Growing up, books abounded with scientific answers about how the world works; The Dinosaurs became extinct because of an asteroid; Meteorologists predict the weather; and the Earth is layered—crust, mantle, liquid outer core, solid inner core. To a child, the world is explained, and there are always new things to learn purely because of the volume of facts.

The interesting thing about science, though, is that none of those things mentioned have definite proof. There is strong evidence, but not proof. Proof is when a fact can actually be demonstrated or revealed, while evidence merely infers to a "fact's" existence. For example, the dirt layers of the last major age of the dinosaurs are estimated at roughly 65 million years ago. But until a crater dating to about the same age was discovered near the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, there was not have a very good idea of what actually caused the mass extinctions. There were debates regarding volcanoes, disease and other factors that could have led to them dying out. Even today, some scientists are still not entirely certain about the exact cause, since overlapping correlation and causation has led to major science fallacies.

Now, the science taught to children and adults might be fairly accurate. However, there is only a degree of certainty in each contemporary scientific theory, but that uncertainty—last I checked—has been left out of almost every basic science book available. The truth is, there are numbers of things we neither know nor cannot explain. Logically, if scientists did know, then we would have technology performing almost anything imaginable (within the laws of physics, which by the way have not yet been fully proven, not until the mystery of quantum mechanics is broken).

Knowing about this uncertainty is beneficial, since children who want to make new discoveries might be discouraged by the statement that there is little more to discover. A classic historic example is Michael Faraday, who was told during his college years (if I remember correctly) that science is virtually complete, and there are just a few holes to fill in. Well, Faraday went on to work in magnetism, and made mind-blowing discoveries about magnetic field lines that stump even modern scientists. His work opened doors to possibilities that had never been considered. Incidentally, every scientific revolution has usually been someone that thought outside the accepted box of their day, and since scientists today are largely setting up the impression to the public that science is almost complete with a few holes, we are just about due for another one.

Buckle up, ‘cause it’s going to be big!