The "rules" of science are a set of principles and methods that guide scientific inquiry, including objectivity, empiricism, skepticism, and replicability. Other fundamental rules are to distinguish between correlation and causation, and to ensure that hypotheses are falsifiable and can generate testable, measurable predictions. Scientists also follow established ethical principles such as honesty, openness, and collegiality.

Core principles and methods

Objectivity: Studies and results must be impartial and unbiased.
Empiricism: Knowledge is acquired through observation and experimentation.
Skepticism: Claims and hypotheses must be critically evaluated and subject to testing.
Replicability: Experiments must be repeatable by others, yielding the same results.
Falsifiability: A scientific theory must be capable of being proven false.
Correlation is not causation:
It is a logical fallacy to assume that because two things are correlated, one must have caused the other.

Ethical and community rules

Honesty: Scientists must be truthful in their research and reporting.
Openness: Findings should be shared with the scientific community.
Collegiality: Scientists should respect their peers and engage in constructive criticism.

Scientific laws and theories

Scientific laws are descriptive statements, based on repeated experiments, that summarize a range of natural phenomena. They are not prescriptive like legal laws and do not explain why a phenomenon occurs, only how it behaves (e.g., Newton's Laws of Motion).
Scientific theories are well-substantiated explanations of some aspect of the natural world that are based on a vast body of evidence. They are not simply "hunches" or "guesses" and are distinct from scientific laws; a theory does not become a law.