Elegant science

Arturo Casadevall; Ferric C. Fang

doi:10.1128/mBio.00043-18

Elegant science

Arturo Casadevall, Ferric C. Fang

Bloomberg School of Public Health

Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review

2 Scopus citations

Abstract

Elegance is a prized quality in science that is associated with simplicity and explanatory power. This essay considers the qualities that make a scientific model, experiment, method, or theory “elegant,” with a focus on the life sciences. We propose a definition of elegance that includes clarity, cleverness, correctness, explanatory power, parsimony, and beauty. The pursuit of elegance can improve the quality of science, but elegance must be pursued with caution, as the truth is sometimes inelegant.

Original language	English (US)
Article number	e00043-18
Journal	mBio
Volume	9
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1128/mBio.00043-18
State	Published - Jan 1 2018

Keywords

Elegant
Reproducibility
Rigor

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Microbiology
Virology

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10.1128/mBio.00043-18

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KW - Rigor

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Elegant science

Abstract

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

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