Discussing the scientific method and a documentation system of meteorological and biological parameters

摘要

An interpretation of the general scientific method, the hypothetico-deductive principle, is first presented and discussed. It is containing a slightly more restrictive interpretation than usual (The test of a system is interpreted not as a testing merely of scientific hypotheses in a mathematical shape, but as an explicit testing of the definition of the quantitative parameters and the measuring systems of these parameters as well). The outcome of this discussion is a proposal of a documentation system of quantitative meteorological and biological parameters, either measured parameters or parameters derived by model calculation. The documentation system presented is currently being implemented in a web-based system for administration of meteorological parameters at The Norwegian Crop Research Institute. An example of using this documentation system in a biological context, connected to a simple pest warning model for potato late blight is presented. The significance of discussing the scope of such methods concludes the paper. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.