Talk:List of famous experiments

First off, well, first, second, third, fourth, fifth....

Dammit! Every occurence of the word "discover" which point to theories or laws or interpretations, should be excised with extreme prejudice. Experiments can only "discover" phenomena, not the subsequent interpretation of the phenomena... -- Cimon Avaro on a pogo-stick 18:23, Sep 14, 2003 (UTC)

Ok, how would you prefer it be phrased? Raul654 19:19, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

May I also suggest that you add more than one thing at a time, if you're going to keep adding stuff, or maybe use the preview button if you're just correcting mistakes? This page already has an edit history longer than a lot of other articles, and it has only existed for a few hours :) Adam Bishop 19:46, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I know, it's just that since I've started it, I've lost changes 3 times due to people make changes before I could save mine. So I just make quick ones now

Raul654 19:52, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

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First, let me apologize, if my comments or summaries of of yesterday have been excessively harsh. I should know better than to edit under stressful conditions.

About the article - I think there might be a problem with the fact that there are still quite a few entries on the list which aren't really experiments, but rather observations. I consider experiments to be acts which are designed beforehands, and then carried out while observing the results. Maybe somebody has a legitimate reason to consider the concept "experiment" less stringently, I don't know... -- Cimon Avaro on a pogo-stick 14:23, Sep 15, 2003 (UTC)

I think all of the listings here can be put into one of 3 catagories -- controlled experiments designed to collect data (Torsion bar, oil drop, etc), accidental observations (Arno and Penzias, Flemming, etc), and discoveries derived from research (which have all been removed). How would you like to list them? Also, I would like to see each experiment have its own article. I created the Torsion bar and the gold foil experiment pages just for that reason. One sentence descriptions on this page are good, but they don't tell enough. (For example, Karl von Frisch decodes the "dance" honeybees use to communicate the location of flowers would be fine if it linked to an article) -- Raul654 17:40, 16 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Wny are three of the most famous Physics experiments of all time (Thompson, Millikan, Rutherford) listed as Chemistry experiments? DJ Clayworth 19:25, 20 Oct 2003 (UTC)

• Whoops. Didn't see your talk comment before I moved them back. Sorry about that. Anyway, I've always heard of them as chemistry experiments, not physics. The rule of thumb I use is that the subatomic goes to physics, the atomic and interatomic go to chemistry. --Raul654 19:43, 20 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I'm basing them simply on the fact that I learned about all of the them in Physics classes, not Chemistry. Thompson is definitely subatomic, arguably so is Millikan. It's not really that important. I felt guilty about leaving the Chemistry section empty, but I really couldn't think of anything to put there. Any ideas? DJ Clayworth 17:06, 21 Oct 2003 (UTC)

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For those of you here who know psychology, http://scholar.uws.edu.au/~13192655/famous.html lists some famous psychology experiments (none of which are listed here), but with very little description. Adding articles and linking to them from here would be much appreciated. I would, but I know nothing about psych. --Raul654 09:16, 18 Nov 2003 (UTC)

These are famous SOCIAL psychology experiments. Yes, they are famous, but most experiments that are listed already are social psychology experiments too. We could do wich some more from other subfields of psychology. --Heida Maria 05:21, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, Raul654, that was probably me trying to sort out the Psychol section while you were doing something else, and scrunching your edits.

I've had a look at the Australian external links page you found - only one of them is seriously famous, and I have added that. seglea 09:37, 18 Nov 2003 (UTC)

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A couple of recent changes.

The date of Galileo's rolling-ball experiments is taken from modern work on his manuscripts. What's the source for a date of 1589? It's pretty strongly contradicted by his work during the dozen years after 1589.

Archimedes did much more than find out how to measure volume by displacing water.

Again, what's the basis for the doubt whether Newton really did his prism experiments? Such doubt seems to be a very long way from a consensus among scholars; but maybe someone has a source that rebuts that. Dandrake 06:02, Feb 24, 2004 (UTC)

If my syphillis-ridden memory serves me, Cimon Avaro put that in. You might want to ask him. →Raul654 06:04, Feb 24, 2004 (UTC)

Technological experiment

How about adding some technological experiments on to the article. Roscoe x 16:00, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Such as...? →Raul654 20:53, Nov 7, 2004 (UTC)

I can NOT believe that the Pods and Fl. cold fusion experiment is being included in that list of experiments! It was a very very poor experiment that didn't find what it said it had found. It really should be stricken from the record here, or perhaps put in a different section on famous screw ups. It is an interesting technical discussion, since there were many labs that soon thereafter reported also seeing the effect, but all were hoodwinked by a lust to be relevant.

While you're entirely right in your assessment of that bit of pathological science -- an experiment that simply gets worse the more you know about it -- and this would still be true if someone found real cold fusion tomorrow, an eventually validated guess not being a proof of valid procedure -- you'll never get the point across and make it stick.

Anyway, it is, so far as I notice in a quick inspection, the only experiment listed that is not generally accepted as valid. For that reason it could be moved to a section for still-controversial experiments, if one weren't to delete it entirely. It certainly shouldn't remain here in the company of Eratosthenes (Hey, duplicate entries for him. Silly.) and Meselson & Stahl and Rutherford.

BTW please remember to sign your Talk entries with four tilde ~ characters. --Dandrake 23:03, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)