Careful watching and noticing of something or someone, or the specific facts and information discovered through this watching.
From Latin 'observare' meaning 'to watch over' or 'to attend to,' from 'ob-' (toward) and 'servare' (to keep or guard). The noun form evolved in medieval Latin and entered English through legal and scientific contexts.
In science, observations are literally what separate fact from opinion—the scientific revolution happened because scientists stopped just theorizing and started carefully observing the natural world. This shift to evidence-based observation is why we have medicine, technology, and modern understanding.
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