Self-study
P1
Advances in scientific understanding often do not build directly or smoothly in response to the data that are amassed, and in retrospect, after a major revision of theory, it may seem strange that a crucial hypothesis was long overlooked. ███
Intro to Topic ·
Scientific progress is not linear; crucial idea are sometimes overlooked
Example ·
Splitting the nucleus of an atom
Between 1934 to 1939, scientists split the atom without recognizing that they had done so.
P2
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Theory ·
Atoms can be split
It was known that in theory atoms could be split.
Experiment ·
Neutron-bombardment was not intended to split the atom
Scientists did not expect that to happen.
P3
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Experimental Results ·
Meitner and Fermi's experiment produced "puzzling" substances
They didn't know what the substances were (mainly) because they weren't expecting to have split uranium.
Experimental Results ·
Hahn identified substances as barium and technetium
Barium and technetium's protons and neutrons add up to the protons and neutrons of uranium.
P4
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Hypothesis ·
Nuclear fission occurred
Meitner finally realized that they had achieved nuclear fission.
Passage Style
Phenomenon-hypothesis (RC)
Single position
26.
Given the information in the ████████ █████ ███ ██ ███ ██████████ ██ █████ █████ ████ ████ ████ ██████ ██ ██████ ███ ██████ ██ ████ ██ ████ ███ ██████████ ██ ███████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ██████
a
The physicists conducting ███ ███████████ ██ ███████ ███████████ ██ ███████ ████ ███ █████ ███ ████ ████████ ███████████
We have no reason to think that failure to use the same research techniques was one of the factors that made it difficult for physicists to realize atoms were being split. So we have no reason to think (A) would have caused physicists to realize that atoms were being split more quickly.
b
The physicists conducting ███ ███████████ ██ ███████ ███████████ ██ ███████ ███ ███ ████ ██████████ ████████████ █████████ ███ ██████ ███████ ███████████ ██ ███ ████████████
This would eliminate one of the things the author identifies as
c
The physicists conducting ███ ███████████ ██ ███████ ███████████ ██ ███████ ███ ███ ████ █████ ██ ███ ████████████ ██████████ ████ ██ █████████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ █████ ██████
The physicists’ awareness of the calculations showing that in principle it was possible to split atoms is not described as one of the things that made it difficult for physicists to understand that the neutron bombardment experiments involved splitting atoms. So we have no reason to think (C) would have caused physicists to realize that atoms were being split more quickly.
d
More physicists concentrated ██ █████████ ████████████ ███████ ████ ███ ███████ ███████████ ██ ████████
Not having enough physicists focused on doing neutron bombardment experiments isn’t identified as one of the things that made it difficult for physicists to understand that the neutron bombardment experiments involved splitting atoms. In fact, we already had enough evidence of atom-splitting before Meitner’s insight. So we have no reason to think (D) would have caused physicists to realize that atoms were being split more quickly.
e
Physicists conducted experiments ██ ███ ███████ ███████████ ██ ████ █████████ █████ ████ ████████
The lack of experiments involving bombardment of non-uranium substances isn’t identified as one of the things that made it difficult for physicists to understand that the neutron bombardment experiments involved splitting atoms. So we have no reason to think (E) would have caused physicists to realize that atoms were being split more quickly.