The Epistemic Importance of Experimentation in Ecology

Abstract

This philosophical research aims to epistemologically analyze the different methods from which ecology obtains knowledge. If the ecologist focuses on the search for patterns, the method that supports it is inductivism, corresponding to non-experimental studies. On the other hand, if the ecologist focuses on the search for processes, the method that supports it is the hypothetical-deductive one, corresponding to experimental studies. Ecology presents difficulties to carry out manipulative experiments, and therefore to investigate the causes of the observed pattern. Faced with this problem, a complementarity between manipulative and non-manipulative studies is proposed.