Trinity College
Skepticism and Belief
Judy Moran and Barbara Walden
Course philosophy: Through the study of specific issues in science that non-majors encounter in their daily lives we will provide students with the analytical and logical skills to enable them to think critically about data and evidence and know what constitutes a valid experiment.
Unit 1:What's the chance that that will happen?
| Topic | In-Class Activities | Out-of-Class |
| Course philisophy: Learning via hands-on activities. Present data to support this! | ||
| The wisdom of using the lottery as an IRA | Group activity: powerball probabilities | Excel workshop |
| Expected winnings | Film clip: beginning of Waking Ned Devine | |
| Distribution of chosen numbers | ||
| Coincidence and disease clustering | Film clip: A Civil Action |
Unit 2:Deciphering the evidence:
| Topic | In-Class Activities | Out-of-Class |
| Graphical display of information | Golf scores of CEO's - analysis of article in New York Times | Write letter to the editor refuting conclusions in Times article |
| Correlation vs. causation | Computer workshop: graphical analysis of student data | |
| Distributions, mean, median, standard deviation | Film clip: Challenger accident, Feynman testimony | |
| Graphical analysis of data in the Challenger accident |
Unit 3:The elements of a good scientific argument
| Topic | In-Class Activities | Out-of-Class |
| What questions can science answer? What can't it answer? | Guest lecture: "Can You Believe Your Eyes?" - Bill Mace, Psychology Dept. | |
| Making an effective and convincing argument | Guest lecturer: Beverley Wall, Writing Center, Prof. of Composition and Rhetoric | Film: Facilitated Communication, NOVA |
| Elements of an experiment: control, uncertainties | Laboratory experiment: The Physics of Bicycle Wheels, or Coffee Filters | |
| Film clip: Emily Rosa and therepeutic touch | Design an experiment to address the objections of therepeutic touch practitioners to Emily Rosa's experiment | |
| Astrology experiment: survey students with multiple horoscopes |
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