Catholic Dictionary

Find accurate definitions of over 5,000 Catholic terms and phrases (including abbreviations). Based on Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary, © Eternal Life. Used with permission.

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EXPERIMENT

An act or practice undertaken to discover, test, or illustrate some truth, principle, fact, or hypothesis. Implicit in every valid experimentation in the moral and spiritual order is: 1. the recognition of certain nonexperimental principles of faith and morality; 2. adherence to the Church's directives on the conditions for experimentation; 3. definite and clear-cut norms of time and circumstances within which the experimenting is to be done; 4. willingness to recognize the success or failure of the experimentation and take measures to implement or desist from further experimentation accordingly. (Etym. Latin experimentum, trial, test, experiment; learning through experience.)