What Does It Mean to Do Experiments in Ecology? Historical Context and Current Approaches

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter outlines the history and practice of the scientific method, with a focus on its development within ecology broadly. The scientific method is an approach to understanding the world, which has developed over time, with roots in ancient Greek philosophy and medieval scholarship. Today, scientists base their research on hypothesis testing and the principle of falsification. Good experimental design helps avoid failing to rejecting a true null hypothesis, or accepting a false null. The attributes of good experimental design are the presence of a control, replication of experimental units, and randomization of treatments/samples. The formalization of ecology as a science required thinking about how to do experiments in the natural world. Early tensions between field and bench science meant that ecologists generally chose one approach or another. Today, ecologists move between observational (natural) experiments, where the experimental treatment is a naturally occurring phenomenon, such as a disturbance, and manipulative experiments in the field or the lab. In addition, the advent of computing has made it possible to do experiments in silico. No matter how one conducts an experiment, good experimental design remains a paramount concern.