How is first principles thinking embodied in the scientific method?

Hello, this is an interesting question. I'll try to explain my understanding in plain language.

You can think of it this way: First Principles Thinking, to put it bluntly, means you act like a "contrarian". Regardless of what others say or how things were done before, you dig down to the most fundamental, basic point of everything. You keep digging until you reach those "axiomatic", irreducible facts, and then, starting from these facts, you re-derive a conclusion.

So, how does the scientific method embody this? It's a textbook example.

1. Doubt everything, don't accept "it's always been this way"

The first step in scientific research is usually observation and questioning. It doesn't stop thinking just because "everyone says so" or "it's written in books". For example, Aristotle stated that heavier objects fall faster than lighter ones, a conclusion that dominated thought for nearly two millennia. This was a way of thinking based on "experience" and "analogy".

But Galileo didn't believe it. He wondered, what's the most basic principle here? Is it weight? Or air resistance? He returned to first principles – "I need to see it with my own eyes, verify it myself." So he dropped iron balls from the Leaning Tower of Pisa (though the story might be disputed, the spirit is correct), using experimentation, the most fundamental method, to test that most basic question. This is a classic example of thinking from the source, rather than accepting ready-made answers.

2. Find the foundational "building blocks", don't just copy the "blueprint"

First principles thinking is like disassembling a complex toy car into a pile of basic "Lego bricks" and then studying the properties of each brick. The scientific method is precisely that process of disassembly and study.

For example, people once saw fire and believed it was a mysterious substance called "phlogiston". Things burned because they contained phlogiston; when they finished burning, the phlogiston had escaped. This was a model based on appearances, similar to an "analogy".

But Lavoisier wasn't satisfied. He wondered, what is the most fundamental change in combustion? He didn't study the concept of "phlogiston" invented by others, but rather the most basic elements: matter, weight, air. He conducted a sealed experiment, precisely measuring the weight of everything before and after combustion, and found that the total weight remained unchanged; only the state of matter had changed. He found the most basic "building blocks" – the law of conservation of mass and oxygen.

Starting from these most basic, undeniable axioms like "oxygen" and "conservation of mass", he rebuilt the theory of "combustion", completely overthrowing the "phlogiston theory". What he used was the scientific method, and the core of this method is first principles thinking: don't bother with the "blueprint" others give you (phlogiston theory); I'll find the most basic "building blocks" myself (elements, mass), and then build something to see.

3. Starting from basic axioms, perform logical deduction

The establishment of scientific theories is a logical chain starting from first principles. Take Einstein's theory of relativity, for example. He didn't just patch up Newton's theory; instead, he returned to a few most basic postulates (first principles), such as the "constancy of the speed of light" and the "principle of relativity".

He thought at the time, if I accept these two premises as absolutely correct, what results would be deduced? Following this logical chain, he derived groundbreaking conclusions like time dilation and the mass-energy equivalence equation. The entire process is:

• Find the cornerstone (First Principles): Identify a few undeniable axioms.
• Rigorous reasoning (Logical Deduction): Build upwards step-by-step from these cornerstones.
• Accept the results (Conclusion): No matter how paradigm-shifting the result, as long as the logical chain is complete, it must be acknowledged.

In summary:

The core of the scientific method is not to blindly follow authority and experience, but to seek the most fundamental, irreducible objective laws of things (which are first principles) through experimentation and observation, and then, based on these laws, construct an explanation of the world through logical reasoning.

Therefore, it can be said that the scientific method itself is the best practice and institutionalized process of first principles thinking. It forces you to return to the origin, using the most reliable facts as the starting point for your thoughts.