces as much tumour-killing proteins as a normal cell; and 4) injecting tumour cells into a mouse with Protein A knocked out of all Cells X, and seeing if the mouse has a bigger tumour than a mouse with normal cells.

      It’s nice to be able to do all sorts of tests, and in biological sciences it’s often possible. But it’s not always possible in all areas of science! For example in some fields of physics, scientists are measuring things so tiny that we only have one type of machine (or in fact only ONE machine in the whole world) that can measure it! In that case they won’t have the luxury of running lots of different experiments to test their theory. But the results from that one experiment that they can do, will give them more confidence to invent and build more machines in the future, so that those tiny measurements will become easier and easier to make.

    • Photo: Paul Waines

      Paul Waines answered on 20 Jun 2013:

      The more ways you test a theory the better. This makes sure that what you are seeing in your experiment is a ‘real’ result. In biology in particular, things can vary a lot and so you have to be sure that your theory is tested in as many ways as possible and also as many times as possible!

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