The received view of scientific experimentation holds that science is characterized by experiment and experiment is characterized by active intervention on the system of interest. Although versions of this view are widely held, they have seldom been explicitly defended. The present essay reconstructs and defuses two arguments in defense of the received view: first, that intervention is necessary for uncovering causal structures, and second, that intervention conduces to better evidence. By examining a range of non-interventionist studies from across the sciences, I conclude that interventionist experiments are not, ceteris paribus, epistemically superior to non-interventionist studies and that the latter may thus be classified as experiment proper. My analysis explains why intervention remains valuable while at the same time elevating the status of some non-interventionist studies to that of experiment proper.

公认的科学实验观点认为，科学的特点是实验，而实验的特点是对感兴趣系统的积极干预。尽管这种观点的版本被广泛持有，但很少得到明确的捍卫。本文重建并化解了两个论点来捍卫公认的观点：首先，干预对于揭示因果结构是必要的，其次，干预有助于获得更好的证据。通过研究来自各个科学的一系列非干预主义研究，我得出结论，干预主义实验在认识论上并不优于非干预主义研究，因此后者可以被归类为适当的实验。我的分析解释了为什么干预仍然有价值，同时将一些非干预主义研究的地位提升到实验的地位.