The old unpublished posts are now ready to put up on the site. Here’s your “Quickstart” guide for jumping back in to the re-worked series:
• You can start with this post for an updated overview of the mega-series on my scientific discovery framework. Eventually, that post will link to all other posts in the series. Bookmark that page for easy reference.
• I’ve picked a running science example, to highlight concepts in the series, using leftover plutonium from nuclear weapons.
• I’ve also added a new fictional character to illustrate how concepts play out in projects. Read this old post about Mrs. Mulliver to get caught up on her origin story.
I’ve taken in feedback and heavily edited and updated the original post style:
• Posts are shorter, simpler, and easier to read.
• Posts contain more links for you to dig deeper.
• Posts focus more on how content directly affects you.
Leave me feedback on ways to improve the posts, either in the comments or by email at thephysicist@insightfulscientist.com.
And let me know what you’d like to see in the How-To series I’m working on (The Scientist’s Repertoire part of the website). These will be short tutorials/recipes for activities you can do to support your scientific discovery efforts.
Remember, discovery awaits the mind that pursues it. Get ready to join the pursuit!
The Architecture of Scientific Discovery (ASD) is my framework for understanding all the levers and you knobs you can pull to produce scientific discoveries in your own work.
The Architecture of Scientific Discovery is different, but works with the scientific method.
The scientific method focuses on how to create valid, rigorous, reproducible observations and predictions about the natural world.
Overviews and guides laying out the scientific method teach you how to run trustworthy experiments and develop well-grounded claims about the world.
But what the scientific method leaves out is…well…you.
It doesn’t acknowledge that most science is done by real people. Or that those people have different capacities, biases, and mindsets.
The scientific method also glosses over an underlying performance goal. Scientific discovery.
We intuitively know there is a difference between regular science and scientific discovery.
Both need the scientific method. But discussions of scientific performance almost never talk about what makes the difference. Or how you can not just contribute to science, but make scientific discoveries.
The Architecture of Discovery is designed to fill that performance gap and you put back in the equation.
As the physicist behind The Insightful Scientist website, my mission is to figure out what we can do to turn our passion for science into discovery-level performance and pass it on to you. I find, create, and share tips, tricks, and tools to let you pursue your highest contribution to science.
We can all be insightful scientists.
We can all make discoveries.
You just need to know how to start.
This post is an index to all 33 posts in my mega-series about the Architecture of Scientific Discovery.
The posts cover the six core areas that make the framework and how they affect your own work.
You can also check out the Research Spotlight section of the website. There I summarize classic and cutting-edge research on topics affecting science performance. Also, the Discovery Library has a searchable index of deep reads for both online and offline.
But it’s not just about information here on The Insightful Scientist website. I’ll also share tools to help you get scientific discovery done.
But to make something happen, you first have to get clear on what you’re trying to produce and what affects your results.
So let’s get clear on what scientific discovery is all about. Below is an indexed list of links to all the posts in the Architecture of Scientific Discovery (ASD) series. Dig in. And get discovery done!
If you’re short on time, don’t worry. You can jump in and out of the series anywhere. The posts are each standalone. If you want to read the whole series in order, just read through the posts in the order they are listed below.
The original series of posts have been removed and updated (read about that here) to be easier to read.
Updated versions will be uploaded eventually, activating links.
Architecture of Scientific Discovery Complete Series
In our ideal imagination someone would always be able to give us an exact game plan to achieve our dreams, full of steps we know exactly how to do.
That kind of recipe would be comforting and make us more confident.
I can’t give you that.
But what I can give you is a mental picture of the five key phases that make a scientific discovery happen. It’s just one of six core components of my scientific discovery framework (you can read about that here).
Equipped with a mental picture, it will be easier to see where you’re losing momentum and look for ways to fire up your progress.
Let’s dive into this “discovery cycle”.
The five evolution phases of scientific discovery, in order, are:
Question. It all starts with having an unanswered question about the world that needs to be answered. Discovery always begins by actively asking an unanswered serious question. Serious questioning is about generating compelling questions and then choosing one to go out and answer.
Ideation. Next you must form an idea about what might be the answer to your question. Productive ideas are ones that we can chip away at through real-world tests and investigations. Ideation is the process of generating productive ideas and narrowing it down to one idea you move forward on.
Articulation. Productive ideas don’t investigate themselves. You’ve got to put it in a format that lets you determine your idea’s ability to correctly answer your serious question. Transforming something from an idea to a real-world process, procedure, gadget, or systematic concept is articulation.
Evaluation. Now that you’ve articulated the idea you think might answer your question you need to put it to the test. Compare your concept against real examples. Observe and probe your data. Run your model and see if it breaks. That’s the heart of evaluation.
Verification. If your idea survives your evaluation (and most of them won’t) then it’s time to open your idea to deep challenges from others. It’s not a scientific discovery until other people have independently confirmed that your idea answers your starting question and that the way you articulated the answer holds up. Personally, I think two separate independent verifications plus your initial investigation are ideal because good things come in threes.
And that’s the discovery cycle in a nutshell.
The scientific discovery cycle is a human learning algorithm for scientific discovery.
You may move back and forth between scientific discovery phases as you make mistakes and learn new things. That’s normal. But in the end, if you discover something new, you will have evolved through all the phases at some point in the process.
Talking with other scientists, I’ve learned that how long you’ve worked with science (not a project) affects which phase is more likely to trip you up.
People new to science tend to get stuck on the question phase.
They don’t know what a good science question looks like. If this fits you, learning more about creativity, filling your knowledge gaps, and becoming more skilled at asking deep questions and mining published papers can help.
People who have some experience working with science, but haven’t spent a whole career on it, often struggle with the articulation phase.
They’ve got ideas, but they don’t know how to put them in productive testable forms. If this sounds like you, reading up on rapid prototyping, building mental models, and techniques like work sprints can help.
People who have made a career out of working in or around science frequently run out of ideas and struggle with ideation.
They may feel like everything’s been done. Or that every idea is bound to fail (or get ignored) anyway. Sometimes they can’t imagine better solutions than the good solutions they already know. If this describes you, then looking into techniques to get around the Einstellung effect or how to think of more “subtractive solutions” might help.
Those are the three main phases where most individuals get stuck and lose momentum in the scientific discovery cycle: the question, ideation, and articulation phases.
Just to be thorough, if the evaluation phase is where you struggle try things like practicing Fermi questions, toy model techniques, or “why not?” counter-thinking. Verification problems are usually about convincing others to engage with your proposed discoveries enough to test your ideas in a public forum. Learning better communication skills can make the difference.
Most scientific discovery projects must pass through all five evolution stages—question, ideation, articulation, evaluation, and verification—to succeed.
Knowing which stage you’re stuck in can point you toward techniques to help you get past an obstacle.
And being clear on where you are in the discovery cycle can tell you what not to do, like getting lost in brainstorming hacks (ideation) when what you need are strategies to create a new metric to measure something (articulation).
Use this discovery cycle framework like a teacher who points out where you are in your project and what needs more work.
Simply put, a mental picture of the scientific discovery cycle is your ultimate personal coach.
Reflection Question
What phase are you in on a discovery project you are working on, or planning, and what’s keeping you from moving to the next stage?
Bernadette K. Cogswell, “A mental picture of the scientific discovery cycle is your ultimate personal coach”, The Insightful Scientist Blog, September 24, 2021.
[Page feature photo: Photo by DeepMind on Unsplash.]
Knowing the type of scientific discovery you are trying to make can save you years of effort
If we have the choice between being successful now or successful 10 years from now, most of us would choose to do it now.
It’s a no brainer. We’re impatient by nature and like to enjoy good things as soon as possible.
The point is: we prefer to take the more direct route.
Scientific discovery is no different. The clearer you are on what you’re trying to accomplish, the more likely you are to get it done efficiently and enjoy success sooner.
Picking a category of discovery to work on for your next project is one way to carve a straighter path to discovery.
Let’s define these discovery categories and talk about the effort needed to pursue them.
I also wrote that scientific discovery is one of four human discovery capacities. The capacity to learn something new about the world.
That learning can be divided into scientific discovery learning categories, or discovery types. These tell you what kind of information is gained when a discovery is made.
Discovery types are one of the six core themes behind discovery.
I’ve divided the discovery types into three categories.
Attribute type discovery: Learns about the properties of a known object.
This is the easiest discovery type. Already knowing the object exists; probably having a way to interact with it; maybe even knowing its other properties. These make it easy to guess what else might be true.
Object type discovery: Learns about an unknown object.
This is the next hardest to discover. Lots of possibilities exist. And we may not have any known way to interact with the options yet. Still, there’s a reason why someone thinks it might exist. That “why” limits the range of what it could be.
Mechanism type discovery: Learns about how and why the world works the way it does.
This is the hardest to discover. The cause could be any source (object, property, known or unknown, etc.). Or it could be a mix of influences (factors, systems, actions, etc.). A vast number of possibilities means lots of chances to get it wrong before getting it right. It’s like looking at a parallel universe through a kaleidoscope—you have no idea what you are seeing.
Some categories are easier to make discoveries in.
That’s because the learning curve is smaller.
For attribute type discoveries the new knowledge gained is a small amount or closely connected to what we already know.
So, for attribute discoveries the learning curve is smaller. It’s easier to think up ideas. We probably already have technologies to work with it.
In the physical science community this is called “low hanging fruit”. A little work quickly brings a sweet reward. These kinds of discoveries are easier to achieve by small teams or by individuals in a shorter time.
In contrast, object and, especially, mechanism type discoveries have big learning curves.
You need lots of new information to narrow down the possibilities. That’s why these types of discoveries often involve more resources, like more/larger teams and decades.
No matter what type of discovery you’re after, being clear on the learning category can help you make smart choices to save effort.
Here are three reasons why knowing the type of scientific discovery you are looking for can guide your choices:
Because the discovery category tells you how large the pool of possibilities is.
The information gained for an attribute-type discovery is small, often just one characteristic or property. But for a new object or mechanism it can be a lot–many new properties, maybe a whole class of objects, or additional mechanisms that support the main discovery. This means there are many possibilities to brainstorm and explore for discoveries in the object and mechanism categories. Start small if you are new or have limited time or resources. Try making an attribute type discovery. The range of ideas is smaller and a lot of information is already known for you to build on. If you go for a mechanism or object type discovery, use analogies to narrow the range of possibilities by extending an example from somewhere else into a new area. Or get a large group of people working on separate ideas so you can crank through the range of possibilities faster.
Because the discovery category suggests ways to scale back to baby steps or blow up to big leaps.
If the number of ideas or models is exploding exponentially and you’re not making any headway you can scale back to a smaller information hill and go after an attribute type discovery. Alternatively, dig around for an object or mechanism type discovery if your area is stuck in a vicious cycle of “we know everything” and/or “we’re learning nothing”. Again, analogies from a wildly different field (like sociology to physics or vice versa) can create a quick smart starting point.
Because the discovery category tells you what you are looking for.
Here’s an obvious one, but the reminder helps: Science mostly works by looking for something on purpose and then seeing if you find it or not. That’s because technologies and techniques are designed to look for specific evidence from the real world. Knowing what kind of information you are seeking (properties, things, processes) helps you decide what tools you need. Another trick: use existing tools/techniques for things they weren’t originally designed to look for. Anomalies have a way of popping up and those anomalies can be evidence for discoveries.
Determining your scientific discovery learning goal, or re-evaluating it mid-project, impacts how you plan and what you try.
Make smart choices and you can get to discovery sooner. Make unwise choices and you can set yourself back by years.
Simply put, knowing the type of scientific discovery you are trying to make can save you years of effort by matching your category to your resources.
Reflection Question
Looking back on past projects you’ve contributed to, or dream projects you’d like to do. What discovery types have you thought about? What obstacles did you experience, or do you foresee?
Bernadette K. Cogswell, “Knowing the type of scientific discovery you are trying to make can save you years of effort”, The Insightful Scientist Blog, July 23, 2021.
Imagine the person closest to you is talking to you right after the public announcement that confirms your discovery.
Are they smiling at you and are you smiling back? Is your heart racing happily?
Would you laugh, feel excited, have a burst of energy?
There’s a good reason why we hope to make a discovery when we start doing science. A reason beyond the endorphins and adrenaline hit, the recognition and praise.
Scientific discoveries change the world.
We intuitively know that scientific discovery is more high impact than regular science.
Making something that matters is a desire we all share.
But in science the fear of failure can keep us from trying to have that impact, to make that discovery.
Thinking about discovery as levels that we can accumulate one at a time can take the energy out of that fear and put it back into the motivation to try.
Scientific impact lies on a continuum from low to high determined by how many essential qualities a discovery captures.
A quick recap if you haven’t read the post on those qualities (check it out): what makes a scientific discovery different from regular research is that the new finding has a radical, universal, or novel quality, or some combination. Radical means it shifts our perspective. Universal means it extends our knowledge from a smaller area to a bigger one. Novel means it’s never been discovered before.
Impact classes for scientific discovery are based on the number of qualities a new finding possesses.
The more discovery qualities a science finding has, the higher, broader, and longer its impact.
I’ve identified three discovery impact classes:
Minor class discoveries possess only one of the three vital discovery qualities. So, they are radical, or universal, or novel, but not some combination. These are the easiest class of discoveries to pursue and they are just a small step up from regular research.
Major class discoveries possess at least two essential discovery qualities. For example, a major class discovery might find something new and shift our perspective about the world (be novel and radical). This discovery class can really change things, but it’s harder to achieve them.
Legacy class discoveries must have all three discovery qualities. These split the world into “before” and “after”. They bring radical, universal, and novel understanding to the table. These are the hardest class of discovery to make.
Science spans from regular research to legacy class discoveries on an incremental spectrum defined by the discovery essential qualities.
This spectrum idea is powerful because it means we can start out further down but accumulate toward a big result over time.
Think of making a discovery like building a house. You are building the support beam structure. If you need to place a nail, you can try to whack it hard and hope it goes in without getting destroyed (or smashing your finger).
Or you can tap tap tap the nail with a hammer over time. Each hit drives the nail further in toward your goal and every nail that holds make the structure more secure.
Starting with regular research and then leveling up by tap tapping at minor class discoveries, then major, then legacy is a solid way to approach your discovery goals. And you’re less likely to get hurt or break something in the process. The more hits and nails you get in the stronger your house of knowledge gets.
Understanding the classes and that discovery is on a spectrum means everything you do drives toward discovery and discovery has no end point.
We fear failure because we think of discovery as a fixed, unobtainable, high-performing and out-of-reach goal.
I call this the “Einstein or bust” mindset. We get stuck thinking that if it’s not a legacy class discovery it doesn’t count. Why try?
But the minute you get involved in science you are automatically on the discovery spectrum. And there is more than one level of discovery, each with its own meaningful impact.
It’s not possible to “fall off” or “fail out” of a spectrum.
But you can always start small and build up from where you are to make your first discovery and then bigger and bigger discoveries.
Simply put, knowing the three levels of scientific discovery will end your fear of failure because no matter where you are on the spectrum of discovery now you can build toward higher levels one small doable step at a time.
Reflection Question
If you got a phone call tomorrow saying you were being awarded the world’s biggest prize for having made a scientific discovery, what would you do that night to celebrate?
I’ll make you a deal. I will give you one million dollars if you are the first person to bring me an authentic, Trendel-made, lime green pogificator and post proof to my website that you have an original one by the last Friday in December.
Easy, right?
It might be.
Or it might not.
Who knows? Because you probably don’t know what a pogificator is. Or if it’s a real thing (it’s not). Or if Trendel is a real place (it’s not).
So, even if I extended the imaginary offer on my website to every year for the next three years it won’t help.
You can’t produce something when you don’t know what that thing is.
It’s a silly example, but discovery works the same. If you’ve got a wicked social or science problem you want to solve, you can’t make a scientific discovery if you don’t know what a scientific discovery is.
To go out and get started you need to have a good definition.
I’ve come up with my own definition by thinking about my physics research, research my co-workers do, and reading about discovery. I’d like to share it with you as part of my scientific discovery framework series of posts.
Scientific discovery has three essential qualities that regular research does not.
To be a discovery a finding doesn’t have to have all three qualities (though how many it has determines its impact). But it does have to have at least one of those qualities.
The three discovery qualities are:
Radical. Radical means that the new science finding shifts our perspective on the world. How we look at things before the discovery is different from how we look at the world after. Radicality makes scientific discovery high impact.
Universal. Universal means that the new finding extends knowledge from one area to a wider class of things, not just one individual case. Making more general predictions about the world is easier after a scientific discovery. Universality gives scientific discovery a broad impact.
Novel. Novel means that the focus of the discovery has not been verified to be true before (and it may not even have been recognized or known before the discovery is announced). How much we know about the world grows after a scientific discovery and that discovery drives more growth. Novelty grants scientific discovery a lasting impact.
Defining these qualities gives you a criteria for knowing “discovery” from “not discovery” so you can spend more time on discovery activities.
I had information overload when I first started trying to pull actionable understanding from reading stuff about scientific discovery. All that data jumbled and confused my brain. Sometimes I gave up learning.
It was like asking a simple question on Google, “how to improve insight”, and ending up watching weird perky YouTube videos by a corporate coach about insight reports for marketing teams. You wonder, “What just happened?”
But when I came up with a targeted definition of scientific discovery it made gathering ideas doing-centered. I started to be able to link actions to outcomes.
Having a definition in your head lets you tell apart science examples of discovery (useful role models) from science that is invention or innovation or incremental gains (not useful role models for discovery).
Ironically, even though I spent a year designing a new definition of scientific discovery, I didn’t memorize it right away. Every time I sat down to learn more, I had to go back and look at my own original Microsoft Word document with notes.
It was frustrating. It made me feel like I was starting from scratch each time. It slowed me down. A lot.
I hadn’t taken my own advice: I had put in the effort to gain some insight, but then I went back to being confused because the definition of discovery remained vague in my head.
When I finally memorized my definition, it was like someone put a magic prism or filter in my brain. That laser like focus from having a clear definition of scientific discovery let me pursue it with single-minded devotion. Even if “devotion” only meant 20 minutes a week.
Simply put, memorizing the definition of what a “scientific discovery” is lets you actually make one.
Because you can’t produce something when you don’t know what it is.
Reflection Question
Wander down the rabbit hole of the internet for 5 minutes and find one example labelled a “scientific discovery”. Think about if it is radical, universal, and/or novel. Now think about something you’d like to discover. How would it capture some of those qualities?
Bernadette K. Cogswell, “Memorizing the definition of “scientific discovery” lets you actually make one”, The Insightful Scientist Blog, March 26, 2021.
There’s a hidden catch to reading inspirational stories about individuals.
Reading them makes you feel humans can do anything.
Reading them can also make you feel like, any human but you can do anything.
It’s a paradox hidden inside reading the stories that has to do with the details. The more details we read the more real the achievements seem. But also, the more different the person and/or experiences that lead to them seem to be from who we are.
So, after reading an upbeat story about how Albert Einstein said something cool and then discovered something amazing, you can feel both inspired and demoralized at the same time.
The reason is because these stories focus on individuals more than capacities.
That makes sense because biographies and inspirational quote sites are selling peoples’ personalities as much as their ideas.
That’s not a bad thing. It’s just not helpful when you’re trying to learn practical discovery skills.
Instead, I want you to become the Einstein in your own story. So, we need to focus on things a little differently.
Let’s talk about human capacities and discovery.
If you read widely, you will see a lot of ideas about how to do something new.
You’ll see buzz words like innovation, invention, creativity, and insight.
Capacities are the mental and physical abilities and skills we have to get things done.
So, discovery capacities are abilities, that all people have, to discover new things.
I’ve identified four discovery capacities.
What makes each discovery capacity unique is that we are motivated to apply that ability for different reasons. So, we create different results depending on which capacity we use.
On the other hand, what every discovery capacity shares is that it gives us a way to create new things in science and technology.
Here are the four discovery capacities:
1. Innovation. You apply your capacity to innovate when you are motivated to improve the way something works. Better. Faster. Stronger. That’s all about innovation.
2. Invention. When you are motivated to build something useful you use your capacity for invention. An idea brought to life is the heart of invention.
3. Insight. Being motivated to get a more accurate understanding of the real world is when you deploy your capacity for insight. Insight gets rid of being wrong, being oblivious, and being confused.
4. Scientific Discovery. If you are motivated to explain the natural world then you will use your capacity for scientific discovery. What exists? Why does it exist? How does it work? Scientific discovery is finding the answers to those questions.
Although making scientific discoveries is our focus, all the capacities have a role to play in discovery. They build on and support each other.
For a long time, I held these two images in my mind. That and the famous photo of Einstein sticking out his tongue (which you might know too).
Making discoveries, through the lens of Einstein, seemed like something only mischievous, extraordinary people do.
But then I started hearing a phrase from one of my family members (they’re not in science).
It’s called “capacity-building”.
The United Nations defines capacity-building as, “the process of developing and strengthening the skills, instincts, abilities, processes and resources…to survive, adapt, and thrive in a fast-changing world”.
I realized that to make discoveries we need exactly that.
The skills and processes to survive, adapt, and thrive in a fast-changing information world.
That’s why I call them discovery capacities. Because strengthening them is a capacity-building exercise for those who want to make scientific discoveries.
The four discovery capacities all support each other.
Sometimes you need to build a new tool (invent) to fill a knowledge gap (insight). Or you may need to improve how a system works (innovate) to create space for new knowledge to be found (scientific discovery).
Luckily, we all start out with a basic ability to do all these things.
That’s because basic human survival requires the skill to observe, adapt, build, and learn.
As we grow, and make new learning choices, we may specialize or strengthen some capacities more than others. But we never lack, or lose, those discovery capacities all together, unless we suffer a catastrophic injury.
We can also learn and develop specific techniques to improve our capacity.
But just remember, you’re always improving on a basic ability you already have. Not starting from zero. You’ve already got what it takes. But what you’ve got can get better.
Simply put, making a scientific discovery is something anyone can do, not just a group of elite science performers.
Discovering new things is a set of core human capacities we are born with.
So, own it. Grow it.
Keep your discovery capacities strong through practice.
Become your own Einstein.
Reflection Question
Building up your discovery capacity is about practice. Practicing which discovery capacity annoys you the most and why? Which one excites you the most and why?
If I told you there was a study that found what actions you take for the next 10 minutes determines whether or not you will make a scientific discovery in your life…how would you spend that time?
How does thinking about the impact of what your doing right now on your discovery potential make you feel? Guilty, curious, confused, even overwhelmed?
Unfortunately, no such study exists. Instead, there are plenty of biographies analyzing how the Einstein’s of the world spent their time.
Don’t get me wrong.
Getting inspired by previous scientific discoveries and the stories behind them is wonderful motivation.
But it doesn’t tell you how to spend the next 10 minutes of your life to make your own discoveries. For that you need an action plan.
So let me share the scientific discovery framework that I’ve developed, which will give you a plan. It’s helped me see how discovery gets done and it will help you too.
There are lots of parts to scientific discovery, but they all fit together in a logical whole.
In a series of posts, I’ll explain my framework for connecting those parts and how you can prioritize your efforts to get moving on making a discovery.
This first post lays out the big picture of scientific discovery. Get ready for an information download! Stick with it. Don’t worry if it feels like a lot. Shorter follow-up posts will guide you. Jump in and out of the series anywhere – the posts are all standalone. You can take it all in as you have time.
Let’s get to it.
I’ve identified six core areas that power scientific discovery:
1. Discovery repertoire. The personal portfolio of techniques that you use to get science done is your scientist’s repertoire. There are four sections to your internal portfolio: how you think about your science (mindset), what tasks you know how to complete to get science done (activities), the recipes you have for combining outcomes with actions (skills), and what you know (knowledge). When you have a solid plan, but still don’t make progress on your science it means you need to strengthen a weak part of your repertoire.
2. Discovery capacities. Learning new things in science and technology is driven by four human capacities: innovation, invention, insight, and scientific discovery. Capacities get different results because they are driven by different motivations. Innovation motivates us to improve the way something works. Invention motivates us to build devices that will do something useful. Insight motivates us to change how we see the world. Scientific discovery motivates us to explain how the world works. Insight and scientific discovery are core capacities that build on each other.
3. Discovery vital qualities. The difference between a scientific discovery and regular scientific research is that a new discovery-level scientific finding will have at least one of three vital qualities: It will shift our perspective on the world (be radical), it will link knowledge to make a broader range of predictions about the world (be universal), and/or it will be new knowledge (be novel). Your work should have one of these qualities as an objective to aim for discovery-level science.
4. Discovery impact classes. Scientific discovery intuitively feels more high impact than regular science. That impact lies on a continuum from low to high, determined by how many vital qualities a discovery captures. Minor class discoveries possess only one of the three vital qualities. Major class discoveries possess at least two and legacy class discoveries must have all three. Science spans from regular research to legacy class discoveries on an incremental spectrum defined by these qualities. So, start small and build up to the big discoveries.
5. Discovery learning categories. Scientific discovery learns something new about the world. What you learn falls into three categories: something about an unknown object (object-type), something about the properties of an object (attribute-type), or something about how and why the world works the way it does (mechanism-type). Some categories are easier to make discoveries in because the learning curve is smaller.
6. Discovery evolution phases. Most scientific discoveries evolve through five phases, which I call the discovery cycle. First, you ask an unanswered question (question). Then you form ideas for an answer (ideation). You make those ideas into tests in the real world (articulation). You run the tests and evaluate the results (evaluation). And if the results repeatedly prove true then they become a scientific discovery (verification). Troubleshooting your scientific discovery progress is easier if you know what phase you are in because unique problems trip up scientists at each phase.
The framework I’ve developed lets you craft a scientific discovery action plan, troubleshoot your progress, and connect specific activities and techniques with the results you want to achieve.
The simplest starting point? Aim for a minor class, attribute-type discovery that is universal. That represents a baby step from current science to something new. And if you hit an obstacle check your insight in a systematic way and seek out techniques to boost you from one phase of scientific discovery to the next.
No matter where you start, be inspired by the scientific discovery stories of others, but don’t stay stuck in them. Discovery isn’t a sightseeing tour through known territory. It’s a push toward unknown territory.
Simply put, to make a scientific discovery you need a plan for how to tackle the unknown, not a map of the known.
Take Action
Once you’ve got a framework and a plan, spend the next 10 minutes taking action. You’ll be 10 minutes closer to making your next discovery.
The hardest part of sharing scientific discovery skills is giving good examples.
The pros of using real world examples:
• Your readers learn how skills played out in real life.
• Your readers have examples they can explore further.
• You readers will find examples in some topics fascinating.
The cons of using real world examples:
• Your readers will compare themselves with some stories and decide it doesn’t apply to them.
• Your examples might confuse readers because of grey areas.
• Your readers will find examples in some topics boring.
The biggest downside of a real example is that you will automatically compare yourself and your situation to it.
I don’t want you to do that.
I want you to think about the concept and see if it helps you. Not worry about the fact that Scientist X lives and works in place Y, does Z for fun, and isn’t anything like you, so you could never do anything like them.
That’s why I’ve decided to start illustrating my blog posts with examples using a fictional character from a real book I wrote, but never published.
Say hello to Mrs. Magnolia Mulliver, from “Mrs. Mulliver’s Travels”.
You’ll see her in my series sharing the framework I use to practice scientific discovery.
In this post I’ll give you enough backstory to understand Mrs. Mulliver and her mysterious log entries.
Love her or loathe her, she’s a good way to play with the concepts in your mind. And there is no need to compare yourself—she isn’t real anyway!
Now, about Mrs. Mulliver:
What would Mrs. Mulliver’s “About” page look like if she were a blogger?
“Magnolia Mulliver is a former part-timer, long-time housewife, mother of five beautiful children, and has many nieces and nephews. She lives happily with her husband Burt, a bookkeeper, who knows a lot about trash disposal. She was always quite keen on science in school. But she never got round to it. Too many other wonderful things popped up in her life.”
What are the log entries Mrs. Mulliver writes and why is she writing them?
Mrs. Mulliver has left behind what seem to be diary entries. These are now in an edited book called “The Posthumous Papers of Mrs. Magnolia Mulliver’s Travels in Trendel”. On The Insightful Scientist website, it’s called “Mrs. Mulliver’s Travels” for short. Each of her diary entries is labelled “Scientist’s Log” with a date and describes her challenges, thoughts, and events while serving as a Citizen Scientist in the fictional land of Trendel.
Her reasons for writing these entries are anyone’s guess. How they came into the possession of The Insightful Scientist remains a mystery. But in her honor the blog section of the website has always been called “The Scientist’s Log”.
What is Trendel? Why is Mrs. Mulliver a Citizen Scientist? What is going on?!
The details are murky. Mrs. Mulliver’s diary entries only partly cover a ten-year period. But here’s what we’ve pieced together on The Insightful Scientist:
Mrs. Mulliver was on her way to visit a niece when her plane vanished over the Pacific Ocean. She awoke in a strange land, maybe still on Earth, named Trendel (pronounced tren-dull).
Trendel has two regions: Trendellup, which is on the surface, and Trendellow, which is below ground. Trendelites appear to be human and most things, like the language and food, are still familiar to our Mrs. M.
But the Trendelian history is new to her. She described in her diary that Trendel lacks much scientific knowledge, even though they still have many familiar technologies. Except for the internet and other oddities.
From her diary entries we also know that Trendel suffered through a Great Information War, generations before Mrs. Mulliver arrives. But little is known about what existed before the Great War.
Now the Trendelites, a relaxed bunch, are left a lot of technologies and things that they don’t understand and aren’t quite sure what to do with.
Unfortunately, this confusion over how things work and what to do with them includes nuclear weapons, which have the Trendelites baffled.
Mrs. Mulliver has heard things about nuclear weapons because one of her nieces worked in nuclear threat reduction and was a physicist. Mrs. Mulliver’s science experience is limited. But she still knows more than the Trendelites. So, she’s assigned by the Royal Order of Trendel, the R.O.T. or a sort of managing body, to be a Citizen Scientist and oversee disposing of nuclear weapons (since the Trendelites can’t make heads or tails of how to do anything other than blow themselves up with it).
Mrs. Mulliver’s challenge is made worse by the fact that whoever created and maintained the nuclear weapons, and their specialized knowledge, mysteriously vanished overnight during the third and final phase of the Great Information War.
Luckily, Mrs. Mulliver is comfortable cleaning up other people’s mysterious messes (she did have seven siblings and five children). So, she jumps into the challenge.
Most of the Scientist’s Log entries about Mrs. M’s work revolve around something called “plutonium disposition”. Plutonium is a kind of chemical element that is used to make nuclear weapons and gives weapons a devastating chain reaction effect.
Plutonium’s chemical name is “Pu” for short. Unfortunately, the Trendelites know nothing about it except for the label appearing here and there. They pronounce “Pu” like “poo” and call it the “Pu Problem” (poo-problem).
This is no issue for Mrs. Mulliver, who, with her five children, has also frequently cleaned up other people’s left over poo.
But the science and safety of the Pu Problem are tricky.
Our Mrs. M has to solve a problem that was never settled in her world. And she must rediscover things that were only known by the weapons’ vanished makers.
It’s big task! But the Log entries suggest our Mrs. Mulliver is up to the job.
Mrs. Mulliver is fake, but is the science she’s working on fake too?
No. The challenges and science behind the Pu Problem are real.
Mrs. Mulliver is fictional, and her ideas can be off-the-mark, since she struggles to find the information she needs. But I have tried to keep true to the reality of dealing with leftover plutonium from nuclear weapons.
That’s our dear Mrs. Mulliver in a nutshell. She’s a great addition to the website and a neat way to explore practical themes in scientific discovery.
Simply put, sometimes you need a “Mrs. Mulliver” to help make tough ideas easier to think about.
Bernadette K. Cogswell, “A fictional scientist is the way to learn how to make scientific discoveries”, The Insightful Scientist Blog, August 21, 2020.
Have you have ever been on the receiving end of a colleague, boss, or even stranger sitting next to you on a plane (ah, the good old days before coronavirus), asking you questions like,
“But what impact will your work have?”
“Can you study something more interesting/important?”, or even,
“Who cares?”
If so, then you have come up against a problem all researchers, scientists, and citizen scientists face: How to try and do the best possible, most high impact, most important science you are capable of as often as possible.
What you are aiming for is a scientific discovery. And what well-meaning acquaintances and strangers are asking for is the same thing.
But how do you do that? Trying to aim that high can seem overwhelming.
The Problem: Many existing definitions of scientific discovery are good for textbooks, but not for project planning, follow-through, or troubleshooting.
My Solution: Define “scientific discovery” so that you can achieve it with training and algorithms, and perform quantitative studies to probe it.
The purpose of this post is to lay out all the key components that will help us train ourselves to become better discoverers. You can see this framework drawn in my concept sketchnote below.
My hand drawn sketchnote of the “architecture of scientific discovery” showing all the important parts of the process. (Artist: Bernadette K. Cogswell. For reprint permission, contact me.)
There is a lot of ground to cover, so in this post I am going to give short descriptions of everything in the big picture.
In the following 22 (!) posts in the series, I will drill down into each of the 18 parts in more detail, with examples taken from science history.
Now let’s jump in…
Group 1:
Discovery Capacities
Scientific discovery is just one of four human capacities for discovery in science and technology.
Let’s zoom in on the discovery architecture picture I’ve drawn above.
A close-up of my sketchnote showing the four discovery capacities at the core of the discovery architecture. (Artist: Bernadette K. Cogswell. For reprint permission, contact me.)
As human beings, we have the capacity to discover new things in science and technology. These discovery capacities form the main part of the structure and they house all our abilities and knowledge about science and technology.
These discovery capacities fall into four types—insight, invention, innovation, and scientific discovery. The main differences between types are their results and our reasons and motivations for pursuing a discovery.
So let me give you a definition of insight, a definition of invention, a definition of innovation, and a definition of scientific discovery.
Insight
Definition of insight:
“Insight” is refining the accuracy of your perspective of the real world.
Getting a more accurate perspective, or “achieving insight,” is accomplished in one of three ways. You can add something new to your perspective that you were not aware of before. You can correct something that you misperceived. Or you can clarify something that you only vaguely understood.
Motivation: “I want to…change how I see the world.”
Invention
Definition of invention:
”Invention” is building a machine or process that creates a previously unobtainable result.
Creating a previously impossible result, or “inventing something new”, is brought about by focusing on three aspects of what you build. You want to build something that has not been built that way before. You want to build something that does what it was built to do. And you want what you built to create something that a machine or process like it has not created before.
Motivation: “I want to…build a device that will do something useful.”
Innovation
Definition of innovation:
”Innovation” is improving the functionality of a process or device.
Refining how things work, or “innovating”, is really about making things work better more easily. You can make something function more efficiently. You can make something run faster or with fewer resources. You can make something more likely to produce what it was designed to produce. And you can make something produce a higher quality version of what it was designed to produce.
Motivation: “I want to…improve the way things work.”
Scientific Discovery
Definition of scientific discovery:
”Scientific Discovery” is finding the evidence, interaction, and causes of things that exist in the natural world.
Learning something new about nature, or “making a scientific discovery,” relies on three things. You must acquire knowledge. You must demonstrate that the phenomena exist using evidence and statistical or logical analysis. And the knowledge you acquire must include one or more element of the radical, the universal, or the novel (those are defined in the next section).
Motivation: “I want to…explain how the world works.”
In this framework “applied science” can be defined as a combination of mastering the capacities for invention and innovation, while “fundamental science” or “basic science” can be defined as a combination of mastering the capacities for insight and scientific discovery. By “science” I mean the physical sciences (e.g., astronomy, biology, chemistry, computer science, data science, engineering, geology, medicine, paleontology, physics, etc.), the social sciences (e.g., anthropology, economics, political science, psychology, sociology, etc.), and mathematics.
(Also, you might wonder why insight is listed as its own discovery capacity since it is integral to the other three discovery capacities, invention, innovation, and scientific discovery. This is true. However, it’s more useful to put it on an equal footing with the other three capacities. It’s easier to develop training protocols, algorithms, and quantitative metrics to explore discovery methods, all goals for developing this framework.)
Group 2:
Scientific Discovery Vital Qualities
There are three qualities any scientific study or research must have, or it can’t be called a “scientific discovery”.
The three scientific discovery qualities are the foundation on which we can build any kind of discovery.
A close-up of my sketchnote showing the three qualities that form the foundation of defining something as a scientific discovery. (Artist: Bernadette K. Cogswell. For reprint permission, contact me.)
They are integral to recognizing discovery and generating discoveries.
These three essential qualities form the basis of what makes scientific discovery different from everyday scientific investigation and scientific research.
How is scientific discovery different from scientific investigation? Scientific discovery has a higher and more long-lasting impact on the evolution of science. So let’s define the vital qualities that embody that impact and enduring nature.
Radical
Definition of the radical quality of scientific discovery:
The “radical” quality of scientific discovery means that the new knowledge gained as a result of the discovery represents a meaningful shift in perspective from the previous state of knowledge.
Role in scientific impact and longevity: Scientific discovery is radical—it changes the perspective of science in one of three ways. Something can be added to what we know. Something can be rejected from what we thought we knew. Or something that we know can be changed. By impacting our scientific perspective, the radicality of scientific discovery opens up new avenues of research and creates or ends long-standing practices and beliefs.
Universal
Definition of the universal quality of scientific discovery:
The “universal” quality of scientific discovery means that the knowledge acquired as a result of discovery is valid and reliable and that the knowledge gained has predictive or descriptive power in a range of physical situations.
Role in scientific impact and longevity: Scientific discoveries have a broad impact because the new knowledge they bring has a range of application. The universal nature of a scientific discovery lies on a spectrum from “proximal” to “distal”. “Proximal” means that the new knowledge can be applied to a broad range of areas with few changes to its verified form. “Distal” means that the new knowledge discovered can only be applied to areas and phenomena closely or directly related to the area in which the discovery was made, or that to apply it to other areas requires a lot of translation. The scientific discoveries with the most direct universal appeal have the longest legacies.
Novel
Definition of the novel quality of scientific discovery:
The “novel” quality of scientific discovery means that the knowledge obtained through the discovery has not been previously shown to exist, in a reproducible way, by observation or experimentation.
Role in scientific impact and longevity: Scientific discoveries electrify areas of science because they bring something new to the table. And when those new elements are verified, they shape future research activities and ways of thinking.
The impact effects of scientific discoveries and their longevity, as forces that shape research practice, effort, and interest, are embodied in the three vital qualities at the foundation of the scientific discovery architecture. They give scientific discovery it’s je ne sais quoi factor that inspires the layperson and the scientist alike.
Group 3:
Scientific Discovery Impact Classes
The impact and significance of all scientific discoveries can be grouped into three classes.
The purpose of discovery is progress in some area (understanding, outcomes, effectiveness, and knowledge as we saw from the section on the four discovery capacities above).
The discovery classes represent broad categories that help identify the level of impact (or progress) that our discoveries are capable of achieving or fostering.
These classes, therefore, overarch the specific categories of scientific discoveries.
A close-up of my sketchnote showing the three discovery impact classes that overach all scientific discovery and describe a discovery’s effect and longevity. (Artist: Bernadette K. Cogswell. For reprint permission, contact me.)
In particular, the discovery classes encompass three different levels of impact, from wide-ranging to narrow, as described in their definitions below, and as represented by the fact that the three domes of discovery impact classes are nested in my sketchnote diagram.
Minor
Definition of a minor impact class scientific discovery:
A “minor” class discovery meets the criteria for any one of the three vital qualities of scientific discovery—radical, universal, or novel.
Minor scientific discoveries are either radical, universal, or novel, but not all three at once. Therefore, they have an impact beyond ordinary scientific investigation, but their impact is limited.
Major
Definition of a major impact class scientific discovery:
A “major” class discovery meets any two of the three criteria for the vital qualities of scientific discovery—radical, universal, or novel.
Major scientific discoveries are either radical and universal, or radical and novel, or universal and novel, etc. They have two of the three vital qualities, but are missing the third one. As a result, their impact tends to be more wide-spread than minor class discoveries, but not as high impact as they could be if they embodied all three qualities.
Legacy
Definition of a legacy impact class scientific discovery:
A “legacy” class discovery meets all three criteria for the vital qualities of scientific discovery—radical, universal, and novel.
Legacy class discoveries are the full package—radical, universal, and novel. The impact of legacy class scientific discoveries is wide-ranging and long-lasting. These are the hardest scientific discoveries to achieve, but the ones with the greatest value.
Group 4:
Scientific Discovery Learning Categories
The types of scientific discoveries you could make can be grouped into three categories.
The learning categories are specific to only one of the discovery capacities, scientific discovery (they are not intended to be applied, by analogy, to insight, invention, or innovation).
These categories of scientific discovery divide the field of knowledge obtained through scientific discovery into three areas. These areas are determined by the kind of information you hope to gain, or your learning objective.
Object
Definition of the object type scientific discovery:
An “object” scientific discovery is acquiring knowledge about the existence of a new object in nature.
Learning Goal: Answers the question, “Does something exist?”
Attribute
Definition of the attribute type scientific discovery:
An “attribute” scientific discovery is acquiring knowledge about the characteristics, properties, and/or traits of an object or process in nature.
Learning Goal: Answers the question, “What is something like?”
Mechanism
Definition of the mechanism type scientific discovery:
A “mechanism” scientific discovery is acquiring knowledge about the causes, connections, interactions, and/or sequences of objects and attributes in nature.
Learning Goal: Answers the question, “How does something work?” and/or “Why does something happen?”
A close-up of my sketchnote showing the different types of discoveries you can make as central to the architecture of discovery. (Artist: Bernadette K. Cogswell. For reprint permission, contact me.)
Let’s look at this part of the discovery architecture more closely, as shown above in my sketchnote drawing.
The scientific discovery learning goals are shown under the dome of the scientific discovery classes because they can fall under (i.e., be impacted by or represented in) all the classes of scientific discoveries.
Another way to think of it is that the scientific discovery classes are umbrella terms that cover all the categories or types of scientific discoveries you could make.
(Again, this is just the overview, in future posts I will talk about each of these in more detail and it will begin to make more sense as you see examples and further discussion.)
Onward to the last group I want to cover in this post…
Group 5:
Scientific Discovery Cycle
(Evolution Phases)
Most scientific discoveries must pass through five phases.
All of the above groups—the discovery capacities, the scientific discovery classes, the scientific discovery categories, and the scientific discovery qualities—form the main architecture of scientific discovery.
You can think of these like a very old and sturdy building, where every brick and design element of the structure is built up out of our application of the discovery capacities, classes, categories, and qualities and the knowledge, abilities, devices, and processes that we have created as a result.
There is one more important element in the overall architecture, and that is represented by the sun shown in the upper right hand corner of my sketchnote illustration.
A close-up of my sketchnote showing how the scientific discovery cycle illuminates all other aspects of discovery. (Artist: Bernadette K. Cogswell. For reprint permission, contact me.)
The sun represents the process that drives scientific discovery, or the “scientific discovery cycle”, which shines a light on all the other elements of the architecture so that we can become aware of them and manipulate them in the course of running our projects as scientists.
Below I summarize each of the five evolutionary stages of the scientific discovery cycle.
Question
Definition of the question phase of the scientific discovery process:
The “question phase of scientific discovery” is the stage in the process when the question to be answered, or problem to be solved, is explicitly defined.
Purpose of Stage: Define what you want to find, create, or explain.
Ideation
Definition of the ideation phase of the scientific discovery process:
The “ideation phase of scientific discovery” is the stage in the process when a possible solution or solutions is conceived of to answer the discovery question or solve the discovery problem.
Purpose of Stage: Come up with a guess for how you will find it, create it, or explain it.
Articulation
Definition of the articulation phase of the scientific discovery process:
The “articulation phase of scientific discovery” is the stage in the process when at least one proposed solution is put into a form that can be tested in the real world.
Purpose of Stage: Write an equation or description, or build or code a prototype, embodying your answer.
Evaluation
Definition of the evaluation phase of the scientific discovery process:
The “evaluation phase of scientific discovery” is the stage in the process when the testable solution is probed and its success in answering the discovery question, or solving the discovery problem, is assessed.
Purpose of Stage: Test your equation, description, code, or prototype to see if it answers your question.
Verification
Definition of the verification phase of the scientific discovery process:
The “verification phase of scientific discovery” is the stage in the process when the best available solution to answer the discovery question, or solve the discovery problem, is confirmed to be accurate and reliable by multiple independent analyses.
Purpose of Stage: Subject your “discovery” to public scrutiny and see if it holds up to testing.
Note that, the way I have defined it, the scientific discovery cycle is different from the scientific method.
The scientific method focuses on how to obtain valid and reliable information about the world. But it is not concerned with the impact of that knowledge.
The scientific discovery cycle (or scientific discovery process) is concerned with the impact of the knowledge obtained and its purpose is to obtain knowledge of a certain minimum impact level (namely, knowledge that is either radical, novel, or universal and, therefore, at least meets the standard for a minor class discovery).
The scientific method would be used to obtain relevant insight at various phases within the scientific discovery cycle (such as during articulation, evaluation, and verification).
Therefore, the scientific method is one set of activities in the scientist’s repertoire, which they can use to help them complete the evolution stages in the scientific discovery cycle. They are connected, but distinct.
Summary
Phew!
That brings us to the end of my overview of the architecture of discovery that I have built as a way to develop better discovery training protocols and quantitative methods to identify patterns and correlations in discovery processes.
If you are someone who loves algorithms or self-improvement, then this architecture and way of conceptualizing discovery and how to achieve it is for you.
So much good stuff to talk about!
I’m really looking forward to writing the rest of the posts in this series. Having these new words and concepts in my discovery arsenal has already helped me organize and conduct my research projects in a new way. And it makes extracting nuggets of insight from examples of scientific discovery much more productive.
To wrap up this post, let me give you the very, very short, bullet-list version of “the architecture of scientific discovery” that I covered in this post:
Scientific discovery is just one of four human discovery capacities—including insight, invention, and innovation—in science and technology.
There are three vital qualities—radical, universal, and novel—any scientific study must have, or it should not be called a “scientific discovery.”
The significance of scientific discoveries can be grouped into three impact classes—minor, major, and legacy—which range from low to high impact.
The types of scientific discoveries you could make can be grouped into three learning categories—object, attribute, or mechanism—based on the information gained.
Most scientific discoveries must pass through five evolution stages—question, ideation, articulation, evaluation, and verification—to succeed.
With all these categories and types, it’s easy to fall into the trap of seeing things as black and white, or just buckets to assign things too.
But the definitions and concepts I’ve come up with work well because they allow us to see scientific discovery as a continuum of insight, from narrow to broad, from low impact to high impact, from fundamental to applied.
Every scientific investigation, every research study, every time you use the scientific method, you are placing yourself somewhere on that continuum of insight. Discovery is always just a little way further along that scale. The question you should be asking yourself is not “Am I making, or trying to make, a discovery?” it’s “Where on the discovery spectrum am I working right now?”
So next time someone challenges you on your impact, dream brave and think (or tell them), “I’m working on some (minor/major) research questions right now, but my dream is to leave a legacy discovery for future generations to build on.”
And hopefully with this discovery architecture in your mental repertoire, you will someday be able to do just that.
Bernadette K. Cogswell, “The Architecture of Scientific Discovery: Overview of the Process – On how to define and categorize all aspects of scientific discovery”, The Insightful Scientist Blog, June 13, 2020, https://insightfulscientist.com/blog/2020/architecture-of-scientific-discovery-overview.
[Page feature photo: A quiet and quirky cabin sits among the mountains. Photo by Torbjorn Sandbakk on Unsplash.]
