The word science is derived from the Latin verb, scientia - "to know." This implies that science is an action, more than it is a certain thing. Science, then, is a means of knowing. A process or a method of learning. Science is also all of the knowledge resulting from this method.
From dict.org:
Science is applied or pure. Applied science is a
knowledge of facts, events, or phenomena, as explained,
accounted for, or produced, by means of powers, causes,
or laws. Pure science is the knowledge of these powers,
causes, or laws, considered apart, or as pure from all
applications. Both these terms have a similar and
special signification when applied to the science of
quantity; as, the applied and pure mathematics. Exact
science is knowledge so systematized that prediction
and verification, by measurement, experiment,
observation, etc., are possible. The mathematical and
physical sciences are called the exact sciences.
The public understanding of the scientific method as the core of science has been replaced, in our time, with the body of knowledge being the core of science. This has lead to a misunderstanding between those who perform science and those who casually learn of the results of science. Those who perform science, necessarily understand the implications of science as a method - chiefly, the notion that one performs experiments to discern fact from illusion, and the notion that old knowledge is easily supplanted by new experimental results. Those that casually learn of the results of science, through the course of media outlets, or even some "popular science" books, may miss the implications of science as a method in the process of learning about science as a body of knowledge. The misunderstanding of this key distinction leads, for some, to the idea of some sort of "magic" (distinct, of course, from magick) involved with science and what it discovers.
The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.
—Stephen Hawking
Our scientific capabilities have outrun our spiritual capabilities.
We now have guided missiles and misguided men.
—Martin Luther King, Jr.