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Falsifiability of a hypothesis?

The book "Anatomy & physiology" states that

" A good hypothesis must be (1) consistent with what already known and (2) capacble of being tested and possibly falsified by evidence. Flasifiability means that if we claim something is scientifically true, we must be able to specify what evidence it would take to prove it wrong. If nothing could possibly prove it wrong, then it is not scientific."

(1) why should a good hypothesis be consistent with what already known? isn't the purpose of experiment to find the unknown and things not discovered.?
(2) what is the meaning of falsified? if i could prove one thing wrong, then that thing is wrong and no longer scientifically true , isn't it?? :confused:
Reply 1
Avatar for tory88
tory88
18
What is meant by (1) is that a good hypothesis cannot contradict observations we have already made - it's no good suggesting that gravity points away from a planet if we've already seen an apple fall from a tree towards Earth.

In (2), falsified does mean proved wrong. The point here is that there must be some observation which would invalidate the hypothesis - if the apple flew up into the sky that would falsify the hypothesis that gravity points towards Earth.

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