Before an experiment: “Bean plants grow taller with more hours of light each day”
Terms
| Term | This example | Why |
|---|---|---|
| hypothesis (in science) | ✓ | |
| theory (in science) | ✗ | |
| law (in science) | ✗ | |
| conjecture | ✗ |
Distinctions using this example
- Conjecture vs. hypothesis vs. law vs. theory: “Bean plants grow taller with more hours of light” is a hypothesis, because it is a prediction that an experiment can test and could show to be false. It is not a theory or a law, because no body of evidence supports it yet, and it is not a conjecture, because experiments, not proofs, decide it.