Stars

What science really offers is not facts, but understanding; not answers, but contingency plans. Everything we think that we know about the world is based upon assumptions - that our senses do not deceive us, that equipment works the same way wherever it is placed, that patterns of behaviour established in a limited number of experiments hold good in general, and so on. Science studies the consequences of those assumptions, tests them, and discards any that are found wanting. Its aim is to devise coherent points of view that can be used to understand the workings of the world around us.