What is research

Formally research is defined as

Any honest attempt to study a problem systematically or to add to man’s knowledge of a problem may be regarded as research. (Theodorson and Theodorson 1969 cited in Reber 1995)

The aim, as far as I can see, is the same in all sciences. Put simply and cursorily, the aim is to make known something previously unknown to human beings. It is to advance human knowledge, to make it more certain or better fitting the aim, as I have said, discovery. (Elias 1986)

Informally my personal feeling about research is “Research is what we are doing when we don’t know what will be the output in trying to solve the problem”. It simply means that when we are trying to do something which is not done before. Why research? As we are just walking in the dark cave to search for something we even do not know is there or not. If we find that thing we are successful otherwise we have to try another cave or make it clear that what we are finding is really what we know in mind. Sometime we have it in front of our eyes but as we don’t have clear definition of that thing or sketch of that thing in mind so we miss that thing and walk through the cave. Sometime we find something of more interest when we are searching for something else.